Rolling~C~Productions of Toronto has completed SUMMER MORNING, the fifth spot in a series for Kraft Canada and its agency FCB Toronto. "The complexity of both composition and animation has evolved and got more elaborate in each spot since the initial concept three years ago," commented exec producer Michael Crabtree, "Creative/animation director Terry Godfrey continued this trend and really upd the amount of animation and brought in some very nice changes to the format and flow."
The :30 spot starts in relative darkness, then as if the sun was rising over the back hedge, light cascades over blooming flowers made of red peppers, olive centers, bean sprouts and leaves of beet greens. It then cross dissolves to sliced radishes animating in an iris pattern to form what will be recognized as the flowers on the garden arbor. Next, songbirds formed out of vegetables, fly into a wideshot of the garden as the sun continues to rise. Alexandre "Sasha" Iliach, a Russian born animator, brought the animated birds to life through cut-outs and composited them in Adobe After Effects. "The bird animation is so good," Godfrey says, "that they really look 3D. Sasha has an incredible sense of form and movement."
As the birds flit about and perch on the edge of the birdbath, a bottle of Kraft salad dressing is poured on them, which they drink and splash about in. As the bottle exits, the salad is tossed to camera. The spot is resolved with a bottle dropping from full frame and morphing to the hero bottle shortly after it hits the bed of salad and you see the words, "Bite into Summer."
The 3D bottle and liquid were animated by Adrian Tsang in Alias|Wavefront's Maya and Next Limit's Real Flow. The toss, bottle drop and supers were composited in After Effects by Francois Valentyne. Photography was by Michael Mahovlich, Silent Joe did the music and Venom did the Sound Design.
Rolling~C~Productions Inc. is aligned with Pascal Blais Productions for representation in the U.S. and Canada. Founded nine years ago by Crabtree, Rolling~C~ Prods. has done extensive commercial work as well as long form animation for direct-to-videos and music videos. They can be reached via e-mail at rollingc@radiant.on.ca
