Wandering Eyes And Worlds In New CG-Enhanced Ads
Golden Square Post has completed post work on two new MasterCard spots.
MASTERCARD STUDIOUS PUPIL: The idea behind this quirky commercial for McCann Erickson New York was to promote a unique competition for MasterCard customers.
Working with a script about a man with an overactive eye, director Christian Bevilacqua developed his treatment with inspiration from the photographs of Andreas Gursky.
Shot entirely on green screen in London, the Golden Square team built the backgrounds in Photoshop and Flame from stills shot in New York by the director.
The images were worked up to heighten their natural symmetry and then separated into virtual planes in flame to create parallax when the camera moves were applied.
Subtle lighting changes, birds, fog and extra people were all added to help bring the backgrounds to life.
The hero's wandering eye was created in Flame by building a 3D eye, which was texture mapped with an image of the actors eye.
This allowed the eye to move wherever the director chose with minimal adjustment. Finally, a strong filmic grade was applied in flame to bring it all together.
MASTERCARD SEVEN WONDERS: The Seven Wonders viral was part of a series of priceless gift prizes available through MasterCard. The idea was for the viewer to enter into a magical Phileas Fogg-esque popup book that would transport you around the world to the Seven Wonders of the World.
A series of popup book scenes were shot on HD in the studio and passed on to the Golden Square team to enhance and bring to life.
Flame was used to manage and distribute the shots, while After Effect and Maya were used to assemble around half of the scenes before handing back to Flame for grading and delivery.
The challenge was to deliver a huge amount of treated shots within a very tight schedule; managed by using a combination of Flame, 3D particles, stop frame animation, and filmed footage.
The end result transports the viewer from the humid Amazon rainforest complete with river dolphins and parrots to the Great Wall of China to fend off marauding Mongol hordes.
All the scenes included a few intrepid tourists, snapping away at the incredible scenery.
Golden Square is based in London and has previously worked on campaigns for Nike, Sky, Coca-Cola and HSBC.