The Challenge: Create a giant art installation involving hundreds of seemingly random elements and optical illusions that will look like a perfect seamless image from a specific angle. To make the challenge even more difficult, that same art installation has to look like a completely different image when viewed from a different angle. Oh, and it all has to be done practically in camera. No CGI or VFX trickery. Oh, and they would like 2 of these installations.
oh boy...
This was probably the most difficult project I've ever worked on in my 20+ year career. Designing one massive optical illusion is difficult enough, but multiple ones all working together? Making it work from 2 different angles? All done practically? And they would need two of them? Needless to say we spent a lot of time in the computer building the installation virtually so that we could experiment with different designs and optical trickery to make the illusion work, first in the computer, and then in real life.
Since this effect had never been done before we really couldn't look to other works for clues as to how to pull this off. We had to discover the solutions for ourselves. The most important being the requirement of working through 2 virtual cameras simultaneously. Any change to an illusion in one camera would most likely affect an illusion in the other camera so we had to be very careful about how we positioned every single element. All the while keeping in mind that this all needed to be able to be actually built. It all had to be possible.
In the end we were able to provide the production designer with accurate models and measurements of all the elements, prints, and other illusions so that his talented team could fabricate everything down to the fraction of an inch. We spent two weeks building both art installations in a vast industrial warehouse south of downtown Los Angeles. Just under two months of preparation in total for a single motion control take per spot. A remarkable and utterly exhausting achievement. The result, however, was totally worth it. A pair of commercials that are both mind bending and totally unique.
Agency: R/GA
Client: ETrade
SVP Executive Creative Director: Jay Zasa
Group Executive Creative Director: Paul Dery
Creative Director: Marie Ronn
Managing Director: Michael Stoopack
Creative Director: Erik Tell
Executive Production Director: Kat Friis
Executive Producer, Campaigns: Jeff Skutnik
Account Supervisor: James Hogan
Producer, Campagins: Lucas Dennison
Senior Content Producer: Chris Ott
Production Company: Brand New School
Director: Jonathan Notaro
Managing Partner: Devin Brook
VFX Supervisor/Lead Flame: Mark French
VFX Supervisor/Lead Flame: Bryant Reif
Flame Artist: Kirk Balden
Flame Artist: Greg Cutler
Art Director: Jeffery Welk
Art Director: Andres Rivera
Art Director: Jordan Lyle
Technical Director: Dan Bradham
Modeler: Scott Denton
Concept Artist: Carlos Ancalmo