Archive for July 2nd, 2012

You walk in to your apartment to find your roommate making out with a walrus – what’s your first thought? You wonder if the trollop has stolen your boyfriend, that’s what. Or at least that’s the story in the latest spot from Skittles Riddles, featuring VFX from MPC, who collaborated with DDB Chicago and Moxie Pictures Director Martin Granger on the effort.

This bizarre story continues with the accused explaining that the walrus, an enormous animatronic custom built by Moorpark, California’s Animal Makers Inc., had assured her that he wasn’t her roommate’s boyfriend Bobby. Rather, he was like new Skittles Riddles – different on the outside than on the inside. She demonstrates by punching in a green-tinted candy that tastes like fruit punch, before continuing her googley-eyed romp-fest with the walrus.

MPC’s biggest challenge was to make the animatronic walrus appear to be real, breathing life into the animal. The team created 3D eyes and eyelids for the walrus in post, while tracking and animating every move. After creating elaborate matte paintings that doubled the size of the walrus mass, MPC added flesh and fat, animated the nose, made the walrus’ jaw move, added a tongue and neck fat, made his face twitch, belly quiver, time warped his head, and added breath to the animal. Telecine was done by MPC’s US Creative Director of Color Grading, Mark Gethin.

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Credits
Client: Skittles Riddles
Spot Title: Walrus :30 and :15
Air Dates: July 2012

Advertising Agency: DDB Chicago
ACD/Copywriter: Kevin Goff
ACD/Art Director: Blake Winfree
Executive Producer: Will St.Clair
Assistant Producer: Jamie Gallant
Production Business Manager: Scott Terry

Production Company: Moxie Pictures
Director: Martin Granger
DOP: Barry Parrell
Producer: Heidi Soltesz

Editorial: The Whitehouse, Chicago
Editor: John Smith

VFX: MPC, LA
VFX Supervisor: Ryan Knowles
VFX Team: Mike Wynd, Ryan Knowles, Ben Persons, Ian Wilson, Fred Durand, Jim Hillin, Mark Holden, Elliott Brennan, Lisa Ryan, Ben Davidson, Jacob Toommen, Sathya Narayan
Production Producer: Nicole Fina

Telecine: MPC, LA
Colorist: Mark Gethin
About MPC
MPC is an award winning VFX and Digital studio servicing the advertising, motion picture and television industries. From its London, New York, Santa Monica, Vancouver, and Bangalore offices, MPC’s dynamic and diverse team delivers industry-defining VFX, animation, motion graphics, color grading, production, projection mapping, social and mobile application development, online advertising, data management, software R&D and pipeline development.

With a trio of integrated divisions, MPC utilizes a unified approach that drives the use of existing or newly created assets across the whole range of today’s media landscape. MPC Creative handles client projects directly with top-notch directing, CG animation and character design. MPC FX Studio is a dedicated corps of graphic and digital designers who bring clients’ visions to life. MPC Data Lab processes the content and makes it available for editing on demand. MPC is a Technicolor Company.

moving-picture.com

More info: TRUST 646 452 3388 (NY) 310 451 5153 (LA) trustcollective.com

TRUST, the New York based communications collective that specializes in helping brands find their voice and connecting them with an audience, is launching a sales division to be led by Carson Hood. The new group will complement TRUST’s comprehensive integrated PR, marketing, branding and social media expertise, which it has deployed across the advertising and entertainment space for the last seven years, helping such industry leaders as Tool, RPA, Mekanism, ROKKAN, Anonymous Content and MPC to name a few, craft their message, establish brand recognition and grow their respective client rosters.

“By embedding ourselves within the framework of our clients, we have established a unique pipeline that funnels their competitive advantages to the wider world, rolling up stories in top publications, spreading the word through social media, and getting them in front of influencers at major awards shows,” noted TRUST founder Adam Fine. “The next logical step was to take this work directly to brands and agencies and show them exactly what our clients are capable of. This is a true 360-degree approach that allows our clients to focus on innovation and creativity in the studio while we help their businesses grow.”

Hood will harness TRUST’s intimate knowledge of several key market segments to connect select clients with direct-to-brand and agency opportunities. Hood arrives fresh off a run in new business development at Favorite Color, which followed several years on the production and post side of the business at Click 3X, jumP editorial and Manic. Prior, Hood was at MTV.

“TRUST has always been involved with the top talent in the business and I’m excited to be able to work with them to offer sales and a fully integrated 360 approach to building these brands and connecting them with potential clients. Today’s marketing and advertising landscape is constantly evolving and it is important that brands and agencies have access to a resource that can connect them with the appropriate talent for their project needs. It only makes sense that TRUST become not only your number one resource for the latest work and news, but also the connectors to the top talent behind the work as well,” noted Hood.

The launch of TRUST’s new sales division corresponds to the unveiling of a new website, which features the latest work from the company’s clients, samples of TRUST-generated marketing and sales collaterals, links to news hits, TRUST-run social media sites, and much more.

Contact Carson Hood at carson@trustcollective.com.

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About TRUST
Can you draw a map from your latest marketing campaign to your newest client?

At TRUST we believe a successful business is built on more than the sum of its parts. The best product, the most engaging marketing campaign, the sharpest public relations strategy, and the most aggressive sales efforts can only go so far if those separate elements aren’t working in tandem to raise your profile and create new business opportunities.

TRUST is a team of communication specialists, strategists, web developers, writers and designers, all practiced in the art of turning problems into opportunities.

When your business is missing something, TRUST fills in the gaps. We know what makes your business unique. We find your company voice. We go undetected in the background. We become a trusted part of your team. Let’s make it all about us!

More info: TRUST 646 452 3388 (NY) 310 451 5153 (LA) trustcollective.com

Recent jumP LA addition Richard Cooperman is off to a great start with his new studio by cutting a high-energy spot for Lexus. Teaming up with Serial Pictures Director Jonas Ackerlund via Team One, Cooperman wove together a powerful combination of images, music and typography.

Miles is a winding adventure passing through day and night, remote desert scenery and lively cities, twisting mountain roads and pick-up lanes at train stations. It is populated by the young, urbane and fashionable, who pile in for long road trips and gather around pools for raging late-night parties. Cooperman perfectly blends this dynamic world with upbeat music and shots of a Lexus powering down the road.

“Jonas gave me so much unbelievable footage to work with,” noted Cooperman. “The tough part was winnowing it down to the very best and building something that matched his and Team One’s vision for the spot.”

“We are thrilled to have such a beautiful spot be Richard’s first project with us,” noted jumP EP Betsy Beale. “It was a great collaboration between Jonas, the agency and Richard”.

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Credits
Client: Lexus
Spot Title(s): “Miles”
Air Date: June 2012

Agency: Team One
CCO: Chris Graves
GCD: Jason Stinsmuehlen
SR.AD: Ryan DiDonato
ACD/Copy: Andrew Smart
Senior Producer: Beth Hagen

Prod Co: Serial Pictures
Director(s): Jonas Ackerlund
DP: Par Ekburg
EP: Violaine Etienne
Producer: Alec Sash

Editorial Co: Jump LA
Editor: Richard Cooperman
EP: Betsy Beale
Producer: Gavin Carroll

Post/Effects Co: A52
Lead VFX/Inferno Artist: Paul Yacono
EP: Jen Sofio Hall

Telecine Co: CO3
Colorist(s): Dave Hussey
Producer: Denise Brown

Audio Post Co: Juice
Mixer(s): Bob Gremore
About jumP
Bicoastal jumP is an award-winning creative editorial boutique focusing on commercials, features, short films, music videos, and emerging media content. The firm works with a wide-range of top-tier brands, directors, and agencies continually delivering powerful and efficient results for each of its clients. The company roster includes Partner/Editors: Luis Moreno and Michael Saia, Editors: Lin Polito, Troy Mercury, Terence Ziegler, Richard Mettler, Patrick Griffin, David Trachtenberg, Mark Imgrund, Richard Cooperman, Wendy Rosen, Jonathan Edwards, EPs Betsy Beale and Alexandra Leal, and Partner/Managing Director Dee Tagert.

More info: TRUST 646 452 3388 (NY) 310 451 5153 (LA) trustcollective.com

Billerica, Massachusetts – Broadcast Pix™ today announced that Texas Southern University (TSU) School of Communication has added a Granite™ 5000 Video Control Center™ to its student control room. The new system is part of an equipment upgrade for the Houston-based school to support HD and SD video production.

The control room serves as part of the school’s production laboratory, where sophomores, juniors, and seniors work with external producers to create content. Students produce a variety of projects, from news programs to short films, and much of the content is distributed through Comcast Cable’s on-demand portal. “It’s an excellent platform for our students,” said Cliff Edwards, director of broadcast engineering, School of Communication.

Because projects are produced in both SD and HD, it was important that TSU invest in a video switcher that could handle both. “The ability to go HD or SD, that was the goal,” said Edwards. “I wanted something that was going to last and be state-of-the-art quality – and give students a leg up when they went into the real world.”

The Granite 5000 was purchased from and installed by Houston-based Industrial Audio Video last summer, and TSU began using it for classes last fall. It replaced an aging Echolab switcher and CG, and its built-in Fluent-View allowed the school to replace its cumbersome wall of CRT monitors with four Panasonic 42-inch flat panels. Edwards said students enjoy using the built-in Fluent Clip Store, which allows them to bypass time consuming, tape-based workflows. “Now, they can focus that time on putting packages together,” he added.

According to Edwards, the School of Communication needs to invest wisely when it purchases new equipment. With its Fluent™ workflow tools, regular software upgrades, and modular expandability, he said the 2 M/E Granite 5000 essentially sold itself. “I was sold on the product from day one,” Edwards added. “It’s a wonderful tool. We wow the students, we wow visitors, and when we generate content, we wow the viewers.”

About Broadcast Pix Broadcast Pix is the leader in live video production systems. Its Video Control Centers™ empower operators with patented techniques that combine cameras, clips and graphics to create compelling live video. The integration of a multi-format switcher, clip store, graphics system with a Harris or Chyron CG, and device controls provides the lowest cost of ownership at a fraction of the cost of a conventional control room to buy, staff and operate. Systems range from compact systems controlled by a touch-screen or voice-automation to sophisticated 2 M/E control panels. Customers include leading broadcast, corporate, education, religious, government, webcast, entertainment and mobile studios in more than 110 countries. Learn more at www.broadcastpix.com.

Broadcast Pix, Granite, Fluent, and Video Control Centers are trademarks of Broadcast Pix, Inc. Patented.

— 229th Guitar Center location features on-site lessons and repair services, along with
GC’s vast inventory selection —

Westlake Village, CA (June 27, 2012) – On the evening of Thursday, June 14, 2012, Guitar Center held the grand opening of its new location in Danbury, Connecticut, located at 15 Backus Avenue, Danbury, CT 06810. Guitar Center Danbury is Guitar Center’s 229th retail location.

Guitar Center Danbury’s grand opening introduced customers to a vast selection of products and a dedicated staff with unparalleled musical knowledge and experience. To celebrate the store opening, Guitar Center hosted a Grand Opening Weekend celebration featuring exclusive savings, gear giveaways and free events catered to local musicians. The grand opening events will also include workshops throughout the first two months of the store’s operation.

Guitar Center’s newest Danbury location features showrooms for customers equipped with the latest products for musicians – from guitars, amplifiers, percussion instruments and keyboards to live sound, DJ, lighting and recording equipment. The new store features Guitar Center Studios, an in-house, state-of-the-art lesson facility, which is creating unrivalled opportunities for Danbury musicians of all ages and skill levels. Guitar Center Studios provides music lessons from beginner to advanced featuring certified instructors teaching world-class curriculum as well as one-on-one courses on Pro Tools, Logic Pro and GarageBand. Guitar Center Studios is now the most modern and affordable lessons facility in the area. Guitar Center Danbury also features GC Garage, Guitar Center’s on site guitar repair service.

As part of Guitar Center’s initiatives designed to educate and inspire artists nationwide, Guitar Center Danbury is offering unique opportunities for musicians to craft their skills, maintain their instruments and experience many other aspects of the music industry first-hand. Musicians interested in learning about the industry are able to come to the store to interact with and pick the brains of several industry leaders.

Danbury shoppers are also able to enjoy Guitar Center’s new multi-channel “endless aisle,” which includes multiple combinations of product options to conveniently choose from. Not only does the “endless aisle” include Danbury inventory, but it also provides easy access to $400 million in new and used inventory located in hundreds of stores and warehouses across the nation. Customers have the ability to combine a myriad of in-store, online and phone options to purchase music equipment from anywhere they may be, allowing for a personalized and convenient shopping experience.

Free Recording Made Easy classes are conducted every Saturday from 10:00 to 11:00 am for anyone who wants to make the exciting journey into recording their music.

In addition to special programs at the new Danbury store, Guitar Center offers nationwide programs designed to spearhead creativity and highlight the nation’s most promising undiscovered talent. Danbury residents will now be able to participate in these ongoing national events from their hometown:

• Guitar Center On-Stage is an annual competition that provides unsigned artists the chance to open for established artists such as Motley Crue, KISS and Jane’s Addiction.

• Guitar Center Singer-Songwriter is an artist discovery program which aims to find the nation’s best unsigned singer-songwriter. The winner receives a career-altering prize package including recording 3 songs with accomplished GRAMMY® Award-winning Producer John Shanks, recording time at Converse Rubber Tracks studio and $10,000 cash.

• Guitar Center’s Battle of the Blues is a nationwide amateur guitar skills competition with the goal of finding the next great undiscovered blues guitar player. This year’s winner, Jonathon “Boogie” Long, performed alongside GRAMMY-winning guitarist Warren Haynes at the Grand Finals in LA, and won an incredible prize package valued at over $50,000.

• Guitar Center’s Drum-Off, entering its 24th year, is the nationwide search for the next great undiscovered drummer. Drummers from across the nation compete in the world’s largest drum competition, vying for thousands of dollars in prizes and the coveted title of Guitar Center’s Drum-Off Champion. The grand prize package is valued at nearly $50,000.

Guitar Center Danbury is open seven days a week. Store hours are 10:00 a.m. – 9:00 p.m. Monday-Friday; 10:00 a.m. – 8:00 p.m. Saturday; and 12:00 p.m. – 6:00 p.m. Sunday.

New Gear Addresses Customer Need for Long HD Image Stabilization

BURBANK, CA, JULY 2, 2012—Bexel, a unit of the Vitec Group’s Services Division and a leading worldwide provider of broadcast services and solutions, has added an array of Canon HD zoom lenses to its rental equipment inventory. The purchase comes as part of Bexel’s continuing upgrade and expansion of its long lens inventory in advance of major broadcast events up ahead this year. Included in the purchase were Canon’s DIGISUPER 86II xs, DIGISUPER 22 and XJ60 lenses.

The DIGISUPER 86II xs is a field lens that utilizes Canon’s POWER OPTICAL SYSTEM and X-Element technology and optical design concept. By adopting these, the DIGISUPER 86 xs realizes the necessary optical performance for HDTV, with a zoom ratio of 86x and improved wide angle of 9.3mm, while still maintaining a size equivalent to that of previous SDTV lenses. The Power Optical System achieves higher specifications and quality using the optical X-Element, which virtually eliminates aberrations.

“Canon has long been recognized as a leader in optical image stabilization technologies and the DIGISUPER 86II xs is a welcome addition to Bexel’s inventory,” says Tom Dickinson, chief technology officer, Bexel. “The DIGISUPER 86′s built-in optical image stabilizer eliminates even the slightest amount of wind or operator movement, providing incredible HD zoom pictures in the field. It will be used for many of our clients’ sports productions.”

As part of the Canon purchase, Bexel also added the DIGI SUPER 22 lens to its inventory. The DIGI SUPER 22 is a new innovation in HDTV studio lens design—one that introduces an important new choice in studio system configuration. It is intended for broadcasters and producers whose foremost priority is a high-performance but cost-effective and compact HDTV studio lens and camera package that can be supported on a modest-sized pedestal or sturdy tripod system. This low-weight combination is also ideal for robotic system applications.

Bexel has also added Canon’s XJ60x9BIE-D lens to its inventory as part of the purchase. It is intended to offer the industry a cost-effective lens that can optimally service many long focal length applications in the field, large studios and special venues. This lens embodies the pinnacle in dynamic image creation for live television production for both HDTV and SDTV. It is intended for mobile truck operators and broadcasters seeking good telephoto flexibility for high-definition sports and entertainment event coverage while operating within constricted production budgets.

“We have had a great working relationship with Bexel for many years,” says Thomas Bender, director, national sales accounts, Canon. “Our lenses have become the industry standard for production trucks and various other applications, with many broadcasters coming to rely on them for critical operations. Bexel is very responsive to this need, always ensuring its customers have access to the gear they require.”

Bexel has also purchased peripheral equipment from Canon, including servo modules and lens supporters.

About Bexel
Bexel is the pre-eminent worldwide provider of broadcast services including video and audio equipment rentals, fiber services, new audio sales, used equipment sales, and repairs/maintenance. Bexel provides brilliantly designed and flawlessly executed systems and solutions to all customers – including producers of the biggest and most important televised events in the world. For more information, visit http://www.bexel.com.

A Snapshot of The Vitec Group
Vitec is an international Group principally serving customers in the broadcast, photographic and military, aerospace and government (MAG) markets. Listed on the London Stock Exchange with 2011 revenue of £351 million, Vitec is based on strong, well known, premium brands on which its customers worldwide rely. Vitec is organized in three divisions: Imaging & Staging, Videocom and Services. Imaging & Staging designs, manufactures and distributes equipment and accessories for photography, video and events. Videocom designs and distributes systems and products used in broadcasting and live entertainment, film and video production and MAG. Services provides equipment rental, workflow design and technical support for camera, video, audio, fiber optic and wireless technology used by TV production teams and film crews. More information can be found at http://www.vitecgroup.com.

Blackmagic Design today announced that leading news organization Agence France Presse (AFP) broadcast their live coverage of the 65th Cannes Film Festival award ceremony using Blackmagic Design’s ATEM 2 M/E Production Switcher, Smart Videohub and UltraStudio 3D.

At the festival, television reporting teams from AFP captured the first reactions of winners and discussed the films that had been entered into the 2012 competition. Customers of AFP in Europe and the Middle East were fed a live HD broadcast feed from the AFP OB van via satellite, while fiber link was used to transmit the broadcast to those in Asia.

With the support of France based Atreid, AFP built its SNG van around Blackmagic Design’s Smart Videohub, which routed all incoming SD and HD signals. The upstream video signals to the van were converted from HD-SDI to fiber optic using Blackmagic Mini Converters, before content was fed into the ATEM 2 M/E Production Switcher.

“The feature rich broadcast switcher allows for live direction of complex shows, making Blackmagic’s ATEM 2 M/E the perfect switcher for broadcasting live news, television shows and corporate programs with motion graphics thanks to powerful DVE and keyers built in,” said Yves Tassel of Agence France Presse.

Tassel adds: “Blackmagic Design’s new audio mixer feature on the ATEM 2 M/E arrived just in time for Cannes. Before the audio mixer feature came out, we had to extract audio from the HD-SDI streams in order for us to mix sources with an analog mixer, then route the audio mix into the analogue XLR inputs. With the audio mixer, play out sources were setup and manual mix was configured on the voice over from the journalist.”

Additionally, Blackmagic’s UltraStudio 3D Thunderbolt based capture and playback device, connected to a MacBook Pro and Final Cut Pro 7, was used by AFP to allow news teams to edit reports via the SNG van on location to broadcast time sensitive content as it happened.

“The addition of the audio mixer to the ATEM 2 M/E makes this a very powerful piece of kit given that space is always something of a premium. The small form factor, coupled with its intuitive design and broadcast quality features make this a very powerful and cost effective piece of technology,” concluded Tassel.

About ATEM Production Switchers
Empower live creativity with the new ATEM Production Switchers! For the first time extremely powerful broadcast grade features, incredibly small size and low cost have been designed in a live production switcher! ATEM Production Switchers include 4 upstream keyers each with independent chroma, shaped and linear keying, 2 downstream keyers, stinger effects, graphic wipes, media players for stills and clips and a built in DVE for amazing DVE transitions or key repositioning. For portable use, the built in Multi View showing all cameras, preview and program can be viewed on a single SDI or HDMI monitor.

ATEM Production Switchers also include loads of HDMI and SDI inputs allowing professional SDI cameras as well as consumer HDMI cameras and computers to be connected. Only ATEM Production Switchers allows low cost HDMI consumer cameras in a professional switcher so it’s easy for customers starting out in live production! ATEM Production Switchers include a free software control panel and media pool management software for Mac OS X and Windows 7. ATEM Production Switchers are sold independently of the hardware control panel, allowing lower initial cost and greater customization. ATEM Production Switchers retail for only US$2,495.

Press Photography
Product photos of all Blackmagic Design products are available at www.blackmagic-design.com/press/images.

About Blackmagic Design
Blackmagic Design creates the world’s highest quality video editing products, digital film cameras, color correctors, video converters, video monitoring, routers, live production switchers, disk recorders, waveform monitors and film restoration software for the feature film, post production and television broadcast industries. Blackmagic Design’s DeckLink capture cards launched a revolution in quality and affordability, while the company’s Emmy™ award winning DaVinci color correction products have dominated the television and film industry since 1984. Blackmagic Design continues ground breaking innovations including stereoscopic 3D and 4K workflows. Founded by world leading post production editors and engineers, Blackmagic Design has offices in the USA, United Kingdom, Japan, Singapore, and Australia. For more information, please check www.blackmagic-design.com.

OXFORD, UK: Award winning audio plug-in developer, Sonnox has today released AAX DSP and AAX Native versions of it’s highly acclaimed Oxford EQ and Inflator plug-ins. In making the announcement, Sonnox Managing Director Rod Densham remarked, “We’re delighted to be supporting the next generation of Pro Tools users with AAX and are very optimistic about the ProTools|HDX platform. The new AAX format will undoubtedly become an established plug-in standard, just as TDM has been. The Sonnox development team has doubled in size in recent months, and is working hard to port all our remaining plug-ins to AAX as soon as possible.”

Avid’s new AAX (Avid Audio eXtension) advanced plug-in format comes in two versions: AAX DSP plug-ins compatible exclusively with Pro Tools|HDX (TDM is not supported in Pro Tools|HDX); And, AAX Native plug-ins, compatible with any system running Pro Tools/Pro Tools HD 10 software.

“Sonnox consistently sets the pace for superior-sounding, innovative processing for Pro Tools, and we are thrilled to see their portfolio coming to AAX,” comments Ed Gray, Director, Partnering Programs at Avid. “Sonnox plug-ins running on a Pro Tools|HDX system will provide a winning combination for the next generation of audio professionals. We can’t wait to see what Sonnox brings to our users next.”

For detailed information on Sonnox Oxford Plug-ins please visit: www.sonnox.com

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