integrated creative productions

x

Your Name

Your Email

Send to

Subject

Your Message

Back to Taylor James home

Shell V-Power

...

Landscapes with a twist strike a cord with drivers in this far-reaching press and poster campaign. JWT’s concept required real and imagined worlds to unite.

We worked up a 3D model to prove the concept at pre-production stage, and then Andy Glass went to shoot at Atlantic Road, Norway, and in the Docklands, London, whilst we developed the CGI. This seamless integration of disciplines, and a little retouching magic, shows how an intelligent approach from the start can bring a concept alive.

CGI

Photography

Post-Production

Concept

Long-term partner photographer, Andy Glass, approached us armed with a project from JWT for their client Shell, and Taylor James were instantly attracted to the strong visual concept for this press and poster campaign. There was no doubt that a strong partnership between photography and CGI was needed to achieve this creative imagery.

The brief was to produce 2 still shots, one on the Atlantic Road in Norway and the other in the Docklands, London, each requiring a photographic backplate with a CGI hero element to be built and superimposed by our retouch team. We created a test using location photographs and a simple 3D model to prove that we could achieve such seamless integration of looping CGI roads into photography; thus awarding us the project!

  • BTS-Shell_Agency-Layout-resized
  • BTS-Shell_Agency-Layout

Pre-Production

How do you photograph something that isn’t there?

JWT supplied us with concept sketches so we could start to consider how the shots would be framed, our first aim to find the optimum angle and lens combination before Andy went on location to shoot. We always ensure strong communication between the photographer and our CGI team from the start of the production, to enable us to quickly get to a stage where we can show the client what the end result will look like, gaining their confidence in us and Andy as a team. Remote-desktop viewing allowed us to communicate with Andy real-time so that he could direct our CGI artist back in the studio to see how different angles would look with different lenses.

Entering the parameters of Andy’s Phase One IQ180 camera, we could place the camera anywhere without having to move an entire crew around, find the best lens avoiding any perspective distortion and use our GPS calibrated sun system to show what time of day would capture the best light. We could give Andy the assurance to go on set, using our angle study as a base to place his camera.

Doing this pre-visualisation meant that we could arrange permits in advance and save on unnecessary costs such as the stand-by cherry-picker which was first anticipated.

3362_Shell_Previs_Loop_V1_2a-crop
3362_Shell_Previs_Loop_V1_2-crop
3362_Shell_London_Previs_image2-crop
3362_Shell_London_Previs_V1-crop

Scouting from our own back yard.

Wherever possible we try to do our own location scout in order to capture 3D scans of the area and take the measurements to create our pre-vis.  For this Docklands shot, our Technical Director was able to do a recce; getting a good sense for where the natural angle is to plan exactly what we’ll need from a CGI and retouch perspective.

We were able to take the photographic assets and comp them into the CGI environment on set, to give the client a detailed visual representation of what the final images would look like.

3362_Shell_Previs_Loop_V1_0-crop
3362_Shell_London_Previs_image-crop
The challenge with the spiral shot was that the CGI hero asset was a generic road spiralling high into the sky in an area of London Docklands. So with no existing feature to reference, it was unclear where the spiral road would sit in reality - a perfect example of why the pre-vis process massively saves both time and money.
David Wortley, TJ Technical Director

CGI Production and Animation

We requested additional texture and reference photos from Andy on location so we were able to build a fully textured, realistic 3D model that echoed the detail of the existing road into a beautiful perfect spiral. Planning the CGI and photography together improves the quality of the final images as we can be sure we are getting the correct perspectives for the CGI asset to fit in and to work for all final crops.

The spiral road was a very complex shape to draw so we went straight into designing it in 3D rather than 2D sketches, so we could use the shapes to explore camera angles for the road bending and curving. This sort of complex production takes a lot of refining to maximise how everything fits together photo-realistically, and required us to flip the direction of the spiral from the original concept drawing to fit the logo and copy in all layouts. With our location photography and CGI measured out to scale beforehand, we were able to confidently present a pre-vis, which integrated the CG concept into a real-world scenario and prove that we could capture the best angle for the job.

The final angle decision is of course with the photographer and there are always things we cannot pre-visualise beforehand, but we find increasingly that this process allows us to confidently show the client exactly how the project will look at the end, as well as give the photographer the extra confidence in delivering what the client has bought into.

Shell Post production
3362_Shell_Previs_Loop_V1

Post-Production

As everything had been well thought out and planned, the retouching of these shots was straightforward. The backplates were comped and a large Yacht that had moored up in our spiral shot was removed. Andy captured the vehicles retrospectively, once the CG scene setups were approved, so the cars sat perfectly within each scene.

Once the final CG passes were rendered it was a simple process of bedding in these elements before applying the final colour styling and taking the image from day to night. We also added life to cityscape by turning on a few lights in the windows and adding street lights.We like to keep our photoshop files super organized so when it comes to exploring the colour we have corresponding alpha channels saved out for all the major elements.  This enables us to accurately select areas of the image so we can easily play and experiment with the look and feel, saving out colour variations, before finessing the final colour grade.

Results

The result is two stunning images that are a perfect example of CGI and photography working hand in hand. Andy Glass worked closely with our retouch team to direct the shots and supply pre-comps and comments at each round of feedback. The whole process was very smooth and with everything captured in correct perspective, the elements naturally sat together, adding the extra 10% of realism which is essential to make these composites of images look real.

The campaign is running globally in press and poster including 48sheet billboards.

  • 3362-SHELL_BRIDGE-Results
  • 3362-SHELL_LONDON-Results