Coca-Cola is a dream brand to work on so getting a brief through Draftfcb to produce and direct not one but two Coke commercials was really exciting, according to Craig Wessels of Wicked Pixels.
“The concept revolved around Coke crates flying around and joining up to form words or objects in real life scenarios,’ explains Magda Roets. “Our plan was to shoot the live action stories ourselves and then build and animate the crates in 3D. Everything was handled in-house except for the editing of one spot to save time, and grading was outsourced.’
Wessels directed the shoots and unbelievably both commercials were shot in one day, with locations in Johannesburg’s CBD and Soweto.
The animation process began after editing was completed. With Wicked Pixel’s Johannesburg studio now up to full speed and headed by “local hotshot’ Carl Jeppe, the workload was split between the company’s Cape Town and Rosebank studios.
Says Jeppe: “Some pretty serious camera tracking was necessary, as all the shots were very dynamic with a handheld feel to the camera. Animation, compositing and post FX took the team two weeks.’
Roets adds: “The agency and Coca-Cola were ecstatic with the final result and are looking forward to their next project with us.’
Other new work from Wicked Pixels includes the relaunch of Play energy drink, and 45 Axe spots for web and Facebook release. It’s interesting to note that this commission comes from the world’s largest digital agency, Razorfish, via their New York office.
As usual there are exciting times ahead for Wicked Pixels, a multifaceted production company at the forefront of digital content creation.
