Digital Kitchen: Finish Line

finishline.jpg

Fun typography and super-fluid pacing in this Finish Line spot from the masters at Digital Kitchen. Incredible job on the motion tracking as well. This is a beautiful example of live action and design getting in bed together (with the appropriate supervision) and making some fantastic love.

About the author

Justin Cone

/ justincone.com
Together with Carlos El Asmar, Justin co-founded Motionographer, F5 and The Motion Awards. He currently lives in Austin, Texas with is wife, son and fluffball of a dog. Before taking on Motionographer full-time, Justin worked in various capacities at Psyop, NBC-Universal, Apple, Adobe and SCAD.

12 Comments

THA_DON

I saw this on my television set and was wondering who did it.
I really enjoyed it, very well designed, the animation is playful in the right kind of way, and I feel like going to Finish Line to pick up a new pair of fresh summer sneakers.
Good job Digital Kitchen.
And my-my, havent you been busy, Designer/Model was another good little thing, keep it up team, you may find a stocking filled with Christmas goodies this year, Santa is watching- wink-wink.

caulfield_ek100

man saying something’s well motion tracked is like saying it’s great the took the lens cap off.

Nice spot though. Great use of reference material ;)

del_razor

I actually know one of the guys that worked on this spot.. he let me know a little more info about it..

FinishLine Team included: 1 illustrator/designer (he did the awarded boards) 6 designers/animators (my friend included) 1 3d guy, 1 in charge of tracking, 1 producer.

This was a quick turnaround spot ‘for them’: we had 3 weeks and 1/2. A job like this typically lasts 4-5 weeks

sidewalksurfing

caulfield_ek100 – you clearly have no idea what you are talking about and have ZERO knowledge of compositing or film cameras.

stick to motion graphics dude, vfx will not be kind to you.

KGB

lens cap = motion tracking?
I don’t think so….
Obviously there are various degrees of accuracy and success that a particular tracking job could have.
Tracking can be a huge part of the project, since a bad track can ruin the believability/look of a piece.

Considering how it can take a guy days/weeks to 2d or 3d track, I don’t see how you can downplay the process to a mere lens cap.

vectorsnob

Hay, the “one 3D guy” here. Thanks for the comments! This was a fun spot to work on.

As far as tracking goes, it was actually a little painful. It seemed like it should have been smooth, but with the length of the shot we ended up having to patch together four cameras in 3D.

I’ll upload some behind-the-scenes wireframe-ish stuff to my Flickr, if you care.

sidewalksurfing

vectorsnob – would love to see that behind the frames stuff!!!! when i saw the spot i was impressed not only with beautiful design but the technical mastery that went with it. You see such few design / mograph style projects that even realize that a higher level of sophistication and integration can happen with great tracking; lighting; etc.

a fantastic job!!!!! also – what did you use to track? syntheyes? boujou? flame?

kudos!!!!

caulfield_ek100

Sorry nannas, I didn’t realise it was national raw-nerve day.

Whoever worked on this piece obviously knew what they were doing – great design, perfect execution. And I love anything with a short turnaround.

I was just commenting on the moderator’s reference to the tracking – it’s a funny thing to hear referred to, as it’s only noticeable when it’s done badly.

And for the record sidewalk surfer, I’ve been working in VFX since 2003, with two years in 2D animation (for film) previous to that, for companies including Weta, Walt Disney, Animal Logic, Fuel and Engine, among other smaller post houses for one off jobs. So please don’t tell me I don’t know what I’m doing :)

vectorsnob

Ehem. On a side note, we used Softimage XSI for the 3D and Boujou for the tracking. The 2D animation was sequenced out in Illustrator and comped into the matchmoved shots (in AE of course).

uncledrew

meow…saucer of milk for two? The spot is hot. Nice work all around…less the lame endtag which could not be credited to the lads at DK.

jarratt

I think Justin better start watching his overly provocative metaphors

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