Digital Domain teamed up with director Carl Rinsch, RSA and AMV BBDO for “Escape the Map,” a surreal POV journey into a world inspired by Google Street View. With characters ravaged by digital artifacts, blurred visages and time echoes, it’s a slickly imagined ride that pulled me in, despite knowing it was a car advert.
The film was intended for a lightly interactive microsite, which you can visit here.
From the release:
Digital Domain Visual Effects Supervisor Jay Barton, who is currently working with Rinsch on his upcoming feature for Universal Pictures, “47 Ronin,” led the team. His idea was to use photogrammetry — a technique in which measurements are taken from photographs to create real-world objects — to create the world. All of the live action was shot in Hong Kong, with Barton scouting and shooting iconic locations which were later used in the world-building. Additional green-screen shoots were staged in Hong Kong and Los Angeles.
“We first had to develop the visual language of the world,” Barton said. “We took inspiration from Google Street view and replicated that, but in moving video. As photos are stitched together, they sometimes seam strangely. They might not line up, or two buildings might occupy the same space, or people get cut in half. We played a lot with how images would load or resolve, or react when a whole new set of photos came in to reset the world. Here, when you explore you have more options and more viewpoints. You can decide where to look, walk, or drive and your perspective and resolution update accordingly.”
CLIENT: Mercedes Benz
PRODUCT: C63 AMG
TITLE: “The Escape”
ADVERTISING AGENCY: Abbott Mead Vickers BBDO Ltd UK
Creative Team: Paul Knott & Tim Vance
Creative Director: Tim Riley
Agency Producer: Emmalou Johnson
Board Account Director: Ben King
Account Director: Rob Tauscher
Account Manager: Nick Andrew
PRODUCTION COMPANY: RSA Films, Ltd. UK
Director: Carl Erik Rinsch
Producer: Margo Mars
FACILITY COMPANY HONG KONG: RSA Asia
Hong Kong Facility Producer: Marco Leung
FACILITY COMPANY Los Angeles: RSA LA
LA Facility Producer: Christy Lindgren
DOP: Eric Steelberg
FACILITY COMPANY Los Angeles: RSA LA
LA Facility Producer: Christy Lindgren
DOP: Eric Steelberg
CASTING DIRECTOR: Denise Chamain
TALENT: Mariah Bonner
VISUAL EFFECTS: Digital Domain, Inc.
300 Rose Avenue, Venice CA 90291
Chief Creative Officer, EP: Ed Ulbrich
Executive Producer: Tanya Cohen
Head of Production: Scott Gemmell
Visual Effects Supervisor: Jay Barton
CG Supervisor: Ronald D. Herbst
VFX Producer: Chris Fieldhouse
VFX Coordinator: David Ziek
Avid Edit: Todd Miller
Avid Edit: Brian Miller
Avid Edit: David Hsin
Digital Standards Consultant: Jeff Heusser
Previs: Roy Sato
Flame Artist: Paul Kirsch
PHOTOGRAMMETRY: Scott Edelestein
PHOTOGRAMMETRY: Gil Hacco
GENERALIST: Daisuke Nagae
GENERALIST: Brian Creasey
GENERALIST: Casey Benn
GENERALIST: Rick Thomas
MAYA/HD FX: Adrian Graham
Maya FX: Lee Carlton
MATTE PAINT: Zach Christian
MATTE PAINT: Ting Lo
TRACK: Michael Lori
TRACK: Montu Jariwarla
TRACK: Roxanne Zuckerman
Roto Artist: Edgar Diaz
Roto Artist: Nathalie Gonthier
Rigging: Derek Crosby
Compositor Supervisor: Rafael Colon
Nuke Compositor: Chia-chi Hu
Nuke Compositor: Sven Dreesbach
Nuke Compositor: Aruna Inversin
Nuke Compositor: Scott Hale
Motion Graphics Artist: Cody Williams
Digital Studio Engineer: David Bryan
Digital Studio Engineer: Fernando Pantoja
OFFLINE EDIT: Stitch Editing
Editor: Frank Effron
DIGITAL PRODUCTION COMPANY: Unit9
Interactive Director: Rob Corradi
SOUND DESIGN: Factory Studios
Sound Engineers: Tom Joyce and Anthony Moore
COMPOSER: 11:59
Track: ‘Trepanation’