Nissan UK

As 2013 raced to a close, our Senior VFX artists Ian Baker had the genuine honour of working with Sir Chris Hoy on the launch film for Team GB’s “Unite and Excite” campaign sponsored by Nissan. Directed by RSA’s Juriaan Booij, capturing the Olympian at high speed in an empty velodrome wasn’t without it’s technical challenges, but he was delighted with the result.

“The crew at Unit we were able to create the illusion of hundreds of fans flashing their cameras. With both visual effects as well as great sound design it seems like a roaring crowd of GB fans, it’s very effective” he said.

Working with Matt Henry, Unit’s Head of Design on the typographical and graphic elements he adds “The idea was to bring the data and monitoring results the researchers found in the Nissan research lab to the race in the Velodrome, so there would be a direct overlap between the two different locations. By motion tracking the movements of the cyclists we were able to integrate the graphics very smoothly into the shots, making them really become part of it without making the graphics and type become obtrusive”.

The beautiful result was a truly creative collaboration by Juriaan and team Unit, so with that in mind may we wish the best of luck to Team GB in Sochi. We’re loving that Olympic tingle…

CREDITS

Agency: TBWA London
Creative director: Nick Cooper
Copywriter: Anja Muller
Art Directors: Nick Shay and Jason Fletcher
Agency Producers: Caroline Connor / Kate Mahoney
Production Company: RSA Films
Director: Juriaan Booij
Production Co Producer: Ben Porter

Unit

Executive Producer:Sally Heath
Lead Smoke: Ian Baker
Lead Flame: Rob Ellis
Grade:Simon Astbury
Audio Mixer and Sound Design: Chris Southwell
Motion Graphics: Matt Henry, Paddy Lerwill and Lloyd Francis
Nuke: James Smith