VENICE BEACH, CA - Digital Domain recently provided post services on a new spot introducing the 2005 Chevy Corvette. The newly-redesigned model marks only the sixth time the American sports car has seen significant changes since it was introduced 51 years ago.
Campbell-Ewald, Detroit, planned a major launch by teaming up with director Guy Ritchie of Anonymous Content for the :60 spot titled "A Boy's Dream," which aired during the Olympic Games and will follow with cinema releases throughout the country.
The spot opens in slow-motion on dumbfounded children in a school playground, looking skywards, as the new Corvette flies overhead. Continuing in slow motion, the spot cuts to a classroom interior where a teacher looks out the window in astonishment. All the children's heads are turned in the direction of the window as well, mouths agape. Outside, a new Corvette flies by. A boy in the driver's seat waves to his classmates as he passes.
The Rolling Stone's "Jumping Jack Flash" kicks in and the spot moves from slow motion to a fast montage of the Corvette tearing up the roadways. The boy is awakened from his dream from the sounds of traffic and sees in front of him the new red Corvette of his fantasies.
Digital Domain combined CG with live action footage. "Anytime you see a Corvette making some kind of impossible jump or turn, that's a CG car," explains Digital Domain senior VP, general manager Ed Ulbrich. "We knew it had to be indistinguishable from the live action, but when you have Guy Ritchie and Harris Savides creating beautiful images like these, it wasn't easy."
Digital Domain posted the project in just four weeks, providing animation, modeling, compositing, color grading, output to film, and conversion to HD in order to meet the Olympic broadcast timeframe.
Marc Langley of White House in New York edited the spot. Digital Domain credits include: executive producer Ed Ulbrich, head of production Michael Pardee, VFX producer Mark Allen Kurtz, VFX supervisor Fred Raimondi, CG artist John Allardice and lead CG artist Brad Hayes.