CULVER CITY, CA — DoorDash, the on-demand local logistics platform, launched a new, multi-platform marketing campaign during this year’s Super Bowl. The company’s :60 TV spot, titled The Neighborhood, is designed to reinforce DoorDash’s mission to grow and empower local economies. It also unveils new brand messaging around deliveries of neighborhood favorites beyond food, highlighting the breadth of DoorDash use cases and platform categories, like restaurants and convenience.
The campaign features Sesame Workshop, the nonprofit behind Sesame Street, and puts community connection front and center. The Neighborhood spot is a re-imagining of the classic Sesame Street tune “People in Your Neighborhood”, and stars Grammy and Tony Award-winning actor/rapper Daveed Diggs, along with familiar characters such as Big Bird, Cookie Monster, Grover and Rosita. Together, they celebrate the local neighbors who provide the many offerings available through DoorDash.
The Neighborhood campaign was created in partnership with The Martin Agency and was directed by Academy Award winner Michel Gondry. Shot on location in New York over the span of four days, creative studio Jamm (www.jammvisual.com) was tasked with dissecting the printed screens and geo-CG environments to breathe life into the printed sets. Jamm mixed the plates to ensure the Sesame Street Muppets popped off the screen with accuracy and punctuality.
“The process was very fluid,” explains VFX supervisor/lead compositor Glyn Tebbutt, a frequent collaborator of Michel Gondry for his commercial projects. “First, Michel worked closely with his production designer Maxwell Orgell to determine how he wanted it to look and feel. Since this campaign is very choreographed and performance-driven, about three weeks prior to the shoot, we all began walking through the transitions to decide what was possible, then worked on setting those up.”
Jamm also incorporated elements such as a CG train, and added a bit of animation magic to the sequence where Grover flies. Working on Flame for compositing; Houdini, Maya and Redshift for the CG elements; and Nuke for roto, Jamm also completed plate work, clean-up and animation for the accompanying social teasers.
The Neighborhood showcases the studio’s latest offering — color grading. Colorist Adam Scott connected with the client via remote sessions to set the look. Then, working on Baselight, he created a palette that stays true to the natural light and primary color simplicity of Sesame Street.