CAR2GO - WALKOUT VIDEO

THE SETUP

Kennisha Cox was a lead animator that needed to go on vacation. Olivier Reppert was the CEO of car2go and unfortunately this conflicted with his needs for a walk-out video to accompany his entrance to car2go’s annual conference. An intrepid sort, Kennisha found me via LinkedIn and recognized in my work a clean design aesthetic that would allow her to deliver the video and vacation at the same time.

THE CHALLENGE

The only thing Kennisha had was a 3D model of the economy class car2go and a general concept of the video’s story. My opportunity was to derive and deliver a script, key messaging, art direction, animation and video editorial. The final challenge was that she needed the entire project delivered in roughly 3 days. No problemo.

THE PROCESS

I started at the end by creating style frames. Given their tight delivery schedule I quickly generated a style that represented the final look of the video and that could be executed within their time-frame. I leveraged Video Copilot’s Element 3D to create a simple 3D city-scape that could act as a backdrop for their 3D car model and any messaging/talking-points that would be created further in production. I then licensed an off the shelf 2D character animation rig for After Effects called Pixity Land and this allowed me to employ character animation without actually designing and rigging a character from scratch. With main assets in hand I created a single check-in style frame which worked within Kennisha’s expectations.

From there I tackled the script. The story was meant to show autonomous driving technology in action and give the viewer a glimpse at how a practical example of this would play out. So I kept it simple and just described the steps of how one would go about requesting a car2go. Via a quick content call with Kennisha we mapped out the steps and then I formatted them into a simple script.

Next was picking the right music. Because the timeline was tight there wasn’t really an opportunity to create fully realized pre-production for this piece which is typically done (and highly recommended) for visually compelling film & video. The music would need to evoke a lot of the charm for the piece. When in doubt I prefer to delight and so went with a piece of music that was light hearted and had clear rhythm section that would inform cut points in editorial.

After Kennisha settled on a piece of music (I gave her three options) the rest of the video came together fairly quickly. And because we had clearly defined and approved pre-production it only went through a single revision round that had only one revision request.

THE RESULTS

car2go received, a fully produced, 3D animated, 0:30 spot in three days. This is a bit unusual in that, depending on complexity, clarity of vision and available resources, it is not uncommon for production schedules of this type of content to last weeks. The city-scape in particular really elevated the piece from merely informative to cinematic and what’s best is that it was an unexpected addition that was very well received.

NOW WHAT?

Do you have an idea or concept you need to bring to life but don’t know where to start? Are you short on time but still need to deliver something compelling and impactful? Schedule a meeting and let's do this!