Together with Electric Zoo’s Maarten Hemmen and director Sean Fitzpatrick, Nice Flower Trading 66 dived into a fashion commercial for retail department store V&D in Holland. We helped them bring the summer collection to life with two commercials shot over two great days – one day on the beach and the other on the majestic steps of Rhodes Memorial.

One of the challenges was the handling of the fish. The script called for fish in a plastic bag, which then get released into the ocean. But as any aquarist will tell you, wild fish get stressed and change colour when placed in a bag. Furthermore, the trauma they suffer when poured out, could make them floaters, rather than swimmers. So we printed the fish in 3D! Using rapid prototyping, fish were printed and then hand painted for a realistic, ultra-humane result.

No producers, directors, crew or even models were harmed on this relaxed, fun well-organised production.

Production Company: www.ElectricZoo.nl
Producer: Maarten Hemmen
Director: Sean Fitzpatrick.
Agency: www.yrnotjustfilm.nl

A fun commercial that plays off the advertising proposition that people always come when you offer a Leo. Moving the concept along were creative director Babak Hosseiny and copywriter Catherine Quadens for Ogilvy Brussels, with director Manu Coeman and producer Gerda Coppens for production company Latcho Drom.

As many of you know I worked at Latcho Drom in the 90ies before moving to South Africa, so it was great working with old friends again.

The challenge for this commercial was to creating a swamp with quicksand, where the actor could sink into, without disappearing forever. And if that was possible, could we then control his rate of decent too?

Thanks to Andrew from Elemental FX (http://www.elementalfx.co.za) , who created a metal basket with a pneumatic system that was sunk into the quicksand pit, saving the day, and the actor.

Production Company: www.latchodrom.be
Producer: Gerda Coppens
Director: www.manucoeman.com
Agency: www.ogilvy.be