Client: San Antonio Solid Waste Management
Director: Murray Breit
Copy Writer: David Parker
Director of Photography: Zach Nasits
Senior Editor: Jeff Chesnut
Animation Director: Joe Schaertl
Colorist: Zach Nasits
Art Director: Martin Jaeger
Production Manager: Chantel Nasits

San Antonio advertising agency, Texas Creative, approached us with a concept for Jefferson Bank to portray the detailed, custom crafting of a great pair of hand-made boots as a metaphor for the bank’s “right fit” of products and services.

This years Jefferson Bank “Boots” TV spots were certainly the right fit for Geomedia and begged for some creative and unconventional cinematography style. 

We approached the spot from a macro perspective of what goes into crafting of a pair of hand-made boots and focused on their assembly, step-by-step.

Before and After color grade.

The spot was captured in 4K, and our Red Epic camera package was outfitted with Zeiss Super Speeds that enabled us to shoot in extremely low-light conditions. Diopters were incorporated to enhance the feel of being “up close” and personal with the craftsmen and their processes. The camera was often over-cranked for slow-motion effect. Lighting consisted of diffused Kino Flo’s and a small HMI that accentuated a single window source.

Shot of sewing boot sole prior to color grade.

Shot of sewing boot sole after reframe and final color grade in Resolve.

Dramatic post-production design and color grading in DaVinci Resolve, played a heavy role in the overall aesthetic of the spot. Audio was produced and mixed by Keith Harter Music.

Before and After color grade.

Jefferson Bank’s “The Right Fit” TV spot went on to win an American Advertising Federation GOLD ADDY and also received the Judges Choice Award for Cinematography.

We are convinced that our great crew, post-production capability and our passion for pushing the envelope to deliver exceptional spots, primed the success of these creative commercials.

Gold ADDY and Special Judges Awards for cinematography!.

Client: Jefferson Bank
Agency: Texas Creative
Creative Director: Brian Eickhoff
Co-Creative Director: David Parker
Director/DP: Zach Nasits
Senior Editor: Jeff Chesnut
Colorist: Zach Nasits
Sound: Keith Harter Music
Production Manager: Chantel Nasits

This year’s TV campaign for Valero Energy Corporation encompassed a range of dynamic, live-action shots which required extensive and complex production capture. Armed with our RED Epic camera, we were up for the challenge.

The assignment landed on our desk just prior to last winter’s coldest month. Unfortunately, by the time we could begin filming, the local Texas grounds were quite dead and the trees were looking very cold and wintery.

The outside look didn’t present so much of a challenge while filming interior scenes at the Valero Corner Store, but concepts also included action shots out on the roadways. We location scouted areas that could pass as warm and green once we worked them over in post. In many instances, we relied on RED Epic’s RAW capture and 5K resolution for opportunities to paint, shade, and grade to give the exteriors a warm and lively feel.

Finished, color-graded tag sequence from the spot, captured with the Helivideo aerial cinematography platform.

We selected specialized tools that would enable us to capture our traveling scenes with motorcycles and Mission Petroleum’s fuel tanker. We rented a camera car from Chapman Leonard, outfitted with a 16′ Lenny Arm and G3 Shock stabilized gear-head with a digital Preston FIZ (Focus, Iris, Zoom) for most of our traveling shots. In some instances, where the roads were not substantial enough for the camera car and the picture car, we engaged a remote controlled gyro-shock stabilized helicopter with camera mount. It was awesome!

The camera copter is flown via remote control by an operator following in a chase vehicle. In addition to carrying the FS100 HD camera, the copter sends video of the “pilot’s” view wirelessly back to the operator.

Constructed of lightweight carbon-fiber, the copter sports a fully articulating camera head capable of panning, tilting and even longitudinal roll… All remotely controlled!

In cooperation with the San Antonio Police Department and Kendall County Sherrifs department we opted to leave the roads open to traffic and perform more “intermittent traffic control” where our officers could pace and safety the camera car and picture car with out stopping traffic on I-10.

Our roster of professional film crew in conjuction with the right tool selection enabled us to safely pull off this portion of the shoot while capturing some amazing footage at high speed.

The 16 foot “Lenny Arm” and stabilized gear-head, mounted on the Chapman Leonard truck.

Mounting the RED Epic and calibrating the digital “Preston FIZ” remote controller.

Scenes filmed at the gas station included more conventional style production complete with actors, set dressing, full make-up and wardrobe departments. We employed a huge crew to ensure that we could capture all 15 scenes in 1 day. Scenes included interiors and exteriors wih the Epic camera mounted on our Chapman Pewee III dolly or occiasionally hood mounted to a vehicle.

In order to achieve clarity and a high contrast ratio, most scenes were captured with Arri Alura T2.6 lenses (18mm-80mm and 45mm-240mm). For tighter spaces, we used our T1.3 Zeiss Super Speed MKIIs. Veteran camera aficionado, Calmar Roberts excelled as our 1st assistant cameraman, which was a great treat for Zach who, earlier in his career, trained under Cal for several years.

In addition to principal photography, there were several time-lapse sequences and visual effects scenes that were coordinated and executed in-house between our production and our animation departments.

Progression of long-exposure DSLR shots from a time-lapse sequence of the station. Sky replacement, composited signage and blending of station elements from offset moments in time were required to achieve a smooth time-remapped sequence, compressing hours into seconds as daylight turns to night.

Frame from the final composited, color-graded time-lapse sequence.

Final edits, conformed to the Log C raw footage, were tone-mapped and transformed to the target color space and graded using Apple Color. Visual FX plates were transferred as ProRes 4444 sequences.

Hats off to our staff, agency partners, our wonderful crews and the terrific folks at Valero… It was a blast!!

Client: Valero Energy Corporation
Agency: 180
Director: Murray Breit
Production Manager: Fernando Cano
Director of Photography/Colorist: Zach Nasits
Senior Editor: Jeff Chesnut
Visual FX: Martin Jaeger, Jeremy Kenisky, Rudy Martinez, Joseph Schaertl
Animation Director: Troy Davis
3D modeling/Animation: Jeremy Kenisky
Technical Direction: Jeremy Kenisky
Audio Post Production: Keith Harter Recording
Production Coordinator: Alycia Phair

Client: GVTC
Agency: Creative Noggin
Account Executive: Tracy Marlowe
Creative Director: Trish Rawls
Director: Murray Breit
Director of Photography: Zach Nasits
Senior Editor: Jeff Chesnut
Visual FX: Martin Jaeger
Colorist: Zach Nasits
Animation Director: Martin Jaeger
3D modeling/Animation: Jeremy Kenisky
Original Music: Keith Harter
Production Coordinator: Alycia Phair

Our recently completed multi-spot campaign for Valero Energy Corporation features some high-octane 3D animation and visual FX. In addition to shooting all the live-action and providing editorial, the post production required building a photo-realistic 3D modeled, textured, rigged and animated F/A-18 Hornet fighter jet like the ones used by the Blue Angels of the US Navy.

One of the first major challenges was rigging the aircraft to move realistically in the air. Yaw, pitch and roll become complex maneuvers when trying to manipulate a 3D model aircraft through a space that is relatively 10 – 100 – 1000 times larger.

Once the aircraft were modeled and rigged, the first step was to audition good live action cloud footage to use as backgrounds for our aerial shots. We had to find footage that matched the tone of our spot and that matched the direction and choreography we needed for each shot. We often had to try and color grade many different sources to make everything feel similar. After shots were chosen and processed we were able to start animating our 3D jets.

Visual FX progression of 3D animated F-18′s flying in formation over the cloud deck.

Final rendered and color-graded CGI shot as F-18′s break away from “camera” chase plane!

Based on the lighting in the cloud shots we had chosen, we constructed high dynamic range images and reflection maps to help light the planes realistically. We had to pull lighting information from cloud formations to try and understand things like sun direction and color temperature, as well as shadow information. Once the light rigs were constructed, we could drop our 3D planes into the scenes and they would naturally feel like they were part of the environment.

Anatomy of a visual FX shot showing progression from live-action plate, sky replacement and rotoscoped ground crew, to wireframe composition of F-18 and openGL shaded view.

Lighting was rendered in Autodesk Softimage XSI using Mental Ray and a combination of physical sun and sky data as well as our own HDRI, Final Gathering, and global illumination light setups. Using a proper linear workflow, we were able to get the compositors the most latitude with which to perform final color grade, cloud compositing and visual FX in post.

Finished rendered scene with environment lighting as F-18 undergoes preflight, control surface and systems checks.

On the shots of the plane taking off, we decided we didn’t want to use any stock selections. Trying to recreate the entire airport in 3D would not be as realistic as shooting accurate live-action plates.

Instead, we chose a local airport and researched photos of it with google earth. Knowing the orientation of the runway, the sun direction, and relevant distances, we were able to map out a plan of where and how to shoot a take off and runway taxi shot. We wanted to be sure to move the camera accurately as a plane would as it moves from 30 – 300 MPH. Once we had calculated the take off speeds and distances, we booked the airport and shot the plates on our RED Epic camera.

3D computer generated F-18 Hornet taking off from live-action runway plate shot. Note the atmospheric heat distortion visual FX from the afterburners.

In post, matching the live-action airport plates up to our rigged F-18 was now trivial. Because we had measured and done our homework, we simply plugged in the distances and numbers we had already chosen days before and the shot lined up nearly perfectly. With only a few details to iron out, we were able to exactly match the angle, FOV, and camera move perfectly and our plane dropped right into the scene. As part of the F-18 rig, we completely setup the landing gear to function accurately. This was done so that when the plane actually lifted off the ground, we’d get visual confirmation when the wheels and suspension dropped down and started to retract up under the plane.

For the cockpit shots, backgrounds and environments were completely synthetic. Our F-18 model featured a fully detailed interior so we were able to use it to place our pilot inside a true F-18 cockpit. This also made it easy to be sure the wings, flaps and tail surfaces were all placed accurately according to how they’d look from inside a real F-18 cockpit.

Wireframe view in Softimage XSI of fighter pilot in the cockpit, showing inverse-kinematics rigging, subdivided poly model and hardware shading.

Our pilot was modeled and textured inside Softimage XSI and once we combined him with a proper helmet, he was rigged to be able to move inside the cockpit. His entire upper body was rigged for full articulation but since we agreed we’d never see the underside of his body, we didn’t put any rigging in for it. We also rigged his entire helmet and face mask to accurately reflect his movement in the cockpit so the hoses and buckles would move realistically as he moved his head around. For this we used a variety of simple spline rigs and implicit shape deformers inside the enveloped model. It ended up being a fairly simple yet physically accurate solution.

Fully rendered final frame from the cockpit view of pilot. Cockpit glass reflections, atmosphere depth-cueing, image-based lighting, ambient occlusion and carefully textured materials really amp the realism.

Backgrounds for the cockpit shots were generated from a variety of aerial photography and maps. Horizons and skies were created with photos and color gradients in Photoshop. Visual FX such as passing through clouds and other atmospheric effects were created in After Effects and served to help layer the shot for additional realism.

HDRI and Mental Ray’s physical sun and sky shaders were again used to help light the pilot inside the canopy. We processed a variety of reflection and canopy distortion passes as well to correctly bend the light and reflections passing through. Sub surface scattering and architectural shaders rounded out the skin and helmet materials respectively.

This challenging project is a perfect example of the tight integration required between production and post, in order to pull off shots of this complexity. We are proud to have been entrusted to handle all aspects of production, design, visual FX and finishing for this terrific campaign.

Client: Valero Energy Corporation
Agency: 180
Director: Murray Breit
Production Manager: Fernando Cano
Director of Photography/Colorist: Zach Nasits
Senior Editor: Jeff Chesnut
Visual FX: Martin Jaeger, Jeremy Kenisky, Rudy Martinez, Joseph Schaertl
Animation Director: Troy Davis
3D modeling/Animation: Jeremy Kenisky
Technical Direction: Jeremy Kenisky
Production Coordinator: Alycia Phair