On-Set Effects for Telstra’s “The Clever Australian”

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Client:  Telstra
Agency:  Louis&Co.
Brief:  On-set effects for “The Clever Australian” print and TVC campaign

Big Kahuna Imagineering was proud to be working with photographic and production company Louis&Co. on the behind-the-scenes effects for Telstra’s “The Clever Australian” print & TVC campaign.  Working closely with the Art Director, Jamie Morris, our job was to help achieve the final look of the composite image of Dr. Sam Prince — a 28-year-old Sydney doctor who established a charitable foundation that has built 15 schools around the world.

photo-Clever AustralianThe Big Kahuna crew had to tap into our chemistry kits to concoct a palette of colours that had just the right level of transparency to produce the perfect glow when illuminated.  Once the palette was finalised, we custom pigmented gallons and gallons of each colour to be accurately diluted by the on-set team then funneled into huge drums for the crew to then carefully filled thousands of containers of various shapes and sizes and strategically placed them to serve as individual pixels that would produce the final image.

Big Kahuna also produced a hundred switched, LED lit, custom light harnesses to nicely support each colour fluid filled test tube in the foreground of the shot.

The success of such a shoot obviously relies on the vision to create it, but we’d like to think that facilitating Jamie Morris with some tech support helped make it possible!

Julian Wolkenstein was recognised for his photographic work on the campaign in The 2012 Annual Issue of Australian CREATIVE featuring 12 months of the best design, advertising, post production, production, illustration, animation, photography, sound and music plus digital and interactive work in Australia and New Zealand.  Well done, Julian!

Here’s the official “The Clever Australian” launch film with glimpses of the final result and how it was achieved…

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=nZmxB6xIcsA]

Exercising Our Green Thumb On Set

Client:  Scotts Australia
Agency:  Heckler
Brief:  Comparison props for TVC and print campaign

Working with Scotts Australia, Heckler brought Big Kahuna in to help create the on-set effects for a TVC and print campaign for the lawn and garden company’s range of controlled-release plant foods — Osmocote Professional Potting Mix.

The client wanted to create a comparison ad showing not only the dramatic differences between a plant potted with Osmocote and one without; but, also the differences in the root systems of the two plants and the various uses.

Using a week five result photo as a guide for the creative, Big Kahuna used real potting mix and plants to re-create the comparison on a small scale with Marigolds and a larger scale with Bay Leaf trees.

The trick in this project was to expose the living root system and not letting all of the soil fall out.  We had to research a solution that would achieve the result we wanted but not kill the living plants.  In the end, we mixed some of the potting mix with an organic, binding agent that served as a barrier, allowing us to cut a quarter section of the terracotta pot out while keeping everything else intact.

Big Kahuna delivered two large plant comparisons and two small for the final pot selection on the day of the shoot.  We also designed the props in a way that the elements could be easily slotted into backup pots in the event of an unexpected break rather than having to build multiples as replacements.

We’re still waiting for the campaign to be released but we’ll update the blog with imagery as soon as it’s available.

Imagineering Our Clients’ Imaginations — A Peek into the Big Kahuna Imagineering Workshop

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[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pSB_acKqmpI]

www.bki.com.au – Big Kahuna Imagineering makes cool shi… stuff. Models, Scale Replicas, Custom Builds, Props, Special Effects, TVCs, Character Suits, Creatures, Animatronics, Puppets, Experiential Marketing Tools… you imagine it, Big Kahuna imagineers it. Here’s a quick look at a few past projects that have come to fruition in our Sydney workshop and gone on to marketing stardom.
A few you may recognise like the Sensodyne Chill Test and Bankwest “Happy Banking” Characters but some you may have to stretch your memory to recall others like the pirate ships featured in a Mirinda TVC, interactive Toyota display and man-sized robot suit for Korean music video “Egg”.
Enjoy!

Big Kahuna’s Puppeteers

[youtube=http://youtu.be/f_BD-CG8KF0]

Will, Jim and Simon puppeteered the Sun, built by Big Kahuna, for this Happy Banking TVC. Always love working with Host!

Jim and Will making the Big Kahuna magic happen.