​About

Taxi NY approached Psyop with the desire to create a campaign based around a group of friends that meet at their local watering hole to relax, chat and drink. The catch was that these weren't normal people, but bizarre hybrids between animals and 30 something humans. We decided to approach the pieces as if we were filming a live action sitcom. With that in mind, we knew that dialogue would be king so we worked with improv comedians as our VO, but also captured their performances to inspire our character physical performances. We also allowed the comedians to improv the scripts and create their own scenarios, many of which ended up in the final spot. 

Instead of shooting live action video plates on set, we decided to shoot high resolution stills. These still images were then projected onto 3D geometry, creating a virtual set into which the 3D characters were later composited. This gave us the freedom to move the camera based on our character's performances, instead of the usual approach which would restrict us to tracking our characters into locked live action plates.  Psyop's modeling, furring, lighting and compositing teams did a phenomenal job combining the two elements together to create a very believable look that let the viewer focus on the comedy instead of the 3d elements.

Awards

AICP 2013 Shortlist (Nosejob)

Credits

Client: MiO Energy
Agency: TAXI, New York
Executive Creative Director: Dave Clemans
Creative Director: Stephen Leps, Michael Pierantozzi
Copywriter: Tim Wassler
Art Director: Phillip Cho
Producer: Joyce Lee, Holly Flaisher

Director: Psyop
Production Company: Psyop/Smuggler
Psyop Creative Directors: Eben Mears and Jon Saunders
Executive Producer: Lydia Holness
Producer: Michael Neithardt
Assistant Producer: Anu Nagaraj
Designer: Naomi Chen, Ram Bhat, Annalisa Swank
Lead 3D Artist: Pakorn Bupphavesa, Alvin Bae
Lighting Lead: Jonah Friedman
Lead Animator: Pat Porter
Lead Nuke Artist: Nick Tanner
3D Artists: Zed Bennett jr., Bryan Eck, Dave Chen, Joerg Liebold, Shant Ergenian, Andy Hara, Will Robertson, John Payne, Phill Avanzato, Denis Kozyrev, Larry (Ngai Man) Leung, Dan Fine
3D Animators: Stephanie Russell, Anthony Travieso, Kevin Scott, Douglas Litos, Danny Speck, William Frazier
Nuke Artist: Thomas Panayiotou, Jason Conradt
Editor:  Cass Vanini

Storyboard Artist: Robin Nishio