Umbrella Spot

Nickelodeon needed a sweeps spot for their client Hasbro and the launch of Island Princess Barbie product. We shot greenscreen on our stage to deliver the “stepped-effect” they were looking for. Thanks to some 3D and 2D composite, and lots and lots and lots of sparkles, we delivered the kind of beach vacation only Barbie could imagine.

Nickelodeon came to us to bring Zizzle’ s Spotz Maker to their audience for the holiday season. We recreated the spotz in 3D and spent a day bopping around a girl’s bedroom and greenscreen in one the most fun shoot days we’ve ever experienced. Let’s just say that we all got in touch with our inner teen girl… jumped on a trampoline and everything.

Nickelodeon wanted to deliver a nick.com affiliate spot to tout how the power of broadband can deliver way more for the Nick viewing family. Our ideas was to really avoid another web-pages compilation spot so typical for this messaging, and to create a world where everything that nick.com offers comes alive for the broadband customer. The spot was incredibly well received and a big success.

Nickelodeon was ready to relaunch their TeeNick block, and BT created a new look for the brand, and launched some of the most successful live-action properties-to-date. The incredibly breakthrough design of this block has gone on to be copied by lots of other firms and brands. Part of this relaunch included the incredibly popular Drake and Josh music video.

Nickelodeon was looking to reposition chalkzone, as a fresher quantity, as they launched the newest season. The success in achieving that goal was nothing short of remarkable. Ratings more than doubled from kids who picked up on this new way of looking at something known.

Our task here was to promote the begininig of the 4th season of Nickelodeon’s day-parts show Upick Live. Upick’s core was a cas of weird character who would pull crazy stunts in between episodes of the cartoon, all afternoon.Previously, the promotions for this show had been rather shouty and, well, obnoxious, and we though it would be cool to do something experimental, calm, and visually intriguing. I came up with the weirdest set of stream-of-consciousness actions moving us from one character to the other, and to my shock (and horror?) Brian said, “great, let’s go shoot it.”Given that it was “experimental” and for kids, I thought it would be fun to visually reference experimental art within the context of this promo. The first 3 seconds are a reference to the films of Stan Brakhage, who hand painted cells of blank celluloid and in one film projected light through the wings of a moth. In our case, clumsy “Pick-Boy” gets his colorful cape stuck in a film projector, and then we’re off, moving from character to character in a series of visual associations.I shot this promo on HD, for several reasons. Budget and time for one, ease of use for moving quickly and making snap decisions was two, and curiousity in exploring the format was three. I brought in DP Lucas Ettiln, who also had shot my Hellboy video in Los Angeles.My favorite part of this spot is when dancing Brent freezes and actually becomes a t-shirt print clothes worn by Candace. See… compositing is the new magic.I had storyboarded the project carefully and timed it out to a track by Amon Tobin, but after we had a locked edit, thought it might be fun to try out different audio options. In the end, I settled on this track by Ladytron, which perfectly creates the mood of mystery, sexy sophistication, and forward motion.

Nickelodeon’s upick was one of the biggest phenomenon in the channel’s history. For the 3rd season, BT was looking for a way to freshen things, make it clear that it’s cast were contemporary stars, worthy of a music video. Adam directed this spot, which to this day, maintains it’s modern sensibility and the unique personalities of each of the upick cast.

OK. The idea was simple, but brilliant I think.At Nick, we wanted to really build buzz about the launch of Drake and Josh (the first new live action show for Nick in a long while.)So, we took the show’s theme song and shot a music video we could air run-of-schedule. The tweens went bananas and the show was the highest-rated show launch for Nick, ever.Special shout-out to my producer at Nick, Greg– who really put so much into this and to our director Joey. And to the video techs on-set in LA who spent two days rigging our screens and cameras to make this work in the time frame of our actual shooting. And, of course, to Niels, who is just the coolest human being ever… which obviously makes for the greatest boss.

Francine directed this new take on the open of Saturday Night Fever, for Nickelodeon, and pop culture’s newest Travolta, Lil’ Romeo. Shot on the streets of LA, the tease created tons of buzz for the new show, which quickly became the number one show for African-American viewers 2-12.

Try to reach boys 2-10. Not so easy. Not so hard with Nickelodeon’s Slam Block that BT created to package boy-targeted shows in a branded way. Sam Slam and his pet (both the coolest parts of a cat and a dog), became both kid and channel favorites.