Wednesday, April 1st, 2009
Changes are in motion
You’ve followed the BRAVIA-drome ad from concept to post-production. You’ve even enjoyed a sneak preview of the final cut.
Now the wait’s over as the commercial hits TV screens and the new Motionflow site goes live. Click here to view the new site and see great behind-the-scenes videos, more of Kaká and Motionflow demos.
Wednesday, March 11th, 2009
Inside the production process
With the BRAVIA-drome ad due to premiere in April, Jonathan Davies of the Motion Picture Company takes us through the production process.
MPC were involved early on with this project, is that unusual?
We do sometimes get involved with pre-production but this project was different because we were going to build something. Ben Scott took care of the BRAVIA-drome’s aesthetic, Artem did the engineering and we provided the technical information to make sure that it was built to the right size.
At the beginning everyone thought we could just spin the zoetrope and do any kind of animation. But you’re constrained by the physics, how big the image will be, the number of frames you need, how fast you have to spin it. There was about two months’ work upfront.
How did you work out what was needed for the moving image?
We used a 3D package called Maya to visualise the spin. There were certain considerations to take into account, like the size of the square in Venaria, the need to produce around three seconds of animation and to get the image of Kaká as large as possible. We ended up with 64 images, which is around 2.5 seconds of animation.
Then you filmed Kaka doing a series of football tricks?
Once the BRAVIA-drome was built we knew exactly the size and number of images we needed of Kaká. The problem was how to get them to the right dimensions, because film resolution only goes up to a certain size. So we took a technical approach, and turned the camera on its side. That way, we got the most information possible on to the 35mm negative. Joining the loop was tricky. The sequence had to be shot in a particular way so that when Kaká kicks the ball out of frame it can come back in at the same height.
Did you have any problems capturing the BRAVIA-drome on film?
There were issues when it was spinning. If you have people standing in front of the BRAVIA-drome making fast movements you’ll see a series of jagged lines, a bit like an optical illusion. We had to make sure people didn’t move too quickly.
How much footage did you shoot?
We shot about 13 hours’ worth of footage on Sony HD cameras, and the ad itself will be 60 seconds long. That’s a lot more footage than normal, but the editor was on set to deal with the camera rushes. Next step is to do an edit that everyone’s happy with, grade the selected shots, colourise them, then clean up the piece. Sound recording and mixing take place at the same time. The final part of the process is when sound and picture are put together.
Does the post-production team follow a script?
They’re following a storyboard and something called a previz, which we do before the shoot. It’s a basic 3D animation of what’s going to happen in the ad. We take every shot from the storyboard and from the brief and build them into an edit. It gives everyone a chance to see what the finished piece will look like.
What did you think when you saw the BRAVIA-drome in action?
It looked amazing and quite surreal because the image is so clear. Although I knew how it was made, with printed images, it really does look like one single moving image – a bit like a huge circular TV screen.
Wednesday, February 25th, 2009
See the new BRAVIA Motionflow 200Hz advert first
It’s here. If you’ve been following the BRAVIA-drome story you’ll be keen to find out how the final ad turned out. Ahead of its official launch in April, you can watch it here, now.
Friday, February 13th, 2009
Let’s get technical
Get the inside scoop on building the BRAVIA-drome from supervisor/designer Simon Tayler at Artem, the SFX company behind its construction.
What was your brief?
We’ve had extensive experience of large mechanical projects at Artem, but in our 20-year history there’s been nothing quite like the BRAVIA-drome. Our brief was to build an enormous, beautiful, sculptural piece that would look more like a work of art than a traditional Victorian zoetrope. It also had to display a large, bright, clear, smooth image to emphasise the qualities of Sony’s new Motionflow 200Hz technology. (more…)
Wednesday, January 7th, 2009
Capturing the Sony BRAVIA-drome advert on film
For five days Venaria’s Piazza Annunziata was transformed into a film set as director Vernie Yeung and his crew captured the BRAVIA-drome on film for Sony’s latest TV commercial.
Tuesday, December 23rd, 2008
From toy to 10-tonne BRAVIA-drome
Designer Ben Scott describes some of the challenges involved in taking the BRAVIA-drome from pencil drawing to massive motion machine.
“In the initial meeting you have a little toy on the table and you spin it, then say let’s just make that 50 times bigger. The mathematics and the optics of doing that are really complicated. For example, there are so many things that alter the actual image inside, from the size of the slot you look through, to the distance that the picture is away from that slot, to the amount of light.
The images inside the BRAVIA-drome aren’t anything like those you see when it’s moving. They change in shape, they get wider as it spins. The optics of it are such that we had to make those images very thin so that when they’re spinning they come back to a normal size.”
Friday, December 19th, 2008
Science in motion
“When we turned it on…” Hear what happened and get all the inside information about the design, build and testing of the BRAVIA-drome from the people involved.
Tuesday, December 16th, 2008
See the BRAVIA-drome appear before
See the BRAVIA-drome appear before
your eyes
It took six weeks to build the BRAVIA-drome for the first time. You can see it happen in less than 30 seconds.
Thursday, December 11th, 2008
The Sony BRAVIA-drome sets a new world record
It’s official: the BRAVIA-drome is the world’s largest zoetrope. Measuring 10 metres across and weighing 10 tonnes, the massive motion machine has been declared a world first by Guinness World Records.
The BRAVIA-drome is all about world firsts. It’s a modern take on the world’s first moving pictures device, the zoetrope, a 19th-century invention that creates motion from a series of still images. And it’s a celebration of the world’s first Motionflow technology, which with 200 frames a second provides the smoothest on-screen action ever.
Get breaking BRAVIA-drome news here.
