Bigmouth on a cell - Postings - US Unwired is involved in animated advertising spots - Brief Article

Post, Jan, 2003

HOLLYWOOD--Director/designer Miles Flanagan of animation production house Acme Filmworks (www.acmefilmworks.com) combined live-action, animation and visual effects in the Bigmouth campaign for cell phone service provider US Unwired through agency Lawler Ballard Van Durand.

The animated spots resemble a collage of cut-and-pasted elements featuring a character made up of a live-action actor's face on an animated body walking through an animated environment while talking on a cell phone. As they chaffer, the key words they say spew from their mouth in the form of clipped newspaper type.

The structure of the spots was created in Adobe After Effects by making a detailed animatic and the final elements, including animation, live-action and digital photos, were composited into the animatic as the job progressed.

Live-action footage was shot on DV with the actors' heads stabilized with a head support to keep them framed according to the cartoon character's final design. With Discreet Combustion, the footage was tracked, matted, and with a series of plug-ins, the actor's faces were modified and re-painted. The altered live-action heads were then composited into the animated spots with After Effects. The traditionally-drawn animation was scanned and composited with Cambridge Animation's Animo V.4, output to Photoshop where it was manipulated and composited in After Effects on a Mac G4. Background designs and props were created from painted artwork and digital photos.