The Production Process

Case Study: Burnbrae Farms

Live Action + Animation COMBO

Burnbrae is a 6th generation Canadian family business with a social conscience. They are a pretty down-to-earth company. With that in mind they wanted to communicate how great their product is (eggs…) through socials in a direct, honest and charming way. Without the influencers or snazzy graphics.

Burnbrae came to Fuse Creates, the agency with a CONCEPT: Let’s get real people talking to camera about how they like their eggs, why sustainability is important and somehow package all this together with some images and branding.

DEVELOPMENT STAGE: Fuse developed the concept further by adding a few ideas of their own. They proposed using the silhouette of an egg as a frame for the testimonials and to surround the frame with animated illustrations. Head Gear then took these concepts and ran with it. After presenting the agnecy/client with illustration options we collaborated with badass muralist and rollerskater Kayla Buium to come up with the perfect style for the egg centric world. After getting approval on the general style we presented the agency/ client with simple line drawings. Once these were approved we then finessed with colour and shading, showing what a finished frame would look like.

1 WEEK

LIVE ACTION SHOOT: While approvals for the various illustrations were happening Head Gear needed to rustle up a low key shoot environment. Because we were using non-actors for testimonials we would need to shoot a lot of people in order to winnow down the best egg stories. Subjects were shot with multiple takes on bluescreen for easy compositing into our animating scenes. Hair and Make up gave us the extra polish!

1 WEEK CASTING / PRE-PRODUCTION
1 DAY SHOOT

ANIMATIC STAGE: This is where we work out timings. The animatic is where we expand the storyboard. In this case: the title, the testimonials accompanied with supers and the tag. It is important to get the animatic approved before the live action shoot as well as animating illustrations. This helps the client know what to expect at this stage and previews what will be the final spots. Because it is unusual to go unscripted for a shoot, the animatic also works as a guide for timing during so we have a good idea of what we are looking for during the testimonials.

1 WEEK

ANIMATION STAGE: After getting all the illustrations approved, the animation stage can begin. In this case the movement is relatively simple so we animate the already coloured artwork with one approval stage built in. Typically for other 2D animation, the animatic would show pencils (rudimentary animation) without color for the first approval followed by the more finessed motion and colour stage for the second approval.

4 WEEKS (INCLUDING 2 APPROVAL STAGES)

POST-PRODUCTION STAGE: This type of live-action shoot resulted in a lot of footage which needs to be sorted, working out which options suit which spots best. So editorial plays a big part in the Post stage in determining which takes or soundbites work best. This is also where we do colour correction on the live-action, finesse the audio and music and add any legals if necessary.

1 WEEK

OUTPUT AND VERSIONING: These days clients are looking for outputs for TV and Socials in all sizes. This can account for a longer versioning period that may involve changes to the composition or even small edits to accommodate the different aspect ratios. In this case 3 different 15 second spots turned into 24 deliverables. As well many spots have both English and French versions in Canada and English and Spanish in the US. This will often include a separate approval stage.

Note that some of the stages in the Production Process may overlap therefore, ulitmately, a production of this type can take from between 5 to 8 weeks.

3 x :15s ENG
1 x :15s FRE
3 x :06s ENG
1 X :06s FRE
VERSIONING 9:16 + 1:1
= 24 DELIVERABLES

1 WEEK

FINAL SPOTS!

CHECK OUT OUR PROCESS VIDEO for a quick re-cap of the above.