Axe 'Rolling'

YOU GOTTA ROLL WITH IT
Framestore recently completed work on Rolling, a distinctly saucy, decidedly tongue-in-cheek spot for AXE, the shower gel with apparent aphrodisiacal properties. Filmed in Cape Town, South Africa, and directed by Traktor, a directorial team repped by production company Partizan, Rolling reveals the cross-country odyssey of two impassioned and intertwined young lovers and ends with a splash. The brainchild of ad agency Bartle Bogle Hegarty (BBH) New York, the spot relied heavily on Framestore's 2D and 3D effects and animation. The spot has already been airing in selected cinemas, and will soon be airing on television.

"As soon as we saw the concept, we were very keen to get on board," says James Razzall, Senior Producer at Framestore. "Not only was the concept very funny, but we've really enjoyed working with both BBH and Traktor in the past. We pulled out all the stops to win this job. There was a tremendous amount of 2D and 3D animation required, and we got right to it."

To the airy strains of The Brazilian Girls' "Lazy Lover", Rolling opens with a handsome couple sitting on a bucolic -- not to mention steep -- hillside. Seemingly unable to control herself, the beautiful young woman seizes her man by the lips, quickly sending the now-entwined and passionately kissing couple rolling down the hillside. Quite wrapped up in the important task at hand, the amorous duo roll oblivious through a hedge, over a sumptuous picnic, and through the greasy confines of a car garage.

Now covered in food, dirt, motor oil, and grease, the lip-locked lovers continue to roll through a tomato garden, momentarily picking up a Mediterranean beauty for an impromptu ménage-a-trois. Leaving the olive-skinned lovely rapturously caught on a barbed wire fence, the couple continues to roll downhill, almost colliding with a truck filled with AXE shower gel. Swerving to miss them, the truck crashes through a wall and into the sea, followed quickly by the kissing and filthy couple, who fortuitously land in the fragrant foam created by the shower gel. This is, we learn from the closing tagline, "How Dirty Boys Get Clean."

Though lighthearted, this truly hilarious spot presented a significant challenge for the Framestore team, according to Maryanne Lauric, Senior Flame Artist at Framestore:
"To begin with, there was a great deal of compositing necessary," says Lauric. "That beautiful opening sequence was actually shot on a truly miserable day. We had to do a great deal of sky replacement to set the appropriate tone, as well as match up with the rest of the spot which was shot in much sunnier weather. The client also wanted it clear just how ‘dirty' the couple were getting as they rolled along, so we did a lot of dirt enhancement, adding grease and general muck to the actors."

During the brief threesome, a more subjective camera angle was used to convey the young man's disbelief at this good fortune. Lauric and her team added lens flares as well as circulating 2D grass and tomatoes to give the scene a slower, dreamier flow. The Framestore team also had to remove the mats upon which the actors rolled.

Perhaps the spot's biggest challenge, however, came with the spectacular, watery crash of the AXE truck. While the truck on the roadway was real, the one that crashes through the stone wall and falls into the sea below was created entirely in 3D using Autodesk Maya, and was then composited into the scene using Autodesk Flame. "We shot studio elements of a wall breaking up, and then composited those elements into the plate," says Lauric. "We also created a lot of dust particles and composited the 3D truck into the crash scene and into a wide shot of the cliff. It was quite spectacular in the end."

Spectacular indeed, but the clients wanted to ensure that the AXE shower gel was not upstaged. In order to make it clear that it is indeed the magical gel that is cleaning the couple, various 3D versions were created for the underwater scenes:
"The 3D shower gel is much more visible and stylized underwater," says Razall. "We also created the surface foam in 3D, making it crystal clear just what is cleaning up the dirty couple."

While it was initially expected that some scenes would require stunt people to complete, Razzall notes that the acting couple ended up doing nearly all of the rolling themselves:
"I think they really got into it," he says with a grin.