Gillette 'Fire Face'

Ever had Razor burn? The hero of the latest Gillette spot out of BBDO NY directed by Luciano Podcaminsky (@Radical), has a nasty case. So bad, in fact that it's represented by a 'beard' of fierce flames. Played to maximum comedy effect, it ruins his day at the office and gets him laughed at when he tries to pose at the pool.

"It was tricky to get the balance right between realism and goriness" said David Munoz, Framestore Senior Flame op that supervised the shoot. "We tried making his skin glow and spark a little, but it just looked too painful. In the end we kept the look fairly clean but worked on positioning the flames so you can still read his expression." After shooting flames at high speed using an over-sized mannequin on location in Buenos Aires, Munoz tracked the faces and projected the flames onto basic CGI head shapes, giving the 'beard' a subtly defined shape around the neck and chin whilst still feeling organic.

The demo and product shot was created in CG. Lead FX technical director, Spencer Leuders, spent a lot of time developing a Houdini system for the ice and cold effects. Flames were comped from live action elements shot on set.