Wise Owl

In late 2015 Ferrara & Company came to Framestore with an idea to created a brand icon for the launch of an allergy medicine you take at night, XYZAL. Naturally they wanted a character that was well educated, well dressed and well meaning to represent their brand, and everyone knows there’s nowhere better to fulfil that brief than Framestore.

On Set Vis

Animation

Environments

Direction

an animated owl wearing a suit and bow tie with the text 'new! be wise all, take xyzal' text in the bottom centre

Fur, Feathers and Cloth

As many animation artists know fur, feathers and cloth are especially tricky in CG and so the character's design is quite an accomplishment for Lighting Technical Director Greg White and the Framestore CG team. They did an outstanding job of the creation of both the character and his environment. The animation team made it an absolute pleasure to explore the personality of a new character. The composition led by Nuke Compositor Sebastien Boulange resulted in a constantly outstanding performance. The complex realization of the Nigel the owl character and his world were beautifully carried out by Framestore artists.

an animated owl wearing a monocle holding up a children's book that has the text 'kids are not at their best'

I’ve spent the best part of 20 years creating creatures and characters, most of which love to talk! These are my favorite opportunities, when a client wants to work together to create something new and compelling.

David Hulin

Director of Animation

an animated owl wearing a monocle reading a newspaper

Director of Animation, David Hulin, has been behind some of the most memorable advertising icons in recent history creating award winning characters for brands like M&Ms, Sour Patch, Alka Seltzer, Lactaid and, the jewel in his crown, The GEICO Gecko. He states, “We have an amazing team of artists here at Framestore who really understand how to bring a character to life. We know how to design on paper, refine and develop in CG and then flesh and emote in animation. For XYZAL we were able to produce lots of different character designs during the sketch phase and give over really developed concept art, character briefs and art direction to the CG team.”

an animated owl wearing a monocle, suit and bow tie. its holding up a box of xyzal allergy tablets. there is text that says 'be wise all, take xyzal' on the bottom centre

Making the creative decision to produce the entire campaign digitally it meant all aspects of production were provided by the Framestore team. “We can make anything look photo-real with the right resources but I also wanted the team to be able to contribute to the design and art direction Nigel's World rather than be locked into the live action plates we shot. We now have Nigel’s study built, meaning we can ‘shoot’ more spots whenever we want”.

This is where Framestore’s Animation Supervisor and Co-Director Shayne Ryan came into the picture. Shayne brings both a wealth of animation experience and an expertise in cinematography to the table. The animatic and editorial was all refined during the initial phase of production making it extremely efficient to get approvals and move straight into character animation.