Wijn & Stael, What Does Your Case Need?

The whole process gave us a chance to focus more on form than technique. The challenges we faced didn't involve using the most technically complicated tools or computer graphics. In stead we forced ourselves to have a clear and well thought out plan up front and followed through using only the simplest of tools, just a lot of them, in a very delicate way. Overcomplicating things even more would only break the spell and flow of the films. The look of these films and their post-production was focussed around its aesthetic value and clarity rather than big cutting edge visual effects. The visual effects are at the heart of the films, but also in a very subtle way. The finishing touches, grading and titles, were also done at our facility. The music is composed by a third party. A single instrument, namely the cello is used for every film, but used differently in each one. The results are elegant and, in our opinion, beautiful films that communicate very clearly to the viewer. The films were received very well by the client and are live now on the internet.

Our technical approach is focussed on the seamless flow of the transitions. The viewer should be given time to look at the transition, but it should not be obvious when or how exactly the transition is taking place. Not having any distractions in frame or edit choices to conceal our work combined with the slow moving nature would be our biggest challenge. To achieve this we shot the same movement twice, once per outfit. We lined up the movements on set to compare timing and alignment on set which had to match almost perfectly.

In the edit we preselected the takes that aligned well enough and decided on the timing of the movement and transitions. Our first step after the edit was to key all plates on the same clean background with their correct timing. This allowed us to work more freely with masks throughout the whole frame. Then we repositioned and retimed parts of every plate to align with the following one. To make some parts more dynamic we took some moving cloth from different takes to emphasize the shift. After that parts of the clothing are warped from one shape to another. We invented lines from which new plates would appear or cease to exist. We combined, hand-drawn and re-applied the shadows from every plate back into one and layered that under the composition.

This film is brought to us by an Amsterdam agency with a challenging treatment from the director. The concept is based on iconic sports that represent the core values of Wijn & Stael, a Utrecht based law firm. Translating these core elements into sports is visualized by morphing lawyers into their respective sportsman/woman and reversing them back to their court dresses, all in slow-motion. 

In order to create the perfect look, special costumes were designed looking exactly like official court dresses complete with a stiff wing collar with two bands, which will be converted into a basketball player, an American football player and a ballerina. During the wardrobe fitting we collaborated closely with the director, the cast and the choreographer Patrizia Pzia to create movements that are true to the sport, had an elegant flow and met all our technical needs.