Kohler: Never TOO Next [30 sec]

Credits & Description:

The latest addition to the "Never TOO" campaign is "Never TOO Next" featuring a TV spot set in the not too distance future which is anything but your average toilet commercial. It portrays tech-on-tech love when robots attending a sophisticated housewarming party end up convening in the restroom as they discover and wow over the multi-functional Veil Intelligent Toilet by KOHLER. The robots are relieved to find that in the difficult-to-navigate world of human customs, the high-tech Veil Intelligent toilet is not only a marvel of engineering, but also a true kindred spirit.Agency: DDB Chicago
Media: TV
Category: Other
Client: Kohler
Agency: DDB Chicago
Production: MJZ
Country: United States of America
Chief Creative Officer: John Maxham
Executive Creative Director: Jean Batthany
Group Creative Director: Nathan Monteith
Creative Director/ art director: Kurt Riemersma
Creative Director/ writer: Matt Ben Zeev
Executive Producer: Debora den Iseger
Chief Production Officer: Diane Jackson
Executive Art Producer: Suzanne Koller
Senior Print Producer: Carla Nieto
Senior Business Director: Jenn Nolden
Account Executive: Kate Karens
Account Manager: Kirby Summers
Production Manager: Scott Terry
Production Company: MJZ
President: David Zander
Senior Executive Producer: Eriks Krumins
Director: Dante Ariola
Line Producer: Natalie Hill
DP: Phillipe Le Sourd
Production Designer: Christopher Glass
Editorial: No6TV
Editor: Amanda Perry
Assistant editor: Danny Fogarty
Senior Producer: Kendra Desai
VFX: Jamm Visual
VFX Supervisor/Lead CG Lighter: Andy Boyd
VFX Supervisor/Lead Compositor: Jake Montgomery
Lead CG FX Artist: Zachary DiMaria
Flame Artist: Pat Munoz
Flame Artist: David Hernandez
Nuke Artist: Kenneth Brown
CG Artist: Nha Ca Chau
CG Artist: Huisoo Lee
CG Modeling: Aaron Hamman
CG Modeling: Joel Durham
Executive Producer: Asher Edwards
Producer: Ashley Greyson
Color: Company 3
Colorist: Stefan Sonnenfeld
Executive Producer: Rhubie Jovanov
Music House: PullPullPull
Composer: Mitch Davis
Executive Producer: Scott Brittingham
Audio Post: The Studio, Chicago
Sound engineer(s): Nicholas Papaleo
Sound assistant: Bobby Lord
Audio Post Producer: Stacey Simcik
Print Post production: Gianini
CGI Artist: Tim McMahon
CGI Artist: Sebastian Szyszka
CGI Artist: Jeffrey Gilles
Director: Scott Giannini
Executive Producer: Kevin O’Connell
Photography:
Photographer: Michael Huijbregtse (Kohler Co.)
Retoucher: Tom Waterloo (The studio, DDB Chicago)
Our VFX team brought to life the incredible concept art for these robots. The director and DP directed actors Erik and Neva to capture live action footage of the automaton couple, whose movements our VFX team matched with CG later on. This allowed them to use the actors’ performances to give the behavior of the robots an uncanny human-like quality.
“Our CG modelers designed and assembled the CG robots in a similar manner to how you would in the real world,” explains one VFX Supervisor. “We modeled all of the bolts, hydraulics, sculpted panels, support structures and wiring so that the robots would move and articulate realistically. We also pushed the rendering using a lot of translucent and refractive surfaces to show off the internals ”
The director's designs had amazing translucent and refractive paneling that showed off some of the complexity of the robot's internals. There were many different kinds of materials all reflecting off one other, either glowing or bouncing light around, while also being refracted through the exterior panels - something that has always been extremely difficult to create in CG but so rewarding when achieved.
The comp team seamlessly integrated the CG robot renders into live action back plates and made them the life of the party, explains one VFX Supervisor “We wanted to preserve as much as we could of the actors’ performances, while still maintaining the visual design and concept of the robots. Our comp team used a combination of Flame and Nuke software to carry out the CG integration and 2D clean up. The new Flame UV tools were especially helpful for the fine-tuning and locking of performance lineup to the CG.”