Toronto ad agency Ammirati Puris Lintas has brought together the talents of Toronto’s Flashcut Editing and dave (Dome Audio Video & Effects), a division of NetStar Communications, to provide post-production and visual effects on its new Labatt Blue Light campaign. The tv ads made their debut on the ctv Academy Awards broadcast, March 26.

The campaign consists of three 30-second spots, with one spot airing in a 60-second version as well. The ads are currently airing in Ontario only, with two of them to play later in major northeastern u.s. markets. The commercials aim to dispel the cold weather blahs with sunny images of people engaging in various forms of summer high jinks.

The creators feel the spots, although low key, offer something different from traditional beer ads. ‘It’s meant to be everyday life,’ explains Flashcut’s Mick Griffin, who performed the offline editing and directed the post process.

‘You just drop into something that’s going on and you wonder, ‘What’s this?’ and then when you get to understand what’s happening, you’re gone altogether.’

Wain Choi, apl’s art director on the campaign, explains the agency wanted to capture ‘the little things you used to do when you were a kid, like skipping stones, jumping over a sprinkler, or talking underwater and trying to guess what other people are saying.’

It may sound like a straightforward endeavor to recreate these classic summer scenarios, but the crew ended up having to travel halfway across the globe.

With production slated for mid-to-late January, our-home-and-native-land couldn’t pass for itself circa July, so a warmer location was required. In the end, apl chose New Zealand for its similar lakes, mountains and foliage. The talent was assembled from a pool of Aussies and Kiwis accompanied by a voice coach to help them sound Canuck (without resorting to punctuating each sentence with ‘Eh’).

Adding to the irony of a Canadian body double is the fact that apl used a British director-dop team. Director Pedro Romhanyi, repped here by Blink Pictures, was chosen to bring some of the edge and playfulness he displayed in music videos for monosyllabic Britpop bands Blur, Pulp and Suede, as well as in the ‘Mellow Yellow’ spot for Gap. Joining him on the Blue Light campaign was his frequent collaborator, cameraman Adrian Wild.

The crew was greeted by sunshine in New Zealand, but overcast conditions and rain eventually interfered with shooting. The production consequently executed many shots using a blue-screen backdrop. dave designer and Inferno artist Mike Morey later filled in this space with shots of bright blue skies to suggest summer and better reinforce the Blue Light image.

There was a rare meteorological mix on the spot in which a braggart reminds his friends that he owns the stone-skipping record. ‘It was sunny, but we also had rain that day,’ Choi recalls. ‘The camera captured all the highlights of the raindrops.’ Morey had to digitally paint out the precipitation as well as remove a couple of unwelcome vehicular intruders – a car and a boat, specifically. (For more on Morey’s contribution, see sidebar, this page.)

Differing alcohol advertising laws presented a further challenge. Unlike Canada, the u.s. allows tv ads to show people in everyday outdoor activities holding bottles or cans of beer, so after shooting the Canadian version (sans brew in hand), the crew had some of the actors repeat themselves with bottles of Blue Light for the u.s. cut. In the case of one particular shot, the only take deemed satisfactory had an actor with a beer, so dave digitally deleted the bottle for Canadian presentation.

Although skies were clear for a segment in which a group of swimmers tries to guess what one of them is saying while submerged, two previous weeks of rain had left the lake water green and unattractively murky. (dave would later color the water Blue Light blue). The crew moved to an outdoor swimming pool to film the underwater portion, and while the pool offered the appropriate color, it was too clear.

‘In certain parts of the frame you could see the end of the pool,’ Griffin explains. ‘We spent a lot of time throwing it out of focus, blending it in, and replacing parts of the water to make sure people wouldn’t see it.’ Griffin and dave had to make sure the above-water and below-water shots, taken at the two different locations, blended smoothly into one motion as the camera follows the plunging actors.

Choi sat with ace dave colorist Bill Ferwerda in a daVinci suite to oversee some touching-up of the stone-skipping spot. Choi’s main concern was to ‘punch up’ the colors in the ad, making the segment consistent with the two preceding it. Ferwerda added shadows on the actors for drama and greater overall contrast, cutting through the fog that permeated the two shoot days.

Griffin understands that since the visual effects in the spots are not of the spectacular, explosive variety, viewers will not notice the work behind them. ‘We finessed it as much as we had time for,’ he says, ‘doing things that, in the end, nobody’s supposed to see.’

But that’s exactly what Choi and apl had in mind: ‘We wanted to make [the campaign] as real as possible. You don’t notice [the visual effects] at all, which means these guys did a great job.’ Choi stresses the collaborative nature of the project, adding, ‘There are so many people working on tv commercials, and we were fortunate to have all the good people.’