C. O. R. E. Digital Pictures is quickly becoming known in production circles as the digital goose master.

According to Kirsten Marshall, c. o. r. e. executive producer for commercials, the running joke around the office has become, ‘If you want dinosaurs you go to Industrial Light and Magic and if you want geese you go to c. o. r. e’.

So when a 30-second Ikea spot directed by The Partners’ Film Company’s Eric Yealland demanded geese, c. o. r. e. got the call.

While producer Brenda Surminski at agency Roche Macaulay & Partners won’t reveal the actual budget, she will say the job came in at under $500,000.

The spot opens with a woman setting up her patio for the nice weather. Upon hearing the honking of geese overhead she looks up and our attention is focused on a contemplative goose asking his fowl friend, ‘Hey! How do you think they know when to put that stuff out?’ Replies his pal, ‘Instinct I guess.’

Although c. o. r. e. has made computer-generated 3D model geese for other projects such as the feature film Fly Away Home and a 3D imax demo, these inquisitive talking creatures are originals.

Using the research and development acquired while working on Fly Away Home, the team at c. o. r. e. readapted the birds, repainted the textures and composited them into the scene, making this particular gaggle of geese exclusive to Ikea.

Working with Side Effects’ Prisms and Renderman software and Silicon Graphics Impact computer workstations, animator Howard Cassidy says the entire process took about a month to complete.

According to Cassidy, who was working on geese for the first time, dealing with a real bird that everyone is familiar with and creating it from scratch on a computer proved more difficult than other projects he has done in the past.

‘The biggest challenge was actually rendering the geese in terms of their look and their textures to actually make them look believable,’ says Cassidy.

In keeping with their fair-feathered following, c. o. r. e. will soon begin work on a feature film for Disney called Flubber starring Robin Williams and some computer-generated snow geese.

Roche Macaulay’s David Creighton was the creative director.

Sean Valentini was the cinematographer and Evelyn Arthur produced for Partners’. The spot was edited by David Hicks at Panic & Bob.