Are you not getting a charge out of commercials these days?

Well, a spot for General Mills’ Cinnamon Toast Crunch Cereal packs some energized fun. It was also a highly-charged experience for the production team who worked on the 30, airing in Vancouver only.

Conceived by fcb Toronto art director Barry Chemel and writer Jody Overend, the ‘Cinnamon Toast Crunch’ spot features animated plug characters – a wiry, metal, electrically circuited little boy and girl – who are sick and tired of plain old breakfast cereal and languish limply in a sadly dimmed, wired world.

But, after plugging in to the new cereal, bodies spark, coil-wire eyes pop out of red-lit sockets, wiry hair is shocked straight, lightning flashes through the kitchen – all from the electrifying boost provided by their high-voltage Cinnamon Toast Crunch.

Vancouver animation house Bowes Productions, in association with Teddy Bear Productions, a Vancouver commercial and audio production house, also got a boost out of this stop-motion animation project since most of their previous work was in claymation.

Bowes’ Lisa Jane Gray constructed all the artwork and, using plasticine, carved out the initial molds for the plug characters’ bodies and clothing. Bowes head David Bowes hired one of England’s top model makers, John Craney, whose credits include work for Ardmann, an Oscar-winning u.k. animation house, to create armatures from aluminum.

‘They used to be made of lead, but now, with aluminum, they are much more lightweight and easier to work with,’ explains Ted Bishop, executive producer and president of Teddy Bear. Craney then constructed the models from latex.

To create the range of expressions for the plug people – from drained, dull boredom to extreme Prozac-level happiness – 32 interchangeable head molds were constructed.

Bowes built a three-by-three-foot electrical world set for the eight-inch plug characters. ‘We used all sorts of material – molded plastics, silicone, latex,’ says Bishop. ‘We went to electrical shops and bought old computer chips, electrodes from microwaves, transistors from radios, wire, electrical odds and ends.’

To create the wired set, the production team went shopping at miniature doll house shops. ‘We went nuts, we had so much fun buying all sorts of little utensils, blenders, furniture,’ says Bishop.

To create the super-spark ending of the spot, where the plugged world is jump-started with a mondo electrical surge, the set’s floor, chairs, microwave and fridge were electrically wired to flash and flicker.

‘We used 16 different wiring circuits in the set, all for one little commercial,’ says Bishop, adding that the chest cavities of the plug people contained a circuit board so they would also light up.

While working in New Zealand, Gray met a camera maker named Steven Greenwood who had designed a special 35mm stop-motion camera, and they ordered one for the project.

‘With the other cameras you were basically shooting blind because the film had to be developed at a lab before you knew if the animation worked,’ explains Bishop. ‘But this specially designed camera has a built-in video assist and frame grabber. With the video assist you can look at a computer screen and view all the pictures you have taken and, looking through the camera, see the shot you are about to take. So before you develop the film you know if the animation looks good, if it’s working.’

Bishop says the specially designed cameras also allow animators to be more daring and experimental.

‘During the shoot, you can see what is working and what isn’t and make changes. You can be more brave and try new stuff.’

‘It cuts down on time as well,’ he adds. The project, which also entailed close-up shots of the cereal wafer, lightning flashes and milk running through tubing computer generated on Flame by Tracy Friesen and Gary Walker at Rainmaker Studiosm took two months to wrap. Debbie Tregale edited.

This spot was too much fun to be considered work, says Bishop, adding Craney enjoyed the experience so much discussions are underway to have him join the Bowes team permanently.

‘It was amazing,’ Bishop says, ‘we were like kids playing in a candy store.’ CB