Blackbird, a car rig that creates photo-real CG cars [video]
youtube.com
youtube.com
Doctorpangloss's point about product placement is no small thing either. As foreign markets become a bigger part of box office take being able to sell 5 different product placement deals in the same 20 shots is a big win.
The Mill obviously doesn't spell this out in their press release. But this is all about native advertising.
I think they use CG cars instead of real ones for the same reason everything is CG: cost. It's cheaper to just rent one of these from a local film studio than sending out a small fleet of actual cars to film in whatever salt flat they are using this time. It also gives them more control of the look and design of the car. Did you know that 75% of the items in an IKEA catalog are CGI?
Also, I wouldn't be surprised (given the tight release schedule of some car models and the secrecy around them) that this lets them film the advertising of a car concurrently with the final production stages. They don't have any cars coming off of the line to shoot with, so it's easier to rig up the wheelbase (which is established early in production) and get the marketing done concurrently.
I see you didn't watch the video where they showed the wheelbase, wheel sizes/design, width of the platform, as well as suspension tuning can all be adjusted easily.
Sure an SUV and a mini sedan won't but those are extremes.
Considering how many different car models use the same platform even when they are from different manufacturers since many of those are owned by the same parent company these days there is probably enough overlap to put slightly different care models over the same placeholder.
In this case, what we have here is a great tool for vehicular motion capture that can be used in gaming and simulators as well. Ads may have been the motivation to begin with, but other uses can reap the benefits as well.
i count those things not as adverts, but as information sources. An advert is something that tries to convince you to buy _their_ brand of a thing, rather than informing you of the existance of a thing you didnt know about. Suppose there's a universal catalog which lists all possible products/services, then you'd have no need of the former, but the latter is still a zero sum game.
this is the distinction i'd like to make - branding advertising is the zero sum game i was talking about above. Product awareness is simply information - using an advert to tell me about a thing that i didnt know is not really advertising to me, but showing me that a certian music player is so much better, because it makes me hip and cool , _is_ advertising of the zero sum kind.
If i were to buy a music player, i want information, specs, and i'll choose based on objective comparisons. I don't want to, or need to take branding into account, and neither should anyone else! It's illogical!
And yet you do, even if you think you don't. There are hundreds of billions of dollars spent on branding because it works, it's human behavior to have preferences and emotions and tapping into that as a business is the opposite of illogical.
Technology benefits everyone regardless of where it originates. Advertising is also a massive industry and economic driver that has led to the commercialization of the internet and many of the content, services and companies you perhaps take for granted today.
It's also by no means zero-sum as connecting products/services to customers is necessary to actually build all these other non-advertising businesses. For all the hate that advertising gets, the reality is that it's a critical component for any company's success.
In Scandinavia it's always practical/classy/stylish or humorous.
It would be impossible to market a car with some rock music and a man appearing successful by having an attractive wife (maybe just maybe if the woman was driving)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eekrb4wJl-k
The ad "tall girl" (Volkswagen, 2013) has a shot where a man exits a small car and is effectively measured against the car and even the frame (his head is cropped when he straightens up). The idea is that it shows that, after a string of shorties, she's about to meet someone who is tall enough for her.
Interestingly the first ad in that Youtube video is the animated dancing robot Citroen C4 from 2005 -- entirely CG. There's also a full scale model car made out of cake, and other humorous tricks. Not a lot of potential roles for the Blackbird.
Another collection of ads (top 10) starts with a VW car driving along with a dog with his head out the window. I think that would pose similar problems for the Blackbird methodology.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tuXJwR7SKok
It's quite possible that witty art direction and the whole VR/environment mapping/mass customization agenda of the Blackbird are products of two groups of people who just don't intersect in reality.
Also they say "any" car, but what they really mean is any car with worse performance characteristics than this car. (Try using it to simulate a F1 car)
Those usually don't get that much advertisement because not that many people buy them.
It might not fool "car guys" but a large number of car commercials shoot with CG cars now.
Great.
Look at apple's ads. Their almost all renderings. Most people don't care as it looks exactly like the real product.
ie: heavily retouched photos
This looks like a sweet way to shoot car scenes for movies, I wonder if it can take a roll-cage/extra safety features.
A lot of product ads are as well - Ikea catalogue "photos" are almost always CG renders.
http://www.cgsociety.org/index.php/cgsfeatures/cgsfeaturespe...
Mass customization of cars is increasingly possible with high-end 3D printers and tech like this may allow you to insert your own idea of what your car will look like into a Hollywood style commercial.
At the end of the day, car commercials already show people drifting around corners and skidding to a stop. Realistic commercials of cars stuck in traffic isn't going to move any units.