Intro

There’s a vivaciousness present in youth sports that is unlike anything else in the sports world. The marriage of discipline and physical mastery with the raw openness and play of teenagehood is a distinct combination, and its visceral energy is palpable to anyone who has ever attended a high school baseball game. Our experience working with real teen athletes in our sports documentary work has given us a shorthand around capturing this special blend of teen spirit and sports, and we’ll put this to use to tap into the genuine spirit of these baseball and softball teams. We’re excited about the possibility of combining the authentic edge of these young athletes with an artful and textural visual language to elevate these spots into a distinctly cinematic space that emphasizes how totally transformative the Dick’s store experience is to each of our players.

Approach

In order to ensure the viewer feels what it’s truly like to work tirelessly for the greater good at work and home, we will capture our subjects with a nuance and specificity that will evoke that truth. We’ll draw from tenets of documentary filmmaking and create a framework for our talent to explore the emotions of each scene with space to draw from their real experiences as inspiration for their performances. In order to ensure organic performances, we want our cast to have some experience in the roles they are playing. We’ll be open to their natural blocking or reactions, capturing their real vulnerability within each scripted beat. We’ll limit our crew in the room to create the sort of intimate creative environment that will allow our cast to feel comfortable to express themselves truthfully and give us those moments that will make these spots resonate. We’ll create a narrative that highlights the interconnectivity of the human experience. Our characters will feel like people we all know from our own communities, and as a result, our viewers will feel the impact their important work has on the fabric of society. This will spark viewers to relate to them on a human level, not just feel grateful for their service.

Tone

The types of gatherings where V.S.O.P. is enjoyed are the gatherings we want to be at.  We go out for moments like these.  We remember moments like these.  They carry us and energize our joie de vivre. Either we see ourselves and our friends in these scenes, and connect in through a shared personal experience, or we see something aspirational, which draws us in through the hunger of possibility.  Crafting each scene with intentional intimacy and honest connection allows us to feel close to these people.

We will play into those universal human moments of connection that often happen so organically over a shared cocktail.  Our piece will hit on these subtle emotional beats while remaining sleek and crisp.  We’ll tap into the innate swagger of young professionals that are already accomplished and self-assured, but still engaged, introspective, and curious. Of people who are constantly stretching themselves to level up, to broaden their perspective.  Of people unafraid to not only share but listen.  We’ll meet each character in the middle of their story and catch snippets that leave us wanting to know more, wanting to know these friends, find these gatherings, and plunge ourselves in.

Cinematography

Our visual world should be grounded in the real world, but plussed up with a bit of color. This campaign is all about fun, so we’ll want to balance a relatable, believable look with exciting, energetic camera movements that invite viewers into a world that’s playful and full of life. Our camera should feel fluid and personable, like it is just another character moving through each of our scenes. Because this film is a celebration of language and culture, there should be a sense of traveling communicated through our camerawork. The spot should start off slow, with some stillness that helps us ground into our world as we enter into the first vignette. But as soon as we meet Duo for the first time and the music kicks in, we’re off—and from there, we’re constantly drifting and floating and in kinetic motion. We’ll whip, zoom into a scene, slow down and drift, then zoom out of a scene, utilizing a variety of techniques to build a steady rhythm into our narrative. This rhythm will crescendo in our energetic karaoke and KBBQ scenes before softening back to stillness for our ending beat.

This new Kevlar product is the definition of cutting edge. It's an innovation that is about to revolutionize the future of protection, and it should claim hero status through each moment of our films. Our cast’s focused and confident performances will speak to the ease and peace of mind that the vest’s groundbreaking design offers its wearers.

Our coverage of it should always emphasize its uncompromising flexibility, durability, and comfort. We want to see it in constant motion—jumping, sprinting, stretching, twisting—illustrating how seamlessly it melds and moves with the body. We’ll use tech mesh dots to emphasize the details of the vest’s versatility and highlight the vest as the center of every shot. It would be amazing to design a white version of the vest for our shoot so we can play with reflection of the colored lights, enhancing our visual language and also bringing further emphasis to the vest itself and making it feel like a true star.

We want to capture our viewers immediately and hook them in with the authenticity and specificity of each character. We’ll do this through a killer cast of distinctive, memorable characters who can deliver captivating performances. Our cast should feel visually distinct and we will cast with attention to diversity of age, gender, and race to create an ensemble who reflect the real Purple market. Each of our talent should feel relatable but effortlessly cool in their connection to their own identity and have unique characteristics that make them stand out. Maybe our entrepreneur has beautiful freckles or glasses, or our instructor has an interesting hairstyle. We want people who have charisma, stand out, and feel naturally genuine on-camera. Our executive might be an inventor of a revolutionary product that has propelled his company from the basement of his mom’s house to Fortune 500 level, while our instructor could be someone who is back on track to qualify for the Olympics after a terrible injury derailed her career. These characters are free thinkers and trailblazers. They’re determined and committed. They don’t worry about what their peers think of them. They light the way for others, and we should feel that from the energy our cast exudes.

Locations

We’re looking for diverse landscapes within close proximity and contemporary locations with region-specific architectural nods. Countries like Iceland, the Czech Republic, and Poland all present incredible natural and architectural resources that feel aligned with our vision.

For our indoor scenes, we will have the ability to control light, sound, and ability to dress raw spaces with architecturally identifiable finishings—like European arches or Japanese line work. Additionally, we would love to shoot at the Cologne Rimowa factory to capture the authentic Rimowa origin and utilize the factory’s elevated aesthetic as the foundation for our film. Our outdoor locations will give us that experience of grandiosity and natural phenomena that’s essential to our emotional arc. Traversing aerials and sweeping macro shots of environments will drive the expansive feeling of the film.

Production Design

The production design for these spots is so exciting. It’s where we’ll get the chance to build out each of our unique worlds with the detail and specificity that will make each place come alive and give them that awe-factor. This is the place where we can lean into the abstract tone in our scripts and really bring it all to life. Each space should feel like a quirky interpretation of a familiar environment.

It’s important to me to tie every department together in all of my films, so they follow a precise thread that ensures our characters are believable and tell a strong story. I’m excited to get really creative here and build in lots of little moments on each set that will take our worlds to a really joyfully absurd place. I’m unfortunately allergic to white walls. This doesn’t mean we’re going for a rainbow apartment, but a touch of baby blue, a warm coral, or some mint on the walls goes a very long way to create unique spaces with character and make the camera happy. I like to hand pick every accessory so I can make sure everything is intentional and tells a specific story about each character.

Edit

In the edit room, we will introduce the pacing that will bring home the humor and irreverence of this unique spot. I’ll shoot deliberately, so we can deliver a wide range of assets. My aim is to provide the editor with the puzzle pieces they need to build out the most joyful and funny moments, allowing them to communicate the playful spirit of the script - all while honouring the original flow of the script and therefore the physical flow we’ll build our path through the bar on. We should feel the energy and spontaneity of each moment between our characters really organically, as though we’ve just stumbled upon them, lucky to catch them before they slip away.

Sound Design

An immersive soundscape is absolutely key to telling our story. Whether the whooshing winds on top of a mountain, or the thundering movement of a waterfall, we are actually hearing what our goose hears as he moves through each location. We’ll hear the hustle and bustle of the chalet party as we move through the space—though we never see the gathering, our experience will be saturated in its energy through sound.  

We’ll feel the directionality and spatiality of our soundscape at all times. Our sound will move from left to right, or whoosh past us to bring us into the moment. We’ll even enhance the experience of our bird through sound, by bringing in subtle noises he makes or the steady thumping of his strong wings.