Lexus Dark Ride

LEXUS DARK RIDE

Do you ever wonder, in the intense heat of the moment, if you could keep it together and make the right choice under pressure? Skinny, Skunk/Stink digital, and Speedshape did exactly that with every aspect of the Lexus CT200h “Dark Ride” cinematic interactive commercial, and as a result, movie and web audiences are going to be joining actor norman reedus for a serious thrill ride.

Since there were no lexus CT200h vehicles available for the shoot, cd Jonas Hallberg of the meteoric agency skinny nyc asked us to replace the stand-in toyota matrix with a digital CT200h. Then, he paired us with director James Brown, producer Ari McGarry and the rest of the highly-capable Skunk/Stink digital production team to really make it shine.

Right out of the gate, we knew we had to make custom low light nighttime markers to create better tracking with the beautiful low-light photography by Claudio Miranda. Once captured, we used the 3d model provided by lexus to seamlessly and transparently build the CT200h over the proxy matrix. Then, to create the interactive user pov experience, we worked with Skunk/Stink to find the ideal lens and field of view to film the experience to perfection.

It’s little wonder that Dark Ride was the winner of TheFWA SOTD, SOTM, SOTY. (Yes, SOTY stands Site Of The Year.) And there was one thing that all of the auto blogs failed to mention in their raves about the creative – CGI. Nobody even had a clue.

Executive Creative Director - Nels Dielman
Agency - Skinny
Skinny Creative Director - Jonas Hallberg
Director - James Brown
Producer - Ari McGarry
Editor - Jono Griffith
VFX Supervisor - Connor Meechan
CG Supervisor - Ilya Astrakhan
Executive Producer - Craig Bernard
VFX - Speedshape Venice