Directed by Zoic’s Chris Jones and led by VFX Supervisor Vince Blin, the Zoic team in collaboration with The Richards Group, assembled four “motion posters” for the 2016 college football season, each of which took the 1980s as its chief source of inspiration, and featured the Dr Pepper character – and icon – Larry Culpepper.
In each :15 spot, Larry is frozen in time while the world moves in ultra slow-motion. Each moment is the perfect 80’s heroic poster frame up as we hear Larry’s voice over begin, extolling the greatness of Dr Pepper.
To achieve the ideal results for these spots, Chris Jones approached the creative from the perspective of a still fashion shoot, rather than a traditional film making perspective. The key was creating the ability to control both light and action. To achieve this, all of the posters were shot as two separate elements. The first element was the hero talent. Larry needed to be lit perfectly, with a uniform fill and a hot key, to give him shape and an epic, heroic feel. To maintain this control, Larry was shot against green screen. The corresponding backgrounds were then shot at high-speed on location. This gave the Zoic team the flexibility to create the elaborate scenarios required to really push these posters over the top in 80s “style.” Additionally, shooting the separate foreground and backgrounds allowed the team to combine multiple frame rates to seamlessly create the effect of Larry being frozen while the backgrounds moved in ultra slow-motion.
Each poster culminates with Larry coming to life and shattering the illusion. Our hero looks straight into camera for a line delivery only Larry Culpepper could give.
We’re left with one, simple message.
It’s more than a soda. It’s a tradition.