Concrete Makes Tracks With Land Rover Commercial

Concrete has completed full postproduction and stunning audio design for a stylish and sophisticated Land Rover commercial titled 'King of the Mountain' for Young & Rubicum through Wunderman.
Chris Hook was both producer and director on the project through Ambrook Productions. He is well known for his high profile work with Aston Martin and on 'Top Gear'. The sleek footage was filmed in the South of France on Mont Ventoux, well known to cyclists as its distinctive summit is often used in the Tour de France, as it is again in 2009.
The car commercial is designed to be shown on the internet as it splits into two web streams giving viewers the opportunity to click on their preference, whether it be the off or on road sequence. Both web streams end up with each vehicle reaching the summit at the same time as a parallel narrative, conveying the success of the Freelander 2 over each terrain.
Chri Hook, Producer and Director of Ambrook Productions, said: "Land Rover particularly wanted to show that the Freelander 2 is exceptional on road as its off road performance is pretty much 'a given'."
Scott Shand was the Post producer supervising the project at Concrete. Russ Clapham edited the commercial at Concrete, where he cut the footage to a music track. Senior Smoke Artist, Marcus Millichope was responsible for the grading and compositing of the commercial at Concrete. It involved rig removal, removal of people that should not have appeared in a scene and complex helicopter shadows in an aerial shot that were seamlessly taken out as well as helicopter rotors that were also erased.
Chris Hook stated: "I was pleasantly surprised by Concrete's 'can-do' attitude especially at such short notice. Although the project had some curve balls, Concrete dealt with them admirably and I am looking forward to working with them again."
Dino Sofos, Concrete's award-winning Sound Designer created the sound effects for the piece. He worked with mixture of sounds recorded on the rushes and the sound track. Using his highly skilled sound design techniques, he morphed the two together resulting in realistic and stylised elements that were appropriate for the commercial.
The soundtrack, 'Putty In Your Heads', chosen by the agency, meant that the sound design would be mainly music-driven. The Yardbirds' track 'Putty In Your Hands' was later substituted with a composed track due to licensing issues worldwide, despite the remaining members of the group offering to re-record the track especially for the film.
Dino subtly worked the background sounds and car noises around the track. Adding numerous spot effects to enhance the experience, he also synchronised various dramatic sound effects as the camera zoomed in and out on the Land Rovers emphasising its powerful control on the road.
Dino explained: "I made sure that the sounds related to each Land Rover's setting and atmosphere; therefore I used layered sounds to achieve this effect."
The clients enjoyed the version without the music track too because the sounds worked very well on their own as they were so effective.
(KMcA)