Venice Beach, CA – When extraordinary athletes reach their prime, they are unstoppable. Whatever their goals, these exceptional people will achieve them. While it may not be possible to point to a single defining quality of a great athlete, they are obviously larger than life…superhuman.

TBWA/Chiat/Day, San Francisco, set out to dramatize the unshakable qualities of a great athlete for its Adidas client. The creative team let their minds roam without constraints and imagined a highly conceptualized commercial starring All-Star NBA player Tracy McGrady of the Houston Rockets (a.k.a. T-Mac). In the end, the creatives knew much of the spot’s effectiveness would come from its execution so they turned to Smuggler director Brian Beletic and digital production studio Digital Domain, Venice Beach, CA.

The :60, appropriately titled “Unstoppable” pits McGrady’s athleticism against a miniature troop of special forces attacking from the land and air. The project required multiple CG elements coexisting throughout the spot, layers and layers of compositing, and a computer-generated gymnasium background wrapped around the scene. “This was a huge job across the board,” said Digital Domain visual effects supervisor Brad Parker. “We were working with all sorts of creative and technical issues—animation, cloth simulation, background simulation, compositing, 3D, scaling issues….by anybody’s standards, this was a very big CG job.”

“Unstoppable” opens innocently on McGrady in a practice gym working on his game. He takes a jump shot from fifteen feet out that is met with a swish. A trainer bounce passes another ball his way and T-Mac turns towards the other basket. Time slows down.

In slow motion, McGrady charges towards the camera as a pair of tiny cable-toting helicopters try to lasso him about the neck. But he keeps charging. Soon, three or four pairs of helicopters are being dragged towards the hoop. On the ground, white armored vehicles, using the lines on the court to camouflage their approach, move in. Paratroopers land on McGrady’s back and drop lines to the vehicles below which brake in an attempt to slow his approach. Men in white suits fire harpoons at McGrady to slow him down. But T-Mac keeps on charging.

In perhaps a subtle tribute to classic monster movies, we see T-Mac from inside of one of the helicopters. Menacingly, he gives a cold stare to the soldiers as if to say, “You can’t stop me.” Another harpoon is fired towards him.

From above, we see McGrady execute a spin move dragging at least ten helicopters and twenty ground vehicles. From under a white tarp on the free throw line, miniature men fire cables over McGrady’s shoe to try to hold him to the floor but nothing will stand in his way. In spite of all the cables, weapons, choppers and ground vehicles circling his every step, McGrady leaps and dunks authoritatively. But then suddenly, there is nothing. No troops or choppers and no cables. Just T-Mac as he lands back on the court floor. He smiles and starts his charge down to the other end of the court.

“When production calls for a CG background, little CG people running under T-Mac’s feet on a CG floor, ten CG helicopters displacing air and casting shadows around T-Mac’s head, live action people—big and tiny—being composited into the scene, tiny harpoons casting tiny cables all over the place, and everything has to look perfectly photoreal, you better be sure about what you are doing,” said Digital Domain senior VP, general manager Ed Ulbrich. “When you are working with athletes, usually your window of opportunity is small. We prevized the entire spot in preparation for the two-day shoot. Brian knew exactly what he wanted so we were able to shoot efficiently and create the rest back at Digital Domain.”

“Our first job was to create an environment,” explains Parker. “There was a small piece of set at the shoot which we used to create the rest of the environment. But that meant that most of the walls and the doors, and all of the bleachers, the wood floor, the lines on the court and everything else that made up this highly stylized practice court had to be created in CG. The entire spot is about 90 percent CG and photogramatry.”

Photogramatry—a process of using two-dimensional photographs to create 3D objects that can be manipulated and relit—was used in some places throughout “Unstoppable” to address scaling issues and create realism. “There was a lot of choreography going on,” added Parker. “With multiple CG elements existing in the scene at one time, you are inviting all sorts of creative and technical issues. One of the biggest challenges was to create these very stylized helicopters and miniaturize them in such a way that they look real. In the end, I think the spot looks nothing short of completely real”

ABOUT DIGITAL DOMAIN

Founded in 1993, Digital Domain, Inc. has established a world-class reputation for innovation and artistry. Recipient of four Academy Awards, the studio has produced visual effects over the last ten years for films that have generated over $4 billion in worldwide theatrical box-office sales.

In the world of commercials, Digital Domain is one of the industry’s largest and most honored creators of visual effects, including the cutting edge advertising campaigns for Adidas and Nike directed by David Fincher. The division consistently works with a stellar group of A-list directors including Michael Bay, Joe Pytka, Bruce Dowad, David Kellogg and Alex Proyas. Industry awards for the commercials division include numerous Clio awards, AICP awards, Cannes Lion awards as well as numerous other industry honors.

Digital Domain is currently one of the largest digital studios in the world and hosts an integrated production studio that includes divisions for Feature Film Visual Effects, Commercial Production, Music Videos, Location Based Entertainment and Feature Film Development.

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Press Contact: Fran Koenig (203) 661 5090, koenigpr@optonline.net

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