The popularity of the UFC has exploded from it’s underground roots to spread far and wide in this new promo for the 6th season of SpikeTV’s hit show. With the recent partnership between SpikeTV and the UFC, the campaign was expanded to promote not only the show, The Ultimate Fighter, but to help brand Spike as the Home of the UFC.
The biggest challenge was representing the ever widening popularity of the UFC, as the propaganda posters, stickers and billboards spread ever wider through out the cityscape. In order to illustrate the range of locations, the production of the spot combined eclectic techniques, including live action background elements, 2d and 3d animation all seamlessly blended together.
While long-time BL:ND collaborator Rick Spitznass scoured downtown Los Angeles with a Hi-Def, straight-to-disk camera, to capture background plates, Erik flew out to New York to partner up with Terry Minogue of Spike for a greenscreen shoot with the two coaches of the show, Matt Serra and Matt Hughes. While there, I was able to shoot additional photo stills for backgrounds including some billboards in Times Square.
Back in LA, all of the diverse elements were sorted through and assembled into a story. By combining photos and videos of locations from both LA and NY as well as modeling a couple of environments in 3d, we were able to create a generic cityscape filled with UFC propaganda.
I love this.
Was this done in After Effects?
How do you guys operate? Do you have a design team who pitch the ad with the style templates?
How long is the entire process?
Thanks
Yes, most of this was done using After Effects, except for the 3d shots which were either Cinema 4d or Maya. Some of the elements were also shot with a high-def video camera and then integrated into the shots. The design team produced several different designs at the start of the project, many of which are shown above. Once the final design was selected, the production process took around one month to complete.