Okay, I admit It. In 3D, It’s definitely better...!
Signs, signage, and pictograms are, for me, an inexhaustible source of animation subjects. Even though symbols and typefaces are very powerful tools for communication, I remain a huge fan of those little signboard figures. A year ago, I had some fun with my own experiments on Rebellion, then I got really hooked on Mr. Reeves’ 3D version.
So when Framestore (VFX on 007, Dark Knight, X-Men, Superman, Harry Potter, among others...) tackles this kind of exercise, it’s definitely worth a look!
No Restrictions was created by the TBWA agency for Neotel, a South African telecommunications company. For more information about the making of the spot, check it out here — and thanks to Vincent for the link! After making Hector’s Life for Renault, the guys at Framestore wanted to go bigger this time, with hundreds of little figures to animate!
I think the compositing is really well done. The lighting and color grading, the reflections in the windows, the tracking, the interaction with real elements — everything works great! The characters fit naturally into the shots and feel alive. In short, great work :) If I ever try something with signs again, it’ll have to be in 3D — it just looks too good to pass up ^^
PS: If anyone knows the music, I’m all ears! Shazam couldn’t recognize it -_-
About the author
I am the Founder of Mattrunks. I work as Creative Director and Motion Designer in my studio. I also create video tutorials to share my passion of motion.