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iSHARES “ELEANOR T FITZSIMMONS”

DDB SAN FRANCISCO
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Eleanor T. Fitzsimmons, a talented, wise, and blessed child prodigy, and her magical world, was designed as a metaphor for the iShares and their ETF products. Creatively this was a rich opportunity to build a colorful world, from the ground up.


Production Designer, Fiona Crombie and I worked with digital artists Alexis Christodoulou and Reisinger Studio, who are at the forefront of a new wave of digital architecture, to create the environments for Eleanor’s world. However, this was not a simple blue screen shoot -- instead we applied their designs as digital backgrounds to our practical foregrounds and mid grounds, and in some cases built sets based on their renders.  Rina Yang captured it with a sense of vibrancy that gave us all confidence in this colorful vision, while JAMM built out the digital side of the universe, translating the Cinema 4D artworks into breathing worlds. For finishing, I finally got to work with the master colorist, Jean Clement Soret, grading from his living room, while Barking Owl created a perfect music and sound bed to Luke Lynch @ Parallax’s strong edit.

However all this technical achievement was truly outmatched by the brilliant young actress, Tallulah Connabeare. Tireless, spontaneous and thoughtful, she was discovered by casting directors Sally McCleery & Hayley Williams.

Being a covid shoot on location in Serbia, I am especially grateful for the Tuna/Icon team keeping us safe, as I know we all already look back on this dramatic time with a sense of nostalgia.