We had the pleasure of collaborating with the renowned Gasket Studios on a handful of occasions over the years – without a doubt, my favorite production with Gasket was this Bosley television commercial spot. The agency for this project was Marketing Architects, who led with the creative for this project. The beauty is in the “simplicity” of the creative – a middle-aged college professor speaking directly to camera, as his hair rapidly recedes to balding in front of our eyes, delivering a message about being mindful of hair loss sooner, rather than later.
Gasket Studios specializes in creating award-winning visuals effects and animation – they were tasked by the creative agency to create seamless aging and balding on our talent. Gasket brought me onto this project as Production Coordinator to align the creative from the agency partner to a plan for executing this concept.
The first steps were to find to the right talent and location. We engaged with location manager Charlotte Ariss from Charlotte Ariss Locations to find us an academic setting – our creative team deliberated about the details of the backdrop: should it be a high school type setting or collegiate in nature? After reviewing the visuals and the logistics of our best location options, we decided to film in a classroom auditorium to portray a professor lecturing to a classroom of college students.
The agency wanted to bring in some fresh talent as opposed to using many of the same faces from the Minneapolis scene they had used in previous commercial spots – so we broadened our search nationally and enlisted the casting services of Liz Lewis based in New York City. After a few rounds of casting calls, we determined NYC-based actor Matt Steiner to be our best option.
I coordinated and executed the logistics of Matt’s travel and lodging, making sure to get him in Minneapolis days early for a wardrobe fitting and some trial runs with our practical VFX head attachment for our balding process.
With all these bits aligning, we still had to hire the right crew to execute the production itself. We enlisted the services of Jonny Stuckmayer, a fantastic director of photography with a vast number of commercial projects under his belt. Though this setup was relatively simple (one shot for the duration of the spot, all on a tripod) for a DP with his level of experience, he helped create a frame that felt authentic, like an occupied college classroom.
But what really helped the classroom feel authentic, “lived in” so to speak, was the efforts of Production Designer Christy Holt. She took care of wardrobe and finding all the props that played into the background of the scene – Christy is one of the best and a true gem to work with each and every time.
As you can tell, there were so many moving parts on this project and a lot to coordinate – in order to execute this without any hiccups, detailed, precise planning was a must in pre-production. That fell on my shoulders to produce a clear plan to execute the vision of all the creatives on the project. And with all these moving parts, oftentimes in production it is easy to lose sight of something and the project budget balloons out of control.
The shoot day itself went off without a hitch. All the professionals we brought into the mix performed their roles to perfection, resulting in a highly collaborative, successful and on schedule production. After the dust settled on the production, I spearheaded collecting and collating the various invoices and expenses so everyone was paid on time for their efforts.
The post production was handled by Gasket and their team of VFX experts and the results speak for themselves. In the end, all the audience saw was our talent Matt Steiner, but as you can see, there were so many important people who all make an impact to create this commercial spot.
Agency: Marketing Architects
Production Company: Gasket Studios
Creative Director: Greg Shultz
Senior Producer: Dan Helgemoe
Production Coordinator: Matthew Deery
Director: Darren Tibbits
Director of Photography: Jonny Stuckmayer
First Assistant Camera: Justin Blake
Teleprompter: Sara Hasling
Audio Engineer: Owen Brafford
Production Designer: Christy Holt
Hair and Makeup: Kristin Schmid
Gaffer: Doug Gander
Key Grip: Layton Umpleby
Grip: Alan Taverna
VFX Supervisor: Justin Greiner
Location Manager: Neil Millington
Production Assistant: Mario Howard
