VIDEO-Science Channel Smashes the Walls of Perception in New Brand Spot - PromaxBDA Brief

by Justin W. Sanders  |  02.18.2015Close

“Science is for rebels,” says Grant Reynolds, co-host of Science Channel’s new show What Could Possibly Go Wrong, in a 2015 brand spot that merges live-action footage with high-impact visual effects. Drinking a beer handed off to him by a friendly drone, Reynolds proceeds to guide us through a warehouse full of spontaneous invention and mind-blowing technology.

“It’s your mind giving the finger to what’s known,” he continues, “and letting your imagination fist-bump the impossible.”

Come to think of it, “…giving the finger to what’s known” could actually be a pretty great tagline, but if that’s taking things a bit too far, it’s still exciting to hear those words in the thick of a big-budget promo. And with the utterance of those words, any lingering doubts about the network’s current take on things are resolved. These days, said Science Channel SVP of marketing Dan Bragg, “we really want a nice swagger to our network, an attitude and a distinct point of view. To feel young and fresh and innovative but still accessible.”

Just one year ago, Science Channel programs such as What Could Possibly Go Wrong (premiered February 7) and All-American Makers (premiered January 21) heralded the current era of frenzied innovation, celebrating a time of inclusion and limitless possibilities. When it came to swagger, those shows and others walked the walk, so Bragg and the marketing team’s new brand spot needed to talk the talk – but they were having trouble channeling those series’ collective energy.

“Typically when we’ve done brand spots, we’ve built them out of our shows and [used] editorial solutions and simple graphic solutions to tell a story,” said Bragg. But this time around, working with Science Channel supervising producer Matt Laster, Bragg found that they kept running up against the same problem: “It didn’t feel unique. It felt like we’d done this before.”

What happened next could be ripped from the pages of any number of classic light-bulb moments from throughout science’s glorious history. Laster entered a coffee shop on a fall afternoon determined to bang out a script that would take the spot to the next level. In his mind he had an image representing what people often mistook science to be: “a stodgy old classroom.” He needed to alter that perception and had an approach to doing it that was profound in its unabashed simplicity: “I wanted to break that idea.”

So Laster did, in the most literal way imaginable. He proceeded to write a script in which Reynolds actually “picks up a bat and smashes it and takes us into a brand new world,” he said. “A world open to robots and drones that deliver beer to you and all this other great stuff.”

When Bragg saw Laster’s script, he was excited. Not only did the concept, a walking tour of what was essentially an innovation factory, allow for any number of cool gizmos, gadgets and set pieces, but it tapped into a new trend in science that viewers could connect with at a human level: the maker movement, in which “people are inventing things in group spaces and basically just pulling out their pliers and tool belts and building what’s inside their brains,” said Bragg. “One of the key things we wanted is to convey is this idea of science being relevant to our everyday lives, so having this maker space was a really great anchor for what the network stands for.”

To fill that maker space, Science Channel called on the talents of Wolf and Crow, a visual effects company already bookmarked by Bragg’s team for a future project due to its ability to seamlessly integrate CGI and live-action for clients such as ESPN, Ubisoft and AT&T. Wolf and Crow also knew how to plan and execute a complicated shoot while adhering to a limited budget.

In fact, Wolf and Crow was able to shoot the entire spot in one day, through the strategic use of green screens in a downtown Los Angeles warehouse. It mapped out Reynolds’ walking tour of the space across 26 shooting stations, allowing for quick set-ups between each shot. With the green screens allowing for the space to be fleshed out in post, even a subtle re-positioning of the camera would make the new angle “look like an entirely new space,” said Laster. “It wasn’t a big space but they shot it really effectively and through the magic of green screen made it seem so much bigger.”

Many details, such as the beer-bringing drone and, naturally, the fist-bumping alien, were created in post. But other details were objects brought in or created by a skilled art department, including the atomizer Reynolds sticks his fist into at the end to withdraw the glowing orb of Science Channel’s logo. The chalkboard he sits in front of at the beginning of the spot, though enlarged using CGI, was an actual board, and all the formulas meticulously etched on it real math equations. Laster knew this to be true because Reynolds’ What Could Possibly Go Wrong co-host Dr. Kevin Moore, who makes a cameo in the spot, is a metallurgist and mineralogist with a Ph.D from Johns Hopkins University.

“One [of the formulas] in particular has to do with the surface of a bubble and how that plays out geometrically,” said Laster. “Everything on that board is legit.”

Layering the details of the maker warehouse world in post, Wolf and Crow added several fun embellishments to give the spot high replay value, such as the aircraft that glides in to land behind Reynolds at the end. Their work results in a rich onscreen world where it feels as though anything is possible.

“When you look at something like Outrageous Acts of Science and What Could Possibly Go Wrong and All-American Makers, they’re still fully embedded in science and fully all about science,” said Bragg. “But they’re more relevant. They have a different edge to them and they feel slightly younger…We’re trying to continue to bring in a broader audience and let people know that science isn’t scary.”

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