Lights, camera, action

Not many screen production students have the chance to create a broadcast television commercial, but a unique partnership with Resene saw Whitireia Community Polytechnic students do just that. As part of an in-house film competition, students were required to generate a unique concept for a commercial, pitch it and then work in teams to generate 30-second long ads. The students were given complete creative freedom, as long as the commercial met the client brief and used paint colours from the latest Resene The Range fashion colours collection – allowing them an invaluable opportunity to gain industry experience with a real-life client and extend their technical and creative skills.

Together, the 11 students enrolled in New Zealand Diploma in Screen Production Level 6 pooled their ideas and talents together to create five commercials under the guidance of their lead tutor, Corey Le Vaillant. Corey’s Upper Hutt-based film and television company, Ingot Films, has been promoting positive, safe production experiences for their clients, talent and crew for more than a decade. His 12 years in the industry has involved work on eight feature films, two tv series and more than a dozen short films, and combined with his previous experience as a professional theatre manager, Corey has plenty of real-life problem solving to draw from for a mentorship role.

“We were impressed by the creative concepts that the students were able to come up with and had quite some debate trying to narrow it down to the five that would be made. Choosing the winner was unanimous – the paint, colour, intensity and sheer fun of Dan’s commercial made it a stand out,” says Resene CEO Nick Nightingale.

“From the beginning, Dan’s original concept was strong and playful,” says Corey. “He always wanted the talent (me) to let loose and have fun. Dan and I discussed the characterisation of the piece often, so that he could feel confident in making clear and precise directions.

“As a producer, I love to see when a crew makes a creative breakthrough. In this case, as a tutor and supervisor, I got to see the ‘light bulb’ moment in students’ eyes. That’s my favourite part: knowing that even when the students are under time pressures they can find fantastic ways to get the shots and story they are after.”

Dan says that he was drawn to the magic of movies from an early age. “My family moved from the Coromandel to Taranaki when I was quite young, from the beautiful Whangamatā beach to a farming town where – at the time – there wasn’t a lot to do. My brother, my friends and I would re-enact movie scenes and create little stories that we would play the roles in, which I think was an early indicator that I wanted to make films. You kind of had to be creative to have any kind of fun in Inglewood.”

“Star Wars and The Lord of The Rings definitely had an impact on me growing up, but as my tastes matured, I fell in love with films like Fight Club, GoodFellas and anything by Edgar Wright – which have had the most influence on what I want to make.”

Despite the challenges of the pandemic, Dan was able to complete two screen production programmes (Level 5 and Level 6) at Whitireia. With his education wrapped, Dan hopes to work his way up in the industry – preferably in lighting or camerawork, to start – so that he can learn how to work as efficiently as possible in a crew setting. “As an aspiring writer and director, the projects I would most love to work on are very absurd and outlandish concepts that utilise the art form as creatively as possible. Like, crazy cosmic horror movies that border on comedy and just get whacky with it. Those are the stories I want to tell.”

When asked what actor or director he wishes he could make a film with, Dan’s top pick was a New Zealander. “I would love to throw Antony Starr in an over-the-top horror movie as the villain. He’s come a long way since Outrageous Fortune and is someone I would love to work with.”

During the planning stage of his commercial, it was Resene’s bold primary hues that Dan was most drawn to using. “I chose three colours that I thought would work the best for what we wanted to do: Resene Now Or Never, a very saturated blue that felt quite powerful, the burning hot Resene Amped red and then we wanted to use Resene Light Fantastic for a very fast-paced and energetic segment of the commercial. I really wanted to have a very bright and vibrant yellow, but it was so bright that it didn’t pick up on camera well. We ended up replacing it with Resene Aloe Vera, which worked surprisingly well for a substitute.”

Dan says that the colour swap ended up being one of the biggest learnings he took away. “Resene Light Fantastic was what fit my vision, but we worked around it by testing what else would work and we got the green. I also wanted to completely paint Corey’s head and hands, but it would have been too time-consuming on the shoot day, so we worked around it by splashing his overalls and caps with the colour he was drumming with, which was equally effective.

“My favourite colour we used was Resene Now Or Never, which is in the shot we pulled off where the paint explodes out of the bucket while Corey bangs away. It looked amazing.”

It was Corey’s background in theatre and his wholehearted commitment to the students’ projects that inspired Dan to cast him as the talent in the commercial. “I had known and worked with Corey for over a year at that point and I thought it would be wasted potential to not use him as my drummer, as I had him in mind when conceptualising the commercial.”

“Resene was a pleasure to work with and the team supported the students the whole way through,” says Corey. “Knowing that this was a student competition, they made sure that they assisted learning where they could from a client’s perspective. This project was the funniest and messiest to work on for the students, and at the end of the shoot day, everyone had smiles and photos of a paint-covered tutor.”

For Dan, the learning opportunities he and his crew received were the best part of the project. “I am still amazed that we filmed five commercial concepts in under two weeks, and I am extremely proud of the final result. I learned so much about the process of making a commercial and working with clients, meeting briefs and taking on suggestions. I’d like to thank Resene and our tutors, Corey, Mark and David, who helped us develop our ideas and grow as a crew – and to Corey, in particular, for standing in a pool of paint for eight hours straight.”

But for Corey, being given the freedom to let loose and smash around in the paint was his highlight. “The child-like glee of slapping the paint was hugely satisfying,” he says.

› Keep your eyes peeled for the Resene Colour in Frame commercials that were created during this competition running online or check them out at www.resene.com/colour-in-frame. To learn more about Whitireia’s programmes, visit www.whitireiaweltec.ac.nz.

Congratulations to all the screen production students who participated: Ruben Braddock, Jayme Corbett, Brady Findlater, Dahntay Gorowski, Eva-Marie Hartmann, Trey Holcroft-Lewer, Kade Martin, Dan Minnear, Melodie Reddish, Sam Ronalds, and Ryelee Sa.

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