Nissan Almera "Facelift 2015"

Client: Edaran Tan Chong Motor Sdn Bhd
Agency: TBWA, Creative Juice
MFX Director: Lau Kim San, Chan Moon Choong

Concept for this spot revolves around the Nissan Almera getting a new facelift. Transforming from its existing Silver Almera design to a more refined and elegant new black one, followed by a second metamorphosis into a whole new 'killer-performance' look specially tuned for sportiness and performance.

Initially, the car was meant to look realistic and concerns led to a live shoot, with a kind of 'crystal-cocoon' transformation-effect done in post to depict the change. However, during pre-production, we opted to go for a fully computer-generated car instead, as it gave more control over the lighting and camera moves.

Our task was to make it as realistic as possible while keeping it looking like a show car, with its enhanced details, contour lines and polished finishing. Pre-lighting, rendering and pre-composites of close-up shots were the biggest challenges, as we had to exaggerate character lines in order to give it that 'showroom-shine'. Extensive pre-comp work really paid off at the end.

Other challenges include a second-transformation effect that resembled the changing-skin of Mystique (from the X-Men movies), which involved a painstaking process. And finally, lighting the car realistically enough and in-keeping with the shot footage yet showing-off its slick showroom look, was tough!