RBA ‘Next Gen Banknotes’.
This project started as a live action shoot with the intent of swapping out a stand-in prop with CGI money, but as initial discussions got underway, it became clear that approaching it in this manner would impose limitations that would compromise the very message of this commercial. Particularly when the commercial is a single shot for the entire duration. And besides, who's not up for the challenge of creating realistic hands in CGI?
Agency: Spinach
Creative Direction, Shoot Supervision, Animation & Compositing: Cadre Pictures
Initial 3D Hand Test.
Asset Development.
Initially the hands seemed like the greatest challenge but these new notes have a series of remarkable security features and many of these change appearance based on the viewing angle and direction to light, and some even include hologram effects. There were no existing shaders which worked out of the box so not only did we need to write our own but they also needs to work accurately to reflect their real world counterparts at any conceivable angle.
So whilst one team was tasked with creating the realistic hands, another team was developing the approach to faithfully portray the effect of the various icons embedded in the new note. And each security feature was checked by the Reserve Bank’s technical experts for accuracy.
In these commercials the hands, wallet, banknote (and table/wall for the $50) are all CG, with a live action backplate at 6k so we could project in 3D space and match to the virtual camera.
