Continuing a long history of VFX for feature films, Click 3X Creative Director and Head of VFX Mark Szumski led the team that crafted all of the VFX for the visually stimulating thriller After.Life, directed by Agnieszka Wojtowicz Vosloo and starring Christina Ricci. Click Creative Director Steve Tozzi and Head of CG Anthony Filipakis worked closely with Szumski to create a stunning array of FX, from the creation of alternate worlds to bizarre and fantastic character transformations.

“Our whole team came together for this one,” noted Click 3X owner Peter Corbett. “As we establish Click as a full-service digital studio capable of projects of any size, it’s important that we continue to work on major feature films, so we were thrilled when Agnieszka approached us to bring her terrifying and captivating visions to life.”

Click 3X’s VFX play an integral role in the film, composing important components of many grotesque and surreal scenes. Anna (played by Ricci), looks in the mirror in one scene to find herself emaciated and lifeless, a transformation wrought by Szumski. In another sequence, the CG team built, animated and lit massive tree roots that emerge from the ground to capture Anna. The same group created animated maggots that fill her mouth as the roots swallow her.

In one particularly impressive scene in which Anna removes her own heart from her split-open chest, Szumski showcases his ability to work in both the live-action and VFX realms. Szumski directed the live-action shoot and spent hours of compositing in Flame to create blood elements on the starlet’s nude body. The Click 3X team also created an elaborate design for the open chest.

In a show of Click’s impressive range, the studio also created entire landscapes. One twisted point in the film finds Anna flung into Limbo, an alternate reality created entirely by Szumski and the CG team. Limbo is an amazing, otherworldly environment that conveys the sensation of being trapped between life and death, with surroundings that alternately appear to be dead or alive.

“After.Life was a blast to shoot,” stated Szumski. “Everyone stepped up to make this one happen, from Anthony’s CG team to Steve’s creative input to the cooperation of the director on every scene. I’m happy to be contributing to full-length feature work and hope to take more on in the very near future.”

Agency Spy Featuring Click 3X “A Nightmare on Elm Street” promos.

Editor Jeremy Baumann has joined creative digital shop Click 3X as a fulltime editor. Baumann worked for five years at the NYC office of Red Car. As an assistant editor on commercial campaigns, music videos, web content as well as long and short-form projects, he was an integral part of the Red Car culture. Baumann’s enthusiasm and zest for cutting earned him multiple opportunities to cut his own spots for clients. Saatchi & Saatchi producer, Zamile Vilakazi said, “In the past couple of years I’ve been fortunate enough to work with Jeremy many times. While he is obviously quite collaborative, Jeremy also has great instincts and is a tireless editor who always comes up with intelligent solutions for our projects. We all love working with Jeremy, it’s more than a pleasure, it’s a hell of a good time.”

Baumann is seasoned on both Avid and Final Cut Pro. He has worked on campaigns for brands such as Puma, Pillsbury, Tide, Urban Outfitters and Visa for agencies including Saatchi & Saatchi, MRM Worldwide and CommonHealth to name a few.

Baumann moved to NYC from Dallas, Texas in 2006. He holds an associate of applied science in video production from the Art Institute of Dallas. A 3-time triathlete, his upcoming schedule includes meets in May, July, September and October. Jeremy brings the same energy to track & field and the New Years Day Coney Island Polar Bear Plunge that he delivers to clients in the edit room every day. Says Head of Sales Trevor King, “Jeremy personifies what I call `owning the room’. Clients just adore him and I plan on introducing him to many new ones this year. We’re thrilled he came to Click 3X”.

The legendary E*TRADE babies are back, this time in a seven-spot campaign produced from start to finish by Click 3X. John J. Budion, working closely with Grey NYC, led Click’s in-house team as director, creative director, and lead flame artist, shooting, directing and handling all VFX. While the basic concept and characters will be familiar to any E*TRADE Baby fan, the campaign evolves significantly behind amusing character developments, unique new settings that go beyond the traditional nursery, and tie-ins to both the company’s sophisticated online trading tools and the NFL Playoffs on CBS.

The team at Click 3X has contributed memorable VFX to previous E*TRADE baby campaigns, making the babies’ lips appear to move as they spoke. The campaign marks an important moment in Click’s evolution, as Grey awarded the company a dominant role in creating the new spots, an acknowledgment of their enhanced technological capabilities and expanding talent base.

“Campaign after campaign, Click 3X amazes us with their productioncapabilities. This year’s E*TRADE Baby campaign is a brilliant interplayof media formats that come together seamlessly for the audience,” said Nicholas Utton, CMO E*TRADE Financial. “From creative concept through post production, Click 3X has been an integral partner in the success of the E*TRADE baby campaign.”

Click 3X Managing Director Jason Mayo adds, “Click is moving aggressively to establish itself as a soup-to-nuts operation.  It says a lot for John (Budion) and the rest of our crew that Grey and E*TRADE would entrust us to collaborate with them on so many important elements of such a major national campaign. John really shows his creative and technical capabilities in enhancing the long-running Baby campaign without sacrificing the legacy of the engrained themes and characters.” 

The new settings create unique opportunities for Baby to show off E*TRADE’s features. Lottery features Baby in a convenience store, mocking an adult who is fiercely focused on his scratch-off lottery ticket. “You know your chances of winning are the same as being mauled by a polar bear and a regular bear in the same day?” he asks, encouraging his friend to stake his retirement instead on E*TRADE’s extensive planning tools.  In First Class, Baby takes to the skies, lounging in the plane’s cabin on his way back from a bachelor party, sipping a glass of milk and bantering with a friend, bragging that E*TRADE automatically triggered his stop-loss orders while he was living it up on vacation.

In Girlfriend, the campaign returns to the nursery, this time for a hilarious two-way webcam chat in which Baby explains to his girlfriend that he wasn’t able to call her last night because he was on E*TRADE diversifying his portfolio, emphasizing the importance of this sort of immediate direct control in such a volatile market. Baby’s credibility takes a hit, however, when his girlfriend grills him on whether the “milkaholic” Lindsay was over, and the troublemaking tot, upon hearing her name, dodges into the lens.

E*TRADE had a very specific vision for the campaign’s look, and Budion chose a variety of cameras to meet this challenge, including a Sony F23 that shoots in 1920 x 1080 HD and a P2 cam that shoots 1280 x 720 in standard def. In order to reach a middle ground and get the exact film texture that E*TRADE sought, he sharpened the P2 footage and degraded the HD footage.

Barbershop, a :15 featuring Baby and his three friends sitting in a study singing a goodbye diddy to their overpriced brokers, perhaps best represents the disparate elements that Click brought together to assemble each final spot. Budion shot each baby in HD individually against a green screen so that they could be reused in any spot, a technique he followed for each shoot. He then transposed the babies against the still background shot and added animated fire to the room’s fireplace. 

Shooting a series of spots that had to be assembled from disparate pieces to look like fluid live action presented special challenges. In Lottery and First Class, for example, the two characters are shot at different times, against a green screen, so Budion had to carefully plan the height at which to shoot each and consider how their eye lines would match up to one another as they conversed. Both spots feature a mix of CG, live action, and stills, a challenging cocktail for even the most experienced production teams.

“Luckily we have a lot of experience in composite and post, so we knew exactly what to do to optimize the live-action shoots,” noted Budion. “Grey was very clear from the beginning on what the final spots would look like, so we arranged the production process around it. This is emerging as a clear advantage for Click as we move more and more into production - we understand post so well that we’re able to plan ahead better than most studios, saving everyone time and money in the end.”

The campaign, which is currently running during the NFL Playoffs, features extensive tie-ins to both the league and CBS. In My Mind is a :10 in which Baby clutches a football and spells out his dreams of one day leading a team to victory on the gridiron. CBS NFL Today Interview features a game-day webcam back-and-forth between the CBS NFL Today show’s James Brown and Baby, in which they break down the upcoming matchup between the New York Jets and the Indianapolis Colts.

Two of the :30s will debut during Super Bowl XLIV, airing Feb. 7 on CBS, and an additional promo will air during the pregame show. 

Outtakes, a 1:16 compilation of “bloopers” is currently running in theatres and on E*TRADE’s YouTube channel.

NY-based visual solutions studio Click 3X has hired online experience veterans Ann Quinn and Lara DeSignor to help increase the firm’s capabilities with digital and interactive marketing campaigns. The duo will focus on building Click’s infrastructure and ability in offering syndication, seeding, social media and viral channels to clients. The new team, which will be a fusion of digital marketing and state-of- the-art broadcast, design and digital production services will take advantage of Quinn and DeSignor’s vast experience to deliver multi-platform digital content campaigns cross platform.

The group’s integrated services will include original content, branded entertainment, crafting integrated digital marketing campaigns from strategy to execution, online and viral campaign strategy and design, broadcast webisodes, websites and online engagements, and media activation and social media outreach. The team will harness the latest distribution technologies and analytic techniques to create, produce and distribute visual content and experiences across multiple platforms, including traditional broadcast, branded entertainment, design, film, video, broadband, and interactive content.

“The best part of this new team is the huge number of services that we can now offer our clients under one roof and in the most cost-effective manner possible,” noted Click 3X Founder and President Peter Corbett. “Ann (Quinn) and Lara (DeSignor) are experts in the new media landscape and can help Click’s clients break through the clutter with captivating, cost effective, measurable campaigns and solutions.”

“Lara and I understand each of these mediums and the significant role each plays in today’s complex and multi-faceted media world,” stated Quinn. “To us, creating effective and engaging experiences is an art form and a science. We are well versed in the nuances and value of these mediums and we help our clients build integrated campaigns that utilize just the right mix for each particular project or campaign. Our integrated services are coupled with production company nimbleness and timing that will make Click 3X a win-win choice for any agency.”

Quinn, who will hold the title of Digital Engagement and Content Strategist, is a Webby award-winning leader in the digital marketing and branded content space with a unique combination of advertising, promotion, entertainment and online marketing experience. She has done stints with Dogmatic, The Marketing Principles, EMCI, Tracy-Locke, and Foote, Cone and Belding, working on campaigns for clients as diverse as Mountain Dew, Pepsi-Cola, Virginia Slims, HBO, Right Gin, Top of the Rock, and Justin Timberlake. Her multi-platform video and interactive work has a history of building brand relationships and increasing her clients’ ROI.

DeSignor, who will hold the title of Integrated Account Director and New Business Development, has a long career in digital marketing, production and broadcast PR with various fashion, beauty, and PR accounts with Dogmatic, including recent campaigns for Chanel, L’Oreal, COTY, Armani, and Estee Lauder. Her work emphasizes cutting-edge technology to create engaging, exciting campaigns. She has long-standing relationships with top fashion, beauty, luxury & lifestyle marketers and has worked on many successful and groundbreaking integrated campaigns.