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Television Media Entertainment

606 Takes To film Rube Goldberg-like car ad 457

Posted by Hemos from the building-the-machine dept.
wagdog writes "Many have no doubt seen the Rube Goldberg-like multistep mechanical chain reaction TV advert for the Honda Accord. Many thought this was yet another example of the pervasive use of computer graphics in TV commercials. Amazingly the entire delicate set up of car parts that constitute the facinating sequence is almost 100% realtime live action requiring an astounding 606 takes to get right . There is one cheat however -- can you spot it?"
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606 Takes To film Rube Goldberg-like car ad More

606 Takes To film Rube Goldberg-like car ad

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  • The expected result... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Xaroth ( 67516 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @10:09AM (#5728081) Homepage
    From 606 to 404 in under 6 seconds.

  • Direct link... (Score:5, Informative)

    by dschuetz ( 10924 ) <david@@@dasnet...org> on Monday April 14, 2003 @10:10AM (#5728099)
    ...suitable for mirroring: http://www.honda.co.uk/newcars/300k.swf [honda.co.uk] (4.1 meg or so)

    ('course, it's slashdotted now.)

  • For comparison (Score:5, Interesting)

    by ih8apple ( 607271 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @10:12AM (#5728108)
    The record number of takes for a single shot in any movie is 125 in The Shining. [filmfour.com]

    • For contrast (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Sentry21 ( 8183 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @11:46AM (#5728907) Journal

      Contrast this with Russian Ark [apple.com]. You really have to watch the trailer for an idea of its scale and majesty, but for those of you without Quicktime:

      • 2000 actors
      • 300 years of Russian history
      • 33 rooms of the Hermitage Museum
      • 3 live orchestras
      • 1
        single
        continuous
        shot
      • (voiceover) "Not only is Russian Ark the longest shot in film history, it is also the first feature film ever created in a single take."

      --Dan

      • Re:For contrast (Score:3, Funny)

        by Alsee ( 515537 )
        (voiceover) "Not only is Russian Ark the longest shot in film history, it is also the first feature film ever created in a single take." *SNEEZE* gezuntite....

        AW SHIT!!!!! CUT! SHIT SHIT SHIT SHIT!!!
        SHIT SHIT SHIT!!
        SHIT SHIT SHIT SHIT SHIT!!!!!!

        -

  • New world record? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Equuleus42 ( 723 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @10:12AM (#5728116) Homepage
    I know that as of 2001, the world's record for the most retakes of a particular scene was held by Stanley Kubrick -- 160 retakes of one scene in The Shining [fortunecity.com]. If car commercial film retakes count for this as well, these guys have set a new world record by far!

  • This a blatant ripoff of: (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 14, 2003 @10:15AM (#5728139)
    "the Way Things Go" by Peter Fischli and David Weiss


    here's a link to the most excellent kinetic art video:


    http://www.firstrunfeatures.com/vid/thewaythings go .html



    of course, if they hired the pair to do the stuff for the Commercial, then.....it's not a ripoff. (hope they made some bucks)

    • damn, I was just about to say that this was "inspired" by the Swiss artist team Fischli and Weiss.

      Honda still made a good ad and we should thank them for that. But the credit for the original ideas for this belong to the Swiss.

      http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/630455163 0/ qid%3D1050333367/sr%3D11-1/ref%3Dsr%5F11%5F1/104-3 118912-3971146
      • Ad people have always ripped off... er... taken their inspiration from... er... no, I do mean ripped off artists' work.
        That advert for Guinness, featuring the trumpet-heavy, slightly-comedic, music with the guy wandering about in a funny manner, with a pint of Guiness, springs most easily to mind.

        That said, it is a good advert. The first time I saw it, I was transfixed, and I can't say that about many (if any) adverts.
        It's also worth noting that the advert is almost entirely silent and it comes as a reli

    • Those who ignore film history (Score:5, Funny)

      by K-Man ( 4117 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @12:26PM (#5729224)
      Are doomed to watch it in car ads.

  • Any American Links? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 14, 2003 @10:18AM (#5728160)
    I work for the U.S. DOD, and surprise surprise, I can't access sites (or at least not many) from other countries from here. Is there any info on Honda's U.S. site? Thank you.

  • Flash video format (Score:3, Informative)

    by silhouette ( 160305 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @10:18AM (#5728161)
    The video itself plays within a Flash movie.

    Not only will you need Flash to watch it at all, but you'll need the latest version of the Flash player in particular (6, which can include video).
    Of course, it's a moot point anyway because Honda.co.uk can't take the Slashdot burden.
    • My mistake, after a closer look I don't think the video is embedded at all. It looks like individual still keyframes from the actual video were just copied into the Flash movie in a sequence. Which means that lower version Flash players should be able to play it without a problem.

  • Rube Goldberg? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by chrisseaton ( 573490 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @10:20AM (#5728192) Homepage
    I wasn't familiar with Rube Goldberg's work before this, but it looks like a carbon copy of Heath Robinson's style. Anyone agree with me here?

    • Re:Rube Goldberg? (Score:5, Informative)

      by 91degrees ( 207121 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @10:28AM (#5728271) Journal
      Anyone agree with me here?

      I think everyone does. Apart from the fact that 90% of Americans have never heard of Heath Robinson, and 90% of Brits have never heard of Rube Goldberg. They certainly fill exactly the same niche in society both for the drawings, and for providing a terms used for an expresion to refer to a bizarre ad-hoc invention.

    • Re:Rube Goldberg? (Score:4, Informative)

      by smallpaul ( 65919 ) <paul@presco d . n et> on Monday April 14, 2003 @10:35AM (#5728322)
      According to Google, Rube Goldberg was inspired by Heath Robinson. Rube was American and Heath British.

    • Re:Goldberg and Heath Robinson (Score:5, Interesting)

      by ianscot ( 591483 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @10:41AM (#5728378)
      Sort of, but not a carbon copy exactly. Rube Goldberg is seen by some people as a sort of "American version" of Robinson -- news programs here might say "Our tax system is a Rube Golbergian mess" where those in the U.K. would invoke Robinson. They were contemporaries, but Goldberg lived longer.

      I'd say Robinson was more about social commentary than Goldberg. His typical drawing would be an overall look at a machine, sure, but there was usually something dilapidated about the workings of it, and there was something sort of comic-tragic about the people in the figure -- they're seriously working to maintain the thing despite its ludicrously overcomplex design, and it's running down despite them.

      Goldberg is more of an engineer's taste -- he was an engineer to start with, wasn't he? -- and the idea is really to play with the idea of the machine to make it as ridiculous as possible. His machines aren't attended by a bunch of sadly intent factory workers, they're what my Great Uncle would call "flights of fancy." You hear about contests in the U.S., for fun, to build elaborate "Rube Goldberg contraptions" to perform simple actions.

      Heath Robinson would have appreciated Metropolis more when it came out.

    • Are you from the UK? (scan blog... yes, you seem to be)

      Here in the US, Rube Goldberg is a household name, but I've never heard of Heath Robinson. A quick googling of him tells me they are very similar.
  • But I wonder what aspect of the domino effect appears to turn the steering and apply the brakes of the car that rolls off the ramp at the end?

  • Apologies to torrez.org (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    http://torrez.org/media/movie/cog.mov [torrez.org]

  • MOV download (Score:5, Informative)

    by MORTAR_COMBAT! ( 589963 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @10:22AM (#5728213)
    Here's a link to those who'd like a non-slashdotted .mov download [torrez.org] of the ad.

    Thanks be to widepipe.org [widepipe.org] for the link...

  • The cost of consumer items (Score:5, Insightful)

    by beaverfever ( 584714 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @10:28AM (#5728273) Homepage
    £750,000 for an ad which will run for 7 1/2 weeks - I'm sure it's not unusual; just don't forget what you're really paying for when you buy a car - a big chunk of the cost of autos is just covering advertising - it's the same with many consumer items.

    I wonder what the math is on the idea of lowering advertising costs to bring down end price of the product which might increase sales, balanced against the decreased exposure which might decrease sales. As long as people are willing to pay what they are currently paying, I guess it doesn't matter.
    • IMO, I think most people seem to want cheap newspapers/magazines and moreso free television, than to pay less for every item they own.

      At least, it sure as hell seems that way whenever someone whines about the cost of cable.
    • 750K GBP sounds like a great deal of money (and believe me, it is), but don't forget -- these are cars we're talking about. It's not like they're makin' two bucks a pop here. If they sell only about 2-5,000 automobiles, they've probably recouped all that cash right there. When you consider how huge Honda's market is, that's rediculously manageable.
      • While your point about the scale of the market and its ability to absorb this sort of cost is correct, one must remember that this car ad will be just one part of a campaign, and the 750K GBP was just the cost of production and doesn't include airing the ad and tie-in ads in other mediums.
    • Advertising is a fact of life. Everyone does it. It's not the cost of the ad that is ultimately important, it's the impact. This ad has generated more buz than any car ad in years. More people have already activly watched this ad than will bother to look at the average car ad. Will this increase sales? Hard to say. Will it get your attention? Very definitely.

      Advertising rarely makes up a significant part of the price of any consumer item anymore. Taxes, especially England's high VAT, makes up a mu

  • Can I Spot It? (Score:5, Funny)

    by telstar ( 236404 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @10:31AM (#5728292)
    "There is one cheat however -- can you spot it?"
    • Actually ... Yes, I can ... since the damn slashdotted movie is playing at about 1fps right now.

  • BitTorrent Mirror (Score:5, Informative)

    by SeanTobin ( 138474 ) <byrdhuntr@hot[ ]l.com ['mai' in gap]> on Monday April 14, 2003 @10:39AM (#5728363)
    Click here [isthatdamngood.com] all you bittorrent users

  • I'm peeved now (Score:5, Funny)

    by 0x00000dcc ( 614432 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @10:40AM (#5728374) Journal
    I actually sat through that entire commercial, as cool as it was, thinking there was going to be some killer car at the end. Rather, it was a friggen' station wagon

  • I remember there was this strange show on PBS which involved object after object setting of another. It involved fire, tires, weights, etc. Anyone remember seeing it?

  • Great advert (Score:2, Interesting)

    by t_allardyce ( 48447 )
    Can someone explain the speakers that vibrate the windscreen? When i first saw it i just thought it must be CG or mixed, but to be completely real is amazing. The speakers just dont look real though... But this certainly has to be the best car advert ive ever seen. It really makes a change from all those stupid "mix together lots of random shots of a car driving by with music and happy people" adverts.
    • I was wondering about that. The speakers seem to be on some sort of springs. Would that many speakers be enough to create the vibrations to start a shock spring rolling?

      I also can't see what happened to get that funky windshield wiper walking creature to move? The windshield washer pump sprays fluid on to the glass, but what causes it to start the next stage?

      robi

      • Re:Great advert (Score:4, Interesting)

        by Richard_at_work ( 517087 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @12:42PM (#5729306)

        If the shock spring was finely balanced, then the slightest vibration would have set it rolling, so the thumping of several speakers, at tremendous bass, would be sure to have an affect

        The windshield has rain sensors which automatically trigger the wipers, which walk off. Simple yet amazingly effective.

  • One Cheat? (Score:4, Funny)

    by A Swing Dancing Dork ( 324614 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @10:45AM (#5728409)
    There is only one cheat. And he lives with strongbad. The Cheat! [homestarrunner.com]
  • Okay, so maybe the rolling exhaust box is CGI, but what about the sound? I bet most of that was put on in postproduction, samplers and synths. Fake, all of it :)

    Baz
  • There are rules for commercials -- you have to use the real turkey if you're selling Jennie-Oh turkeys, but you can shoe polish the thing as much as you want -- so maybe they did this with real, physical parts because they had to use the pieces of a real Accord?

    Otherwise I'm thinking Computer graphics would have been the more efficient way of accomplishing what they wanted. Efficiency is something we like in a car maker, isn't it?

    (And did they want me to find out it took them 600-plus takes to get the p

  • Swiss Rube Goldberg video 'Der Lauf Die Dinge' (Score:5, Informative)

    by MemexMutex ( 411069 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @10:50AM (#5728459)
    By far the most elaborate & amazing Rube-Goldberg apparatus ever filmed is "Die Lauf Der Dinge (The Way Things Go) by Swiss artists Peter Fischli and David Weiss (http://www.frif.com/cat97/t-z/the_way_.html).

    It includes not only complex mechanical agglomerations but all sorts of homemade pyrotechnical concoctions. These guys really new their inorganic chemistry.

    Fischli & Weiss filled a warehouse with dozens & dozens these devices linked in series with the output of one element trigger the next one in the pipeline. The camera just keeps walking down the line following the action. You get the feeling the devices are set up in a large circle inside a huge empty building with the camera in the middle slowly turning to follow the train of activity.

    The audio is quite intense, as well. Each device has its own very distinctive sound, which helps to make the video quite animated.

    Most incredible of all, they appeared to do it with a minimum of subtle takes. There seem to be only 4 or 5 cuts in this 45 minute video, and some of them require repeated viewing to pick out.

    Despite the fact the primary actors consist of auto tires, ladders, plywood sheets and soda bottles, DLDD is remarkably fun to watch. I highly recommend it.

    You can pick it up on DVD or VHS at many spots on the net. Here's a link to DVDPriceSearch.com's comparative price listing:
    http://www.dvdpricesearch.com/cgi-bin/dv dcalc2?cmd =calc&tmpCart=15602

  • Get the advert + making of FREE (For UK ppl) (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday April 14, 2003 @10:52AM (#5728474)
    If you live in the UK,
    Call the Honda Contact Centre on 0845 200 8000 and ask for a free DVD of THAT Honda ad. They also got it on VHS if you prefer.

    They got 20,000 copies. So dont rush :)

  • Oops (Score:2)

    by Greyfox ( 87712 )
    I hope their cars have more horsepower than their web server.
  • Anyone got a version that works with Xine - like an MPEG or DiVX?
  • I saw a few things that looked a little fishy, but which one was it?

  • Distributed Mirror (Score:3, Informative)

    by brejc8 ( 223089 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @11:32AM (#5728801) Homepage Journal
    There are two good mirrors on the Distributer Mirror [man.ac.uk]. And Im sure a few more will come soon.
  • What this version of the video has in it's favor is it is compressed in the flash format.. So it all is "masked" by the compression that flash uses so it would be pretty hard to actually tell where the 1 frame of computer generated cell is... In fact.. during the compression, that frame may be non-existant anyways.

    Very impressive shot.

  • Cheat (Score:3, Funny)

    by poot_rootbeer ( 188613 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @11:51AM (#5728965)
    There is one cheat however -- can you spot it?

    He's probably hanging out with Strong Mad in the basement, playing the Trogdor arcade game.

  • No interest (Score:3, Funny)

    by heroine ( 1220 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @12:07PM (#5729093) Homepage
    I'm not interested in buying a Honda Accord, a Pentium 4 3Ghz, a copy of EverQuest, or a copy of Firefly on DVD.

  • great ad (Score:5, Funny)

    by NanoGator ( 522640 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @12:36PM (#5729264) Homepage Journal
    So, how many of you are now driving new Honda Station Wagons?

  • Oh dear God. (Score:5, Funny)

    by GLevangelist ( 302391 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @01:01PM (#5729481) Homepage Journal
    They'll probably make millions selling the out-takes to obsessive geeks.

  • Delicious irony (Score:3, Funny)

    by jez9999 ( 618189 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @01:13PM (#5729593) Homepage Journal
    I find this deliciously ironic, because the voiceover on the final ad goes something like "Don't ya love it when things just ... work?"

    Well clearly things didn't "just work" if they needed 606 takes to get it right!! :-)

  • /.'ed (Score:3, Funny)

    by Asmodean ( 21717 ) on Monday April 14, 2003 @03:44PM (#5730878)
    In other news today scientists have discovered the cause of El Nino to be an underwater cable that periodically heats up and boils large amounts of the Pacific Ocean. Telephone officials have traced the cause to stories posted on "Slashdot.org" that link to Asia.

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