68 Places | west coast USA Transmedia. You’ve heard the term and jive role-playing game” for its Nintendo Game Boy Beach-based B-Reel is no exception. A recipient with its concept: a method of conveying messages, system, Pokémon soon became a media franchise of five Cyber Lions at Cannes 2010, B-Reel themes or storylines to a mass audience through of epic proportions with merchandise stretching specialises in high-end web productions, film and the well-placed and artful use of different media across different platforms – video games, anime animation. Working with sister company B-Reel platforms. Play well across media and you’ll comic books, TV shows and Pokémon’s popular Films (a traditional production company with its enhance a brand’s story and solidify its dominance trading cards. All these experiences motivated own roster of directors), B-Reel operates as a and pervasiveness in the marketplace. In short you ever more consumption from bona fide fans. one-stop-shop. will make it relevant. 180 Los Angeles recently teamed up with Transmedia is used today as a way to advertise Digital innovation B-Reel Films director Anders Hallberg on the in a splintered digital world, but it actually goes Consumers became active hunters and gatherers Mitsubishi Live Drive campaign. Teasers were back to a concept used by Nintendo to market a on an epic scale. Pokémon went on to become the created to entice viewers to take a test drive of the new product on its hands. Rubik’s Cube of the 90s and is today the second company’s new Outlander Sport – online. “It’s the It was the mid 90s, and the company was most successful and lucrative video game in world world’s first online test drive,” says B-Reel exec already content with a strong foothold in the video history, second only to Nintendo’s beloved Mario. producer Pelle Nilson, “we specialise in game market with Donkey Kong and the Mario/ Fast-forward 15 years and similar innovation uncovering new digital outlets and solutions, Super Mario series. Nintendo’s next move was to is thriving as progressive companies create new ways to reach and influence target audiences bring out Pokémon. Initially a “monster collecting exciting work in new digital spaces. Venice through integrated campaigns.” IT’s a cross-plaTform ThIng 1 Transmedia marketing isn’t just about blasting out messages across a multitude of platforms, it’s also about exciting an audience by harnessing new technology – such as test driving cars online – and finding new and expansive ways to tell good stories 1. Mothership creative studio 2 B-Reel offices in Venice Beach, CA 3 The Wilderness Downtown, from Google Chrome and Arcade Fire 4 Google Chrome Fastball SH128_p68-69_trans_US.indd 68 09/03/2011 15:09 west coast Usa | Places 69 2 3 4 “If the story has heart, and With the growing use of HTML5 and advanced tools to build a visual sample, a prototype of what JavaScript there are sure to be similar types of their movie will look like and then we put together the brand has advertising on offering. a creative pitch for them. We’re very focused on an integrated, B-Reel’s collaboration with Google Creative expanding and building our roster of directors.” Lab also illustrates how an audience can be Last year, award-winning director Guillermo cross-platform hooked by experiences that engage their Del Toro introduced unique storytelling emotions. Promoting Google Chrome technology, opportunities to the media-frenzied advertising approach and is The Wilderness Downtown is a short online film, world of the West Coast with the opening of blown out to set to Arcade Fire’s track We Used To Wait, that creative workshop Mirada. He and marks a successful collaboration between cinematographer Guillermo Navarro will run the the appropriate directors Chris Milk and Aaron Koblin through shop aside director Mathew Cullen and executive @radical.media. Upon arriving at the site you are producer Javier Jimenez, both co-founders of platforms asked to type in your home address, then, thanks LA-based commercial design and production then the sky to Google Maps and Google Street View, the film company Motion Theory. takes you on a personal journey – via multiple Mirada’s collective know-how stretches across is the limit.” video windows – through your own hometown – many platforms; for example, Motion Theory’s while footage directed by Milk plays alongside. experience in the advertising and music business It’s an absorbing experience. and Del Toro’s expertise writing novels, creating video games, producing, writing, directing movies New hybrid agency/production companies will Collective creativity and developing television. Cullen describes also need to constantly evolve and continue to LA-based studio Mothership also delivers media Mirada as a playground for artists, a workshop develop appropriate strategy for an environment solutions for its film, advertising and gaming to create meaningful stories, “a place where constantly in flux. “The most successful strategy industry clients. Launched just under a year ago, storytelling and pop culture will collide”. is having collaborative leadership,” offers Cullen it operates through Digital Domain, one of the on the subject. “It’s understanding how to create world’s foremost digital production companies. Content or format? and manage creation using whatever the specific “We create entertainment marketing and Cullen believes that engaging viewers’ feelings medium may be. Some stories are just designed to messaging that’s true to the methodology and is still key and “requires elaborately constructed be told in one way; a great book is never designed spirit of each project,” explains Mothership stories that have at their core sharply felt human to be turned into a movie – but there are projects founder and president Ed Ulbrich. “The product is emotions.” He goes on, “the question really that are made to expand across everything from then blown out across multiple platforms because becomes what is more important, content or video games to merchandising opportunities.” single screen content is a dinosaur. We’re now distribution? It’s content because once you plug However much a brand’s reputation is at stake, shaping the work for multiple screens.” in and provide a genuine experience for the one thing is for sure: at the heart of it, if the Mothership is also evolving the careers of audience they then share the work with others. audience is entertained they will watch and share. commercial directors in an attempt to garner People today are using media in ways that have “If the story has heart and the brand has an longer format work and has a full art department completely changed our business model.” integrated cross-platform approach and is blown on site dedicated to nurturing talent. “A script isn’t Consumers will continue to invest deeply in out to the appropriate platforms then the sky is enough to get a movie off the ground anymore, so brands, while brands themselves will continue the limit,” says Ulbrich. “The key is to get the we help commercial directors make their first trying to engender trust and loyalty in its message out to audiences using great ideas, film,” explains Ulbrich. “Directors use our digital customers through multiple delivery platforms. creativity and true innovation.” S SH128_p68-69_trans_US.indd 69 09/03/2011 15:09.