606 Takes To film Rube Goldberg-like car ad

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?"

Comments

For comparison

[ih8apple]

The record number of takes for a single shot in any movie is 125 in The Shining.

Re:For comparison

[JDevers]

Stanley Kubrick ordered more than 120 takes in the scene where the camera simply slowly zooms in on Scatman Crothers as he "shines" in his bedroom. Kubrick originally wanted approximately 70 takes of the scene where Hollaran gets killed by Jack Torrance, but Jack Nicholson talked Kubrick into going easy on the 70 year-old Crothers and stopping after 40. At one point during the filming, Crothers became so exasperated with Kubrick's notorious, compulsive style of excessive retakes that he broke down and cried, asking "What do you want, Mr. Kubrick?" This is from http://us.imdb.com/Trivia?0081505 from another who loves The Shining =)

New world record?

[Jon Abbott]

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. If car commercial film retakes count for this as well, these guys have set a new world record by far!

Rube Goldberg?

[chrisseaton]

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?

A very spectacular advert

[whimdot]

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?

give credit where credit is due

[Anonymous Coward]

from one of the articles:
"...The idea for the advert derived partly from the old children's game Mouse Trap, and from the wacky engineering of Caractacus Potts's breakfast-making machine in the Sixties film Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.

HOGWASH! Nothing else exists like this except "The Way Things Go"
No mention of the Swiss artists, so I guess they didn't work on it. Anyone who has seen "The Way Things Go" will immediately recogize the ripoff. they have Tires going uphill too! And it all takes place in the same narrative format: one long left to right sequence (the original is actually almost 30 minutes long, compared this this thing from Honda...)

Re:Goldberg and Heath Robinson

[ianscot]

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.

Great advert

[t_allardyce]

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.

Re:Great advert

[Richard_at_work]

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.

Re:Direct link...

[TGK]

So the clear and obvious solution is to set up a running process that queries the sight every 5 mins or so. When it gets back a 404 error it changes the href tags to point to an internal /. cashe.

That way the site owner isn't denied any ad revenues (his site was a smoking hole) and interested parties can still read the content. /. continues querying the server once every 5 mins until it gets a responce back other than 404. After 24 hours of consistant responces the mirror is yanked.

Seriously folks, Google seems to get away with this, and many people use the cashe INSTEAD OF the actual page. A system like this would only use the cashed versions in the event that the main site was allready wallowing in GET requests.

For contrast

[Sentry21]

Contrast this with Russian Ark. 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:Honda Accord is the Cadillac of Autos

[chrisbro]

Will be modded offtopic, but it's a worthy sacrifice.

I have a '94 Accord with 203,000 miles on it, and the only damned thing wrong with it is the power antenna got stuck in the "up" position because my brother kept yanking on it. No mechanical problems whatsoever other than regular maintenance-related issues. Wonderful, wonderful car, and please don't compare it to an American automaker that couldn't make something that ran well over 100,000 miles if their industry depended on it (which it doesn't because people think a new car every 5 years is somehow necessary).

What is it meant to say about the cars?

[Andy_R]

There is nothing at all in the advert that makes me want to buy a Honda in preference to any other car, and apart from the complete car in the last few seconds, there is nothing that is even a recognisable Honda part there (unless you take apart cars for aliving, I guess?).

All I get from this advert is the message that Honda have a lot of time and money to waste. Now I also know that and they insist on doing things in a very dumb way when they could have saved a lot of time and money by using a computer.

Way to go, advertising agency, you just put me off the Honda brand.

Re:The cost of consumer items

[Mr Z]

My dad likes to tell this story: Goebel Beer was the #1 beer (in Michigan at least) at one time. They were so popular they decided "Hey, we're #1, we don't need to advertise any more!"

Have you ever heard of Goebel Beer? If so, do you think it's anywhere near #1 in sales? Basically, the moment they stopped advertising, they coasted a little bit and fell into perpetual obscurity.

And in case your bored: Some more beer commercial history.

--Joe