Musikvergnuegen for Ford

Team Detroit recently called on Hollywood-based music house Musikvergnuegen to contribute to Ford’s new “Summer Spectacular” campaign, which was directed by Prologue Pictures.

 
Musikvergnuegen, led by CCO/Composer Walter Werzowa and Composer John Luker, helmed the original music and sound design for the entire 15-spot package of “Blockbuster Deals” presented by Ford, which also included various cut-down versions, combinations and Hispanic versions.

 
An entertaining homage to every major Hollywood film genre, the trailer–style spots promote Ford’s 2013 fleet of top-selling models. Musikvergnuegen scored equally inspired music for each genre-driven spot (one per model), from superhero and apocalypse-style action flicks, to quirky comedy, horror and drama. The campaign launched on TV and online in July.

 
Each spot drops viewers right into the action with highly entertaining “movie scenes” cut to an unmistakable trailer with a production caliber that makes viewers double take upon realizing it is a Ford commercial.

 

"Our mission for the Summer Spectacular campaign was to have every spot feel like a real Hollywood blockbuster movie trailer,” says Michael Priebe, Team Detroit Creative Director. “That's why we went to Musikvergnuegen, because they do this every day. The music tracks give the commercials a bigger-than-life feeling that grabs the viewer’s attention from the first scene. It was a fantastic experience to see Musikvergnkuegen giving the same enthusiasm and attention to :30 second TV spots as they would to real Hollywood movie trailers." 

 
To view, please visit: http://www.musikvergnuegen.com/ford_summer_spectacular_2013
http://www.musikvergnuegen.com/ford_summer_spectacular_spanish_2013

 
The spoof nature of the campaign called on Musikvergnuegen’s real-life movie marketing expertise in the sound realm, focusing on authentic timing and soundscapes attributed to world-class blockbusters. Classic blockbusters such as “Independence Day,” “Close Encounters of the Third Kind,” “Fast & Furious” and more became research material for the music 
within the trailers.

 
“We’ve known the guys from Prologue for more than a decade now, so we’ve built a lot of trust and understanding with each other,” says Werzowa. “They came to us with rock solid ideas that offered us an enormous amount of fun and creative flexibility to explore musically and sonically. This campaign is much more than TV commercials; we took a movie marketing approach and made the spots feel just like real trailers.”

 
Musikvergnuegen worked closely with Prologue from the project's outset, completing a bulk of the work in three weeks. They began by reviewing the storyboards and temp scores that Prologue provided as a jumping off point. One of the biggest challenges, they say, was quickly communicating both the concepts and inspirations behind each genre, while also making sure the music production quality reflected the marquee action Prologue scripted and shot.

 
“We created huge orchestras and huge sound palettes so the audience would believe it was a real movie they hadn’t heard about,” explains Luker. “We wanted to trick them in the first few moments. The inherent challenge was it had to feel like the footage was culled from a real 2 ½-hour movie, so we strove to make the music sound like it was drop needled from different points of a real ‘film.’”

 
“Team Detroit was instrumental in helping us hone all of the details,” adds Werzowa. “They were deeply invested in the project and together, we explored all of the various genre scores to achieve the tone they envisioned for each film.”

 
Each musical element was supported by the genre. For the superhero genre, Luker composed a score using big brass, driving percussion and string sounds, which Werzowa further enhanced with sound design. The emphasis here was on using both real instruments and computer samples to sound as real, lush and big as possible.

 
“Sometimes we used real recorded orchestra to add to the fullness and make it more believable and lively,” says Luker. “We love the real orchestra world combined with new technology. You get a sound that’s contemporary, expansive, fresh and new.”
 

Werzowa says the key to selling the idea of movie marketing was filling out the whole spectrum of sound, but not overpowering anything.

 
“John and I complement each other well – and good music and sound design should do the same. There's no distinction between the two anymore. Overall, the collaboration with Prologue and Team Detroit went exceptionally smooth. We worked with amazing, creative people who gave us great feedback. For any of the ‘movie’ concepts that they imagined, I’d love to see the actual film myself.”

Credits

 
Client: Ford
Airdate: July 2013                                       

 
Ad Agency: Team Detroit
Creative Director: Michael Priebe                                                                     

               
Art Director: Jim Mahu                                                       
Copywriter: Russ Rinke
VP, Broadcast Producer: Ken Dumm

 
Production Company: Prologue Pictures
Directors: Kurt Mattila & Kyle Cooper
DPs: Keith Dunkerley & Juan Ruiz-Anchia
Executive Producer: Alexander Dervin

Visual Effects Company: Prologue Pictures

Editorial Company: Prologue Pictures

Postproduction Company: Prologue Pictures

 
Music Production, Sound Design & Audio Post Company: Musikvergnuegen/ Hollywood, CA
Creative Director/Sound Designer: Walter Werzowa
Senior Composer: John Luker 

                                                               
Executive Producer: Mariane Hwang
Mixer: Gabe Moffat
Engineer: Austin Hagen
Session Players: Mike Fonte (Guitar) & Gary Grant (Trumpet)

Key Software: Soundminer, Avid Pro Tools, Logic, Spectrasonics Omnisphere, Native Instruments Kontakt, Waves, and Sound Toys