Alexis Sablone AS-1

Treatment by Dillon Buss

Thank you for the opportunity to pitch this idea.

This concept is a marriage between skateboarding and art, and we’re really excited to share it with you.

Everyone on our crew is a skateboarder, I’ve made it my intention to bring skaters together to be a part of this production. This shoe is made for skaters, by a skater.

We want to continue that trend.

Overview

This spot is a merge between two worlds. One where inspiration is drawn (skating in the streets), the other where that inspiration is artistically brought to life (Alexis’ studio). These worlds collide using fast-paced, sound-infused, free-flowing and in some ways Surrealistic imagery. There’s a big emphasis on playfulness this year for Converse, so I’m channeling my inner Michel Gondry/Spike Jonze to bring some whimsy into the mix. I put a lot of thought into the reference you shared, The Power of 10. My interpretation is to create manipulations in perspective and scale. We want to intermittently suspend the viewer from reality. One moment, you are outside skating with Alexis, the next moment Alexis is experiencing magic inside her studio. Let me take you through how we’re going to go about this…

Storyboard

The spot begins with textural, macro imagery of the bottom of her new shoe. It will serve as an abstract, graphic image that can’t be deciphered. Are we looking at giant caverns? Or are we looking through a microscope. We will light it so that it’s almost impossible to make out what it is.

We cut to her at her desk, with illustrations, art and designs filling her workspace. Over her shoulder you can see that she’s working through a thought.

She starts flicking her pencil back and forth, and on the third flick - her pencil turns into a miniature AS-1 shoe. She looks at her hand, curiously. Simultaneously, you hear the rushing sound of skateboards riding on concrete.

Cut to exterior shots of Alexis and her friends mashing down the street in quick explosive edits. The images are loose, somewhat careless feeling and full of energy. We’re on our way somewhere.

Cut to an open court. The energy and pacing have slowed down a bit. Alexis and her friends are in the zone. Learning new tricks and experimenting. We see and hear them having fun; there’s a carefree nature to this scene. There’s focus and attention, but also a childlike playfulness and camaraderie between Alexis and her crew.

There’s an energy shift. We’re now at an angle from the treeline surrounding the court. Looking down at Alexis skating; she's now multiplied. The frame is filled with multiple versions of her. Some are pushing, some are popping a trick, and they are all layered over each other and flowing in slow motion. Cut to a quick transition of textural flowing concrete, the sound of skateboarding on gravel returns, growing in volume.

We snap back into Alexis’ studio. Over her shoulder she is looking down at her desk - it appears there are multiple Alexis’s skating on a sketchbook! They are about 4 inches tall.

Before long the image transitions back to exterior skating on the streets, the image is blurred and relaxed. The sounds and pacing of the edit reflect the vibe. We follow Alexis’s movement, skating alongside them. A wide shot shows Alexis and her friends skating away from the camera down the street. In the distance, beyond our talent, a shoe the size of a double-decker bus sits at a street corner as if stopped at the intersection.

The final sequence of the montage is a satellite image of new york city, the angle starts to descend rapidly. You see buildings, cars, trees, a street… a pair of shoes. Alexis skates by them and scoops them up. Converse, AS-1 text shows on the screen as you hear the sounds of skateboards and new york city sonically filling the space.

Aesthetic

The color treatment will be natural in tone, sharp with graphic shadows, with a slight grittiness in texture. We will add some 35mm film grain to the image in post. We want this to feel contemporary, new and refreshing.

ApproacH

Filming Skateboarding / FIlming Alexis with her Friends

This is by far the most straightforward aspect of the day of our shoot. We follow Alexis and her friends, we skate with them. We film them posted up somewhere, hanging out, messing around with skate tricks, learning, and essentially playing. We even have a rig set up planned for a time lapsed, high-paced pushing scene, where the shoe is stationary and there is blurred movement all around it. Steve Mastorelli, our dedicated Director of Photography, has been filming skateboarding for the majority of his career. This is second nature to him, and he’s more than comfortable skating with talent, while filming, on his skateboard.

Eye candy & SFX

Miniatures.

I have a friend who is an artist that specializes in miniatures and is more than capable to achieve this, he will just need a few more photos of the shoe. The transition is performed in camera. You mimic the same hand movement twice with two different objects. I filmed and edited this in under 10 minutes. We will capture the moment on iPhone during the day of the shoot and edit that footage to check to make sure the jump cut is clean.

Forced Perspective

For the mini Alexis’ on the desk scene, the main trick here is to accurately line up the angle at which we are filming talent in the exterior. Steve and I will screen-capture the framing to make sure the scale and angle are lined up for the edit. A very similar technique that I used for the Moncler shoot. The rest of the work is all rotoscoping and layering each Alexis on top of the sketchbook.

For the giant shoe street scene, we will use one of the oldest tricks in the book of cinema. Forced perspective. We will film talent skating down the street, with a locked-off shot, then we will walk the shoe in and line it up to where it will appear in the frame, this would be fairly close to the camera. In post, we will paint it into the shot, and rotoscope talent and any stop lights or cars/people that are in front of it.

Final Shot

This may be the most simple VFX setup for the film. All we have to capture is a top-down, fast zoom onto a pair of shoes lying on the ground. The rest is all interweaving layers of satellite photographs in after effects to emulate the descending effect.

*The total run time of special effects will take an estimated 8-10 seconds of the edit.

Editing / SOund Design

The editing style will be elegant, with room for action. Fast-paced cuts of the b-roll will enhance the tempo of the film, breaking up the stationary zooms with action, momentum, and explosive energy.

For sound, I’d like to merge music with environmental sounds as queues for transitions and chapter markers through out the piece. The sounds will transition and flow in and out of the two worlds. Helping them seamlessly go from one to the other.

Music

Shot Sequence

GIF ANIMATIONs

For the Gif’s I would like to extract elements from the edit and weave together shots of product and skating. I would also like to explore the potential to incorperate the rotoscoped, graphic image of multiple Alexis’ skateboarding. It will look graphic, like a moving textile.