This summer reality pictures helped BMW unveil their brand new 4 Series model Coupe, as well as their much anticipated seven-year rerelease of the X5 Sports Activity Vehicle!

For this shoot, director Kim Takal and the reality pictures crew had the pleasure of collaborating with director of photography, Bill Ahrens, who brought a unique style and passionate enthusiasm to an already exciting set. Over a seven day shoot, Takal, Ahrens and the reality pictures team captured these two extraordinary vehicles in several gorgeous locations throughout the Los Angeles area including the Angeles National Forest, Padres National Forest, Tejon Ranch and Digital Films Studios sound stage. 

With an excellent visionary team now well versed in showcasing the best elements these vehicles have to offer, these multifaceted locations allowed the crew to highlight the high performance and unique details of BMW's all-new 4S Coupe and all-new X5 SAV, resulting in some amazing footage for the reality pictures editing room! It was not only the impressive vehicles, solid team and dynamic locations that made for such incredible shots, but also the gear brought on set to match the crew's ambitious imaginations! 

For this shoot, reality was lucky to work with a remote helicopter rented from Mi6, an aerial photography and video company based in southern California. For the first time reality pictures used a remote helicopter with a 5D Mark II mounted on it, allowing Takal and Ahrens to capture some amazing aerial footage. 

The final products of this exciting shoot will be four creative and in-depth videos that highlight each car, as well as the 4 and X5 video owners manuals. These videos will be featured on both the BMW website, bmwusa.com, and the Interactive Customer System kiosks located in the BMW dealerships!

Check out some more photos from the shoot! 

reality pictures has been named winner in both the in-store video and kiosk video categories in the 34th Annual Telly Awards for one of the videos created for Time Warner Cable's Experience stores! With nearly 11,000 entries from all 50 states and numerous countries, this is truly an honor. 

The Telly Award is a long standing award "honoring outstanding local, regional, and cable TV commercials and programs, the finest video and film productions, and online commercials, video and films" whose winners represent "the best work of the most respected advertising agencies, production companies, television stations, cable operators, and corporate video departments in the world."* The judging panel is comprised of 500 accomplished industry professionals, each a past winner of a Silver Telly and a member of The Silver Telly Council, and the entires are not rated against each other, but are judged purely on merit. reality has won over a dozen Telly Awards over the years, and is proud to have won these awards with the newer content they've produced. 

For 6 very exciting months of hard work and creative development that started way before that, we worked alongside our sister company, Reality Interactive, to create custom built interactive video content featured in Time Warner Cable's brilliantly executed TWC Retail Experience Stores. 

The video content that reality pictures developed is featured in the store's multiple interactive stations, which showcase TWC's many features and popular networks. The video that won us the multiple Telly Awards is called "TWC Experience: Apps" and focuses on the many applications that TWC provides. This clip is a main feature in a series of videos that are featured throughout the TWC Retail Experience Stores. The content attracts the customer's attention and further explain the features TWC has to offer. 

reality pictures takes great measure to ensure the content being produced by the team is creative, innovative and fresh. We are pleased to see that after 27 years in the biz - we still got it! reality is always excited to take on new projects for emerging and established businesses alike, alongside innovative designers in an ever changing and advancing industry. We look forward to continuing to win well renowned and prestigious awards such as the Telly Award that recognize our continued progress in this broad and exciting industry!  




*34th Annual Telly Awards official press release.  

As a culture quickly adapting to the ever-developing technology of our personal computers and mobile devices, not only has the personal exploration and exchange of information greatly advanced over a short period of time, but it has also greatly affected consumer experience expectations.  Interactive and experience content in the consumer world has not only been imagined and created by such production companies as reality pictures, but takes vast leaps in its development as dictated by the technological advancements that quickly become second nature to us web users and product shoppers. As a company that creates and helps facilitate this experience in the corporate and consumer world, it is extremely important to us to stay on top of emerging trends and technology. 


From promotional, motion picture flat screens to searchable menu stations and kiosks, and now to mouse-less, interactive touch screens, the consumer experience has grown in to literal interaction with the information being explored...and the consumer's interactive expectations may again be influenced by yet another development in tech capabilities - gesture control. Already brought about in the gaming world as Kinect, a new program called Leap Motion aims to bring the technology of gesture control to the general populace: 

"Often associated with Minority Report-esque interaction, Leap Motion has built a motion - and gesture-control sensor that Wired has likened to 'Kinect on steroids.'"*

With this technology, the user steps past the click of a mouse, or tap of a finger to full motion controlled interaction, and with Leap Motion partnering with Best Buy and Asus, gesture control moving past the gamer and to the device-using population is not far from reality. As a company that has evolved over the years into creating specialized interactive video content, reality pictures is exploring how to incorporate these technologies for our clients and projects. 

Upcoming trends that reach beyond intuitive and expected progression are just as important to us in the field of interactive content. One of these advancements on trend in the tech world is exhibited by Condition One, "a technology company developing next generation immersive video applications" (conditionone.com): 

"Condition One reimagines video for mobile devices...The software is designed to give viewers the feeling that they're 'there.' right where the video was shot. As viewers turn their phones to the left or right, the perspective and frame of reference shifts with them -- as if they were behind the camera looking in either direction."*

Ever changing technological advancements, such as that presented by Condition One, offer a view in to what interactive content standards may raise to in the foreseeable future, and reality pictures is already developing projects to incorporate these new technologies. 


New technologies such as this one may be extremely useful in the work that we do for clients such as BMW, Ingersoll Rand and others. While already creating interactive video content for our clients, this technology may offer a way for the shopper to not only learn about the different features of the product they are buying or looking to buy, but get a first person, personally controlled view of the exact product without even needing to be present.


*http://adage.com/article/digital/21-startups-4-trends/240043/ - "21 Startups and 4 Trends You Need to Know Now," by David Teichler, www.adage.com

It is always fun to look through old photos, reminisce about the past and see how far we’ve come. Since our inception in 1986, various forms of video and film have come and gone. Beta was pushed aside by the Digi-Tape and then tape was left behind by the memory card - what next? 

And now, going through an old box of production photos in our storage closet, we've been reminded once again of our roots and all of the fun projects we’ve had the pleasure to work on. Looking back, we've come to realize that in over 25 years in the biz, there is one thing we know has never changed: our love of storytelling and the journey of working with great companies and crews to do so.

Through the years we’ve worked with amazing companies to tell great stories - like American Express, for example, shooting a celebratory film for their 150th year of doing business. We shot the film in various locations in Canada, got the chance to recreate Hong Kong in Calgary, and made it "snow" in the dead of summer, all for the telling of their amazing story. (more pictures available on our Facebook page.)

There’s nothing better than looking at these photos and remembering all of the amazing times we’ve had in our many years of video production. Featured here are some pictures of really fun shoots we've had in awesome locations such as Greece, Portugal and beyond! The diversity of clients, whether it is cars, flowers, or credit cards, keeps the excitement alive! 

 

After a year of positive reviews and feedback, and in the backdrop of yet another spike in indie-flick interest amongst critics, Netflix embraces another potential hit that reality pictures is proud to have a hand in producing. 


Released in 2010, and starring reality Pictures own Kim Takal's talented daughter, Sophia Takal, Gabi on the Roof in July offers a portrait of a generation much like that of Lena Dunham's Tiny Furniture: the under stimulated and over educated youth of an apathetic generation starving for art, love, life and a long anticipated adulthood in an unforgivably fast pace city scape.  As the filmmaker's own synopsis wittingly describes it, Gabi on the Roof in July is "a portrait of young New York and the misguided hopefuls who can't afford to live there but do anyway... an ensemble comedy about ex-girlfriends, sibling rivalry and whipped cream in a city that's constantly in flux."*

Well written by Lawrence Levine, and appropriately timed, Gabi not only offers a portrait of a generation screaming for a voice, but more technically elaborates on a modern style of improv acting that critics can't get enough of. Following in the footsteps of it's Mumblecore influences, Gabi offers a glimpse in to the lives of "hipsters in stasis"** with an intensive analysis of characters and their relationships with their city, their friends, family and selves. As Slantmagezine.com phrases it, "Gabi on the Roof in July projects its transparent character flaws far in advance, but the actual betrayals aren't what make this film interesting. It's the way that Levine stages the incredibly lengthy confrontations between characters after the fact that indelibly connects theme with evolving patterns of personality."

After a voice such as Dunham's has hit the critic's table, it is no wonder this portrait of a generation - which also features the talented director of the outrageously popular show GIRLS - would make its way on to the Netflix screen.

RPL is proud to help produce this piece while also taking a moment to contribute to this generation's journey to find its voice in contemporary art and media. While staying strong and active in our exciting new corporate projects with influential companies such as BMW, Ingersoll Rand and Time Warner Cable. RPL looks forward to continuing its role in supporting the indie-flick world with such worthy projects as Gabi on the Roof in July. 

Recently reality pictures helped BMW unveil their 3 Design Lines concept for one of their signature vehicles, the 3 Series Sedan. 

Polaroid of our great crew.

reality pictures recently shot the BMW 6 Series convertible in lovely Santa Barbara County, California.

Filming covered a variety of scenarios with professional driver Emile Bouret behind the wheel.

We used a variety of camera mounts combined with remote controlled camera heads. High-flying helicopter footage and exciting "pass-by" shots captured the excitement and head-turning features of the newly designed BMW 6 Series convertible.

Directed by Kim Takal. Produced by Andres Rojas. Mark Chamberlin, Director of Photography.

We hope you enjoy this clip as much as we enjoyed filming it!

The 3 part BMW videos reality pictures produced for Dotglu/KBS: “Uniquely Yours” “Spartanburg Plant” and “ Inside the Assembly Hall” received the Gold Remi Award in the series/campaign category at the WorldFest Houston Film Festival, “[in] recognition and [to] honor outstanding creative excellence in film & video…” .

The films, currently on BMWUSA.com highlight the initiative where a customer can see his or her custom built X3 through seven live cameras in the plant supplemented by extensive footage shot and edited by reality pictures throughout the eighteen month project. The films have an original music score and are narrated by Will Lyman.

WorldFest Houston is the 3rd oldest International Film Festival in North America and is the the oldest Independent Film Festival in the World. It is the only film festival in North America that is staffed and managed totally by filmmakers. All staff members have active film and video production experience, which gives them a unique point of reference in relation to the entering filmmakers and their work. Only 15% of entries win an award at the festival.

Over the past several years reality pictures has won more than 45 awards in recognition of its work. We are pleased that these two films, produced for BMW, have been added to reality pictures’ “Wall of Awards” .

See the films here.

BMW Dealership of Bloomfield, NJ, has just unveiled a super sized screen. It's a 8.5' x 22' Mini LED Billboard with a 16mm Full Color LED Display . Reality Pictures, Ltd., provided the visuals that can be seen from passing cars as well as customers in the dealership. The screen and installation were provided by Skysight Signs & Axia Art, LLC.

Rolling hills, wine vineyards and zooming cars were all part of the scenery in Napa Valley, California.

From here we brought back footage for the latest national spot for BMW’s 2011 5 Series Grand Turismo.

Utilizing the Russian Arm, a “unique combination of a gyro stabilized remote system the ‘Flight Head’ and a [car mounted] remote camera crane..” and the talents of our crew we were able to capture the beauty of both our subject and the stunning backdrop.

reality pictures specializes in shooting studio and dynamic automotive footage.

The spot is currently airing.

Directed by Kim Takal. Director of Photography, Mark Chamberlin.

Check out our work.

We just finished up post production on the BMW 5 Series Gran Turismo We shot it down in the Carolinas. In addition to our regular high definition camera packages, we brought down three of the new Canon 5D Mark II still cameras. If your not familiar check out the Canon site:

http://www.usa.canon.com/consumer/controller?act=ModelInfoAct&fcategoryid=139&modelid=17662

Our primary use for the Mark II was as a mount camera on our picture car. Before heading down south we did a little research. A quick Google search turned up a few promising results.

The appeal of this particular still camera was it’s ability to shoot 1080p HD video. The light compact body, and the option of multiple prime and zoom lenses appeared to be a great, less expensive alternative to HD lipstick cameras.

We knew the camera could capture beautiful images. But we were still faced with a lot of unknowns. How would the camera physically hold up to the intense rigors of high speed automotive film making, and what would our post-production workflow look like.

We had a variety of mounts planned, both interior and exterior. After some thought and clever rigging we settled on a combination of clamps and foam to brace the lens against the mounting plate. The camera body has so many external buttons it’s difficult to find a place to grab it, however we found it to be much easier to mount than other larger heavier cameras.

Dealing with the media on location was the next hurdle we had.
We were using three, eight gigabyte cards. Which translates to a gigabyte a minute when recording 1080p. Just as with our second unit camera the Panasonic HVX200, we found that the same combination of a laptop, card reader, and two redundant drives worked perfectly. The cards off loaded at approximately the same speed as P2.

The similarities to P2 media continued when we got back to New York to begin post-production. Like P2, the media had to be transcoded before it could be played back with in our Avid system.

The Avid handled the transcoding internally but the process took quite a long time and the clips almost tripled in size. We ended up archiving the media on a dedicated drive and putting it up on the shelf next to our shot tape stock. With hard drives dropping in price, this workflow just about equals a traditional tape based system.

With gorgeous images, and a manageable workflow, the Canon 5D Mark II has become another amazing tool in our arsenal. Check out the video above to see us in action on set.

We're really looking forward to putting this camera to work for us more often. In fact we have a production coming up that we’re considering shooting exclusively with the Canon 5D Mark II. Stay tuned!

Watch here: http://exposureroom.com/members/realitypictures/0228d29d422d450f95a488d3eacae1d8/