This blog post will introduce the branding video and short commercial that we made for a Japanese company, White Express Cleaning, a nationwide chain of dry cleaning stores.
White Express Cleaning is a nationwide chain of dry cleaning stores in Japan. The purpose of this campaign was to increase awareness of their futon dry cleaning service, with the message being that the best way to get soft and fluffy futons was to trust them to White Cleaning.
The target for cleaning services in Japan is almost exclusively housewives. It was decided that instead of using a model/talent the message would feel more real if an actual mother could come and talk about using the service and how soft and fluffy her futons were! So her interview was scripted, but this script was based on hearing her experience with the White Cleaning service, meaning her comments were both genuine and on message. Because she believed in what she was staying there was no need for a performance.
So the main branding video was to be a scripted interview with a housewife, along with some shots of her cleaning/caring for a house, including making up beds. But how were we going to convey in a short commercial just how soft and fluffy these futons were? The answer was in trampolines.
We had a team of a Creative Director, DP, makeup artist, photographer (also providing overall creative for the video) and the client on set, at a house studio in Tokyo but just a day to film the scripted interview, house cleaning scenes and the commercial so we had to move relatively quickly, making use of the natural light available with just accents from our lights. By the time the talent was made up and we had angles sorted for the various scenes it was already getting towards 11am so we decided to get the interviews done first and then move onto the house cleaning scenes before bringing out the trampoline for the soft and fluffy moments!
It was a busy day so we didnt get any shots of the trampoline unfortunately but the idea was to have the talent somehow floating slowly in the air, like a futon being fluffed out on a bed - if you use White Express Cleaning then this is how you will feel, just like your futons, all light and airy! If we had a budget with several more zeros on the end of it we could have had wire harnesses from cranes flying our talent across the English countryside like this Open Spaces spot by Burberry, but by filming trampoline jumps at 120fps and slowing this down in post to 240fps we managed to get our talent almost flying, certainly airborne at least, for some soft and fluffy feeling moments.
The video above is the Director’s Cut of the commercial. The client decided to go with the much shorter piece below as it would be easier to share on social media and their site.
