How Platige Image Created a Cyberpunk-Styled Anime for Sasa Seasoning Flour

Platige Image recently created a spot for seasoning flour brand Sasa.  

Creating an anime-style animation, one also embedded in a cyberpunk world, required the team to utilise their extensive experience and creativity, as well as the studio’s technological facilities. During their work on the project, the creators used a motion capture session to enhance the previs and layout process. The material obtained in this way was then manually converted into an animation imitating classic, time-lapse character movement.

“We solved the character issues by creating shaders that were not fully physically correct but were more flattened. The characters’ faces, in particular, required careful development of the materials. We finally achieved the finished effect at the compositing stage, when the various parts of the rendered material were combined into the final image. The backgrounds were created in the same way,” explains art director Michał Niewiara. “The secret was to do without those details that would probably not be painted in traditional 2D animation. In terms of animation, we used an old, tried-and-tested trick – the movement was designed not to be fully fluid. The idea was to get the most analogue feel possible."

One of the main topics discussed with the client was the colour palette of the spot. A cyberpunk city can be associated with a contrasting combination of cold shades broken up with red or pink. Michał Niewiara's task was to find the right colour scheme so that the city would not be too dark. The studio also created elements such as drones, motorbikes and robots to lend the spot the right ambience, inspired by the works of the masters of the genre – Masamune Shirow and Katsuhiro Otomo.

“We also have the interior of the main character's room, a kitchen interior, an underground station and a restaurant. We prepared a total of 12 character variants and almost 30 separate elements such as laptops, tablets, phones, robots, goggles, cars, drones and motorcycles. There was also an extensive set of dishes and kitchen utensils. We put a lot of work into making sure that the effect was satisfactory for both the client and ourselves,” comments CG supervisor Marek Gajowski.

The visual impact of the Sasa project is a rare concept in the advertising reality, which is governed by its own rules. The Platige Image creators ensured that the entire world, architecture, characters, gadgets and vehicles were all presented credibly and refined to the smallest detail.

“The Sasa project was a very interesting adventure for us, giving us a unique chance to prove ourselves in the formula of a cyberpunk anime film. The entire graphics team, led by director Bartek Kik and CG Supervisor Marek Gajowski, showed professionalism and great ambition. Although the bar was set very high, it can be said with complete confidence that the final result is stunning, the best proof of which is the client's satisfaction. We are very happy that we were able to implement this project,” CG producer Agnieszka Górna concludes.