Honda commercial destined to become advertising legend

The Telegraph (UK) ^ | 4/13/03 | Quentin Letts

[tdadams]

Six hundred and six takes it took, and if they had been forced to do a 607th it is probable, if not downright certain, that one of the film crew would have snapped and gone mad.

On the first 605 occasions something small, usually infuriatingly minute, went just slightly awry and the whole delicate arrangement was wrecked. A drop too much oil there, or here maybe one ball-bearing too many giving a fraction too much impetus to the movement. Whirr, creak, crash, the entire, card-house of consequences was a write-off and they had to start again.

Honda's latest television advertisement, a two-minute film called "Cog", is like a fine-lubricated line of dominoes. It begins with a transmission bearing which rolls into a synchro hub which in turn rolls into a gear wheel cog and plummets off a table on to a camshaft and pulley wheel. All the parts are from the new Honda Accord - £16,495 to you, guv'nor, or £6 million if you want to pay for the advertising campaign. And what an amazing ad campaign it is, too.

Back on Cog, things are still moving, in a what-happened-next manner redolent of "there was an old woman who swallowed a fly". With a ting and a ding of metal on metal, a thud of contact and the occasional thwock, plop and extended scraping sound, the viewer watches as individual, stripped-down parts of car roll into one another and set off more reactions.

Three valve stems roll down a sloped bonnet. An exhaust box is pushed with just enough energy into a rear suspension link which nudges a transmission selector arm which releases the brake pedal loaded with a small rubber brake grommit. Catapult! Boing! On goes the beautiful dance, everything intricately balanced and poised. Nothing must be even a sixteenth of an inch off course or the momentum will be lost.

[snip]

Cog looks certain to become an advertising legend and part of its allure is the seemingly effortless way the relay of parts slide and touch and roll with such apparent ease. The reality of the film's production was slightly different. It was, by most measures of human patience, a nightmare.

Filming was done over four near-sleepless days in a Paris studio, after one month of script approval, two months of concept drawings and a further four months of development and testing. One of the more surprising things about the ad is that it was not a cheat. Although it would have been much easier to fiddle the chain of events by using computer graphics, the seesaw and shunt of events really did happen, and in one, clean take.

The bigshots at Honda's world headquarters in Japan, when shown Cog for the first time, replied that yes, it was very clever, and how impressive trick photography was these days. When told that it was all real, they were astonished.

[tdadams]

This is really a feat and amazing to watch. See the video.

[Sir Gawain]

Already posted 4/30/03

[tdadams]

Thanks for the link. Maybe some people didn't see the original post.

[CaptRon]

Thanks. I was trying to find the original post last week.

[Mr. Bird]

It's definitely amazing, but I think they wasted their time. In a world of Matrix-style effects, nobody is really floored by viewing this type of thing. It's a curiosity, to be sure, but they could have faked it and most people would have still thought it was "neat".

[SJSAMPLE]

I've got one little problem - with the tires. The first tire hits the second, smaller tire and that tire rolls forward (uphill) and hits another tire. Then the second, smaller tire rolls backward. As the camera pans to the right, you can see that the second tire rolls forward, uphill AGAIN. How did that happen? Shouldn't it have hit the third tire and rolled back down the ramp, instead of rolling uphill again?

[jimkress]

That's amazing! Rube Goldberg would be proud!

[Havoc]

Noting for later

[Andyman]

There were weights inside the tires.

[tdadams]

Click the link for the full article. It explains that the tires were weighted. I'm sure that's what causes this.

[RayBob]

"I've got one little problem - with the tires. The first tire hits the second, smaller tire and that tire rolls forward (uphill) and hits another tire. Then the second, smaller tire rolls backward. As the camera pans to the right, you can see that the second tire rolls forward, uphill AGAIN. How did that happen? Shouldn't it have hit the third tire and rolled back down the ramp, instead of rolling uphill again?"

They put weights in the tires, with the weight part up. when the tire hits the next, the weight throws off the balance and rolls it "uphill" into the next tire, and so on.

[FourtySeven]

I didn't see the original.....thanks for posting. :)

[Question_Assumptions]

Ping for later.

[Iowa Granny]

It's interesting. Unfortunately, I think I must be too Old and too female to 'get it'. Somebody has way too much time on their hands. I wish they'd come to my house to cut the lawn.

[eyespysomething]

Now that is cool.

From the story:

and from the wacky engineering of Caractacus Potts's breakfast-making machine in the Sixties film Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.

My son always wanted to crack eggs like they do in that movie!

[TenthAmendmentChampion]

You'd probably like this site:

The Nitpickers Site

[HairOfTheDog]

This is really neat.

[tom paine 2]

bump

[PhilSC]

A couple of things bother me about this video - 1) The lighting is perfect (almost too perfect). The small alcoves that hold the lights repeat going down the room, which would make an unusual room. 2) The separation in the boards on the floor seem to have a repeating pattern and a low probabilty of actually occurring.

At first I thought the video was real as described. Now I am not so sure.

[Tennessee_Bob]

Bump for later viewing.