Hoo

Hoo’s launch was scheduled around the time of the ‘staycation’ boom following the Covid pandemic, and they asked us to produce an attention-grabbing video that would make a splash in all the major news publications – which it did!

The brief was to create a tongue-in-cheek advertisement for Great Yarmouth, taking creative inspiration from the overproduced style and comedic tone of Love Island. We set out to showcase all that Yarmouth has to offer, from freshly battered fish and chips to a dizzying array of activities.

The shoot took place over two gloriously sunny days in Great Yarmouth, with plenty of sun cream required by all on set. We used a variety of locations for filming, including the beachfront, an amusement arcade, and a boating lake.

As part of our concept development, we incorporated the framing and shots from a few iconic films, including Sexy Beast & Casino Royale, with a touch of Hoo. These were a lot of fun to set up and we were really pleased with the outcome.

We used our in-house Red Gemini and the lovely Cooke anamorphic lenses (courtesy of Shoot Blue) for this one. We also had the Laowa probe lens to play with for the close up detail shots in the arcade, ice cream parlour and fish and chip shop. The probe lens was the perfect tool to put inside a 2p machine and created a very interesting perspective we were super happy with.

The talent we worked with were all fantastic, including Ru Paul’s Drag Race’s Ellie Diamond. While we love working with both children and animals, this did also add an extra layer of complications to the shoot. In particular, we needed to get a scene with three children atop three donkeys, and unfortunately the donkeys weren’t as co-operative as we had hoped. Luckily, the children were fantastic and we bagged the shots we needed ahead of schedule.

The other animals we planned to work with were even less tame. We needed to get a scene of a lady defending her lunch from seagulls, and initially we thought that our lighting set up and crew would deter the gulls from swooping into shot – but we were wrong. Within moments of placing the fish and chips in front of our actor, the flock descended on us. The actor we were working with was actually afraid of birds so her performance was completely genuine, she did an amazing job suppressing the need to flee the scene and we were very grateful to her!

To keep the transitions between scenes engaging and to show off more of the iconic seaside town we took along our trusty drone. We also had our good friend Yassin Yassin capturing hyperlapses of the town which really helped to maintain the edit’s pace and energy.

Producer / Director: Mark Lunt

DOP: Dom Lake

1st AC: Kai Newton

2nd AC: Keiran Coyne

1st AD: Dan Morbin

Production Assistant: Katie Milsom

Editors: Mark Lunt & Katie Milsom

Gaffer: Jorge Higgins

Runner: Lauren Standley

Hyperlapses: Yassin Yassin

Grade: Chris Bell @ Creep Post Production

Talent agency: Sandra Reynolds Agency

Talent: India Rose Harl, Ramzan Miah & Ellie Diamond