Ninian Doff Proves He's the Gran Master

Pulse director Ninian Doff recently completed a set of spots to trail the launch of PS4 game Gran Turismo 6 through Brothers and Sisters London.

Clever performance films that have a subtlety not normally found in video game spots the films showcase performers tailoring their talents to reflect the game. The first to be released is Beat Boxer [above]. Below Doff explains the thinking behind the campaign, how he approached it and why he thinks it works so well.

What was the brief from the agency?

The scripts had been written with a very deadpan approach in mind. They'd seen my short film Cool Unicorn Bruv in which an incredible thing is treated as something matter of fact and underplayed which obviously really applies here.

One of the most important things to nail when starting any project is what the tone is, so I think they were interested in finding someone who understood the tone more than anything. 

Did you immediately know how you would tackle the project?

I immediately understood and was excited about the humour and charm in keeping these really underplayed and deadpan. That doesn't just stop at performance but also camera work and editing. I was really sure from the start that I wanted to cut these as little as possible - hold on long wides or mids much longer than usual.

The reason for this is that I think long takes prove a talent is real. One of my real bugbears in commercials is when you see, for instance, a skateboarding trick and just as the board lands it cuts to a close up of the wheels landing. Rather than that being a cool cut, as far as I'm concerned that just means they never landed it and you had to cheat the edit.

There's a such a real pleasure in seeing amazing talents played out in one shot. So I knew I wanted to really strip back the edit and camera work - nothing flashy so we 100 per cent are watching a true and honest performance/talent.  

This is a very different way of advertising a game, far more subtle and naturalistic; was that a deliberate approach?

I wanted it to shoot it a little bit like you would shoot a nature documentary. By that I mean position yourself in the corner and quietly film this incredible moment on a long lens, rather than have a camera right up in someone's face. So even when it cuts closer we get to that close up by changing lens rather than physically moving closer - that all helps with keeping it observational.

Everyone was on board with this approach and were really keen and supportive on keeping it naturalistic and restrained - credit to them for writing these scripts which are refreshingly more subtle than you'd expect from game teasers.

What is interesting is that in the development I definitely threw lots of idea out as the project formed. Initially - prior to casting - I was trying to crow bar in jokes, sight gags and extra characters into the scripts as I was worried that the skills wouldn't be enough to sustain.

As far as I knew it was possible we'd never get anyone who could do the extraordinary talents we were looking for that well, and if that was the case I felt like a bit of narrative and jokes would be needed to hold it together.

Then we did the casting and our jaws fell to the floor at the talents we were witnessing and immediately the feeling was any extra gags or characters would just be distracting and unwanted - the performances are so engaging.

All the narrative and story is still there actually but it's revealed through the art direction and costume. I love that all these guys are just on a lunch break, popping to the store room or on their way home - they're normal people in the real world which makes the films much more interesting and engaging.

Tell us a bit about the casting process for the spot?

We did the casting with Hannah Simons and it was amazing. In one day we saw skill and talent on a level I hadn't let myself daydream we might get for this! The guys we cast, like Beat Fox for this first spot, are really at the top of their game. 

Were there other areas of the game you could have/did focus on in a similar fashion?

Those decisions happened more on the agency side as the guys developed the scripts. I know initially there were lots of other skills - and what they related to in the game - on the table. Briefly there was a script involving incredible skipping tricks which, if you look online, turns out really is a thing!

What was the shoot like and how did you direct the actors to what you wanted?

The shoot was great, I absolutely loved it. It was my second job in a month with [producer] Caroline Hicks and [production manager] Jessica Archer so we were a pretty well oiled machine by now and it went great. Ben Magahy was the DP and he did a beautiful job - immediately understanding the tone I was after. I even found a great pair of overalls on set to wear, so I had a director's uniform for the day! 

The cast are interesting as they're performers but they're not actors. So although they're not delivering dialogue they are all playing characters and a scene which is still something that can really fall flat. Real credit to them for keeping that casual, matter of fact, un-aware performance so believable, as well as still doing their incredible skills - that's a really hard thing to pull off.

What was the most difficult part of the process?

A lot of my work is usually very tricksy or post-heavy so this was refreshingly straightforward to shoot as there weren't all the technical post production elements to keep on top of.

However, in a way, simple is actually much harder than complicated. If you've got lots of cuts and post-tricks you have much more leeway to fix and tweak things in post. Here - especially as I wanted to stay on wide shots - all the timing, performance, pace, rhythms had to be nailed there and then, there were no tricks in the edit to hide behind.

Timing choices you'd normally later make in the edit had to be decided on set. Then even in the edit it's actually again trickier to cut something that isn't flashy but instead very restrained - means you really need to justify every cut. We edited it with with Max Windows at Stitch who was great at getting these as tight and simple as possible.

What are you working on next?

I've just finished a music video for Raliegh Ritchie which is coming out in January. He's an actor [in Game of Thrones] as well as a musician so it was a great chance to make it more a short film than a performance video. Then there's a few more commercial projects hopefully on the way for 2014.

Are you a gamer and, if so, GT6 aside, what’s your favourite game?

I actually won't let myself own a console as I'm capable of getting massively addicted to computer games. Really, I get so hooked I can lose days in them. To the detriment of my productivity I did recently discover my laptop can run GTA IV so have played a lot of that.

I think the whole GTA series is really inventive and groundbreaking. However my all time favourite computer game will always be Chuckie Egg on the BBC Microsystem which I played obsessively as a child and am pretty sure I was briefly one of the world's best at though I have no proof for this massive claim.