Some people can skate and some can’t...

I directed this commercial for Designwyse with less than a day’s notice. Damien Bear, who worked for them at the time, called me up at 11pm one night and said “we need an ad for the Globe skateboarding championships tomorrow night...”

Nothing like a bit of pressure. So I met up with him the next morning and we came up with the idea. I grabbed a camera and Damien grabbed a handful of the guys from the store and we headed down the road to the local skate ramp.

Damien took the lead as the guy who couldn’t skate. The irony is he’s actually a pretty good skater. I made him fall of a dozen times just to make sure we got the shot (and for payback for the last minute notice).

An hour or so later and we packed up and Damien and myself rushed back to the edit suite to frantically put it together. Damien provided the music from a band he was friends with. A few hours later and with some snappy editing, we had a finished product.

That night it was run on the big screens around the Rod Laver Arena where the competition was held. I was too tired to go...

I’m sure some of the astute super-geeks out there (and yes, I consider myself one of them) will notice by the Apple G4 and Final Cut Pro version 3, that the ad was made way back in 2002. My how things have changed in such a short time.