Behind The Scenes

How do you make an elephant dance? It sounds like a riddle, but that was the problem to be solved by BBDO in New York, effects house Quiet Man in New York and director Joe Pytka for a new GE spot, “Elephant,” to show that the company “create[s] technology right in step with nature,” according to the voiceover. Pytka filmed two men lashed together performing Gene Kelly’s moves from “Singing in the Rain” (the music in the spot), and then Quiet Man added a computer-generated elephant. “Two dancers were out there [on a set at Universal] splashing in the water and brushing up against leaves and grass and interacting with the environment,” says Johnny Semerad, animation director, special effects supervisor at Quiet Man. “So it looked real because these two guys were out there doing it.”