Ever since the first CG cars rolled out of the starting gate, VFX artists and CG animators have had to go some distance to quell the skepticism of anxious clients and agencies. The fear that photo-real is not real enough gripped some of the suits on Madison Ave. and in Detroit, and still does today. But by the mid-to-late Nineties, when automotive boards started calling for more challenging shoot conditions, the advantages of simulation over sheet metal became clear. Spots like "Trampoline" from BBDO, for the launch of a new-model Plymouth Neon, relied on the CG expertise of Venice-based Digital Domain to make the implausible - a car bouncing on a trampoline - possible.

Speed ahead to 2008, and while CG artists such as Neill Blomkamp and Trevor Cawood are tasked with making Citröen models dance, ice-skate and generally turn into robots, other computer animators and VFX teams are working to close the gap in perception between the photo-real, CG car and the real thing. And that means developing techniques, and proprietary software such as SWAY Studio's Drive-A-Tron.

Mark Glaser, owner and creative director of the Culver City shop, says his early experiences in creating CG cars led him to think that if they'd ever have a chance at being taken seriously as an alternative to live action, "the movement of the cars would have to be addressed in CG." Thus, upon forming SWAY in 2002, he and a computer programmer set out to create a driving simulator with which VFX artists and animators can literally sit behind the wheel and drive through a spot.

The Drive-A-Tron was up and running by 2005, and has been used for several recent spots, including Subaru "Peel Out", through DDB, New York, and a new campaign through Saatchi & Saatchi, LA for the Toyota Corolla. Produced by Buck, the global campaign depicts a SWAY-created CG Corolla zooming through a real-life miniature model town. Each of the 32 spots in the campaign is tailored to a different feature of the new car.

The Drive-A-Tron can work with CAD models, scans of the car, or cars created from scratch digitally. It has several presets pertaining to assorted makes of car - from sedans to SUVs - but Glaser says "the more information we have about the particular car, the more accurate the simulation.

"We put in everything - the size of the engine, how heavy the car is, what type of suspension it has - all these diferent characteristics are entered into the simulator," he adds. "Once you have the car set up, it's really as simple as driving it."

As for driving over tricky terrain, the roads can either be created in CG, or road scans can be taken from live locations. "That gives you the possibility of shooting a plate of a dirt road and then scanning it in and aligning the data with what you've filmed," he explains. "The end result is you have a CG car driving over a real location, with every bump and pothole."

Glaser says matching automotive motion over rough terrain through animation is particularly daunting, so the Drive-A-Tron should serve as a welcome innovation in spot-making. "What the Drive-A-Tron does is make that process as easy as driving a real car."

SWAY Studio http://www.swaystudio.com
Buck http://www.buck.tv
Saatchi & Saatchi, LA http://www.saatchila.com