Montreal agency CloudRaker has launched an internal digital film services division that will create in-house productions based on what it describes as “modest budgets and fast turnarounds.”
Demo Reel from lovecat productions on Vimeo.
The new division, Lovecat Productions, is not intended to replace the traditional production houses that CloudRaker partners with, but will enable the agency to create what it describes as “really relevant content” without the infrastructure (and cost) of major commercial shoots.
“We’re dealing with budgets that probably wouldn’t interest them,” said Christina Brown, creative director and partner with CloudRaker. “We’re dealing with much leaner budgets, and don’t have to worry about things like craft services and actors.
“It was sort of born from our experience with clients, and specifically a lot of the time they have a need for content that doesn’t need all of the infrastructure of a traditional production house.”
Brown believes Lovecat is a model that could ultimately be adopted on a widespread basis, as production tools improve and a new generation of creative becomes increasingly adept at using them.
“It’s of our times,” she said. “We’ve got these amazing tools, and when you look at the new wave of creative, these guys are really competent in so many different realms.
“For me it’s about giving the creative teams as much of a creative outlet as possible, maximizing clients’ budget and giving them content that can be repurposed online or for internal purposes – with people who understand their brand and what they’re trying to accomplish.”
Lovecat will not operate as a standalone entity, said Brown. “It is folded into the agency completely, but we wanted to give it its own name and its own mojo.”
The name Lovecat is both a nod to one of the 11 key pillars of the CloudRaker philosophy, to be a “lovecat” – Brown defines a Lovecat someone who wants good things to happen – and the agency’s digital roots and the enduring fondness for internet cat-related humour (otherwise known as lolcat).
CloudRaker’s entire creative team will contribute to Lovecat, said Brown, noting that several agency staffers have expertise in typical production skills such as animation, editing and photography.
The incubator for Lovecat was an internal online magazine developed by CloudRaker called The Rake, which has created a series of videos in recent years. One of the productions, a video guide to Paris called My Paris by Bruno, was picked up by trend-hunting site Notcot.org and has now been viewed more than 43,000 times, while another video interview with the creative director of special projects at sunglasses manufacturer Oakley was picked up by HypeBeast.com. The Lovecat team also recently traveled to Senegal to create a video for Washington, D.C.-based client, .ORG.
