Swedish Fish & Friends

Watch this sweet animation we created where we go inside a bag of Red Band candy and explore a colourful world.

Red Band, Swedish Fish & Friends

Concept

When we were approached to create a commercial for Red Band, they asked us to start from a blank slate; Their only criteria was that the animation should be fun, colourful and showed off their candy. 

After exploring a variety of different approaches we decided to start with the candy bags. Each type of candy was packaged in a unique colorful style that fit the specific candy. The idea of expanding the candy bag and creating worlds inside them fit the clients hope of creating a fun and colorful animation while also leaving room for the possibility to create more content with a similar theme in the future.

We decided on highlighting three of Red Bands most popular candies in an effort to not overwhelm the viewer while also speaking to the wide range that they offer. In order to feel the connection between the candies we used the Red Band butterfly as a guide to lead the viewer through the different worlds.

Process

So how do you take a bag of candy and create a world? With a little imagination, planning and a lot of paper of course 🙂

Taking an in depth look at the first scene, we started by planning the method of how we were going to “go inside” the bag of candy. For this we designed a table with a vertical board in the middle which had a square hole that the camera could fit through. From there we created an optical illusion. Replacing an actual candy bag with paper elements that, when viewed at the right angle, looked just like the candy pack.

As we go into the ‘candy bag’ we make the water start moving by replacing the strips of blue paper with new ones where the wave has slightly moved in a circular motion. This gives the waves a bouncing feeling. 

Each of the Swedish Fish are attached to a simple wooden tool that we created to easily make them jump from the ‘water’. 

For the boat, we wanted to really create the swaying feeling you get on the water and not just a back and forth. By attaching it to a stick that we cut at an angle and then turning the base around we were able to get the right motion that felt authentic.

The butterfly that starts on the package and then flies through the scene was first animated with paper and then added into this shot during our post production. This was so that it could fly from one scene to the next seamlessly.

The first scene with the Swedish Fish candy lasts just 5 seconds and took 5 days to animate.

This film was picked by Design Rush for their The Best Video Production Designs of 2023.

  • Concept: Rogier Wieland

    Art Direction: Rogier Wieland

    Animation: Willem van den Boomen & Rogier Wieland

    Animation Interns: Eli Meijer & Julia Peelen

    Music Development: Rogier Wieland