French Press

A compilation of our recent work.

Netflix

Foundation Capital Startup Stories

We believe that great creative work is defined not only
by its beauty, but by its ability to deliver results.

Montaño

Short Film

Skype

The Next Generation of Skype

AdRoll

Foundation Capital Startup Stories

Sister Crayon

Music Video: Your Girl

Lookout

Introducing Identity Theft Protection

FEMA

We Prepare Every Day

Biz Stone

New Book: Things A Little Bird Told Me

AMBDS

Music Video: Hey Man

Lending Club

Foundation Capital Startup Stories

Filming products in the French Press studio.

Gap Inc.

Inspire Internationally

Quelle Chris

Music Video: Ghost at the Finish Line

Credit Karma

Wrestlers

The Slottery

A mock trailer for our 2016 holiday card.

Foundation Capital

The Way to Design

Plastc

Experience Plastc Card

Uber

Everyone’s Private Driver

Twilio

Introducing Twilio CX for Chromebook

Filming digitally through an old portrait camera.

Sunrun Solar

Foundation Capital Startup Stories

Maveron

Seed Investments

Healthline

Faces of Parkinson’s

Google

Apps for Business: Weights

Symantec

Cyber Security Services

Exile

Music Video: Klepto

Ubisoft

Just Dance 2016: Hunter Pence Surprise

French Press

A compilation of our recent work.

Take a look at our favorite projects from the past few years, spanning commercial, web, documentary, music video, and short film genres.

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Foundation Capital Startup Stories

The “white knuckle moments” from building Netflix.

Foundation Capital approached us to create a series of videos showcasing their “winner” portfolio companies, like Netflix, Lending Club, Sunrun, and AdRoll.

Our concept was to share the personal stories of the CEOs from these companies and hear them recount the “white knuckle moments” of overcoming struggles along the way. We then collaborated with illustrators and animators from around the world to match each story with a style unique to its CEO.

The resulting videos break the mold of standard corporate videos and PR scripts; they are candid, intimate conversations presented with visual personality.

Our creative approach to this project was also highly practical. These CEOs are difficult to access and schedule, and by recording audio-only interviews, we needed far less of their time and they were more comfortable opening up about their stories.

In this video we sat down with founder Reed Hastings to talk about leadership and strategically guiding Netflix to success.

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Short Film

An Olympian’s story of perseverance, athleticism, & feminism.

Alysia Montaño is an Olympic track runner, advocate, and all-around badass. Last year, she made headlines for a devastating stumble during the Olympic trials for 2016, and has since been making a comeback.

For a rare non-client-driven project, we collaborated with director Lauren Finerman and cinematographer Heath Orchard to tell Montaño’s story of perseverance, athleticism, and feminism.

French Press was involved through every step of the process—from co-funding and planning, to filming for 3 days on location, to conducting interviews, to editing the video into a short motivational piece. We also worked with a composer to ensure the soundtrack was a perfect fit for the story’s tone and goals.

The video was released to promote Montaño’s recent race (covered in the following article by Jezebel), and is helping to spread her inspiring story with the world.

Article in Jezebel

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The Next Generation of Skype

Unveiling Skype’s new brand identity with style & storytelling.

Skype needed a video to announce their new brand identity and app design. After originally working with a New York based creative agency, the resulting video—although artistic—failed to demonstrate the core product and brand. French Press was tasked with rescuing the video and existing footage, on a tight budget that allowed for just a single day of filming new material.

We worked to seamlessly integrate new animations and Oakland-shot footage with the original content from New York, while simplifying and refocusing the video’s overall message.

The video launched alongside Skype’s new app and was featured across news sites, and has since been viewed millions of times. We see this project as a testament to our core value: that great creative work must be more than artistic—it must also achieve a client’s needs and goals.

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Foundation Capital Startup Stories

The “white knuckle moments” from building AdRoll.

Foundation Capital approached us to create a series of videos showcasing their “winner” portfolio companies, like Netflix, Lending Club, Sunrun, and AdRoll.

The resulting videos break the mold of standard corporate videos and PR scripts; they are candid, intimate conversations presented with visual personality.

In this video we sat down with founder and CEO Aaron Bell to talk about learning to stay calm under pressure.

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Music Video: Your Girl

Using old portrait cameras to achieve a uniquely intimate look.

For the final installment of our “Sister Crayon” music video trilogy, we worked with a choreographer, took over a clock factory, and invented an intricate camera setup. Inspired by how the song paints the portrait of two lovers, we explored how to create a unique visual style for the video with more than just post-production filters and effects.

Behind the Scenes: Antique Photography, Today

We discovered that the aesthetic of early-1900’s portrait photography was a perfect complement to the song, leading us to create an eight-foot rig that combined a modern digital cinema camera with an antique medium-format camera from that era. Be sure to check out the making-of video and case study article, below.

Read the Case Study

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Introducing Identity Theft Protection

Motivating people to take action, through relatable stories.

Lookout is a mobile device security company, who approached us to help promote their app with a simple and relatable video.

Identity theft is a serious topic and approaching it can quickly become gloomy, overwhelming, or overly hypothetical—causing a viewer to disengage. Lookout’s previous video campaigns had struggled to gain viewers and convert new users, so we knew that striking the right tone was key.

Our concept for the video focused on sharing stories of identity theft in a relatable way. We cast real people, who came to the French Press studio to recount their own experiences and reflect on the importance of awareness and innovative solutions like Lookout’s app.

That concept resonated with the general public. The final video generated seven times the engagement as previous campaigns, and came in at one fifth the cost. It’s a perfect example of our philosophy that great creative work drives results.

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We Prepare Every Day

Educating and inspiring communities to prepare.

The US Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) approached us to create a series of videos building awareness for their new app and encouraging people to make emergency kits.

The video above focuses on disaster preparedness for people with disabilities. The production emphasized authenticity and accessibility: we cast real people, and finished the video with both closed captions and sign-language picture-in-picture.

The project also included ten 15-20 second spots highlighting parts of their app, all of which were filmed in a single day in the French Press studio space. The series was shown across social media, at events, and even high-profile sporting games.

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New Book: Things A Little Bird Told Me

Lessons & insights from a Silicon Valley icon.

Twitter co-founder Biz Stone sought to accompany his new book with a video trailer to help with promotion.

The project was led by director and cinematographer Jesse Dana, who approached us to lead post-production. While collaborating closely with Jesse and Biz, we also created animations throughout the video that match the illustration style found in the book.

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Music Video: Hey Man

A twist on hipster music video tropes, for the new song by A Million Billion Dying Suns.

AMBDS is a transcendental rock band from California, who approached us with free reign to craft a story and visuals to accompany the release of their new song, “Hey Man.”

We created an elaborate concept for the music video that follows an overly confident, oblivious guy tumbling through a world where everything turns against him; a darkly humorous reaction to hip videos of people being cool.

  
    We took cues from the song and lyrics to create the story’s arc: changes, swells, and climactic moments in the song would dictate how our hero’s journey progressed.
  
  Andrew JunckerDirector

Achieving this concept required four days of intense and highly collaborative production, an underwater night shoot, and huge efforts on behalf of casting, makeup, art, and props.

The final video was premiered by Impose Magazine alongside the release of the band’s EP album “Strawberry” which features the song.

Read the Case Study

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Foundation Capital Startup Stories

The “white knuckle moments” from building Lending Club.

Foundation Capital approached us to create a series of videos showcasing their “winner” portfolio companies, like Netflix, Lending Club, Sunrun, and AdRoll.

The resulting videos break the mold of standard corporate videos and PR scripts; they are candid, intimate conversations presented with visual personality.

In this video we sat down with founder Renaud Laplanche to talk about Lending Club's journey from a startup to today.

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Inspire Internationally

A global production for a global company.

Gap Inc. was shifting their entire corporate structure, including all of their brands, from being U.S.-based to global. They needed a video to rally excitement across the company, its shareholders, and the press; a video to demonstrate how Gap Inc.’s brands were ready for this momentous step toward being international.

Coordinating simultaneous shoots in San Francisco, New York, London, and Tokyo over three intense weeks of production allowed us to achieve Gap’s ambitious vision for the video in a record-breaking timeframe. In fact, we had a rough cut (a first draft of the video) the day after production finished!

We sent members of the French Press team to these different cities to oversee crucial details, like maintaining a consistent look and feel in each of the shoots and executive interviews.

The video was presented on the Gap Inc. website and to the press, and a longer version of the video was shown internally at a major employee event. French Press has taken on numerous projects for Gap, and this one was by far the most challenging and impactful.

  
    Every video French Press produced for me told a memorable story with compelling visuals, and they always delivered on-time and on-budget. I actually miss seeing them when projects are over!
  
  Sue KwonGap Inc.

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Music Video: Ghost at the Finish Line

An unconventional take on the hip hop music video.

Music videos are one of our favorite ways to get creative and experiment with bold styles and storytelling. Oakland-based hip hop artist and producer Quelle Chris approached us for a music video for the headliner song of his third album “Ghost at the Finish Line.”

Playing off the song’s outer-space vibes, we envisioned a neon hip-hop spin on the muppet show. The concept may sound crazy, but it perfectly encapsulated Quelle’s own style while allowing us to be resourceful on a tight production budget. In fact nearly all of the effects were achieved “in-camera” rather than digitally in post-production.

Read the Case Study

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Wrestlers

Short, humorous ads for a simple service.

Credit Karma is a company based on a simple concept: provide people with truly free credit scores.

As the latest of many projects we’ve done for Credit Karma, this series of ads presents the service in a fun and out-of-the-ordinary way: show ridiculous characters in a relatable situation. Because even wrestlers need to keep their financials in check.

The “Wrestler” series of ads aired on TV and online.

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The Slottery

A mock trailer for our 2016 holiday card.

For our annual holiday card, we decided it would be fun to resurrect an old a script we wrote, in which each member of French Press dies a horrible death. We collaborated with some of our favorite fellow filmmakers—including Phil Briggs, Ben Lunden, and the Perez Brothers—to create this mock trailer to an imaginary horror flick.

What better way to say happy holidays to our network of friends and partners!?

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The Way to Design

Promoting Steve Vasallo’s new book on design & entrepreneurship.

Steve Vasallo is a designer, thought leader, and General Partner at Foundation Capital (a repeat client of ours). Foundation approached us to create a compelling teaser trailer for Steve’s new book—a manifesto of his design philosophy and a practical guide for entrepreneurs.

We collaborated closely with Steve and Foundation’s Director of Content to refine a script that articulated key messages from the book while maintaining its own miniature story arc and ending. Determining the visuals was another challenge; we ultimately pursued live action over animation because the book is highly practical and grounded in the real world.

  Steve’s philosophy praises a creative process that anyone can participate in—much like kids playing with crayons or LEGO bricks.

In addition to promoting the book online, the video was used as an introduction to a series of talks that Steve gave at conferences, design organizations, and Stanford’s D. School.

TechCrunch Article

Read the Book

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Experience Plastc Card

Successfully crowdfunding through relatable stories.

Plastc was preparing to launch their revolutionary credit card device, and needed an exciting video for their crowdfunding campaign.

Our creative concept wove a surprisingly long list of features into a storyline of relatable moments. And the concept worked! Our video spearheaded the campaign, and Plastc received more than five million dollars in preorders in the first week.

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Everyone’s Private Driver

A video mission statement for the early days of Uber.

Uber was a young company when we began working on projects for them. Their concept was gaining traction, and they wanted to share their new “2.0” vision in a compelling way. We proposed a video mission statement that positioned them as a sleek and elevated transportation option while highlighting the warmth with which they were empowering drivers in new ways.

Uber had never made a video like this before, and relied on French Press to help them articulate and share this vision. The finished product was presented publicly via their website and through the press, playing an important role in increasing the company’s brand awareness at the time.

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Introducing Twilio CX for Chromebook

A simple message in one seamless shot.

Twilio is an online communications company that approached us for a video promote the release of Twilio CX for Google’s Chromebook laptops.

Their new service was teased as being so simple and easy that a company using it could set up a call center agent’s laptop in less than 30 seconds. Our creative concept portrayed that simplicity by filming the entire ad in a single shot. No edits, and no explanations of complex technology; just a seamless demonstration of the customer experience.

Read the Case Study

Although the final result appears effortless, the process of creating it was highly planned and orchestrated. We created storyboard “animatics” for each moment, built a whole call center set lined by a hundred feet of camera dolly track, and finished the video’s sound with layers of foley effects, music, and voiceover.

Twilio presented the video at one of their major company events, and also shared it publicly alongside the product announcement.

  
    Our production effort depends on vendors that meet our bar for quality and professional execution. The French Press team fulfilled exactly that. Every step of the process from brainstorming to production was a collaboration and produced some of our best film work to date.
  
  Andres KroghTwilio

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Foundation Capital Startup Stories

The “white knuckle moments” from building Sunrun.

Foundation Capital approached us to create a series of videos showcasing their “winner” portfolio companies, like Netflix, Lending Club, Sunrun, and AdRoll.

The resulting videos break the mold of standard corporate videos and PR scripts; they are candid, intimate conversations presented with visual personality.

In this video we sat down with founder Lynn Jurich to talk about the grassroots journey of growing Sunrun into a success business.

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Seed Investments

Showcasing Maveron’s most promising startups.

Maveron Ventures approached us to help tell the story of how their young portfolio companies are making the world a better place for consumers. The goal was to highlight the thread that runs through these companies, and Maveron’s passion for helping their founders.

We created a concept for the video that fluidly moves between the founders of these top startups, briefly sharing the purpose behind each of their brands. Maveron leveraged this video online to articulate their mission as a consumer-focused venture capital firm.

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Faces of Parkinson’s

Inspiring, real stories from people living with the disease.

Healthline is an online provider of health information, helping people better understand and live with medical conditions. We’ve had the pleasure of working on at least a dozen projects with them over the years—everything from interviews, to infographics, to short documentaries.

The video shown above comes from a series called “Faces Of Parkinson’s” which features the stories of real people living with the disease. Each of these documentary-style videos required French Press to find the individuals they focus on, then articulate their story in a hopeful and informative way.

Healthline presented the series through their website, which is one of the most highly-trafficked online resources in the United States.

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Apps for Business: Weights

Comical ads tailored for the web.

We’ve had the privilege of working with Google on numerous projects. “Weights” is part of a series of short ads showcasing Google’s suite of business apps, which were just gaining momentum at the time.

The ads were shown across the internet, and because web-based ads are often muted by default, we set out to convey the usefulness of their business apps with non-verbal comedy. Whether through metaphor or slapstick directness, each video highlighted a different precarious scenario that would simply be avoided by using Google’s business apps.

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Cyber Security Services

Explaining complex products through story & animation.

Symantec is one of the leading software and cybersecurity companies, and we’ve worked with them on everything from international live-action productions to animated explainer videos. This project falls into the latter category, as they approached us with a script they’d already written and the goal to build a compelling video from it. We pulled from our network of top animators to illustrate how Symantec’s cybersecurity services help prevent companies from being hacked.

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Music Video: Klepto

A music video plot takes a turn for the absurd.

Rapper and prolific music producer Exile approached us with a music video idea for one of his original songs: “I want to get kidnapped and beaten up by clowns.” We decided to skip the clowns—instead adding bombs, fire, and an amazing powder-blue suit into a gruesomely comedic story. Interwoven with Exile himself singing on stage, we edited the violent narrative parts to appear in slow-motion—matching the pace of the song and emphasizing its outlandishness.

The production itself was a brilliant collaboration amongst our team of filmmakers, spanning three locations under a tight schedule.

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Just Dance 2016: Hunter Pence Surprise

Generating buzz by dancing in the streets.

We have a great working relationship with Ubisoft, and have produced many videos for their games. The goal for this video was to promote the new “Just Dance” game by featuring a celebrity guest: SF Giants baseball player Hunter Pence. We partnered with Pence and ride-sharing service Lyft to stage a fun day full of surprise encounters and eccentric dance moves.

Of course, from a filmmaking perspective, achieving this fun and spontaneous illusion was a massive logistical undertaking. We worked with the San Francisco police to shut down entire city blocks, and planned nearly every minute of our limited time with Hunter. The shoot was a blast and the challenge paid off, as this video became one of the most popular parts of Ubisoft’s campaign.

  
    French Press knocked our project out of the park. They captured awesome content, nailed the editorial, and were a pleasure to work with.
  
  Katherine BamfordUbisoft

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What We’ve Made

French Press

A compilation of our recent work.

Netflix

Foundation Capital Startup Stories

We believe that great creative work is defined not only by its beauty, but by its ability to deliver results.

Montaño

Short Film

Skype

The Next Generation of Skype

AdRoll

Foundation Capital Startup Stories

Sister Crayon

Music Video: Your Girl

Lookout

Introducing Identity Theft Protection

FEMA

We Prepare Every Day

Biz Stone

New Book: Things A Little Bird Told Me

AMBDS

Music Video: Hey Man

Lending Club

Foundation Capital Startup Stories

Gap Inc.

Inspire Internationally

Quelle Chris

Music Video: Ghost at the Finish Line

Credit Karma

Wrestlers

The Slottery

A mock trailer for our 2016 holiday card.

Foundation Capital

The Way to Design

Plastc

Experience Plastc Card

Uber

Everyone’s Private Driver

Twilio

Introducing Twilio CX for Chromebook

Sunrun Solar

Foundation Capital Startup Stories

Maveron

Seed Investments

Healthline

Faces of Parkinson’s

Google

Apps for Business: Weights

Symantec

Cyber Security Services

Exile

Music Video: Klepto

Ubisoft

Just Dance 2016: Hunter Pence Surprise

We believe that great creative work is defined not only
by its beauty, but by its ability to deliver results.