This past weekend, Brandon, Adam, FX (short for Francis Xavier and is the camera man), Cristiano and I all boarded a train from Paris to Cologne, Germany for a photo shoot in Nuremburg, Germany.
Most of you, if not all, know Brandon is a Creative Director at an advertising firm here in Paris. Well, one of their clients is Nissan (European market) and they're launching 3 new sports cars in the near future and have hired Brandon and Adam to come up with a new campaign.
In the hills of Bavaria in a place called Nuremberg there is a fabulous and famous European race track called Nurburgring. Last time I was there, I was maybe 18 or 19 and there were only practice runs happening (there are BMW, Audi and other car manufacturers who have test buildings around the corner from this race track so they can test drive their new cars.) This time around, there was a HUGE 24 hour race happening. Essentially, any car from any company can participate. This year, there were something like 200 cars racing. It's very much like the Indi 500 or Nascar but the way it's set up is more like what Woodstock was. The fields surrounding the race track are very hilly and people will pitch tents, build scaffolding and place sleeping bags up there, park their camper vans, cars, motorcycles or motorbikes and just set up camp to watch and hear the races. This race, like I said earlier, is 24 hours long. Non-stop. Well, only as long as a pit-stop would be. Each car has a team. Each team consists of the pit crew but also 4-6 drivers that rotate every 2 hours. It's a very cool sight to witness, and being that we were "with" Nissan, we were able to go into the pit and see all the backstage stuff happening much easier and cheaper than a normal fan.
Cristiano, the acting producer for the weekend, would find various Nissan people, whether they worked for the pit crew, the driver, the assistant to the car designer, a mechanic, or someone who represented Nissan. They would be brought to an office building that was lent to us to film these various people saying line for line, what Brandon and Adam wrote as a new manifesto or mantra for the new sports cars for Nissan. Either Brandon or Adam would stand next to the camera and FX and feed each line as they wanted it broken down to the person standing in front of the camera. This helped the people enormously, especially since a majority of them did not speak English very well, but even so, it eliminated having the people look down to try and read the line in English. When done, they're then going to edit them together, and voila, it will eventually be the opening video when someone clicks on sports cars on the Nissan website.
It was very interesting, especially seeing that there were Germans who were asked to speak in English and they had their thick accent and certain troubles pronouncing words properly, and same with the Japanese. Watching one of the Japanese men stand perfectly still and very proper versus the other, older Japanese man, who seemed to be more thoughtful and it turns out, felt it was better to explain in great detail the concept of say one word, like the word "outlaws"...he took great liberties. But it was great to watch each person perform each line to the camera. Then I was asked to go up and speak by Brandon and Adam fed me lines twice. Cristiano (who happened to have told Brandon he REALLLLLLLY likes me...awww) felt he needed to step into Creative Director character and feed me the lines, even after Adam and Brandon were satisfied with my performances. Bless his wee heart, it was very tough to understand him because the man is an Italian-Stallion and has quite a thick accent, and we all laughed at his attempt to be suave in the Creative Director position and "charm" me, to FX's chagrin. But he is awfully sweet and endearing nonetheless!
We finished a few hours earlier so we were then able to go and hang out behind the scenes and view the pit and how it all works. Unfortunately, the only Nissan car racing was hit by another car and taken out for a while at 2am and for 3 hours, the mechanics and pit crew took apart another car and transplanted it to the race car, hoping that would solve the problem. It raced for a bit longer then other problems started to show themselves. I don't know if Nissan really ever recovered, though they tried quite hard and did manage to get the car out a couple more times before we got to the pit. At the pit, the car was still being worked on and also, a BMW was wrecked behind it, also in the pit. As we were standing near the race track side of the pit, I saw a Porche pull in next door and was awfully banged up as well. All in all, it was very fascinating at the speed of the cars, the speed of the pit crew and the know-how of everyone involved.
Tomorrow, Brandon, Adam and FX are going to film some more Nissan people who are located here in Paris and then the editing will begin. I'll probably have a first look, seeing as though my boyfriend is the main guy working on it, but as soon as I can show you guys, I will. It was boring in many aspects, since most of the time, we sat in the room waiting for Cristiano (to bring a new person who could break from their job for a while) and watched the race on the telly (though we did have surround sound, with the track just outside our window.) But nonetheless, it was very interesting to see how these things are done!
ENJOY THE PHOTOS, THOUGH THEY ARE OF CARS, I TRIED TO EDIT THEM AND MAKE THEM SOMEWHAT INTERESTING FOR YOUR VIEWING PLEASURES!
Some of the fields packed with camper vans, tents and German hippy-rednecks.
FX, the camera guy and Brandon squashed next to me in the van on the long and windey road...driven by a maniac Italian who thought he was driving in the races...uuf.
Brandon hard at work...
Adam, hard(ly) at work.
Cristiano TRYING to look suave and hard working...
The Italian-Stallion STILL trying...
Boys will be boys...in the new sports car pretending to have the wind blowing in his hair....
The 3 crazy boys posing in a mighty cool car after a REALLY long day of working hard!
The back patio space at the LOVELY German hotel we all stayed at. I couldn't see what I was photographing, thus, the wobbly-ness.
View from my balcony...LOVELY!
FX and Cristiano already eating their delicious breakfast grub...mmm broetchen (the best German rolls EVER!)
This hotel was a converted mill and this is the view from behind me at the breakfast table. On the other side of this river/creek are vineyards and then lots of large rolling hills.
From the other side of me at the breakfast table.
This is the same kind of Audi that was in Ironman...and was parked outside the offices where we were filming. There were also Lamborghinis, Ferraris and other insanely expensive cars, just parked for all to gawk at!
No clue what this car is called but it reminds me of the old 1960s Italian films for some reason. The other side, what would be the passenger seat, was covered. There's a bar like piece separating the two seats and the gears are underneath that bar.
That is the Porche pulling in to the pit for them to work on. It was pretty banged up, but I do think they got it back out after a bit.
Every girl apparently loves a race car driver.... He's the replacement.
The fast pit crew hard at work, the driver almost above the guy in the yellow is working on taking off his very protective helmet.
Here he is, and he really looked exhausted. I had glanced back and saw another driver who had a massive torn blister on his hands. I can't imagine the amount of stress these drivers are under each time they get behind the racing wheel.
That massive building with the 2 thin spires in the background is the Cologne Cathedral and is quite impressive.
This is the Cologne Cathedral. Unfortunately, my camera battery died right after I took this picture otherwise there would be MANY more photos! There is scaffolding all over and as FX and I walked (he had never been to Germany, so I gave him a little tour of the city I frequented when I lived only 45 min north) I noticed that they are in the process of cleaning it. Yes, it looks somewhat clean now, but in actuality, it is FILTHY black with soot and dirt. The spot that was cleaned looked absolutely incredible and of a very light yellowy tan color. I look forward to going back when it is completed, but also many times between now and then (it will take YEARS, I believe!)
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