Documentary for Yebisu Hop Terroir Follows the 'Hops and Dreams' of Beer

In May of 2022 Chase A Cloud won a pitch (out of 40 candidates) through the Tongal platform for a four-minute Documentary style film for the web and streaming in Japan about Sapporo’s new Yebisu Hop Terroir beer, filmed in Žatec, Czechia.

The end product is a mixed media film (live-action & 3D Animation) with a :30 cutdown.

The film is a part of Sapporo’s marketing campaign around their seasonal Hop Terroir beer. It’s positioned as a premium Lager and is released around the holiday season in limited quantities. The Hop Terroir beer is made with 100% Saaz hops which this year are sourced solely from the Bohemia region where Žatec is situated.

Vladé shares more about the work, “I’d say by far the biggest challenge of this project was the pre-production, having to coordinate with so many players in the project. First there’s Tongal, then Dentsu Japan and finally the client. Couple that with needing to juggle Zoom calls within three time zones, literally on opposite sides of the world, and it all becomes very difficult to navigate rather quickly." 

“Žatec is a wonderful place. A quaint Czech farming town that’s filled with real people - farmers. Farmers carry themselves with a sort of grounded-ness in their step and for me this way of living, working the land, has always felt naively magical. This and our initial interview with Mr. Rosa, the main character, made me realise that this film is not just about the farmers nor the beer. It’s about the magic they’re both part of."

“From then on, the story sort of fell in place. During the scout in July me and Angel (the director of photography) were constantly going back and forth that we need this film to feel vintage. It only made sense for the story."

“Let me tell you something about Soviet glass. It’s clunky, probably designed by some drunk engineer and is often times a pain in the ass to operate. But when it clicks, it clicks. A rehoused set of Lomo Anamorphic lenses and an Alexa Mini. Not your typical documentary setup but our project wasn’t the typical documentary either. I really like the texture of the final picture. The focus field of these lenses is so ridiculous that my girlfriend who had Lasik eye surgery last year said she can’t watch it since it makes her feel as if she’s losing her sight again."

“First time for me working with a mostly Czech crew. We had young and very professional lads who just made the whole production flow with ease. My favourite part of the job is meeting people from other countries and finding how similar we are. Brings a smile to my face every time. Aside from the occasional rain dodging, things went pretty smoothly after the camera started rolling. I’m sure the copious amounts of stellar Czech beer every night after wrap helped boost morale."

“In the end of the film there is a scene where a photographer takes a silver plate photograph of Mr. Rosa and his father while they’re holding a framed picture of his grandfather. Since photography was a part of the project deliverables as well, I talked to Daniel Lekov who apart from doing kickass product photography, loves to work with collodion. And he was super down to have him be a part of the story. So much so, that he drove his production van from Bulgaria to Czechia (you can’t fly with the sort of chemicals needed for this kind of photography) and managed to nail the pic first try. After we scanned the silver plate, we sent it back to Czechia for the Rosas to keep as a memento."

“The animation is all done in-house and this time around was handled by one of our animation leads Alexander Nachev. Our reference starting point was a 2D cut out lithographic style which he took and lifted to a whole new level. What you see in the film is an entirely 3D world with 2D shaded assets that beautifully captures the aesthetic we were after while giving it a modern twist."

“The soundtrack is tailor made by George Strezov, a brilliant composer who operates out of Sofia. Each time I go to him, it’s with some wacky reference in mind. This time was no different. “Alright, George, I want this to have Japanese taiko drums, a big-ass cello and Bohemian strings”. And he just finds a way to make it happen. We even managed to squeeze in some Bulgarian Rhodope choir voices in there which absolutely tear through the instrumental in such a beautiful way."

“And a shoutout is due to Nick Laspina and Gerard Gonzalez from Tongal who were the two main guys on this project. It was a pleasure to work with them."