MACHAS

Flowing energy: Leonardoworx x Eni

You are probably familiar enough with Machas’ website to have noticed that Eni is a bona fide patron for many young artists. Eni’s founder Enrico Mattei instilled this passion for the arts into the company’s DNA more than 60 years ago - and it doesn’t show any signs of fading away.

The energy supplier that every day delivers power to millions of homes and business has made a point of involving young artists into the company’s soul and, together with its leading agency TBWA, has commissioned Leonardoworx to bring this decennial liaison to the screen.

On occasion of the Spoleto Art Festival, Leonardoworx crafted a 60” long 3D video for which he has also created the sound design and a surprising ambient remix of Fleetwood Mac’s “Don’t Stop”

“The video starts with an enzyme of energy that grows and transform first in literature, then music”, says Leonardoworx.”The viewer follows this ever-changing charge of energy in its journey to become a dancer, paint, film and finally to come back to the beginning, the enzyme, that is at the end revealed as the eye of the iconic Eni dog.”

“It was a challenging project as we wanted to achieve an artistic product that could retain my visual signature but at the same time that could reach a public as vast as possible. We really didn’t want to be too cool for school and I’ve adapted my style to achieve this.”

“The 3D is not strictly photo-realistic: I wanted the video to have a warmer mood, surely a nod to animation and a nod to Eni’s long history with illustration. At the same time I wanted to keep a real depth of field, as there was a physical camera moving around the elements, so I didn’t use global illumination for my renders but a physical render. The physical render calculates the object as it were in a real environment and even though I chose to stylized the elements I still wanted to give the viewer the impression to be in a real space.”

“I wanted to keep part of the video as realistic as possible and, in order to animate the dancer and her body made of particles, I had my assistant to film me while I did the dancer’s movement. Then I re-created all the movements with my 3D model using the video as a blueprint - all those years practicing classical dance in my youth proved to be quite helpful!”

“I was really happy to be given the opportunity to work on the sound side of the project as well. I am a classical trained musician and it was great to re-interpret Fleetwood Mac’s iconic “Don’t Stop” in a completely different context: the electro sounds and glitches, that belong to my musical landscape, add an element of surprise to the video . I also used the sound design to create a musical architecture that progresses in synch with the visual narrative of the video, a steady crescendo that peaks right when the dog is revealed.”

“What most people don’t know is that I created a good 40/50% of the music for this project on the Korg app on my iPad. If I’d go out and had an idea I could “jot it down” on my iPad and developed later or directly there on the tablet. There is no need to say that I love technology!”

“My favorite part of the video? I personally like when the sticks become the dancer: that marks the passage from inorganic to organic matter, it seems like the human factor takes the center of the stage. I also like the ending where the viewer discovers that the eye of the dog is in fact the enzyme, in fact I suggested to have that element as it gives consistency and continuity to the narration.”

See more Leonardoworx’ here