Framestore: When Roger met Danny.(Roger Woodburn, Danny Kleinman, Framestore CFC)(Interview)

The directors Roger Woodburn and Danny Kleinman got together to chat about their careers in commercials.

Roger Woodburn was the first client through the doors at Framestore CFC, closely followed by Danny Kleinman. The two directors sat down to discuss the changes they've witnessed in the years since - both behind the camera, on location and in the post-production suite.

Roger Woodburn: When I started, you'd do anything to do it in camera. Special effects were the poor relation - something that solved little problems in the story. Nowadays, it's 90 per cent of the idea sometimes, isn't it?

Danny Kleinman: I've always thought good ads are based on good ideas and never based solely on good special effects. You can have a brilliant special effect and a bad idea and it'll still be bad. But if it's a brilliant idea and a poor effect, people will still like it. The mix made in heaven is a brilliant idea and a brilliant special effect. I don't think that using special effects is anything to do with a lack of ideas, but they should enhance and illustrate an idea well. The only way they shouldn't be used is gratuitously, for the sake of the effect.

RW: There was a changing point in my career when an agency asked if they could come round and talk to me about a script. We sat down for the meeting and he said: 'OK, Roger, what tricks have you got?' It was a moment of revelation to me that instead of being handed a really good idea, he just wanted to know if I had a box of tricks that he could hang a product on.

DK: Like you, I started when you edited the actual film print. You'd look through the Moviola and see all the Chinagraph marks …