Atanasio + Martinez have joined forces with Saatchi & Saatchi LA and directed the new campaign for the spectacular Mirai, Toyota’s new Hydrogen Powered prototype and the campaign titled Lead the Way. This spot marks the first project with their new US representation, Logan & Sons, and under executive producer Paul Abatemarco.

The concept was bold. Reverse the world, its going in the wrong direction. One car will lead the way. Not just any car. A revolutionary car. A hydrogen powered car. The Mirai from Toyota is that car.

Reversing the World... How did we do it? How do we make the world go in reverse and the Mirai be the only thing in that world going forwards?

Atanasio + Martinez proposed that the solution was to reverse the problem. We couldn’t get all the people and all the cars and all the birds and planes to choreograph themselves in reverse, but maybe just maybe, with the right driver we could get the Mirai to go in reverse and then reverse the whole sequence, effectively reversing the world with the Mirai now being the only thing traveling in the correct direction.

We needed the right driver for such a task and he came in the form of Hollywood stunt driving legend, Greg Tracy. Greg was wonderful to work with and he entertained our crazy toy-car reenactments to help design the choreography for a forwards/backwards ballad of people and cars in realtime. Not as obvious as it may seem! Thankfully Logan Post and Stephan Kosinski and his team helped immensely by crafting an incredibly precise Pre-viz based upon our storyboard and direction.

Our brilliant cast of talent did a sterling job of bringing this spot to life. Thank you to actors Bahia Gold and Justin Wade and the rest of the cast.

The Director’s Cut will be finalized in the near future. https://vimeo.com/710422272