FoxyLab launch showreel: chat in, video out
FoxyLab makes marketing films from a chat. This is its own launch showreel: fifteen seconds that open on one typed line, “make our launch video”, and answer it with a cut of every kind of video the studio makes, from ads and reels to launches and product films, in every size.
FoxyLab made it with FoxyLab, in two sizes, 9:16 and 16:9. It has no voice and no music: every word is set in type on the picture, so it reads the same with the sound off.
One line of chat: “make our launch video”
FoxyLab is a studio in a chat. A person writes what they need, the chat asks a few questions back, and the studio makes the film. For its own launch, FoxyLab gave itself the same start any person gets: four words, “make our launch video”.
The chat then asked four questions. Is it an ad or content? An ad. What is the feeling? Very fast. Which formats? Both. A voice, or type only? Type only. That was the whole brief, and it is short on purpose, the way a one-line brief for a first cut can be.
- Kind Showreel
- Sizes 9:16 and 16:9
- Length 15 s
- For anyone who lands on the site
Ads, reels, launches: words that change every 0.4 seconds
The film opens on a black screen and a chat field. The line “make our launch video” types itself in white, a yellow cursor blinks after it, and a yellow round button sends it. In the wide cut the line lands as a white chat bubble at 1.4 seconds.
At 1.6 seconds the answer starts. City lights flare across the frame. Then a pour runs over crystal on a pink ground, and a match cut turns it into coffee poured into a white cup, under the word “ads”. Sneakers step into the surf, still under “ads”.
The word changes to “reels” over a dancer in neon and smoke, and over a skater's kickflip at sunset. A splash, slowed, and a drop of confetti over a party carry “launches”. Then “product films” stands over white sneakers at the water's edge, and the frame splits into panels of the same footage.
Next, “every size” sits above three boxes labelled 9:16, 1:1 and 16:9, and the boxes fill with footage. The last words are “chat in”, then “video out”, with the footage playing inside the letters of “video out”. In the vertical cut those words hold to black. The wide cut ends on an empty chat field with its yellow cursor, so the loop starts again where it began.
Each shot is a different kind of film a brand might ask for: a drink, a shoe, a dance, a trick, a party. The words name the kind, and the speed says how fast the studio works.
“Faster in the middle.”
Two notes and a critic's pass changed the cut
The first cut went back to the chat, and two notes came in. “Faster in the middle.” The middle of the film now cuts every 0.4 seconds from 1.6 seconds, so the shots of ads, reels and launches pass almost as fast as the eye takes them. “End on the words.” The last word now holds to black, and the film ends on what it says, not on a picture.
Each note is a sentence about what the viewer should feel, not a setting to change. That is the way of notes, not knobs, and here two of them were enough.
Before the render, FoxyLab's own critic looked at the film frame by frame. It found a blank frame at 9.2 seconds and took it out. It also checked that the words held to the black at the end, so the loop is clean. From the first line in the chat to the last render, the film took 52 minutes.
Black, yellow and one heavy typeface, with no voice
The film's kit has three colours: black, yellow #F5E500 and an off-white, #F2F1EC. Black is the ground of the chat and the end. Yellow is used only for what the person does: the cursor and the send button. The words are off-white, so the footage gives the film its other colours.
The type is one heavy grotesque, Archivo Black, set in lower case and very large, so one word fills the width of a phone. Its tone is three words in the kit: fast, loud, clear.
The motion is in the cuts, not in effects. The words do not fly in; they change with the picture. Near the end the footage moves inside the letters, the one place where the type and the film become one thing. With no voice and no music track, the film works on mute, as most feeds play it: few words, large, each on screen long enough to read.
9:16 for Reels and Stories, 16:9 for YouTube and the site
The chat asked for both formats, and the studio cut the film twice, not cropped once. The 9:16 cut, 720 by 1280, is for Reels, Stories and other vertical feeds: the words stack in the middle of the frame. The 16:9 cut is for YouTube and for the site, where this showreel plays: the words run on one line, and some scenes put three shots side by side.
The film's files are an MP4 of 8 MB, small enough for any feed, and a MOV of 59 MB for further editing. For the other sizes a feed may want, see one video, every feed.
Questions about the FoxyLab showreel
What did FoxyLab write to make this film?
One line: “make our launch video”. The chat then asked four questions, and the answers were an ad, very fast, both formats and type only.
How long did the film take to make?
52 minutes, from the first line in the chat to the last render, with two notes on the first cut.
Does the showreel have a voice or music?
No. It is type only, with no voice and no music track. Every word is on screen, so it reads with the sound off.
Which sizes was it made in?
Two: 9:16 for Reels, Stories and vertical feeds, and 16:9 for YouTube and the site. Each is a cut of its own, not a crop of the other.
What changed after the notes?
“Faster in the middle” made the cuts come every 0.4 seconds from 1.6 seconds. “End on the words” made the last word hold to black. The critic also removed a blank frame at 9.2 seconds.
