Sneakerhead

Sneakerhead was a spec commercial for Kicks and Fros, a women's sneakerhead community in Charlotte. It was one of the first specs we made, built to show what the company was capable of, and co-directed with Chris Lomartire. We attached it to Kicks and Fros deliberately: a local business we'd worked with before, and one that would get the film seen in Charlotte.

The brief

A narrated piece that evokes a feeling rather than sells a product — the story of a woman-focused sneaker culture, told with intent.

The hard part

The grocery store. One scene was written for a supermarket, and it turned out to be much harder to secure than we'd planned. Between opening hours and store policy, we came close to cutting the scene entirely.

How we made it work

We got lucky, and then we moved fast. Compare Foods was about to open a new location and was still stocking the shelves — not yet open to the public — and gave us permission to film there. It delivered exactly the look the film needed, and it saved the scene.

On set

Charlotte, NC, in a single day. Locations: Camp North End, Compare Foods and a local studio. Maurice Victor II and Chris Lomartire co-directed; Chris managed the edit and Maurice handled color. A sound mixer rounded out the crew.

The result

This was the launch of our commercial work. Sneakerhead reached close to 30,000 views on Kicks and Fros' platform and won our first Gold Telly Award, in the Low-Budget Online Commercial category.

‍