Gabby’s Dollhouse

Who says you have to grow up? Our production team got to let out their inner children as they produced a photo and video shoot for DreamWorks’ popular show and toy brand, Gabby’s Dollhouse.

Overview

Following the success of the hit children’s TV show, Gabby’s Dollhouse, DreamWorks set out to promote Gabby’s Dollhouse toys, clothing, bedding, and more for the back-to-school and holiday seasons. DMM’s Video Production team partnered with Dreamworks to produce a comprehensive one day shoot featuring photos and videos of the merchandise in use. To bring this vision to reality, we built a crew around the specific skills of product photography, narrative storytelling, and directing young talent. We found the perfect bedroom and playroom locations, worked with youth casting agents to source a diverse and playful cast, sourced set designers to bring DreamWorks’ visions to life, and designed lookbooks to ensure that everyone was on the same page when it came to look and feel. Four young children ages three to seven were hired, as we diligently worked with our design team to turn our Hollywood set into a Gabby’s Dollhouse wonderland. We owned all aspects of production including: ideation, shot lists, prop management, crewing, building run of show, hiring an on-set teacher to adhere to California minor on-set guidelines, and liaising between client and post production to see the video and photo edits through to delivery. By the time we wrapped production, we had captured over 2,000 photos and four, 30 second videos to be posted on social media.

dreamworks

OBJECTIVE

A goal for DreamWorks was to produce an environment where they could capture a wide range of merchandise content in one day. The merchandise they wanted to capture ranged from bedding, clothing, toys, coloring books and more, with all items being used by girls of the target three-to-seven-year-old age group. To achieve this goal, our DMM production team began ideating around what fun, social-forward concepts we could capture with young girls to promote the merchandise in the most fun and authentic way possible. 

Our team decided the best way to go was to create different set decorated areas around a house to make it feel like the girls were having a playdate with Gabby’s Dollhouse items. The different set-ups included playing in a bedroom, coloring at a table, a sleepover in the bedroom, a tea party outside, and a fashion show in the living room. These set ups allowed us to place the merchandise in one or more of the shots and maximize their use in a way that felt natural to the environment.

To prepare for this shoot, the DMM production team began by sourcing a large house in Hollywood, CA, to dress it up for the ultimate Gabby’s Dollhouse experience. This particular project involved children’s casting so we also worked with a studio teacher in compliance with all California child labor laws, and we worked closely with a local talent agency to find a diverse range of casting options to accurately reflect DreamWorks’ target demographics.

To maintain the authenticity of the shoot while also promoting the merchandise, we had all the girls bring light-colored, pastel shirts to wear when they were not wearing the Gabby’s Dollhouse items to avoid clashing with the main merchandise items. We also had the girls change outfits multiple times to show off the brand’s pajamas, t-shirts, and backpacks.

RESULTS

By designing all the different set decorated areas to shoot in, the DMM production team created a smooth and easy shooting experience for all the crew and the girls. Our team successfully captured over 2,000 photos and 4 social videos. DreamWorks selected certain photos to be retouched to be ready for print and social media, they even took stills from our social videos to use in some of their print campaigns. Two videos went live on the DreamWorks Jr. Instagram feed, gaining 20,000+ views and 600+ likes. All photos posted on their socials earned a combined 3,500+ likes as well.

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