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Peter Xifo - Mercedes Benz; how they dit it.

The magic revealed...

 

We shot my Mercedes commercial at Union Station in downtown LA, in the old (and no longer used) ticket concourse.

The inset photo in the upper left hand corner (above) shows what the concourse looks like totally empty.  The day before they shot my scene, they lined up all the cars (you see on the left) on the right side and shot what is called a "plate."  Then they removed all those cars, brought in different cars that you see on the right and shot me walking down the middle aisle.  In post production, they took the 'plate' and flipped it to cover the ticket windows, with me now walking with cars lined up on my left and on my right. When they shot my scene, I never saw any of the cars on the left, only the ticket counters; I had to 'act' as if they were there.  They spent quite a bit of time on my shoot day to set up this shot so it would line up perfectly for this effect.  The arch you see on the wall just beyond me actually leads to the concourse the public uses.

 

That's how they did it.