Today we’d like to introduce you to Dylan Trussell and David Dinetz.
Dylan and David, can you briefly walk us through your story – how you started and how you got to where you are today.
David Dinetz and I met in college at CU Boulder and enrolled in their [experimental] film program. We learned on Super 8, 16mm, and were cutting and taping film by hand. When we moved back to LA ten years ago, it felt like the exact week that everything changed over from film to digital, so we had to relearn everything.
We wanted to make movies right off the bat but knew no one was going to give us millions of dollars, a chance to direct, or even take the time to read our scripts, so we decided to use marketing as a proving ground. We started making commercials for anyone that would let us. We reached out to brands we thought were cool online and offered to do free ads for them. One of these was a streetwear brand call Gourmet Footwear. We shot this insane look-book with models wearing nothing but their sneakers and would always write our credits in French which made the nudity seem artsy and not salacious. It worked and within 24 hrs of launching the video it had over 400,000 views and was featured on most major streetwear blogs and European fashion publications. We used the press and success from that video to start charging for our services. Now when we reached out to brands we had a calling card.
We treated every commercial like a 30-second movie and made it a point to make each one as cinematic as possible so we could eventually convince the right people we were ready to make a movie. A byproduct of this approach was falling in love with making commercials; every job was different and we were having a blast on set, experimenting with new camera toys like high-speed robots, and always finding a reason to blow stuff up. Audiences for our work grew organically and brands started noticing. The success from each prior job began to snowball on the next one and it reached the attention of Forbes who put us on their 30 Under 30 list for Marketing & Advertising. That was the point when we said, okay, enough commercials, it’s time to make a movie.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
In the beginning, it was not a smooth road. We had to reach out to tons of potential clients for the remote chance of even being able to do something for free. Then after we got our first win with that streetwear brand, we perfected a system of outreach and were able to go after clients more efficiently.
After we got the Forbes honor, things changed and clients started coming to us which made things easier, but then we decided to make a movie and that was legitimately 100x harder than we thought it would be. It took six months to write the script but then finding someone crazy enough to give us a couple of million dollars was next to impossible. We met with over 40 studios, production companies, distributors, and investors, until finally after over a year of cramming as many meetings into our schedule as possible, we finally found a group of private investors by pure tenacity and a healthy dose of chance.
The project was called Airplane Mode and it starred 25 of the biggest social media influencers all playing themselves, kind of a modern version of ‘Airplane’. In 2015, when we started putting the project together, and 2016 when we shot it, social media stars were all the rage, and the project started picking up a lot of steam, which was tough for an R rated slapstick comedy from unknown directors. It was all set to be the next big thing, we had more Instagram followers than the new Transformers movie, Snapchats from set were getting millions of opens, and it was getting massive buzz online. Then we finished the movie and it took almost a year to find the right distributor, and we got really lucky and had a big sale from the result of a bidding war, but then right around the project’s planned release, there was a massive global news story involving one of our actors that seriously delayed the project’s release and put its success in jeopardy. While we can’t go into details, we can assure anyone reading this… there is definitely such thing as bad press. So we went back to the drawing board and decided to double down on our creative agency, start our own brand, and get into TV. Definitely not a smooth road.
So, as you know, we’re impressed with Culprit Creative – tell our readers more, for example what you’re most proud of as a company and what sets you apart from others.
Culprit Creative is a boutique creative agency and production company based in Los Angeles. We do global campaigns for iconic brands like Mercedes, Virgin, Beats by Dre, and Instagram, as well as product launches for promising startups and brands we like. Since we’re a relatively small operation, we only work on projects we’re passionate about, and the passion can be seen in every video and commercial campaign we make. We specialize in creating headline stealing content. We’re able to achieve this because we focus on one thing: Video, which we create from initial concept to campaign launch.
In addition, to live action commercials, Culprit specializes in creating awe-inspiring product renderings and computer-generated animations, utilizing Hollywood’s most advanced technology and artists and uniquely applying them to marketing.
So, what’s next? Any big plans?
In the near future we’re launching our first TV show, Florida Man, it’s a comedy and will be launching on Quibi later this year. More movies, TV, and lots of commercials to come.
We’ve also just launched our own underwear brand called Culprit Underwear and it’s the most insanely comfortable underwear you’ve ever tried on in your life. It’s designer underwear that you can wear without having to rep another man’s name above your junk. Then that started taking off and we decided to make women as well. Our brand ethos is making comfort sexy while never taking ourselves too seriously. But taking not taking ourselves seriously, seriously. The underwear brand is great because we get to make the insane videos we can imagine without having to worry about the ideas getting watered down and without any client approval process, we just have an idea, and go make it. It’s the most fun we’ve ever had. You can check out the videos @underwear on Instagram.
Contact Info:
- Address: 9169 Sunset Blvd, West Hollywood, CA 90069
- Website: www.culpritunderwear.com www.culpritcreative.com
- Instagram: @underwear
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CulpritFilms/
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