Advertising student Luke Bogner united a unique team for his end-of-semester portfolio: his family.
Most students choose a company to do “spec” work for and gather a team to help, but Bogner recruited his family members for help on his project, which is a 60-second Speedo commercial. Part of the commercial was filmed at BYU’s most recently renovated pool late at night.
Laurel Plewe and Katie Hill, both previously Bogners, are Bogner’s sisters. Plewe was the talent and Hill was the film assistant for the commercial. The team chose to feature Speedo because Bogner wanted to highlight women’s empowerment through Plewe’s unique diving career.
Plewe, the second of the two sisters, had a career-ending injury at the end of her 1999-2001 BYU diving career. She set up for a two-and-a-half tuck off the five-meter board at the end of a long day of practice but didn’t make the dive, resulting in a concussion and two black eyes that led her to leave the team.
“I was on a very competitive team at the time, and I knew if didn’t get that dive I wouldn’t be able to compete with the rest,” Plewe said. “I knew I was leaving out of fear, but it was too hard for me to step back up and do the dive.”
After a 10 year break, however, Plewe had a feeling it was time to pick up what she left so suddenly.
“After her second baby, she felt that she needed to do something for herself that was going to push her and make her kids proud,” Bogner said. “She knew it would be tough, but that’s where I wanted to draw my story and narrative from: the concept of independent women doing hard things.”
Plewe starting practicing again at her local public pool in Northern California. After a few months of practicing and getting comfortable, she moved back to Utah where she then participated in competitions and coached for BYU’s competitive club.
Hill, Bogner’s other sister and a BYU adjunct film instructor, helped with the commercial’s production. Hill graduated from BYU’s film program in 2002. After working in Los Angeles for several years, she came back to Provo and was hired as an adjunct professor for the film program.
“Katie was always just one step ahead growing up because she always knew what she wanted to do growing up,” Bogner said. “She was always on sets with my dad and just knew she wanted to do something creative.”
The father of the three, Jim Bogner, is an executive producer in Walnut Creek, California.
Senior advertising student Bentley Rawle was the assigned cinematographer on set and helped throughout the five-plus hour shoot.
“He did such a great job pulling from such an organic, personal story,” Rawle said about Bogner. “The whole AdLab is very competitive, but it’s so nice to work with someone as nice and genuine as Luke who has such a vision for what he wants to make.”
Hill also organized a team of 3-4 crew members who assisted with lighting, sound and props.
“It was so fun to see my whole family work together on a story so close to us as well as having them see me in my element,” Hill said. “None of them have seen me on set, and for them to be there while I was helping Luke was such an amazing experience.”
Through Laurel’s inspiring story and Katie’s creativity, Luke said he was able to visually show his take on the real meaning of advertising: storytelling.
Luke’s final video is on his website and will also be shown along with his three-piece portfolio at the Sundance Recruiting Fair Thursday, Jan. 30, and Friday, Jan. 31.
