Protect My Home – You Wouldn’t Trust Just Anyone

The Washington State Department of Labor & Industries encourages homeowners to verify their contractor is registered before agreeing to any payment or work done to their home. The campaign is called Protect My Home and is put on nearly every year to remind folks to protect themselves before getting work done on their home.

We had the opportunity to produce a new spot for the campaign in 2024 which featured a simple premise: If you wouldn’t trust just anyone with something routine and important to you, why would you trust them with your home? The messaging is about hiring smart, getting at least 3 bids, and verifying your contractor is registered in Washington state to do the work you need done.

The most fun (and challenging) part of this spot was Fifi. We added physical hair to the pup, but didn’t feel like it looked intense enough in the edit. So we also added some hair in post to really push the effect. I added simulated hair that I had made in Blender. I took a model of a dog, animated it to match Fifi’s movements in the footage, and then composited that onto her shot. My boss shot a wig on a green screen and overlay-ed that on her head to push it even further. It took some significant compositing from myself and my boss (arguably more time was spent on that shot than the whole production), but we were happy with the end result.

Here’s a Spanish version of the spot.