We’re (Always) Ready for Some Football
The crew at Atomic Productions has been NFL game-ready for more than 25 years, producing commercials, programs for broadcast, digital content, and corporate videos for both of the Bay Area’s professional football organizations.
Donning the Silver & Black
First came the then Oakland Raiders back in 1995. “We started working with the Oakland Football Marketing Association who needed to market and sell personal seat licenses (PSLs),” recalls Atomic’s Executive Producer Danny Angotti. “They brought us in to create television ads to help sell PSLs and game tickets.”
A few years later, the Raiders decided to launch two weekly TV programs during the season and reached out to us to provide support to their brand-new broadcast department. At the time, their “department” consisted of only one person, so Atomic took on the bulk of the production work and became the de facto production department for the Oakland Raiders in 1999.
The two programs were the magazine-style “Behind the Shield” with Raider legend George Atkinson and JT the Brick (government name: John Tournour). The other is a studio production called “The Silver and Black Show” hosted by Greg Papa and Raider legend Jim Plunkett.
“We shot those shows for the Raiders with three cameras in a studio at their facility,” Danny explains. “It was all live-to-tape. We handled the production and editing of 16 shows per year, plus additional episodes into the post-season as long as the team stayed alive in the playoffs.”
In addition to the commercials and weekly shows, Atomic’s production crew delivered dozens of community and corporate videos to help the organization’s PR, marketing, and sales efforts and several internal (top secret) videos.
The highlight (and heartbreak for some of Atomic’s staff) of the relationship with the Raiders came during the run to the 2003 Super Bowl in San Diego.
“I was born and raised in Oakland and grew up as a Raiders fan, so it was an amazing season to watch and be a part of,” Danny says. “Then getting to go to the Super Bowl was amazing. Not great that they lost, of course, but a great experience.”
More recently, Atomic was at the team’s former Alameda headquarters as Al Davis’ office was packed up. “Mr. Davis’ office was left untouched after he died,” Danny says. “We had a film crew spend the whole day there documenting the space and ultimately capturing the team’s final moments in the Bay Area up until the last moving truck pulled away.”
Joining the Gold Rush
Atomic started working with the San Francisco 49ers organization in 2004.
“For the first time in a while, the 49ers needed some help selling tickets,” Danny remembers. “We had the experience with the Raiders, so they called us in to help.
“Then they had the idea to do a weekly magazine-style show called 49ers Total Access staring Joe Fonzi and Kim Yonenaka,” he continues. “We worked with Joe while producing Oakland A’s programs for Fox Sports, so it was great to reconnect with him. After Kim left, we were happy to work with Melissa Galvin for the last four years of that show.”
While working on “49ers Total Access,” Atomic partnered with the team on several internal projects for the organization’s sales, marketing, and community relations departments.
Atomic built such a great relationship with the 49ers that they were the only crew allowed to be on the scene at Bill Walsh’s funeral in the Stanford Chapel and when Eddie DeBartolo reunited all five 49ers Super Bowl teams in his 5-Rings Celebration in Las Vegas.”
“Over the years, both the 49ers and Raiders have placed their trust in us by letting us be a part of so many noteworthy events,” Danny says. “It’s humbling, and we are grateful for that trust and to be treated as part of their extended families.”
This season Atomic is creating video assets for the official San Francisco 49ers app and corporate sponsor videos used by the sales team. Atomic is the first call production company for the 49ers Foundation, Steve Young’s The Forever Young Foundation, and many other charitable organizations associated throughout the NFL.
“It’s a blast to be connected to the NFL because we get to work on a wide range of things,” Danny says. “We work at games and private events, produce content for all manners of different things around the NFL. Plus, we get to be around some great people, with friendships we’ve established throughout the NFL. That makes it fun.”
Atomic also gets involved in campaigns that help move the needle towards a better society, including the noteworthy Bud Light “Thursday Night Shoutout” advertising campaign that highlighted Black-owned restaurants during Thursday Night Football last season.
“We edited a spot that featured Vegan Hood Chefs, produced by Wieden+Kennedy, one of the biggest advertising agencies around,” Danny says. “It looks like a simple production, but it had a dozen visual effects in it. It was great to work with all those folks, and I hope we can do it for many more years to come.”
