TORONTO—The stakes were raised for the Guru Studio team working on "Travel Happy", an informational promo video for Toronto's upcoming Metrolinx Union Pearson Express (UP) train.

"The train is something that's near and dear to our hearts," said Frank Falcone, Guru Studio president and creative director. "It's something we've needed in the city for probably over 20 years. Anything we could do to help move that along and get it happening was great," he said.

Slated for a 2015 launch, UP train will connect the city's downtown core to the Toronto Pearson International Airport. It has been a controversial project in that the train service will rely on diesel not electric trains.


Working with London-based branding and design agency Winkreative, New York artist Lotta Nieminen, and Toronto director Larissa Ulisko, the Toronto-based entertainment company helped craft what Falcone describes as a "little film," with "a comfortable, modern geometric style."

The film's look came from Nieminen. "It's pretty much her signature style,"  Falcone said, likening her to a modern-day version of Czech artist Miroslav Sasek, whose popular late '50s-'60s illustrated travel books include This is Paris and This is Rome.

Nieminen worked from New York, however, and the project's timeline meant she had little time to research Toronto first-hand. Instead, the Guru team fed her photos of their favourite aspects of the city. "We had to brief her, and make sure she didn't catch the internet's perspective of Toronto, which isn't as beautiful as ours," Falcone laughed. "We provided the eyes on the ground."


Watch "Travel Happy"

Winkreative provided the user experience, making sure "Travel Happy" captured the UP train's brand and properly detailed what it would be like to take the train, and how it will operate. Guru then put it all together with director Ulisko. "She's got a great eye for composition," Falcone said.

The end goal was to make people want to ride, Falcone said. "Hopefully it will excite people when they look at it and make them say, 'I can't wait until that train comes,'" he said.