• by Christine Champagne , September 9, 2008

Cofounder and Codirector, Mekanism

Tommy Means made his mark with integrated interactive campaigns like Sega Monkey Ball's "True Adventures of Chad," which won a Gold Lion at Cannes in 2005, and Microsoft's "Clearification," a winner of two Silver Lions last year.

"Tommy is an interactive Renaissance man," says Todd Crisman, senior vice president and group creative director for interactive at Element 79 Partners. That agency recently relied on Means' directing and creative know-how in the execution of NOLAF.org for Tostitos, a full-screen interactive video site depicting a fictional organization's quest to end fun. "He's all about creating these really engaging worlds for people to immerse themselves in, and he does it all - everything from directing to editing, scoring, effects and building Web sites."

NOLAF.org was one of Means' favorite projects of the past year. "If you go through the entire thing, there has got to be an hour of footage in there," he says. "I got really lucky with that project because the writing was so good, and it was right up my alley."

Right up his alley in that it allowed for the quirky verbal and visual humor that Means & Co. are known for. "Mekanism has carved out a place in the world of comedy and technology. Our reel is pretty out there and reflects our taste in humor," Means says. Then he laughs. "We don't get pharmaceutical-type stuff. They don't even bother contacting us."

Means got his hands dirty directing The World's Dirtiest Film, a cheeky spoof of avant-garde cinema for Bartle Bogle Hegarty and Axe, starring David Spade; he produced, in conjunction with MTV, theclustr.com, a social network for skateboarders; and with mogul Mark Cuban and Vanity Fair editor Graydon Carter, he produced the Doug Pray-directed Surfwise, a feature-length documentary. That's quite a variety of creative output.

"We never get a call for something where we're like, 'We've done that before. We can do that in our sleep,'" Means says. "It's always like, 'Holy shit! How are we going to pull this off? Tell them we can pull it off, and we'll just figure it out.'"