Director:
We Are From LA
Production Company:
Iconoclast London
Agency:
AMV BBDO
The ad starts with a fast-moving shot of a lively roadside as seen from a car, and asks whether you saw the pink kitten.
The film then slows down to reveal a scene dotted with images of pink kittens. But the one that really matters is being held by a girl in the arms of her mother, who is about to be hit by a driver looking at his phone.
This visually striking ad fot the Department for Transport looks to communicate how much of the road a driver misses with a 2.3 second glance at a mobile phone. Amid all the distractions is the very real danger of a collision with a pedestrian.
2D Lead Artist Dan Williams explains, ‘It was great to work with Jay and Neil at AMV again. Their creative is always so smart and pushing the envelope of what’s possible in advertising.
Here the viewer is so engaged with finding all the Easter egg kittens hidden in the piece, that they only see the mother and child (who is holding the final kitten) when it’s too late. We are distracted, just like the driver is.
It was a very difficult shot for ‘We are From LA’ to choreograph. There’s a lot going on, and the directors were continually fine-tuning and building the piece. All the action had to happen within a two second window, shot on High speed Phantom from a moving bike. We ended up using one of the final takes of the day.
The spot is made from a single tracking shot which The Mill then worked into, adding details and comping in drama from other takes. The mother and child were shot separately against grey and then placed into the scene.
We combined several individual ‘moments’ from other takes such as the main car and the chicken running. We added lots of extra kitten stencils to the piece as well as the kitten emoji on the driver's phone. We removed the reflections of the camera vehicle from the shop windows and the car.
The final shot was then time-warped to work with the track and we dialed in additional camera moves to draw the viewers eye towards certain details.’
Agency: AMV BBDO
Producer: Verity Elvin
Creative Director: Nicholas Hulley, Nadja Lossgott
Creatives: Jay Phillips, Neil Clarke
Planners: Tom White, Alaina Crystal, Emma Stafford
Account Managers: Katie Stanley, Tamara Klemich, Amy Tippen, Jess Smith, Luke Hickey
Production Company: Iconoclast London
Director: We Are From LA
Executive Producer: Anna Smith
Producer: Emily Rudge
Director of Photography: Rina Yang
Editorial: Stitch
Editor: Paul O’Reilly
Colour: The Mill
Colourist: James Bamford
VFX: The Mill
Producer: Simon Bath
Shoot Supervisor: Dan Williams
VFX Creative: The Mill
2D Lead Artist: Dan Williams
2D Artists: Jose Caballero, Dave Wishart, Adam Maynard