Creativity... on TV?

Watching TV back in Blighty, I used to feel that besides the odd BBC or Channel Four drama / documentary, the best thing about TV was the adverts (commercials).

Such creativity, imagination and often humour, goes into commercials. I'm not necessarily inspired to go out and buy the product advertised, but I am inspired by the concise and often magical little bit of storytelling that they are.

Today I decided to share a few favourites on this blog. The first few examples are British, followed by two American examples (I don't see enough US TV to have great American examples to hand - but if you can think of something fabulous that I've missed then leave a comment!)

As for what I've been doing lately... I have had to create a number of absolutely tiny fairy shoes for a commissioned project... snapshot of this below. ;)

Lloyds TSB bank commercial (UK). Made by Rainey Kelly Campbell Roalfe Y&R (London).

Click the thumbnail to open the video in a new window.

John Lewis commercial (UK). Made by Adam & Eve /DDB and OMD Manning Gottlieb (London).

Click the thumbnail to open the video in a new window.

Watch the behind-the-scene making of here.

Bacardi Metz commercial (UK). Made by HHCL (London).

My personal favourite. Filmed in Budapest using a hand-cranked Arri camera and inspired by German Expressionist cinema and Grimm fairytales.

W H Samuel commercial (UK). Made by St. Lukes (London).

Click the thumbnail to open the video in a new window.

Marks & Spencer commercial (UK). Made by Rainey Kelly Campbell Roalfe Y&R (London).

Click the thumbnail to open the video in a new window.

National Lottery commercial (UK). Made by Studio AKA (London).

Click the thumbnail to open the video in a new window.

Guinness commercial (UK). Made by AMVBBDO (London).

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Cadbury's Dairy Milk commercial (UK). Made by Fallon (London).

Click the thumbnail to open the video in a new window.







And now a couple of American examples of beautiful, creative commercials. The first is one I love for the production design. It was filmed in a real forest in Washington state, and the fairytale characters are CG. The second example below is a behind-the-scenes image from a commercial made by New Deal Studios using miniatures and miniature model sets in 1:24 scale. Naturally this is going to appeal to me!

Fed Ex commercial (USA). Made by BBDO (New York).

Learn about the making-of here.

Click the thumbnail to open the video in a new window.

DirecTV commercial (USA). Made by New Deal Studios (California).

Click the thumbnail to zoom in on the image, or visit the New Deal Studios website to learn about this commercial.