ENVY Harnesses the Sounds of 1000 People for Mesmerising Freeview Campaign

Anomaly and DBLG have teamed up with ENVY Advertising to launch an ambitious new campaign for Freeview. ‘The Other Way’ uses 1000 extras to create hundreds of highly contextual TV ads that talk to viewers in real time. 

Filmed entirely in-camera without VFX, the advert captures the beautifully choreographed sea of bodies forming vivid, mesmerising patterns. The campaign is an innovative new approach that aims to address two challenges in Freeview’s market place by being ever present and actively competing with pay TV providers by highlighting the value equation.

ENVY Advertising brought the exciting new idea to life by crafting the entirety of the visual and aural post-production. Each ident required bespoke, natural, human soundscapes or songs to be designed and composed from scratch. Rich Martin, Sound Designer at ENVY Advertising, created 20 different soundtracks, each with a unique energy because of the individual crowd sounds.

Rich was able to offer valuable creative input before a single frame had been captured due to ENVY’s early involvement in the process. He comments: “When DBLG invited me for a meeting before the shoot, I was really excited because it doesn’t happen often enough. I suggested that we should try to capture the sound and energy of the cast of 1000, and use that as the backbone of the soundtrack.”

The involvement of a large cast and multiple mobile components presented unique challenges in terms of the grade. Danny Wood, Colourist at ENVY Advertising, explains, “The Freeview spots are about the overall effect of having 1000 people moving around for real, so the grade was very clean and about separating the colours to bring out the patterns as much as possible. With so many people in a shot at once, dealing with skin tones was a challenge, but we ended up with a nice balance of warmth without pushing too many warm tones into the rest of the image. The overall effect is pretty spectacular, especially when viewed on a large screen or projector.”

Flame artist Kieran Baxter adds, “I’ve really enjoyed working with Anomaly on these spots – they did an amazing job on the shoot and working with the 6K footage was a treat! Each ad is uniquely mesmerizing - they will really stand out and I can't wait to see them on air.”

The creative approach Anomaly has taken will allow for dialling up or dialling down key messages as appropriate, using contextual, ‘always on’ channel principles typically reserved for online campaigns. Spots have been brokered with the sales teams at ITV and Channel 4, securing first in break for all contextual ads which comment directly on the storylines viewers will have just witnessed.  

James Trimming, Producer at ENVY Advertising, comments on the collaboration: “Anomaly, DBLG and ENVY have worked closely on a big idea that encapsulates Freeview and its customer base by creating numerous visually and aurally stunning real-time ads. The sheer scale of the setups mimic Freeview’s wonderful offering.”

“It’s rare to work on something of such impressive physical scale. Every time you re-watch each one, you notice another quirky little moment.” 

The first instalment of the campaign launched 1st October 2016 on TV and online.