People are Paralysed by Regret in Purplebricks' Comedic Slo-Mo Campaign

Purplebricks’ mesmerising new slow-motion TVC sees people paralysed in unfortunate - but hilarious - moments by powerful pangs of regret. The new instalment of the estate agent’s ‘Commisery’ campaign was creatively devised by SNAP LDN and produced by Partizan, with post production by Stone Dogs.

Using a montage of beautifully-composed slow-motion scenes, the 60-second TVC shows various comedic scenarios in which people become consumed by the powerful realisation of financial regret. The distraction catches them when they least expect; a man stares solemnly into the distance while well-wishers encourage him to blow out his birthday candles; a hairdresser absent-mindedly shaves a reverse mohawk onto her unlucky customer’s head; a man stands vacant and motionless during a paintball game as he is pelted from all sides. 

The underlying message points to the intense regret people feel when they spend thousands on commission and get nothing more for their money. This dawning realisation is masterfully sound-tracked by Henry Purcell’s epic ‘What Power Art Thou’.

Post production experts, Stone Dogs, were tasked with compositing and enhancing the super slow-motion footage shot by director, Djawid Hakimyar. The team ensured that each of the spot’s regretful characters had the intended ‘thousand-yard stare’ and the correct action going on around them. Djawid shot multiple passes for each scene. Stone Dogs worked closely with him to ensure that none of the detail he envisioned would be missed. 

Stone Dogs’ Dave Kiddie comments: “There were several interesting challenges when it came to the post on this film. Capturing the best performance from each actor simultaneously is a rarity – especially when you throw toddlers and animals into the mix. Shooting at 1000fps gave us the flexibility and precision of choosing which parts of each take we wanted in the final shots. For instance, the toddler shot is actually made up of four passes: one for the father and dog, one for the father's head, one for the mother opening the fridge and one for the toddler grabbing at the father's arm. There was a certain amount of clean up and extension to do for this scene and the final composite of the separate takes.”

He continues: “The most demanding shot by far was for the paintball scene, which was made up of over 40 layers in the final composite - from adding the paintball explosions on impact, to the figures running in the background, as well as an array of missed paintballs flying around. In total, we composited 12 shots, including clean up and removal of objects in the surrounding environments. Once again, Matt and Liam of SNAP have come up with a brilliantly comedic scenario, making it an absolute joy to work on. Djawid crafted a fantastic narrative for each scene and gave us wonderful footage to work with. His attention to detail throughout the process ensured we have a film we are all delighted with."