London-based creative agency Atomic has created a dynamic new campaign to mark the launch of a newly transformed Royal Opera House. Working closely with leading British photographer, Giles Revell, the campaign features a revolutionary new imaging process that for the first time captures the shape and ‘colour’ of movement - beautifully blurring the lines between the moving and still image.
The striking abstract images, a sweeping shock of colour against a black background, were created using pioneering digital technology. While the exact nature of the process remains under wraps, it takes influence from the scientist Harold Edgerton. A polymath famed for his stroboscopic photography in the ‘60s he was driven by his passion to capture the unseen and is the inventor of many sophisticated imaging devices including the high speed flash. Created over an intense three-day shoot, ballet and opera stars from the Royal Opera House were required to constantly repeat choreographed moves at a meticulously measured pace, carefully adjusting their body shapes between each take.
Tell us about your role in the creation of this work.
I am Creative Partner of independent creative agency Atomic London. Atomic were the lead creative agency for the Royal Opera House. We were tasked to create a campaign and new brand identity for ROH. For the past year we have been working closely with the whole team to produce the work you see here.
Give us an overview of the campaign, what is it about?
The campaign is to announce and celebrate the new £50m refurbishment of the Royal Opera House. We created a campaign to encourage people, who may feel the Royal Opera House is old fashioned or not for them, that with ballet and opera you can really feel something new. The ROH has never had a brand awareness problem, what they did have was a perception problem. The work has been created to say ‘it is for you – its excellent, world-class and beautiful, but it isn’t posh and certainly not exclusive.’
Tell us about the creative brief, what did it ask?
The brief asked for a new brand identity and advertising campaign that could be used not just in cinema, posters and as digital display but all the way through to projection within the opera house and imagery that can be used even in the gift shop.
Which insight led to the creation of this piece of work?
The halls of the ROH are bedecked with iconic imagery of ballet and opera from over the last 100 years. Looking at these it was clear that we needed to create a whole new way to capture these iconic art forms. If our audiences were to be encouraged that there was in fact something new going on here.
Can you share with us any alternative ideas (if any) for this campaign? Why was this idea chosen?
To be honest, this was truly our main creative approach but we did experiment a lot with new techniques to capture the magic of colour and movement one can expect at ROH. Working with Giles Rivell our experiments soon revealed a revolutionary new way we could capture a world that was neither moving image nor entirely stills.
How did the client initially react to this idea?
The team at the Royal Opera House reminded us early on that they have at least 1,000 creative directors of their own all under one roof, so we knew we had to come up with something special. Luckily they were as intrigued as we were about an entirely new way to capture their world. When we shared a first test shoot with them it was also shared with the head of ballet and the head of opera where it met with universal approval.
What was the greatest challenge that you and your team faced during development.
The greatest challenge we faced was that we did not know 100% whether what we were trying to achieve would ever be found. We trusted our instincts and kept pushing and experimenting and eventually we opened the door to something beyond our wildest dreams.
What did you enjoy most about seeing this campaign through? Did you learn anything new from the experience?
Working on this campaign with the ROH has been truly spectacular and seeing the first reaction to it is even sweeter. I think what we learned most of all during this experience was that by having a small team of trusted and talented specialists in their own fields it helps you push each other on and always strive for something better. Our head of design, Pete Mould, our VFX Supervisor, Richard Green and of course one of the world’s top photographers, Giles Revell were key to driving this work to where it is.
Where do you see this campaign going in the future?
We have created an enormous bank of visuals from our work that will be used for at least the next two years. After that the client has challenged us to begin finding again an entirely new way to make people feel something new.