Abracadabra! Vertu Constellation – Creating An Extraordinary World | 01 Oct
A magical campaign thanks to Vertu, a leading luxury mobile phone brand.Our multi platform production was for the launch of the shiny new ‘Constellation’ range, and by conveying the beauty of this individual brand with our CGI wands, we displayed features that we also hold close to our hearts: the Made
in England heritage and core business values of premium, artisan quality.
We worked with the brand, its agencies and fashion photographer, Kristian Schuller, on the cross-media campaign to launch the impressively smart phone. With a seamless combination of photography, CGI and VFX, the vibrant global campaign, playing on Vertu’s English heritage, launched across digital and print media ahead of the Christmas present buying season.
With magazine spreads in the luxury and lifestyle press ahead of Christmas, Vertu’s lead digital agency, AKQA, created a microsite and social media content. TJ worked closely with Vertu and both agencies to guarantee a truly integrated campaign.
Planning the print and digital executions in harmony, the CGI elements including the product and butterflies were mapped out in advance to enable to renowned photographer Kristian Schuller to be creative on set, in full knowledge of the technical requirements. TJ Technical Director, David Wortley, provided VFX supervision on the three majestic sets; handling the pre-visualisation, tracking and advising on set assembly. Once the environments were shot, the award-winning studio was then able to integrate the phones, add the effects and control the post-production in-house.
Each Constellation smartphone is built from fine materials, handmade in England by a single craftsman. The luxurious calf leather selected for its feel and natural grain, the polarizing sapphire crystal screen and titanium case were all reproduced in CGI by TJ to exacting details.
“Supplied with CAD data, we created a 3D model that includes the subtleties of manufacturing and handcrafting that make a product look authentic.” David Wortley, TJ’ Technical Director, explains. “Creating the hand stitched calf leather, grade 5 titanium and sapphire crystal, this 3D model is indistinguishable from the real thing. It is used across all media so we had to develop the virtual materials at extremely high levels of detail and to large resolutions to ensure the quality is maintained close up.” The smartphone looks immaculate within the three larger than life fantasy tales across the campaign, from print, digital, interactive and in-store and across the microsite.
The subtleties of the motion elements bring the print layouts to life on screen, a strong example of premium integrated campaign design, without the need for gimmicks. ‘Extraordinary Craftsmanship’ is set in a couture factory. A lady inspired by the couture house is sitting on the sewing machine, with butterflies flying from the machine onto the larger than life dress worn by a cat. Wortley continues, “We built CGI butterflies to flutter around the dress and added animation to create movement, depth and realism. Repurposing the core 3D phone asset we built for the stills also enabled us to easily animate these elements for the digital executions of the campaign.”
Another of Schuller’s visions is a masculine, powerful rhino sitting on his motorbike. He is an eccentric character, sitting in the stately home. VFX such as the smoke were added to the motion version of this image, maximising the use of assets to support Vertu’s brand identity and key messaging.
The campaign is a striking example of how CGI and traditional photography can work hand-in-hand to deliver highly creative multi-platform campaigns and how one studio can help agencies and brands come together on this exemplary cross-platform campaign.