The campy Sing Along With Mitch was a popular TV show in the 1960s. It featured Mitch Miller and his choir singing popular songs, the lyrics of which ran across the screen with an animated ball bouncing from word to word so that audiences could easily sing along.
Figuratively taking a page out of that book–in effect having our eyes follow the bouncing ball–are creatives from Fallon, London, with a spot they conceived to help launch Sony’s line of Bravia LCD television sets. However, this time around, it’s not a single animated ball but seemingly hundreds of thousands of live-action rubber bouncy balls that we are watching as they bound through the hilly streets of San Francisco.
This visual tour de force is a cascade of color–and a kids’ delight. The different colored balls bounce off everything and anything they come across, including road signs, cars, homes and trees, with a music track carrying us along the balls’ journey. In one scene, a frog bounces by, amidst assorted balls. Some of the action unfolds in slo-mo.
Almost as amazing as the all encompassing ball-bouncing spectacle is the fact that this ad was a live-action shoot. Twelve streets were closed off during the three-day shoot. Some 250,000 balls were shot out of 10 cannons down the steep inclines of San Francisco. The balls were fired high into the sky to maximize bouncing. Large cranes were also used to empty thousands of balls onto the streets below.
The tag at the end–with balls bouncing around a Sony LCD TV set–simply reads, “Color like no other,” underscoring the rich color and movement of the picture delivered by the Bravia. The commercial also exudes a sense of fun, which is beneficial for the Sony TV line to be associated with in the minds and eyes of prospective consumers.
The length of the spot, aptly titled “Balls,” is also extraordinary–two and a half minutes taking up an entire commercial break during its Nov. 6 debut right before the telecast of the Chelsea versus Manchester United soccer game on Sky Sports One. The ad will reach audiences throughout Europe, Australia and New Zealand. Subsequent airings will be a mix of :60, :30 and :20 versions on TV; cinema exposure is also planned.
“Balls” was directed by Nicolai Fuglsig of bicoastal/international MJZ. Nell Jordan produced for MJZ. The DP was Joaquin Baca Asay.
The Fallon, London, core creative team consisted of creative director Richard Flintham, art director/copywriter Juan Cabral and producer Nicky Barnes.
Editor was Russell Icke of The Whitehouse, London. Colorist was Adam Scott, telecine director at The Mill, London. Audio post engineer/sound designer was Parv Thind of Wave Recording Studios, London. Thind edited the track, taken from an original recording, “Heartbeats,” composed by The Knife and arranged by Jose Gonzalez.
Flame artist Neil Davies of The Mill lifted the live-action balls off the background and composited them into the end shot with a generated television built in 3D by Mill animator Laurent Makowski.
Earlier The Mill’s 3D supervisors Jordi Bares and Robert Kolbiens orchestrated pre-pro simulations of bouncing balls with varying camera speeds, giving the agency team and the director a better sense of how the balls might behave when dropped or fired out of air mortars during a live-action shoot.
