In the spirit of sharing some stunning creative for one of our clients (and to give myself a kick-start into our blogging world here!), please have a look at this British television ad for Honda/Acura. For those of you who haven’t yet seen it, prepare to be dazzled! The description accompanying this video reads as follows:

If you thought that the people who set up a room full of dominoes to have them knocked over later was amazing, you haven’t seen anything yet. There are no computer graphics or digital tricks in these images. Everything that you see happened in real time exactly as you see it. The recording required 606 takes and in the first 605 takes there always was something, usually of minor importance, that didn’t work.

It was necessary for the recording team to install the set-up time after time and it took several weeks working day and night to achieve this effect. The recording cost 6 million dollars and it took 3 months to finish, including the engineering design of the sequence. The duration of the video is only 2 minutes, but every time that Honda shows the commercial on British television, they make enough money to support any of us for the rest of our lives.

However, this commercial has turned out to be the most displayed in the history of the Internet. Honda execs think that it will pay for itself simply because of the free showings (as Honda is not paying one cent for you to see it). When Honda senior execs viewed it, they immediately approved it without hesitation-including costs.

There are only six Honda Accords built by hand in the whole world, and to the horror of Honda engineers, the recording team disassembled two of them for the recording. Everything you see in the sequence (besides the walls, floor, ramp and untouched Honda Accord) is part of those two automobiles.

The voice is that of Garrison Keiller.

The commercial was so well received by Honda execs when they saw it, that their first comment was how amazing the computer graphics were. They almost fell out of their chairs when told that the recording was real without any graphics manipulation.

By the way, about the wind shield wipers in the new Honda Accords, they are sensitive to water and designed to start working as soon as they get wet.

Enjoy!!

You know that better as the theme song to Hockey Night in Canada, played for more than 40 years on CBC.

Well not any more.

Thanks to CTV, TSN and RDS, that great tune will resonate in our ears in a slightly different manner for years to come…they purchased the rights

in perpetuity…

That means forever folks!

There is no doubt of the power of this theme song.  I have personally used it to connect with a Canadian who had it as a ring tone on his cell while walking the streets of London England.  And the controversy it has stirred has taken over gas prices for a day or two as the top story in the Canadian press.  Letters have been sent, petitions signed and Facebook pages set up all over the place to support our second national anthem.

As a hockey fan, I am disappointed by CBC’s decision but happy CTV have kept it alive.  As a tax-payer, I applaud CBC’s fiscal responsibility.  As a media guy, I don’t know yet what to make of it as the shock has yet to wear off.

I would love to hear some more opinions…

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