HSBC Advance Gets th1ng Treatment

An animation and mixed media production company, th1ng, has been commissioned by JWT London to direct and produce adverts for a global TV ad campaign for HSBC to promote its Advance account.
The London firm's Anthony Farquhar-Smith is behind the ads show that show HSBC Advance simplifies banking needs by helping you achieve your goals.
Each commercial shows a different person fulfilling their dreams, whether that's exchanging one career for another or taking a break from work to travel the world thanks to HSBC Advance. Every ad tells its own story through the way props, clothing and background scenes evolve to show someone achieving their goals.
So, 'today, taking my lunch break' becomes 'tomorrow, taking a career break' as a twenty-something office professional ultimately exchanges his work shirt, suit and tie for a safari shirt and hat, while the background shifts from an office to jungle, and a pen, a phone and a sandwich are exchanged for maps, camera and sunglasses.
To achieve these effects where the camera remains locked on each person in the ad, as all around them the background, their clothing and their props change, required Anthony to use a stop frame animation technique known as pixilation.
The net result is a fast-moving, beautifully executed series of commercials that bring to life JWT's vision of demonstrating how HSBC turns the dreams of today into the realities of tomorrow.
The whole project was completed by th1ng for JWT in just five weeks, from directing to all post, which was carried out by th1ng in-house.
"Anthony and the team at th1ng pulled out all the stops from a creative perspective, while the production team led by Ru Warner came up with some neat ways to make the shoot as effective as possible, including shooting on four stages at once to maximise time," said Dominic Buttimore, Executive Producer at th1ng.
"All 12 stand on their own as a great ads and together form a compelling campaign."
th1ng shot all the actors against a green screen so they could be isolated in post-production before different backgrounds were stitched in. th1ng also re-timed the way objects moved in the background to achieve smoother transition shots. Image grading was completed by th1ng in house and at Rushes.
(BMcC/GK)