Smarty
Simple, honest mobile.
An adventure into animated advertising, a phone network with an outrageously good deal, an internal workshop character who inspired an unimpressed shop keeper, two stories, two films, two ridiculous narratives, lipsyncing to vo, performance and timing, 2D sketches to 3D build, a killer tagline.
The Art&Graft team were delighted to join Wielden+Kennedy to create the first TV campaign for mobile network, Smarty. This was Smarty’s first step into the world of animated advertising, communicating a smart promise to its customers — to give your money back at the end of your month if you haven’t used all of your data.
"We had a funny script for an animated TV ad for Smarty (Three's budget-conscious network). The deadline was suicidal and we needed to wring every last drop of personality and charm out of our characters and performance. We knew Art&Graft would get it. They got it. And smashed it. The process was smooth and fun. Everyone was delighted with the results. And no-one was left holding a stinky nappy."
Iain Tait, ECD at Wieden+Kennedy
Iain Tait, ECD at Wieden+Kennedy
Riffing off of Smarty’s thrifty, honest identity and impossibly good deal, the studio developed two stories centred around some impossible requests.
"Part of the reason for Art&Graft's involvement here was that one of our Spark Session projects was seen and enjoyed by an external creative team, this is a huge reason as to why we do them; creativity with the intention to spark inspiration in others. As soon as we had seen the scripts we knew there was something special to be done here; contained stories with great character moments allowed us to really dig deep into the performances, wringing out every drop of humour and charm."
Stephen Middleton, Creative Director at Art&Graft
VISUAL DEVELOPMENT
Both films depict bizarre stand offs between characters, surreal interactions that awkwardly comical. Given one character remained silent throughout, so much of the understanding of the relationship was communicated through character design and posing.
This entrepreneurial six-year-old offers his ‘unused’ nappies up to the looming figure of the unimpressed shop keeper – the juxtaposition between the characters intentionally exaggerated.
This contrast is also evident in the Tan Shop video when the reedy shop keeper is unimpressed by a sun-kissed, beer bellied geezer. Both these duos are inspired by the tension of Western style standoffs.
Art&Graft’s resident illustration experts worked on original sketches before handing over to our 3D artist for the modelling.
Credits
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