Media went behind the scenes.
At Media, we’ve had the privilege to attended shoots, but never one quite like this. Cathay Pacific’s new global advertising campaign is a major, big-budget production running across multi-channels to accompany one of the brand’s biggest ever new product design projects.
The rollout of the airline’s new business class would have been enough, but in an unprecedented move, Cathay Pacific is also unveiling all-new first and economy-class cabins, as it tries to reinforce premium product leadership amid a difficult economic climate for airline brands.
For Cathay and its agency McCann Erickson, this is history in the making. The simultaneous introduction of three new cabins is quite simply one of the biggest product-design projects ever undertaken by Cathay Pacific. It deserves a communication campiagn to match, explains the airline’s general manager, marketing and product, James Ginns.
Arriving at pre-production meetings, it becomes apparent that this is a remarkable challenge being undertaken by Cathay and the McCann Erickson Cathay Pacific Central team, led by managing director Vince Viola and ECD Sylvester Song.
The scale of the production is huge yet no one seems fazed. We’re going for an epic feel, says Viola. The new campaign will introduce innovations in all three flight classes through a large-scale integrated campaign.
The preparations have been comprehensive with every detail carefully debated and considered. An intercontinental pre-production meeting in McCann’s Hong Kong offices has the entire team assembled over a video conference connection.
Heading the table are Ginns and Viola. From the production side, John Payne, managing director for Asia-Pacific of RSA films, Ridley Scott’s production house, is physically present and the good-natured butt of jokes from Lawrence Dunmore, the director in London.
Talking through the shooting board, Dunmore’s ideas for the ad are met with nods and interjections, until he reaches the final shots and casting choices. We want this to really focus on the product, that busy business people can really unwind in the new business class, and that the service is personal but not intrusive, says Ginns, who appears to be generally pleased with the storyboard.
The last scene, however, needs work. Originally planned as a zoom out of a businessman sleeping to a view of the plane sweeping above a lit-up Hong Kong skyline, the scene concerns Ginns for its potentially inaccurate representation of flight patterns.
There are also concerns to make the campiagn globally relevant. Cathay is a global company which is based in Hong Kong, Ginns emphasises. We’re going for an epic feel, which could be anywhere in the world, agrees Viola.
Much of the casting reflects this idea. Of the two golfing buddies sent to harass the businessman as he runs through the streets, the Hong Kong team believe that at least one of the golfers be ethnically Asian.
Most casting decisions are met with approval. There is to be a recasting of theflight attendant, however, as the role really needs someone who feels natural in the part, says Viola.
For the designer’s working on the animated end shot, it’s back to the drawing board - for the rest, full steam ahead with recasting before the shoot takes place in Sydney.
Interestingly, the Cathay campaign is also a lesson in how to think 2.0. Its digital component allows users to experience the feel of the new cabins, via a specially designed microsite.
Thierry Halbroth, the senior creative director heading up digital, says: We were asked to do something unprecedented. The point of the digital campaign is to give viewers a real feel of what it is like to be in the cabin, and to be trying out the new products.
The website, which launched on the same date as the TVC, allows both a first and third person perspective on the experience of flying in the newly outfitted planes.
The concept behind the digital campaign, the design work and the eventual assembly stems from Hong Kong, with execution handled by Boeing joint venture Teague in the US.
They were interested in working with us because it’s really rare, outside of the gaming world, to have this sort of virtual, first person experience, says Halbroth. The product is at the core of the campaign, and this site’s a critical element of the campaign.
Every detail of the virtual tour (even the accuracy of the colours of the head rests) is fine-tuned. Halbroth admits to the fatigue shared by anyone who has ever spent hours tweaking a creative product. We’ve put in many hours on this site… I get new people to look at it and gauge their reactions.
The TV crew, however, must get it right the first time. For the filming, the joint forces of Cathay, RSA and McCann have managed to secure Peter Jackson’s cinematographer, Andrew Lesnie, who picked up an academy award for Lord of the Rings and has more recently worked on blockbusters such as King Kong and I am Legend .
Viola is in Sydney to oversee the production. In a twist, the same technology used to create the murderous hordes in the RSA-produced film Gladiator is applied to swell the 200 extras to a massive crowd for the Cathay shoot.
Filmed in Sydney but intended to evoke any major international financial centre, the TVC follows the hero as he walks out of his office onto the street, where people ceaselessly make demands of him.
His dog looks at him reprovingly, wanting him to play, his personal assistant runs after him trying to get him to sign papers, a delivery boy arrives with a package, his boss rolls up in a big black car, a tea lady is trying to serve him tea, a tailor comes up to measure him for a suit, his golf buddies join the throng in their golf buggy.
Random bystanders join in the chase as the hero breaks into a run from stress and claustrophobia. The scene ends with a close-up shot of an flight attendant as she wishes him goodnight. Secure in his fully flat business class seat, he sleeps, as the plane flies through the evening sky.
The final part of the shooting takes place on the outskirts of Hong Kong, in a seemingly derelict plot that turns out to house several film studios. The scene inside the new business class is shot using the set designed for flight attendant training.
Ginns reviews the shots from one part of the room, as the director and cinematographer change the angle of the shot to make it more dramatic. The scene is repeated several times, as the crew check the shots to get them perfectly right and in synch with music composed by Human studios in the US. Filming over, the TVC moves into post-production ready for the big launch.
It is early days, but the feeling is that this campaign is likely to make a big impact on Cathay’s business.
