LONDON, UK — Creative collective House337 is launching a new campaign for Greene King’s first ever craft beers, Level Head and Flint Eye. The beers celebrate Britain’s eccentric past but are designed for the modern day, as is the campaign.
The 30” TV and VOD campaign titled “Brand New Beers, Centuries In The Making” takes Greene King’s 200 years of brewing heritage, the historical myths and legends of Bury St. Edmunds, and the freshly reimagined recipes of the beers and combines them all into a contemporary visual homage which spills out of the can itself.
The film introduces us to “craft beer, but not as you know it, because these beers are made from history.” Illustrations inspired by woodcut engravings common to the medieval era were mapped out using hundreds of lines of code, then laser-cut out of 355 aluminum cans. They were then animated using sophisticated stop frame animation to bring the stories to life. A light was placed inside the cans to project the cut-out illustrations showing both the techniques and ingredients that go into making the beers and the stories that inspired them, featuring flint-tipped arrows and St Edmund’s beheading. The film ends with the message: “We may have been doing this for over 200 years but the truth is, we’re only just getting started.”
Greene King Brewery Marketing Controller Alex Radcliffe said, “We know craft beer drinkers value the level of craftsmanship that goes into producing a superior tasting product. To launch this new range of craft beers it was therefore imperative we had a creative treatment to match this, and in turn reflect the level of expertise that has been passed down through generations of our brewers. This advert was a very ambitious project, we’re delighted with the final film and look forward to drinkers learning more about the fantastic local legends that inspired our brewers to make these beers.”
House 337 Creative Director Steve Hawthorne said “Like the beers themselves, this campaign has been a long time in the making, but it is worth the wait. The technical complexities behind it are truly mind-boggling, which precisely reflects the way in which we’ve created something that does justice to the craft, know-how and expertise Greene King has put into its new range of beers.”
The work has been created by Pete Ioulianou and Ollie Agius and directed by Balazs Simon through Blink Ink.
Blink Ink Director Balazs Simon commented, “This is probably the craziest thing I’ve ever done in camera. We essentially created a 360° projector out of the beer can, which seemed a straightforward idea on paper, but proved to be quite the head-scratcher when executed. From calculating the anamorphosis of hand-drawn illustrations to programming motion control and building custom rotating light rigs in a blacked-out studio, this project was a big balancing act, an actual fight with the laws of the universe.”
The film will run for two months in the UK through to December and will be supported by out-of-home.
CREDITS:
Creative Director – Steve Hawthorne
Senior Creative – Pete Ioulianou
Senior Creative – Ollie Agius
Strategy Director – Laura Sammarco
Strategist – George Poynter
Account Management – Rich Williams, Kelly Mahon, Harriet Pinnington
Agency Executive Producer – Bradley Woodus
Agency Producer – Henry Davies
Director/ Production Co – Balazs Simon @ BlinkInk
Producer – Sami Goddard
Executive Producer – Bart Yates
Post Production – GYAR
Colour – Kai Van Beers @ Nineteen-Twenty
Music – Major Tom
Sound Design – Dugal Macdiarmid @ King Lear
Illustrator – Tobias Hall
DoP – Max Halstead
