Ad of the Day: Canon

A new ad for the brand from Grey in New York features a montage of adventurous photographers braving environmental hazards to get that special shot. The spot does a particularly nice job of portraying the product users as the heroes of the story: Their antics are by varying degrees entertaining (trying to outrun a charging giraffe, staring down an irate fishmonger) and stupid-dangerous (climbing to the edge of an icy roof to get a better angle on the kid making snow angels in an empty pool). The resulting pictures are all marvelous, and so is the filming of the spot itself, showing all the right attention to detail—e.g., the birthday girl's sideway glance when her mom nonchalantly sweeps a bowl off the table to get it out of the frame.

The director, Nicolai Fuglsig, also shot Fallon's famous Sony Bravia "Balls" spot. He appears to have an affinity for steep roads and the effects of gravity on unusual objects—in that case innumerable bouncy balls, and in this case a flaming tire.

The soundtrack is Rachel Fannan of the California rock group Only You singing a charmingly understated version of the easily mawkish classic "Beautiful Dreamer," and it's pretty much perfect for the spot. Canon or someone should probably post or sell the whole song somewhere obvious soon. People are going to want to hear it.

Figuring out how exactly the lofty tagline, "Long live imagination," ties into an ad about making concrete records of inspiring moments may take a few steps of abstraction. But in the end, it does make sense, and the conceit, with all its overtones of creativity and immortality, is pretty much dead-on for an ad aimed at people who want to be artists.

CREDITS

Client: Canon USA

Spot: "Inspired"

Agency: Grey, New York

Chief Creative Officer: Tor Myhren

Executive Creative Directors: Ari Halper, Steve Krauss

Creative Directors: Stu Mair, Dave Cuccinello

Agency Broadcast Producer: Topher Lorette

Agency Photography Producer: Jen Pugliese

Agency Print Producer: Debbie Joyce

Account: Rick Cusato, Melinda Hecht, Lindsey Christensen, Jennifer Fritz, Floriana Abramovich

Production Company: MJZ, Los Angeles

Director: Nicolai Fuglsig

Director of Photography: Linus Sandgren

Editor: Neil Smith, Work Editorial

Photographer: Simon Harsent

Music, Sound Design: Henry Boy, Black Iris Music

Agency Music Producer: Zach Pollakoff

Music: Black Iris Music

Arranger: Rob Barbato

Vocals: Rachel Fannan of Only You (courtesy of White Iris Records)

Music Creative Directors: Daron Hollowell, Jonathan Fuller

Music Executive Producer: Jenny Hollowell

Music Producer: Amy Crilly

Music Assistant Producer: Rob Lowry

Sound: Heard City

Mixer: Keith Reynaud

EP: Gloria Pitagorsky