British Road Safety Think Campaign

The UK Department for Road Safety has just come out with a TV advertising campaign highlighting the need for teenagers to pay attention when walking on the road. The shocking advert was filmed with a mobile phone camera, giving the feel of a home-made film. Teenagers muck around on the pavement. One of them goes to cross the road. He looks one way but not the other – a fatal mistake. Read on to view the video, along with others from the same department.

Click on the image below to play the video.

Credits

The ad was devised by Paul Jordan and Angus Macadam from Leo Burnett London, whose team included executive creative director Jim Thornton, copywriters/art directors Angus Macadam and Paul Jordan, and agency producer Emma Gooding.

Director Chris Palmer worked with production Company Gorgeous along with producer Rupert Smythe.

Editor was Paul Watts at The Quarry, London.

Postscript: ‘Camera Phone’ won a Gold Lion in the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival in June 2006.

Crash

Another campaign in the THINK! series is the ‘Crash’, in which pub drinkers discover the impact of deciding to have another drink. The moment a guy is persuaded to order a second drink we see a car crash right there in the bar, complete with maimed bodies. Click on the image below to play the video.

The drink drive tv ad was filmed entirely in a pub over two days in early June 2004 using quickly cut camera shots, stunts and state of the art editing. Using stunt people, a car reaching speeds of between 10mph – 20mph was used inside the pub to create the crash scene and capture the crash’s impact. A pub table was then transposed over the moving image of the car to create the dramatic scene.

Backwards

“Backwards”, a disturbing ad on the impact of wearing seat belts. Click on the image below to play the video.

Slow Down

An eight year old girl appears in the “Slow Down” Campaign, demonstrating the difference between being hit at 40 mph (64 kph) and being hit at 30 mph (50 kph). Not for the weak hearted. But whatever it takes to get us to slow down in built up areas. Click on the image below to play the video.

Although I found these ads hard to watch I believe in them. My eighteen month old daughter was hit by a car in 1992. She died instantly. The car was being driven at sixty four kilometres per hour. Only four years later my eight year old daughter ran onto the street to catch her hat. She also was hit by a car. She survived with bruises. The car was being driven at thirty kilometres per hour.