Isn’t technology brilliant? Take those boffins at Nasa. They invent some great stuff and product-place it in action films and on the news to entertain us. Then a few years later, when they invent something better, the likes of you and I get to play with their old toys.
So hats off to the team at The Wand Agency who got Nasa to lend them the Ultra-Deep-Field HD camera first for this campaign for Peugeot, www.spot3008.com. (OK, I made that name up, but it’s a reasonable description of what this baby can do.)
The Peugeot 3008, you see, is a car so packed with tech you’d expect it to fly. And fly, it has. Somewhere on the rooftops in a vast, eye-poppingly detailed 80 giga pixel panoramic shot of London are 20 Peugeot 3008 Crossovers. You have to find them. And when you do, you have the chance to win a trip into space (or £30,000 if you’ve been there before). What a great prize!
Sometimes, if you’re lucky, you get a TV ad that’s really cool for 30 or 60 seconds. What I like about this is that it’s cool for, well, hours really. This is a photograph, and a task, that you can get totally immersed in. It’s addictive, interesting fun. And, as a piece of free entertainment in exchange for a few personal details, it’s well worth it.
I have spent ages peering into corners of London, and found about seven of the 20 hidden cars. Actually they’re not even hidden. They’re on the roofs. But there are so many roofs and buildings to check. Why, I can nearly see my own house in it. And I live 10 miles from Central London, with no discernable view of the capital that I have ever noticed. But, there again, I have never been up on my roof.
I expect that this kind of super-detailed photograph will be seen everywhere sometime soon. Here, its novelty value is applied perfectly, giving people an simple and appealing hi-tech ‘gadget’ to play with and providing a nice segue into discovering more about the 3008.
Imagine just how good the cameras are that Nasa is still holding back. Even on this evidence it’s clear that it’s not just people across the street who can see into your windows – they’re on the other side of the freakin’ city. You sir, out there in Graham Road, Hackney, should have pulled your curtains… you naughty lad.
And, finally, on the subject of detailed London panoramas, how lovely is this?
www.bl.uk/magnificentmaps/map4.html
Neil Francis is creative partner at Stephens Francis Whitson, part of the VCCP Partnership
