Cannes Lions
WIEDEN+KENNEDY AMSTERDAM, Amsterdam / CITIZEN / 2015
Overview
Entries
Credits
Description
No matter where you are on Earth, the new Citizen Eco-Drive Satellite Wave F100 adjusts to the current time zone in just three seconds. To demonstrate this, we came up with a project that 7 out of 8 production companies said was “impossible”…
We decided to race the Earth itself and prove that time can be cheated.
Inspired by the capabilities of the sun-powered watch, we challenged photographer Simon Roberts and ex-NATO pilot Jonathan Nicol to chase the sunset across the Earth’s time zones and endeavor to live in the same hour for as long as humanly possible. We captured the mission in the 5-minute documentary - CHASING HORIZONS.
Execution
We calculated a route around the North Pole at a latitude of 80 degrees, where the Planet rotates at its slowest. Then, in a precisely planned window of time in late February, when the days were still long but before the Polar Days of March see the sun no longer set, Roberts and Nicol set off from Reykjavik, Iceland.
Flying in the opposite direction to the Earth’s rotation, the team was able to experience the same sunset over and over in a new location. As they travelled through each new time zone, Roberts photographed the setting sun while the F100 adjusted back to ensure they were living in the same hour.
Production challenges were overcome at each stage of the mission including:
- Keeping the aircraft steady in the space-time continuum to allow the Earth to rotate under the aircraft
- Frozen engines
- Ensuring the calculation of the tilt of the sun and the earth to capture the sunset
- Racing the clock to refuel twice and get back into the air without missing the next sunset
Ultimately the mission was a success, we stole a night from the planet and proved that time can be cheated.
Similar Campaigns
11 items