With a film all about brave space rebels fighting against the odds, a safe communication idea wouldn't do. What we knew: live experiences spark conversation and have the power to change people’s minds. And drive sales: 65% of marketers see a direct correlation. On top, out-of-home is a top five awareness driver for movies in Germany.

Combining both, we could harness the imagination and passion for Star Wars: with Germany’s first ever animated mural!

Research we conducted for the release of Episode VII (2015) showed that Star Wars’ two main interest drivers are: 1) the original characters and 2) the big-screen action complete with lightsabers, lasers and more. With the movie set to release in Germany’s darkest month, December, we would showcase the thrill of laser fights, spaceships and battle scenes in an illuminated, rough format.

Ten renowned Berlin graffiti artists transformed a prominent building wall into a massive 22 m x 11 m movie poster mural. The piece was produced with an untraditional twist: electro-luminescent spray paint allowed the artwork to glow realistically throughout the night.

To add true dynamism, we used powerful projectors to enhance the artwork with moving elements. At sundown, the Rogue One mural came alive with projected X-Wing-Fighter planes flitting across the painted sky, and AT-AT vehicles shooting laser beams above painted Stormtroopers.

While the artwork was impossible to miss by locals and visitors to the East Side Gallery, we pushed it further by uploading a “Making of” video to Star Wars’ Facebook Page. It became an immediate hit among fans on Facebook, responding positively and scaling buzz into their communities.

The energetic Rogue One art piece went well beyond a standard OOH advertising… and fans agreed.

Our rebel approach to generating excitement was rewarded. The mural was seen live by 3.8 million locals and visitors during the 28 days it was exhibited—a large number, considering Berlin’s population of 3.5 million.

The making of video and PR coverage created ripples of excitement, scaling the effect beyond the borders of Berlin! What’s more, this excitement was just as high as on the launch day of the movie – something never before seen for a Star Wars release.

The mural generated over 5.7 million contacts across all channels and earned media resulted in 95% additional media value of the initial invest.

And: with almost 4 million tickets to Rogue One sold in Germany, our message resonated with far more than our target 2.8 million super fans!

With those kind of results, it looks like we had more than just the Force on our side.