TBWA\Media Arts Lab and Apple’s Alchemy
TBWA\Media Arts Lab was established in 2006, as a dedicated, in-house advertising agency for Apple, Cupertino, California, USA.
With offices today, in Los Angeles, London, Miami, Shanghai, Singapore, and Tokyo, TBWA\Media Arts Lab has become one of the world’s most awarded and innovative agency networks, with their creative chemistry of producing globally lauded advertising initiatives for various Apple product campaigns.
1. Apple iPhone, Miss You
Advertising Agency: TBWA\ Media Arts Lab, Los Angeles, California, USA
Production Company: DIVISION Global, Los Angeles, California, USA
Dramatising the impressive battery life of Apple’s iPhone 15 Plus, capable of up to 26 hours of video playback, or up to 100 hours of audio from a single charge, the highly entertaining scenario of electrical outlets lamenting their loneliness, directed by esteemed filmmaker François Rousselet, plays out to a soundtrack of “Way Too Long” by American rapper Doe Boy, and American singer, songwriter, producer, and pianist Breyan Isaac.
“At night, I remember
When you and I were inseparable.
We had pure energy.
We had that chemistry.
I feel like it has been too long
And I am missing you.”
2. Apple AirPods Pro, Quiet the Noise
Advertising Agency: TBWA\Media Arts Lab, Los Angeles, California, USA
Production Company: Iconoclast, Los Angeles, California, USA
Post Production and VFX Studios: Electric Theatre Collective, Los Angeles, California, USA
Directed by the Megaforce, Filmmakers Collective, of Leo Berne, Clement Gallet, Charles Brisgand, and Raphaël Rodriguez, the spectacular Apple AirPods, ‘Quiet the Noise’ scenario, features a stirring soundtrack of Zimbabwean-born Australian singer-songwriter, and rapper, Tkay Maidza’s 80s hit song, “Where is my Mind?”
3. Apple iPhone 15, New Driver
Advertising Agency: TBWA \ Media Arts Lab, Los Angeles, California, USA
Production Company: Biscuit Filmworks, Los Angeles, California, USA
The mixed emotions of excitement and anxiety, experienced by Megan’s dad, about her driving herself to school for the first time, is a scenario of family safety concerns that many parents will relate to with knowing familiarity.
Directed by renowned filmmaker Andreas Nilsson, the emotive ‘Relax, It’s iPhone’ commercial, promoting the Check-In messaging feature on the iPhone 15, features a soundtrack of the soulful “Goodbye”, written and composed, by American singer-songwriter and rapper Aloe Blacc, and poet, guitarist, and percussion synthesist, Nathan Yell.
4. Apple, The Lost Voice
Advertising Agency: TBWA\ Media Arts Lab, Los Angeles, California, USA
Production Company: Hungry Man, Los Angeles, California, USA
Directed by Academy Award-winning filmmaker and actor, Taika Waititi, and filmed in New Zealand, the enchanting bedtime-story scenario, of a young girl and her friend, a magical pink and furry creature, centres on Apple’s innovative ‘Personal Voice’ technology, that employs secure, on-device machine learning, to capture and replicate a user’s voice.
Featuring an avant-garde soundtrack titled “Yodeler”, created almost entirely out of human voice samples, by husband and wife team of band X Carbon, the poignantly enacted tale, of human connections, disability awareness, and enabling cutting-edge technology, is narrated by the film’s bedtime-reader, Dr. Tristram Ingham.
An associate professor of epidemiology, and a disability advocate from Wellington, New Zealand, who suffers from ‘facioscapulohumeral’ muscular dystrophy which, ultimately, will lead to an inability to speak, Dr. Ingham’s impactful portrayal in the filmic phantasy, of the metaphorical bedtime-story, brings home the beneficial reality of Apple’s humanitarian focused technology.
As part of their advertising campaign, commemorating the International Day of Persons with Disabilities, on 3 December 2023, Apple published a children’s book, telling the story of searching for a lost voice, that was happily found.
5. Apple AirPods Pro, Share The Joy
Advertising Agency: TBWA\Media Arts Lab, Los Angeles, California, USA
Production Company: Labhouse/MJZ, Buenos Aires, Argentina
Belgian-French choreographer Damien Jalet, American dancer Vinson Fraley, and Israeli dancer Gal Zusmanovich, give filmic expression to the innate joy of listening to music that stirs one’s imagination to unbridled heights.
Filmed in Buenos Aires, the AirPod commercial features a resonant soundtrack titled “PUFF” by Argentine music producer Gonzalo Julián Conde, known professionally as Bizarrap, and Belgian-Argentine hip-hop artist Indra Bhalavan, and was directed by renowned Argentine advertising conceptualiser, writer, and filmmaker, Juan Cabral.
Juan Cabral, has won every major award in advertising, that includes over 25 Cannes International Festival of Creativity Lions, and 2 Grand Prix trophies.
6. Apple iPhone Privacy, Tracked
Advertising Agency: TBWA/Media Arts Lab, Los Angeles, California, USA
Production Company: MJZ, Los Angeles, California, USA
Following the release of iPhone’s iOS, App-Tracking Transparency, Apple in July 2022, joined forces with telecommunication company T‑Mobile, to make wireless-IT easily available for small businesses, with iPhone 13’s new lines of business essentials.
Directed by filmmaker Rupert Sanders, the metaphoric scenario, of skilfully dramatised humour, stars British writer, musician, and actor, Eric Stroud, as Felix.
Largely filmed on location in Prague, Rybná, and Staré Město, Czechia, the engaging commercial features a soundtrack, of British post-punk band from Leeds, Delta Five’s 1979 song release, “Mind Your Own Business”.
7. Apple iPhone, Data Auction
Advertising Agency: TBWA/Media Arts Lab, Los Angeles, California, USA
Production Company: Smuggler, Los Angeles, California, USA
Directed by esteemed filmmaker Ivan Zacharias, the scenario of Ellie discovering that her personal data is being auctioned off, highlights Apple’s highly laudable App-Tracking Transparency, and Mail Privacy Protection features, in a cinematic commercial that is simultaneously amusing, and disturbing.
A recently published report by The Irish Council for Civil Liberties (ICCL), on real-time bidding, the process brokers and advertisers use, to track you and sell your data, reveals that in the USA for example, “a person has their online activity and location exposed 747 times every day”.
And that every year, the location, and online behaviour data of internet users in the USA, are “tracked and shared 107 trillion times”.
8. Apple iPhone, Relax It’s 14 Plus
Advertising Agency: TBWA \ Media Arts Lab, Los Angeles, California, USA
Production Company: Smuggler, Los Angeles, California, USA
In Apple’s relax campaign scenario, to promote the longest lasting battery life ever of the iPhone 14 Plus, Apple has left the office, left working from home, and has escaped to the country, travelling on a slow moving tractor, that is hauling a giant pumpkin.
Directed by renowned filmmaker Ivan Zacharias, the solemn tractor driver, with his black jacket, brown Fedora hat, and iPhone mounted in front of him, is featured travelling along an endless dirt track leading to a distant mountain range, accompanied by a soundtrack of “Two Miles an Hour” by American rapper and actor, Christopher Brian Bridges, known professionally as Ludacris.
The 30 second, minimalist commercial, with its uncluttered, battery for miles focus, is compellingly simplistic, and with a broad smile, engagingly relaxing.
9. Apple iPhone, R.I.P. Leon
Advertising Agency: TBWA \ Media Arts Lab, Los Angeles, California, USA
Production Company: Biscuit Filmworks, Los Angeles, California, USA
Post Production, VFX, and Film Editing Studios, Blacksmith, New York, USA
Directed by esteemed filmmaker Andreas Nilsson, ‘R.I.P. Leon’, Apple iPhones’s 2023 Cannes Lions Film Grand Prix, is a single-minded and somewhat sombre dramatisation of iPhone’s new delete text feature.
Film Lions jury president, Bruno Bertelli, global CEO and Chief Creative Officer of Publicis Worldwide, said: “The first Grand Prix is awarded to the best piece of work in the TV/Cinema section”.
“This winner is a 30-second advertisement that stands out for its sharpness, focused approach, and clever twist. In this case, we aimed to acknowledge simplicity and high-quality crafting.”
10. Apple iPhone 7, Frankie’s Holiday
Advertising Agency: TBWA\Media Arts Lab, Los Angeles, California, USA
Production Company: Park Pictures, Los Angeles, California, USA
Lance Accord’s directional skill brings this unusual Holiday Season scenario to filmic life with remarkable emotive depth, in an empathic take on Mary Shelley’s iconic Frankenstein aberration.
With actor Brad Garrett’s stellar ‘Frankie’ portrayal, and the excellent art direction with attention to details such Mary Shelley’s portrait hanging on the wall of the recluse’s mountain cabin, the masterly produced commercial about the soulful attempt of the hapless Frankie, to find some social interaction solace, resonated with millions of viewers, and received wide coverage on all major TV News Channels.