by Tim Nudd

Advertising craft doesn’t get more delicate than this. Check out the crazy ice cubes TBWA\Hakuhodo created for Japan’s Suntory Whisky.

The agency used what’s called a CNC router (and a process that’s kind of inverse 3-D printing) to carve the designs, which ranged from the Statue of Liberty to the Sphinx to Batman and everything in between. (There even appears to be, perhaps presciently, a Cannes Lion in the mix.)

Miwako Fujiwara of TBWA\Hakuhodo said the CNC router was chilled at -7 degrees Celsius to keep the ice from melting. The agency used an app called Autodesk 123D to capture the 3-D images and prep them for printing. “A touch of chilled whiskey polishes the surface of the ice and gives a beautiful shine to the sculpture,” Fujiwara added.

The campaign was launched in 2014 and just won a Branded Content & Entertainment Lotus trophy at the Asia Pacific Advertising Festival in Thailand.

Lots more images, along with credits, below.

CREDITS
Client: Suntory

Campaign: “3D on the Rocks”

Agency: TBWA Hakuhodo+Hakuhodo
Executive Creative Director, Creative Director, Planner: Kazoo Sato
Copywriters, Planners: Takahiro Hosoda, Nobuhiro Arai
Art Directors, Designers: Yo Kimura, Yuki Tokuno
Creative Technologist: Masashi Matsukura
Producer: Kaoru Otani
Assistant Producer: Fusae Yoshikawa
Public Relations: Kayoko Asano, Miwako Fujiwara

Production: Tokyo, mount inc., amana

Movie:
Director: Eiji Tanigawa, Tokyo
Camera: Senzo Ueno, Tokyo
Lighting: Masachio Nishida
Art: Midoriko Nemoto, Taiyo Kikaku
Ice: Motoharu Kato, Yamane Ice
Sizzle: Noriko Saotome, Grand
Video Engenner: Satoshi Igarashi
Producer: Toshiyuki Takei, Tokyo
Assistant Producer: Masayoshi Takayanagi, Tokyo
Production Manager: Makoto Takahashi, Tokyo
Production Manager Assistant: Rintaro Kozasa, Taiyo Kikaku　
Offline Editor: Ryuichi Hasegawa (puzzle)
Online Editor: Akira Nishibu, Image Studio 109
Multi Audio: Yuta Sato, Image Studio 109
Sound Effects: Norio Kobayashi, ONPa

Music:
Executive Producer: Audioforce
Producer: Danic
Composer: Steve Sidwell

Web:
Planners: Im Jeong-ho, Takeshiro Umetsu, mount inc.
Planner, Art Director, Technical Director, Director: Hidekazu Hayashi, mount inc.
Directors: Hiroka Hasegawa, Hideki Yoshidatsu, mount inc.
HTML Coding: Hideki Yoshidatsu, mount inc.
3-D Computer Graphics: Takeo Saito, Mika Nariya, Fulvis K.K.
Production Manager: Ko Yoshida, mount inc.

Graphic:
Photographer: Keisuke Minoda, acube
Retoucher: Masahiko Furuta, Rizing
Photo Producer: Shinya Omi, Amana

Read the story at AdWeek

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