The latest instalment of the Hansa ‘Vuyo’ series of ads is currently being screened  and contains a few interesting faces. The ads have been a winner since their inception all revolving around the free thinking and loved Hansa hero Vuyo, who drifts off into thought about the success of his business ventures, all based on an everyday event. The campaign is the brainchild of Lowe Bull Cape Town and the ads have been produced by Fresh Eye Film Productions and directed by Jonathan Parkinson.  But packaging an entire concept, evoking emotion and portraying a significant time line of events is no mean feat to accomplish in just 60 seconds.
“It’s never easy doing a sequel to an ad, and even more difficult if the first was one of South Africa’s best loved ads. The tricky thing about doing the next Hansa ‘Vuyo’ ad is to upscale the previous one, how do you beat Vuyo and his wors, going to space, and Vuyo owning his own football team,” says Kirk Gainsford, Lowe Bull CT creative director.

“Well, I think that Jonathan has done a great job, the ad requires great scale, huge scenes that tell you how successful and big Vuyo’s next enterprise becomes, but also the small charming moments that everyone remembers. In many ways there are two movies playing out at the same time, the humble Vuyo and his friends and the meteoric rise of the Vuyozela.  Jonathan took our idea and progressed it, to turn Vuyo into South Africa’s own Steve Jobs,” says Gainsford.

This time we see Vuyo inventing the Vuyozela, which rockets him to international acclaim and stardom.

“We were briefed to make this ad feel even bigger than the previous ads and take it that much further and we also wanted the look and feel of the ad to have a modern thrust and be nice and clean with that big production feel. We achieved it with attention to the smallest details and in some cases it even meant that there were scenes within scenes. Even content on background monitors and TV screens was especially created for the ad,” explains Jonathan Parkinson, the director for Fresh Eye Film Productions.

“A big production also meant lots of people to manage, big locations and different places, all made to look like different settings around the world. This relied heavily on exceptional post production to perfect scenes. Some shots for instance were done in empty stadiums in the daytime and the final scene shows a packed, floodlit stadium at night.”

“The Vuyozela concept was especially nice because of the name play with Vuyo’s name, but we also wanted to create an instrument that fitted in with modern culture, something that was sexy and interesting enough to catch on around the world and be more appealing than traditional instruments. It was also important to get the emotional aspect right, to portray the four friends as real people, people that the South African public could relate to and take a liking to,” says Parkinson.