This summer, Honda is celebrating an unprecedented year of product launches with Ignition, an out-of-this-world brand campaign. During 2015 every model within Honda’s automobile line-up is new or refreshed, including the new HR-V and the hotly anticipated Civic Type R. This year has also seen the HondaJet make its first commercial flight and Honda’s return to Formula 1. No other company has the heritage of engineering across as many categories as Honda: automobiles, motorcycles, robotics, power equipment, aviation and racing. The mission of Ignition’s launch film is to dramatise Honda’s daring ambition, capturing the brand’s philosophy with the inspiring campaign line: “Dare to do the things others only dream of.”
Inspired by Honda’s daring spirit, the film pays homage to one of the boldest expressions of human curiosity and engineering endeavours; space flight. Space travel-inspired iconography and cinematic details aim to capture viewers’ imaginations, from atmospheric photography to the same climatic classical music that was etched into the Voyager 1 probe’s golden record and sent to the outer fringes of the solar system. Opening on Honda’s humanoid robot, ASIMO, the camera reveals a line-up of Honda products arranged on an impressive runway. The sky and sun are reflected in the road surface and the water below. Viewed from above, the formation mimics the familiar shape of a space shuttle or rocket.
Honda’s heritage is woven throughout the film. For example, the new NSX’s driver is captured, with a picture of an original 1991 NSX held in his hand. Eagle eyed viewers will also spot a very special cameo from McLaren-Honda driver, Jenson Button and the voice of the late, great Ayrton Senna. The campaign will be a unified, through-the-line Pan-European launch, as per the recent award-winning ‘The Other Side’ campaign. Trailers will tease the film on social media channels and the Honda website one week before launch. The full-length film will premiere across Europe on 14th August.
Ignition was shot on location on the Podilsko-Voskresenskyi bridge in Ukraine by Aoife McArdle through Somesuch. Local production was supplied by Radioaktive. The film’s epic cinematic look was enhanced through SFX and post production by The Mill, and sound design was crafted by Factory. The film’s score was designed by science fiction film composer Walter Mair through SIREN, and features segments from Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5 and Mozart’s Queen of the Night Aria; 2 tracks that feature on the Golden Record that Voyager took into outer space in 1977.
