Let there be Portrait Lighting…let there be studio lights!
The 39-second long ad, titled “iPhone X — Studio in your pocket” features a young woman at a busy railway station. She looks around, reaches for her iPhone X that is in her pocket and just when she takes a selfie all sorts of professional photography equipment – umbrellas, studio, softboxes, you name it – materializes around her, almost out of thin air. The woman spins around with her phone, enjoying all of the professional attention she is getting as she switches between different lighting options on her phone. And after she clicks a selfie, all the equipment around her disappears. A text then appears on the screen saying, “Studio in your pocket” followed by three of the young woman’s selfies, highlighting how effecting the Portrait Lighting mode can be even in a place as crowded and public as a railway station. The words “Portrait Lighting on iPhone X” then come up and the ad ends with the company’s logo. Playing right through the ad in the background is “La Fete Noire” by Flavien Berger.
Short, simple…and taking a creative leap
You may or may not like Apple products, but it would be hard for anyone to deny that the company produces some of the best tech ads that we get to witness on our screens. And “Studio in your pocket”, is another gem added to its ad crown. When it comes to ads, we love our three S’s, and we think, so does the Cupertino giant. The new ad which highlights Portrait Lighting on the iPhone X is short and simple, but this time, Apple has decided to keep the straightforward element out of the way. “Studio in your pocket” is a short ad which almost effortlessly highlights the feature of the device in a small time frame of about thirty seconds. The ad is very simple, and unlike some complicated ads that we have seen, this one just has a touch of magic and no science. But when it comes to the straightforward element, the company, it seems has taken a different route this time. And we love it. The way Apple has highlighted the Portrait Lighting in the ad is super creative. We love how just when the woman takes her phone out and takes a selfie, all the equipment just pops up in front of her out of nowhere. And we also really like how the unrealistic appearance of the professional studio equipment then very easily blends with reality as the girl switches between different lighting options on her iPhone X. Apple deserves credit for portraying all this in merely a 30 second ad and has kept miles away from the usual (read boring) ad box, and has not used the mainstream-hard sell kind of approach where the viewer is bombarded with specs and information. In many ways, the ad is the opposite of The City iPhone ad – in it, people disappeared, allowing you to focus on the subject when you move into portrait mode, whereas here, things appear when you take a selfie. In each case, the idea is the same: a better picture and a smoother experience.
The ad leaves you wanting more which is one of the best things that there can be about the ad. It leaves you curious and makes you want to try the feature first hand. And of course, we have not forgotten the background music, which fits just perfectly in the whole scenario.
Selfie camera, lights, action…another hit for Apple!
“Studio in your pocket”, as the name suggests, is an ad about how you can carry your own professional photo studio, that is, your iPhone X, in your pocket. Apple has definitely advertised the feature very well here. Unlike some of the other ads that either go so overboard with specs and features that they forget to add any element of entertainment or interest or the ones that go to the other extreme and focus so much on the entertainment that they forget about the product, this ad is a perfect example of how one can highlight the USP of the device, even while being creative, non-tech and interesting. The ad talks about Portrait Lighting on the iPhone X without dropping adjectives, using celebrities, spec sheet details, but simply draws a parallel between a classic photography experience (a studio) and the experience on the iPhone X. The core message is direct: you can get a studio-like experience if you have an iPhone X. And it is delivered creatively in less than half a minute. Add another ad winner for the Cupertino giant.
