The rise of independent agencies in the Australian marketing and advertising industry is a direct result of the democratisation of technology, greater adaptability, innovation and the impact of the changing way we work. As the industry continues to evolve, I believe we’ll see even more top-tier indies emerge, offering innovative solutions, specialised expertise and a more personalised approach to client service.
Now We Collide is a Sydney, Australia-based creative agency that is embracing AI as part of their everyday. We talk to Ryan Bodger, co-founder and now the CCO about navigating AI via their arm Collide-AI and what this entails.
Appeared in THE CREATIVE STORE newsletter.
Ryan, give us the backstory – who are you and where did you come from?
A couple of decades ago, I started out as a junior broadcast cameraman and video editor at the Nine Network, where I stayed for a few years until the transition to a new digital world took hold through the dot com bubble in the late ’90s. In 1998 I co-founded the digital agency Tricky Design (now 24digital.com.au) and delivered campaigns and projects for high profile clients including Telstra, IBM and NAB (to name a few).
In 2003 I was given the opportunity to work in Japan as the Digital Creative Director for Nikkei Net, Japan’s largest news corporation, taking the lead in the redesign and development of Nikkei Net’s English website.
In 2006 I landed back in Sydney and went on to co-found Now We Collide with business partner and CEO Keir Maher in 2015, where I now work as CCO, with an awesome team, overseeing and delivering digitally integrated campaigns and projects for a broad range of great clients.
You have a great range of clients – do you focus on certain sectors, or enjoy the breadth and variety?
We are lucky in that the client partnerships we have built over the years have continued to grow and prosper. We have really spent the time nurturing them, helping them achieve their business goals while building strong relationships. While we don’t focus on particular verticals we specialise in helping big global brands deliver their marketing efforts across APAC and other regions.
Your website states you are pioneers in the field of AI – how are you working in the AI space?
Right now we are witnessing the rapid advancement of deep neural networks in language, image, audio and video synthesis, resulting in remarkably precise, realistic, and customisable outputs. What was once blurry and low-resolution has now transformed into highly realistic and aesthetically impressive imagery, ushering in a new era of synthetic media. In late 2022 we setup Collide-AI driven by a passion to test, experiment and learn what this new technology can do, while seeing an opportunity to bring it into our everyday workflow.
How do you see the future of AI changing the face of a typical agency?
At COLLIDE-AI we believe that AI is not the creative solution for all projects or briefs. It doesn't provide all the answers, or simply replace more traditional creative development or production, nor should it. It is our belief that AI should be adopted as another creative tool for brands and marketers to get their message to market, at speed, in unique and exciting ways. We are conscious of the ethical issues surrounding its use and ensure we are not using it in the wrong way, using specific artists as reference for style and output. What is incredible about generative AI is the way we can come up with new ideas we may never of dreamed of in a much shorter period of time. This is based on how we are using it, prompting and engineering our outputs. It is not a simple process of prompting a few words in and hoping for the best. The processes we use, especially for AI video, is quite complex and uses a number of tools and techniques to get results that push the boundaries. In terms of the future and changing face of the typical agency, I think it is up to agencies to find the AI tools that suit their style or approach best, to find ways to adapt. There is no value in sticking your head in the sand and being stuck in old ways, the game has definitely changed.
Covering Content Marketing – Do you recommend HubSpot as the main tool? How & why would you recommend this CRM for clients?
We work with our clients from developing initial strategy, through to creative and ideation, content creation and media distribution. HubSpot is a fantastic platform to help us understand how all this comes together to achieve objectives and gain insights on what's working and how to optimise. HubSpot connects marketing activities, with sales, content management and customer service - so it really allows us to see the full customer lifecycle and understand the impact of marketing throughout all those stages. We work closely with our clients to ensure they are getting the best out of the software and we collaborate to gain insights, plan and optimise marketing activities.
What has been your most exciting creative to work on to date?
As a person with a life long love of playing and watching basketball, a campaign we recently delivered was for ESPN, creating their brand platform ‘Your Home For Hoops’. This initiative has been in development for a few years now and it has been exciting to see it unfold through such a strong period of growth for basketball in Australia. I’d like to think the campaigns we have run for ESPN, NBA, NBL, NBA Basketball School in Australia have helped to fuel this interest and growth. What has been most exciting about it, is the opportunity it has given us to push the creative boundaries and experiment with many different ideas, production techniques and concepts. You can check out some of the work here.
How do you curate a positive culture at Now We Collide?
By being open, honest and collaborative with our clients, our team and everyone we come into contact. Early Fridays' in summer, flexible working, rostered birthdays off, fun events, regular 'community days' where we give back to the community, the odd long lunch and gatherings and a passion for nurturing ideas and creativity also helps.
Do you look to other companies / have a mentor – whether that is in Australia or overseas?
I’ve been lucky enough to end up with a business partner who at times acts as a mentor, keeps my wandering creative mind on the straight and narrow and ensures things are as much about function as well as form.
As far as other companies go for inspiration I have always had a curiosity for tech-enabled creativity, so am always on the lookout for people, agencies or artists doing new, incredible things, be it here or overseas. I feel like the space for creative innovation is now more exciting than it has ever been before.
How has 2023 been for you? What are you looking forward to in 2024?
2023 has been exciting but challenging. Coming out of Covid posed many new challenges. I felt empathy for employees and clients who had effectively been working in a bubble for over two years, while this year gave people an opportunity to properly reconnect and travel again without as many rules and restrictions. I think people came into 2023 feeling quite restless with a need to explore again. As an agency, we doubled in size during COVID so it was a tricky juggle to find new talent and integrate them into the business. 2023 has opened things back up and brought the team back into the office, which is so important as a creative agency. 2024 will be another exciting year for us with many new and exciting projects currently in the pipes set to launch in the new year.
Last words?
Collide-AI watch this space.
Full article published by The Australian
If you work in advertising or digital marketing, some of today’s emerging technology might seem a little threatening. But just as television didn’t kill the radio, intuitive AI won’t spell doom for human creativity either. Ryan Bodger, Chief Creative Officer at Now We Collide, explains why we should look on the bright side.
Not long ago I was working with a client and telling them about the improvement I’d seen in AI-generated copy. They were, it’s safe to say, dubious.
So we did a little experiment and produced a few different versions answering the copywriting brief they’d sent our way. Oh, and one we slipped in there was produced by an AI source.
Lo and behold, their preferred option was penned by the machine.
Others were at it before us. In 2018, Lexus released an advertisement completely scripted by AI. The company used IBM Watson, an AI system, to analyse 15 years of award-winning car ads. Watson managed to identify the elements of successful ads that resonated most with audiences - and did it with aplomb.
If this sounds like an unconvincing way to open a piece reassuring you that the machines aren’t going to put creatives out of business, well, fair enough.
But bear with me, because where pure creativity is concerned, I’m convinced AI is the assistant we need right now and not an existential threat. Here’s why.
In the media and technology industries machine learning has thus far mostly been associated with measurement. In recent years we’ve been swamped by a sudden deluge of data with no way to make sense of it. The solution was AI.
Ask most people and they’d say machines replacing human brains for repetitive tabulation tasks is a good thing. Well, AI can do something very similar for creatives. There are now huge efficiencies to be had in developing concepts and getting them back to clients quickly.
At Now We Collide, for example, we’re already experimenting with art and text generators like Open AI & Broca for copy, tagline and idea generation. And we’re running tests on video and animation solutions that can help our designers come up with new ideas and expedite existing ones (see below).
We’re also using MidJourney, Dall-e2 and Stable Diffusions DreamStudio for visual concept development and content generation. It’s a new and exciting world - and one that can make us much more efficient as businesses.
In many cases, having this AI in our toolkit means tasks that would’ve taken two to three weeks from conception to delivery can be achieved much quicker. And this is especially important when speed to market is key to keeping share-of-voice high for most brands.
Measuring up in a creative space
In the world of measurement you’ll often hear people from tech companies extolling the virtues of giving the AI the richest data possible. The theory being that what you put in correlates strongly with what you get out. This is having some interesting knock on effects in the creative realm.
We’re now considering the types of roles the intersection of human output and AI technology is creating. There’s now a place in businesses like ours for what we are calling the Prompt Architect or Engineer. This is a role that involves working with AI, providing it with the right stimulus, or ‘prompts’ in order to get the best possible results.
Of course, we’ll never replace the human element entirely, but the ability to maximise the output of AI shapes as a very important new job skill. It’s an interesting inversion to think that great results can come from humans learning machine learning language, rather than us teaching AI what to do.
And if you’re not convinced of AI’s efficacy yet, well, we’re already seeing some exciting developments in the fashion and cosmetics space. In the example pictured below, the model, hair and makeup were all created by an AI source in under two hours - derived from refining a single prompt sheet of images.
And while AI used in this way could be disruptive for the fashion industry, it’s fair to assume this approach isn’t going to work for everyone just yet. But given the potential, I think that brands and marketers will certainly be interested in faster, more cost-effective ways to get their messages to market.
For creative businesses, there are simple ways you can experiment too. Being a big basketball fan, and working with ESPN on creating ‘Your Home For Hoops’ brand platform, I’ve started a BallArt Instagram account as a way to experiment and explore new visual concepts. Just by showcasing what’s possible via AI creativity, it provides us with a way to quickly realise which ideas work with a specific audiences.
Perhaps the most exciting aspect of the rise of machine learning in the creative space for me, though, is the ability to generate fresh ideas and new ways of thinking at a much quicker pace. A lot of effort goes into ideation, and having a collection of thought starters can be a very powerful thing.
If you’re still not convinced, then consider this. For agencies - particularly smaller Indies like us - leaning into this technology can also be a great selling point for clients. It’s a sign you move with the times and embrace agility - and that you’re not afraid to experiment with new trends in the quest for success.
For brands, I say, don’t be scared of it. Embrace it, test it and work with those who are doing likewise. At the end of the day, it’s just another software solution, but one that could really make a difference to your next campaign.
B&T ; MarkeTech APAC ; Mumbrella ; Adnews
Now We Collide has created a new campaign for Meta which showcases the ingenuity of small businesses across APAC in its latest “Good Ideas Deserve To Be Found” global campaign.
The campaign will run across the APAC region and consists of four 15-second ads which bring to life the stories behind nine different small to medium businesses (SMBs) from countries including Australia, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Philippines and Thailand.
“Good Ideas Deserve To Be Found” is designed to build awareness of tools and resources available to help SMBs connect with new audiences and grow their business online.
It is built on the insight that there are millions of good ideas out there, even though running a business and making it stand out to customers can be difficult.
“The last two years have been uniquely testing times for SMBs, providing some serious challenges with store closures and new opportunities with the explosion in digital retail,” said Meta Australia and New Zealand director of marketing, Alex Sloane.
“With this campaign, we wanted to draw attention to the wealth of resources available to help them use digital tools to even better effect, with the potential to create truly global businesses. We genuinely believe that “Good ideas deserve to be found.” and can come from anywhere.”
The campaign will be distributed via digital channels and Meta-owned platforms through Dentsu Media.
Each of the creative executions centre on revealing the ‘invisible’ product of a small business. One shows a boy wearing a bike helmet and pads apparently floating along, before an Instagram ad unit reveals the bike he is riding. Another features a woman practicing Jiu Jitsu apparently alone before revealing she is sparring with her instructor.
“We’re excited to be involved in a campaign that would help out many SMBs across APAC, especially as it was filmed at one of the more challenging periods of the pandemic,” said Now We Collide chief creative officer, Ryan Bodger.
“We had to grapple with these challenges as well, and our team was able to bring to life these stories from all across Asia either filming remotely or in-studio and on location in Sydney.
“By bringing the client into the studio ‘virtually’, we were able to closely collaborate throughout the production process, making approvals frictionless. We streamlined the process through live video offline edit sessions, bringing together various stakeholders from different locations across the globe.”
Now We Collide CEO, Keir Maher, added, “One of the more positive things the pandemic has given us, is the ability to work in ways we never thought possible.
“Quick adaptation to change has always been part of the Now We Collide DNA, but now it is built into our production processes and methodologies. This campaign is testament to our abilities as a nimble and effective team.”
Credits:
Creative Agency: Now We Collide
Production/Post: Now We Collide
Media: Dentsu
VFX/CGI Post: Heckler
Sound: PureSound
Executive Creative Director: Ryan Bodger
Business Director/EP: Naomi Young
Creative Director: Shelby Craig
Meta Internal Creative Leads: Justin Yeo (Meta), Jonathan Cockett (Meta)
Director: Toby Morris
DOP: Dan Freene
VFX Supervisor: Jamie Watson (Heckler)
Stunt Coordinator: Ray Anthony
Account Lead: Shayne Carter
Producer: Re Lim
Editor: Josh Groom
Motion Graphics/VFX: Darryn Rogers
Sound: James Martell
Loved by locals and enjoyed (responsibly) by craft beer enthusiasts, Sauce Brewing Co is an independent microbrewery in Sydney’s inner-west. Based in Marrickville, the brewery has developed a cult following amongst avid craft drinkers, highly regarded for its lineup of easy drinking ales and hop-heavy IPA’s.
As part of their ongoing growth, Sauce Brewing tasked Now We Collide to develop an integrated campaign to support the distribution of Caribbean Fog. Juiced up with Azacca and El Dorado hops, Caribbean Fog is a fruity, sessionable pale ale that’s recently found its way into the fridges of a number of key retailers.
To celebrate their entry into major bottle shops, Sauce Brewing launched ‘Find The Blue Beer’, a promotion to drive taste and trial of their summer friendly tropical ale. In the spirit of supporting a local Sydney business, Now We Collide joined the project to lead the strategy, creative, production and media distribution of the campaign. The team photographed and designed campaign material in-house, rolling out a suite of creative assets to feature across OOH, social media, digital and in-store POS.
Taking an integrated approach to media, the campaign reached customers using hyper-targeted OOH with precinct and neighbourhood posters and targeted digital and social media to reach lovers of craft beer in Sydney locations. The team worked with Sauce Brewing to identify key audiences and used Facebook and Instagram targeting to reach customers based on location, demographics, interests and behaviours. The extensive social campaign also drove new followers to Sauce Brewing’s social pages, increasing brand awareness of their wider lineup of products and their craft brewery experience in Marrickville.
To support the in-store promotion, we also created a suite of POS deliverables to appear in independent bottle shops and major alcohol retailers, to encourage trial of Caribbean Fog at point of purchase.
Through development of the ‘Find The Blue Beer’ campaign, Now We Collide helped Sauce Brewing to paint Sydney blue with it’s Caribbean Fog beer. With a strategic suite of OOH and social assets, the campaign increased brand awareness of the brewing credentials of Sauce Brewing, keeping their product top of mind for craft drinkers and beer lovers in search of their next taste adventure.