Suchard’s Christmas advertisement has been constructed from a meticulous sensitivity towards Spanish cultural codes. An example of this are two everyday objects such as the napkin holder and the sugar bowl typical of bars, elements that Ogilvy has used as a symbolic clue to reinforce the authenticity of the story. The precision with which they are made was what immediately connected the agency with the artisanal approach of the Valencian studio Pangur, responsible for bringing the idea of ​​the agency to the field of stop motion.

From reason.Why We were in Valencia learning about everything behind this year’s spot. There they explained to us that, to achieve one final minute of animation, 2,900 photographs were taken during 78 days of filming. And each gesture of the characters has to be adjusted by hand, including the movements of the limbs, eyes, hair and also the mouths, made one by one to adjust to the different phonemes in the script.

The studio operated as a miniature laboratory with seamstresses making tiny-scale clothing, fine arts professionals molding faces and wigs, and electrical specialists integrating mini-LEDs that, we were told, are only made in the United Kingdom. The entire process was developed with an explicit commitment to local talent and with the aim of highlighting the quality of Spanish animation in stop motion.

Víctor Vázquez and Miguel Provencio, Creative Directors at Ogilvy, told us during the visit that The campaign was conceived with a double responsibility: on the one hand, to maintain the tradition of one of the most anticipated Christmas advertisements of the year and, at the same time, accompany the introduction of the brand’s new chocolates. The briefing arrived in March and opened a process of internal exploration about how the Christmas holidays are really experienced in Spain. The conversations at the agency led to a key conclusion: there are multiple legitimate ways to celebrate these dates. This discovery inspired the concept of “It’s all Christmases”, which has allowed us to connect the evolution of the product with the real diversity of rituals and families.

In this sense, the reinterpretation of Suchard’s historic jingle became a structural element. The melody made it possible to build a bridge between collective memory and the cultural updating of the message, reinforcing the idea that celebrations can be transformed without losing their essence. For the agency, this decision also reflects the brand’s courage in assuming a generational change in the way of living Christmas without giving up its heritage.

Cecilia Rosi, Brand Manager at Suchard, thus stressed that this project coincides with a very relevant moment of transition for the brand, from being known almost exclusively for nougat to expanding its assortment to new categories, including chocolates. For her, the campaign manages to express a fundamental idea: traditions change, consumers change and so does the way of celebrating; but the emotional essence that the brand has built around Christmas remains. During the visit he acknowledged that this has been one of the most careful and significant works they have carried out in recent years.

The choice of Pangur as an animation studio in stop motion arrived, according to the Creative Directors of Ogilvyafter a coordination process with the production companies BOL and Hogarth, with the intention of carrying out a solid Mediterranean production consistent with the manual sensitivity of the project. And they did not hesitate to recognize that working with this technique meant “constant learning”: Each meeting required adjusting ideas to the physical language of animation, understanding some technical limitations, and modulating narrative decisions so that they were executable frame by frame.

To bring the ad’s cast to life, the Pangur team started from a technical base by manufacturing fifteen master structures that acted as the backbone of all the characters. From these modular frameworks they were able to articulate forty different figures by exchanging heads and compatible parts. With the storyboard very present at all times, they organized the filming, verifying that two figures that depended on the same master never coincided in the same sequence. In stop motion That foresight is crucial, because a slight deviation in the construction of a character forces hours of work to be redone.

When the structures were ready, they began to give them body. They were covered in foam to create volume and customized with a layer of hand-made details. Thus, the clothing of each figure included tiny elements such as buttons, pockets or seams that, although they are barely visible on screen, complete the identity of each character. Accessories such as footwear, hats, scarves or glasses were modeled in materials such as silicone or felt. The heads were designed digitally, 3D printed and then coated. The hair was done by hand hair by hair and each character had several magnetized mouths that changed depending on the expression in the frame. The eyes were also mobile, so all the filming material was organized in the workshop with an almost surgical method based on labeled boxes, accessories classified by character and an exhaustive control of each piece.

As a curiosity, Ogilvy explained to us that the artist Mafalda Cardenal went to one of the shoots with a yellow jacket that connected very well with the entire aesthetic of the spot. So they asked him to wear it for the advertisement and, from Pangur, the garment was reproduced on a reduced scale until a complete resemblance to the original costume was achieved.

Pangur is an animation studio specialized in stop motionlocated in Valencia and founded in 2015 by professionals with extensive experience in this technique. They have worked for international brands such as Hasbro, Warner, Nestlé and Nickelodeon, among others. The studio combines commissioned work of a high technical level with its own animated fiction projects, which gives it a hybrid character as a creative producer and specialized craft workshop.

During the visit, Leticia Montalvá, its Executive Producer, and Vicente Mallols, one of its Co-Founders, placed great emphasis on the fact that Valencia is a consolidated enclave in the production of stop motion, and they consider that this project allows us to reclaim that creative and technical ecosystem.

Below you have a making of that has occurred in parallel to the campaign and which we have been able to access from reason.Why.