Starting a studio from scratch in Shanghai…
In 2018, I decided to move back from Europe to Asia, to focus more on digital and take on more leadership responsibilities (and to escape Berlin winters).
With these goals in mind, I took on the challenge of opening Stink Studios, the digital and conceptual cousin of Stink Films, in Shanghai.
The job was to build the studio from scratch, with only a junior digital producer in the office when I arrived. With a bit of luck, and a lot of hard work, we managed to pick up a series of projects, which not only allowed us to stretch our fledgling creative muscle… it also allowed us to grow the team with a permanent creative team, MD and producer, as well as a rotating cast of freelancers to help on the broad range of concepts which took us from concept stores in Hangzhou, to million dollar shoots in Mexico.
Some of the projects include the following:
The global launch film for OPPO’s F11 phone:
A big budget film with a new team at OPPO, showing that the new F11 takes better low light photos… done in a simple yet magical way - in order to communicate across more than 30 markets. After less than a month, with limited online media budget, the film had nearly 100 million views on YouTube.
A global film and digital campaign for OPPO’s SuperVOOC charging technology:
Creating a fun and interactive reason for people to engage with and actually give a shit about really fast battery charging.
A concept store and interactive window display for Freshippo (Alibaba’s online fresh grocer):
Freshippo were opening a new store at a huge residential property development in Hangzhou… the only problem was that the store only opened in 18 months time, and we needed to promote it immediately. So we created a “freshness on your doorstep” concept store, where visitors could open 100 doors and discover different content about what Freshippo delivered to them - as well as an interactive window, which took your portrait and then built it by colour-matching pixels with Freshippo food and ingredients.
But wait, there’s more…
This was bolstered by work for Alibaba’s AI Labs launching their delivery robots, with a range of explainer videos paired with an inspiring launch film - which will be available soon!