TAC targets motorbike safety and speed in new spot directed by Bruce Hunt for Grey Melbourne
The Transport Accident Commission in Victoria has launched its latest spot as part of a campaign targeted at motorcyclists.
Directed by Bruce Hunt from Revolver via Grey Melbourne the TVC highlights the danger of speed, urging motorcyclists to slow down.
Entitled ‘Thursday Arvo’ the graphic spot uses a combination of both in camera special effects and impressive visual effects to reconstruct a tragic motorcycle accident in reverse. Ultimately the TVC demonstrates the importance of applicable speed limits and the significant difference 8km on the speedometer can make.
Agency: Grey, Melbourne
ECD: Michael Knox
CD/Writer: Nigel Dawson
Art Director: Peter Becker
Producer: Sandi Gracin
General Manager: Randal Glennon
Account Director: Jodi Gubana
Production Company: Revolver
Director: Bruce Hunt
Executive Producer: Michael Ritchie
Producer: Catherine Jarman
Cinematographer: Danny Ruhlmann
Editor: Seth Lockwood
Editing Company: Method Studios
Sound Design/Arrangement: Simon Kate/Song Zu
Post Production: Animal Logic
Animation/Visual Effects: Animal Logic
Post Production/VFX: Animal Logic
VFX Supervisor / Lead Compositor – Morgane Furio
VFX Supervisor / Animation – Scott Hunter
VFX Producer – Tyrone Estephan Lighting – Andrew Lodge / Manuel Macha / Aaron Hoffman
FX – Larry Townsend
Modelling / Surfacing – John Saleem
Rigging – James Dunlop
Modelling – Jeff Driver
Rotoscope – Alex Coble / Shane Rabey / Guido Wolter
Sound Design: Simon Kane, SongZu
27 Comments
great ad
S.O.B!! thats pretty graphic….but this ad works. I’m gonna slow down now.
The neck breaking bit is ewwww.
insert accident here creativity…
Apparently the chorus of riders saying “this couldn’t happen” has begun. How would they know, unless they’ve been killed in a crash by a car turning into their path? I say the only way to ensure you don’t get your neck broken on a bike is to drive a car.
So on a bright, sunny day, it’s still the rider’s fault he wasn’t seen?
As a rider I’m sick to death of the focus being on us changing behaviour, rather than driver’s actually opening their eyes.
Everyone should observe the speed limit. And everyone should be aware that the road is a shared space for two wheels and four.
These campaigns are graphic, but are focussed more on teaching a fly to avoid a swatter, rather than teaching the person holding the swatter how to use it.
And there are far, far more swatters out there on the road.
…I don’t mean people driving cars should learn how to ‘swat’ more effectively by the way. Bad metaphor. My apologies. I’m sure you get the idea though.
It’s no use being right and dead, 9:28. As an ex-biker myself let me give you some advice. Car drivers are not looking for bikes. Because bikes are a much smaller object than a car, even with the best will in the world, a car driver may simply not see a bike. But by then it’s too late to do a slow-mo replay and make it all better. Riding a bike is a phase we all have to go through. I rode like a maniac and it’s only pure luck that I survived. Take a tip from me, life’s a lot more fun behind the wheel of a car – a beautiful, solid, classic car.
As a bike rider, I find this ad less offensive than some of the previous.
The direction and tone are great.
I like the calmness of it: no screeching brakes and shocking fast-cuts – just the facts.
I like it so much that I think there should be 2 ads.
A fairer approach would be to have a sister-ad from the perspective of the car driver; who is equally (if not more) to blame in this situation.
If you want to appear to unbiased towards motorcyclists, TAC – make the 2nd ad and put them out top and tail in the same ad break.
Fairs fair.
That’s exactly what I was thinking Ghost Rider. Good call.
And reality check, I’ve been riding for 26 years so I wouldn’t really call it a ‘phase’.
The fact that you equate riding a bike ‘like a maniac’ with ‘fun’ means that you probably never got it anyway.
@Reality Check – I’m a rider who has survived a SMIDSY at an impact speed in excess of that shown in this crappy, anti-motorcyce ad. And I walked away with only two broken ribs. Please explain how that happened.
This ad is wrong on so many levels. It fails to send the right message to riders, because the first thing we see is the “get out of jail free card” given to the car driver.
No experienced motorcycle riders were involved in the production of this ad. In particular an expert panel of riders was not involved. TAC decided what they wanted to do and then engineered their result. Poor form and un-ethical to say the least.
If they had utilised an expert panel of riders from the start, a better ad would have been the result and riders would have no grounds for complaint. But TAC and VicPol chose to exclude riders. That is use the start of why we hate this ad and why we are angry. Got nothing to do with the message – its the way they went about it.
Stunning visuals as always from Mr Hunt……
I’ve been riding for over a decade, raced a bit, crashed a bit, and I like this ad. A lot. Reality Check is absolutely right in my view. The best thing I was ever taught when learning to ride was there’s no point being right – and dead or in a wheelchair. Yes, a lot of motorists don’t pay enough attention for bikes. But we’ve always known that. It’s old news, and won’t change. So, rightly or wrongly, we have to take responsibility where others don’t. No-one holds a gun to our head and makes us ride. We know the risks, and choose to ride anyway. Slowing down is clearly one of the best ways WE can minimise these risks. So surely it’s good message? Of course, motorists need to take responsibility too. But that’s a different target audience and a different ad.
He also woulda missed the car at 120khr nomsayin…
I’ve got to agree with Reality Check et al. As a biker as well, you never trust any cars on the road, ever – that’s the safest way to ride. No point blaming all the car drivers for stuffing up, the fact is mistakes happen. The easiest way to change behaviour and limit motorcyclist deaths is to ask motorcyclists to slow down and increase awareness. Not to say they are in the wrong, but they are their lives at stake, so why wouldn’t you talk directly to them?
I’m astounded at some of the defeatist attitudes in here toward driver training.
“Oh car drivers will never pay attention so its your responsibility to compensate for them”
BULLDUST! If people on the road are not paying proper attention, then they shouldn’t be on the road. They are a danger to themselves and everyone else around them. Cars are smaller than trucks… if a truck doesn’t see a car and hits it, is it suddenly the cars fault? There is so much hypocrisy surrounding the opinions of some motorists that it is outright disturbing.
Driver training is what is required here. Not some nitwit pointing to a speed sign and implying that you will be in an impervious safety bubble if you abide by it.
Rider training for the rider in question depicted in this ad is also paramount. Any rider knows, its your front brakes that do most of your work when emergency braking. The fact that they illustrate a rider doing a rear wheel lock-up for some 20-odd meters (without dropping and sliding miraculously!) highlights the fact that the rider had zero idea on correct braking under the circumstances. Braking in such a method is dangerous to the rider at 60 or 68kph.
This ad completely misses the main points and has been so poorly presented that it defies belief.
Sorry Tim, why get bogged down in esoteric rider crap? Technically you’re correct. But the key message in this spot is bang on. If you’re going to kill it with executional detail, I fear you’re the one missing the point here.
Front brakes/rear bakes/no brakes – who cares? Fact is if you ride a bit slower you’ll significantly improve your chances of not getting whacked when grandma doesn’t see you on the road. Surely even you must agree with this?
Great spot.
Two incontravertible rules for survival on the road of particular relevance to bike riders:
1. Always assume the other driver will do the wrong thing.
2. Travel at a speed that will allow you to stop suddenly when the other driver does the wrong thing.
From personal experience, going slower will NOT save you from an idiot in a car. What it MIGHT do is reduce the TAC payout, and thats the only thing that tac are worried about, their christmas bonus for reducing payouts. if they can scare enough motorcycles off the road they reason that the payouts will go down. This is not a road safety ad, its a message to car drivers that its OK to kill motorcycle riders.
Tac have breached their duty of care.
As an ex bike rider, who’s spent a little time in acute care…
1. Cars simply don’t see you. It’s not an arrogance thing.
2. Riding where cars can’t see you is a pretty arrogant thing to do. You will get cut down eventually.
3. Expecting cars to see you as the master of the road and look out for you is as stupid as cyclists thinking they can run red lights and not get hit. Stupid thing to do.
Trust me, arrogance will lead to a fall. And a fucking nasty one if you ask me.
Have a bit of common sense, you’re tiny. They’re not. It’s the same with cars vs trucks, not going to happen, they’re bigger. And if you look at boats, who has right of way? That’s right, the bigger ones.
Nice one Michael.
Feels really dated. Is this a new spot?
I find this ad highly offensive. I have been riding motorcycles for many years. This ad portrays the rider as at fault for going 8 klms over the speed limit. Idiots who drive cars and don’t look are the killers not just the speed. Ad should have been what would have happened had I looked. Motorcycle brakes are much more effect than cars at that speed due to weight/power so the 8km is not the issue. Very poor
I have been riding bikes since i was 5 and as a bike rider this ad shows exactly what most bike riders do,speed.Even I am guilty of it it’s hard with modern day bikes to travel at 60k. Car and bike riders need to watch their speedos more often , GSXR this is not offensive or poor it’s reality, I for one am now looking down at my speedo more having watched this ad.
This ad has just been taken off air by the Victorian Government for being factually incorrect. The motorcycle could have stopped.
S’funny how everyone bemoans the rubbish driving that we see every day, but fails to see themselves in the picture. Here we have a rider making an error in judgement with his speed, but the implication is that somehow by being over the speed limit a driver is suddenly free from the responsibility to look properly. the penalty points for a rider 8 kays over is 1. The penalty points for the driver failing to give way is 3. Hmm seems the law regards the driver as being more responsible for the violation than the rider. Yet despite this, the ad like so many that wear the TAC stamp of horror followed by more horror, simply ignores the real issue and concentrates on our old mate speed.
Yes speed makes the outcomes worse, but its the error that is at the heart of the problem and that comes down to crap driving, poor observation and sloppy planning. That’d be the same crap driving, poor observation and sloppy planning that most of the posters here are guilty of I suspect. This one dimensional approach to road safety is one of self justification rather than a genuine will to confront the problems at the heart of driving.
Lets be clear, it’s drivers that kill drivers, its drivers that kill passengers, its drivers that kill pedestrians, cyclists and apparently about half of the motorcyclists.
If this blame game approach is so darn good, then how come Australia is slipping down the OECD road safety ratings against countries with worse weather, massive populations and strangely, higher speed limits. Whats that? They train their drivers better? But that would mean all those self-appointed experts, gravelly voiced police and all the other low performance safetycrats admitting they’ve been barking up the wrong tree – and that would mean stepping off the gravy train, having to treat people with intelligence and actually do some serious work for a change wouldn’t it?