In 2008 Hermes launched a new watched named Clipper in tribute to the very fast sailing ship of the 19th century that had three or more masts and a square rig. When the brand commissioned us to conceive this movie, all we were given was merely the name of the watch, and a sketch of the timepiece.

We imagined a movie in which the evocation of this past times would come through the imagination of a child. When he opens a huge book, a ship emerges from the paper and the whole room around him fills with ancient marine charts and drawings. As he turns a page he discovers sketches of a watch. The elements come to life and rise in front of his eyes. When he touches one of the wheels all the movements and watch parts gather and form the Clipper H1 watch. Once the watch is assembled, it returns on a page of the book as a drawing. The book closes and it is no longer the young boy that holds the book but a grown adult, looking back nostalgically to his past, and wearing the watch at his wrist.

Presented along with two other synopses this scenario was immediately adopted by the brand team.

All the production was made by I-réel: we chose the location of the shooting, gathered the team and filming equipment. The film was shot with a HD cam equipped with a pro 35 Kit. The camera was suspended to a moving crane and remotely controlled with a “Louma system”. Camille was casted at the agency among ten other boys. A leather specialist settled in Paris especially crafted the book.

Some of the sequences were shot with a green background so that we had to track and reproduce the flooring.

This movie is very interesting as it gathers a lot of different motion techniques, such as classic animation, 3D animation and live shooting.

The global look and feel is mostly determined by the set, that we wanted warm and light.

This movie has won several prices in film festivals and adds campaign awards.

The music was especially composed for this movie.