Ladbrokes reimagined Rocky Balboa’s legendary South Philly running scene for an energetic brand campaign dedicated to the power of playing together. Recreating the scene required a huge amount of work to match the original camera movement, height, lens and speed – requiring the team to build a bespoke wire cam system, which was used in partnership with CGI visualisation. Every shot was meticulously planned, as was every element of the set. A cast of 250 extras, which replaced the original background characters, also had to be carefully positioned.

Critical final details were added in post-production, which the team says took a whopping 15,000 hours. Extra action scenes were added into the film, including imagery of stunt bikes, cars and parachutes, and the grain and grade of the film were adjusted to match the original 1979 version.

A re-recording of the soundtrack at Abbey Road Studios introduced a few extra audio flourishes.

Credits:
Ladbrokes: Rocky
Category: VFX
Entrant: neverland
Brand Marketing Director: James Kennedy
Head of Brand Marketing: Stewart Townsend
Head of Media: Darran Snatchfold
Senior Brand Managers: Benjamin Reeves, Dee Ulusoy
Brand Managers: Jonathan Williamson, Abigail Wood, William Peters, Daniel Chandley, Pablo Moreno
Head of Retail Marketing: Lewis Wallace
Group Director of Consumer PR: Simon Clare
Head of PR: Nicola McGeady
PR Manager: Alex Apati
Head of Performance Marketing: Daniel Toledo
Senior Social Media Manager: Teresa Rebelo
Paid Social Media Account Manager: Ethan O’Reilly
Senior Display & Programmatic Manager: Robert Charles
Programmatic Executive: Arthur Caraccio
Internal Communications Business Partner: Phil Oddy
Group Procurement Manager: Helvia Ruiz
Assistant Legal Director: Anthony Ladislaus
Compliance Manager: Yoithi Inoue
Senior Compliance Manager: Suzanne Young
Group Director of Corporate Affairs: Grainne Hurst
Head of Safer Gambling and External
Corporate Affairs: Sophie Platts
Creative Agency: neverland
Co-Founder, Acting Executive Creative Director: Jon Forsyth
Co-founder, Brand Strategy: Simon Massey
Head of Production: Amy Coomber
Producer: Alex Cowley
Senior Creative: Lloyd Daniel
Design Director: Rich Kennedy
Business Director: Theo Jenkins
Account Manager: Kate Middleton
Senior Strategist: Clemence Lepinard
Production Company: MJZ
Director: Nicolai Fuglsig
Producer: Tim Wild
Executive Producer: Lindsay Turnham
Production Manager: Michelle Kirkman
Director Of Photography: George Richmond
1st AD: Ben Glickman
Facility Company: Pioneer, Hungary
Editing Company: Final Cut
Editor: Rick Russell
2nd Editor: Claire McGonigal
Assistant Editor: Josh Chadwick
Edit Producer: Nikki Porter
VFX: Selected Works
Creative Director: Greg Spencer
Shoot Supervisors: Greg Spencer, Mickey O’Donoghue, Theajo Dharan, Adame Boutrif
Executive Producers: Sean Costelloe, Alex Fitzgerald
Producer: Katie Sharpe
Head of 3D: Paul Donnellan
CG Artists: Mickey O’Donoghue, Abner Marin, Adame Boutrif
2D Artists: Jonathan ‘Wes’ Westley, Georgina Ford, Maheshwaran Chandrasekaran, Matt ‘Wispy’ Clarke, Stephanie Skarbeck
Data Workflow: Man Lok Li
Technical Pre-Viz: Big Tooth Studios
Colourist: Fergus McCall @ Rare Medium
Sound: 750mph
Head Sound Engineer – Sound Design & Mix: Sam Ashwell
Audio Producer: Olivia Ray
VO Casting: Kirsten Troy
Music Production Company: Lost Track Production
Music Arranger: Tom Player
Music Buyer: Resilient Music LLP
Music Supervision: Jemma Skidmore
Music Licensing: Richard Kirstein