ENGLAND ‘TIL I DYE: SNK Creates Fake Pawdio Mix for Paddy Power Polar Bear Stunt

Working alongside Paddy Power, Pitch Marketing Group and the World renowned Framestore, SNK were tasked with sculpting a convincing audio mix for the controversial Paddy Power World Cup stunt. 

The amateur-looking film which shows a polar bear being spray-painted with a red St George’s Cross caused a vitriolic response online, with users branding it “idiotic” and “sickening”.

SNK were challenged with track-laying a believable sound design bed to support the mischievous on-screen antics of the Russian, masked hooligans. The film was sure to be scrutinised by skeptics around the world and so the mix had to pass as 100% legit. A combination of blended Atmos beds, re-recorded Foley and ADR techniques were carefully worked alongside the original audio captured on location in Canada to create a believable soundtrack to the eyebrow-raising film.

The main focus was to retain the premise that the movie was crudely edited by an amateur, whilst allowing the key dialogue and SFX to cut through the mix. Microphone knocks, distortion, edit clicks, spray-can rattle and wind noise was carefully introduced to reinforce the character of a badly shot, handheld recording and add to the trepidation.

Senior Producer Sam Dillon said: “It was such an unusual project to work on, the premise of the whole thing is just crazy. We’ve worked on some pretty mad Paddy Power campaigns over the past few years, but this one is definitely up there as one of the most memorable and the VFX work Framestore did was amazing- Come on England!"

This was by far the 'worst' audio mix the talented team at SNK have ever done… they are very proud!

The hoax was concocted with non-for-profit organisation Polar Bears International (PBI), to raise awareness of the endangered animal’s plight in the Russian Arctic – and launch a ground-breaking conservation programme they’ve funded for polar bears.

A large number of the world’s polar bears live in the Russian Arctic, which puts the species at risk, as the area boasts up to £26million of untapped oil – leaving it vulnerable to widespread and destructive drilling.

The bookmaker are funding two ground-breaking research projects for PBI – allowing scientists to investigate the black hole in their knowledge around Russian polar bears and their wellbeing. The donation will help fund new analysis of mating systems and genetical sampling of the endangered sub-population of polar bears. Paddy Power worked with PBI over several months on the campaign.

To donate, go to polarbearsinternational.org