James Wills

"Electronic Spectrum Systems Operator" is a complicated name for a very important job in the Australian Navy. It involves analysing the electromagnetic spectrum to identify threats to Australian national security.

To recruit new candidates, we manipulated sound frequencies to hide a print ad inside an audio ad. If you could analyse the electromagnetic spectrum and decipher the message, you'll find the job offer.

The Audio Ad You Can See won awards at global shows, including a Graphite Pencil for Innovation in the Audio category and a Wood Pencil for Audio in the Direct category at D&AD.

Our creative team was also invited to speak at Mumbrella's Audioland Conference to reveal how the idea was made.

April 25 is Anzac Day, a day of remembrance for Australian and New Zealand Army Corps. However, in recent years we’ve commemorated the day in isolation of one another. Our brief from Legacy Australia was to reignite the true meaning of the Anzac spirit and enable Australians and New Zealanders to share Anzac Day together. So, we took an iconic symbol over 100 years old – the Anzac biscuit – and reimagined it.

The Half Biscuit won bronze in outdoor at Cannes, and gold and two bronzes at AdStars.

The Australian university category is a sea of sameness, and Monash University’s new campaign, ‘If You Don’t Like It, Change It’, aimed to shake up tertiary education and redefine why universities exist. To do it, they needed a provocative voice to unsettle the masses.

For the first time ever, A.B. Original partnered with a brand to create an aggressive new original track, titled ‘Blaccout’. The song first featured in the Monash brand film, and was then released via Spotify and Triple J, Australia’s number one youth radio network.

‘Change It’ was a finalist at Cannes in the Entertainment Lions for Music category.

2015 marked the centenary of the Anzacs landing at Gallipoli. Legacy commemorated the event by publishing a daily podcast, bringing to life the letters written by soldiers 100 years ago, to the day.

Letters of Gallipoli won metal at Cannes, LIA, Spikes and AWARD. It was Australia's most awarded radio campaign in its year.

Over the last 100 years, humanity has made a lot of good change. But right now? Well, these are strange times we live in. Things we thought we’d solved still need to be fought for.

This poster campaign for Monash University reminded students that change must never be taken for granted.

To promote Melbourne’s all-night pubic transport service, we showed a whole city how to stay up later. Our team of 80 ‘Late-Night Explorers’ stayed up till dawn to explore Melbourne and capture enough content to create over 200 executions.

This campaign was a finalist at Cannes in the Media Lions.

Australia’s Army Reserve had an image problem. People thought it was the same as full-time Army, and that meant you needed to completely change your life to wear the uniform. Our job was to show Australians that being a Reservist was different . And, we needed to capture all the excitement, adventure, fun and camaraderie that comes with it. This was a fun one.

Over 50 executions were created for cinema, TV, outdoor and social. Here are a few.

The new five-door Mini fits more fun in a small space, so we did the same thing with our radio ads.

The campaign extension of Letters of Gallipoli saw eight of Australia's best actors reading the letters of the Anzacs on the exact day they were written, 100 years ago. 

Letters of Gallipoli II was featured on The Project, Studio 10 and The Age. 

Your wellbeing is a lifelong journey of moments. It’s not just about the big things, like births, deaths, weddings, celebrations and accomplishments. It’s also the in-between moments. The little ones, the seemingly insignificant ones, the forgettable ones. They all make up the fabric of your life.

When Australian Unity helps you get all the important stuff sorted, like your health, your finances and your standard of living, you can make the most of the in-between moments. That’s what real wellbeing is.

‘The In-Between Moments’ was shot by Emmy award-winner, Glendyn Ivin, and was Australian Unity’s first brand campaign in its 180-year history.

Australia Post’s new mail service lets you squeeze anything into a parcel for a flat postage rate. So, we thought we’d squeeze some items into our radio ads. This campaign won a bunch of gongs at Ad Stars, was a shortlist at One Show, a finalist at the Siren Awards, and a finalist for copywriting at AWARD.

Instead of serving generic content to potential students, Monash University let them create their own. To get an insight into the world-class thinking and research that happens at Monash, we turned students into directors, and let them create their own documentaries on topics like automation, terrorism, the ethics of neuroscience and more.

The site features hundreds of hours of interviews with academics, cutaways and music tracks in order to create millions of possible documentary edits, instantly.

Try your hand at directing your own doco here: http://adifferentlens.monash.edu/

This campaign is an extension of the successful Monash documentary series that explores the most pressing issues of our time. You can watch some of them here.

Melbourne is the home of live music in Australia. Now that public transport runs all night to help music punters get home after gigs, we got one of the country’s best live bands to perform Melbourne’s Longest Ever Encore all over the city. The catch? They had to ride public transport from venue to venue.

To encourage the top 1% of high school leavers to accept their scholarship offer, Monash did more than send them a letter. They renamed their university after them. 

Your Name Goes [Here] won silver at Spikes and featured in The Work.

To launch a new soft drink inspired by flavors of old, Schweppes held a Facebook competition where you could vote for your favourite. 

For the record, Lime Spider was the winner. 

The staff at RAC Insurance are incredibly dedicated bunch of people. In fact, they wouldn't let anything stop them helping their customers.

As part of the Virgin Australia AFL Film Festival, we were asked to showcase the Fremantle Dockers. We thought we'd show one of the lesser known blokes at the club. 

This commercial was a world-first to link alcohol use to cancer. In 2017 it was named the most powerful alcohol education ad in the world by the British Medical Journal Open.