Genius Billboard of Steph Curry Combines Photography and Astrophysics
To mark the release of Steph Curry’s new book Shot Ready, the publisher Random House teamed up with a creative agency to create a unique billboard that harnesses an astronomical event.
Curry is widely regarded as the greatest shooter in basketball history and to drive this point home, the creative agency Known enlisted the help of the photographer Squint to create a billboard that at first glance looks like a standard ad for Curry’s book.
But starting around 5 PM on November 4, the billboard on West Pico Boulevard in Los Angeles was momentarily transformed when the supermoon rose from behind the spot and it suddenly looked like Curry had just released a shot.
AdAge reports that the project involved hiring an astrophysicist to ensure the celestial alignment was correct.
“We set out to manifest Steph’s philosophy beyond the page and beyond the basketball court — on an even bigger scale,” Mark Feldstein, president of Known Studios, tells AdAge.
“Known’s science and creative teams worked together to engineer a massive image of Steph timed perfectly to literally shoot the moon — November’s supermoon, to be exact. Because when preparation meets the moment, something extraordinary happens. That’s what it means to be Shot Ready.”
“The team built an ad you can miss,” notes the marketing agency Attention Compound. “It rewards only the people who pay attention. That’s not marketing, that’s embodied storytelling. A message you don’t just see, but you experience.”
The Moon moves in predictable patterns and photographers can use this information to plan for incredible shots. PetaPixel featured one such photographer yesterday, Travis Burke, who also harnessed the supermoon for an epic shot of a skateboarder silhouetted against the lunar surface.
Burke used the app Photo Pills, a common tool for astrophotographers and photographers who want to plan the astronomical elements in their shot.
