Photographer Treated Heineken’s New Ad Campaign Like a Documentary Photo Project
Amstel hired Spanish photographer Javier Tles for a very unusual type of advertising campaign for Heineken beer. Rather than set up a staged photoshoot, as is par for the course, Tles covertly captured photos of real people enjoying drinks with their actual friends, approaching the ad campaign more like a documentary photography project than a commercial project. It is a very different type of advertising campaign, especially in the era of AI-generated ads.
The new campaign, called “Shot Without Permission,” was created by the European advertising agency INGO and aims to authentically capture people in real bars. There are no actors, scripts, wardrobe, makeup, or staged lighting. Tles, positioned outside a bar with a Sony Alpha camera and G Master telephoto lens, looks more like a private eye searching for cheating spouses than a globetrotting professional photographer working on advertising photos for one of the most famous beer brands in the world.
There are some important caveats to consider. While all the people shown in “Shot Without Permission” are real people who were initially photographed without their knowledge or consent, everyone featured in the campaign signed a release after their images were captured. Nobody is included in the ads without permission.
“We treated this as documentary photography, not advertising,” Tles says, as Muse By Clios reports. “Nothing was directed or staged. By stepping back and letting moments unfold, we were able to capture something far more honest — interactions and feelings as they exist in real life, not as they are usually presented.”
“To portray genuine friendship, we had to momentarily break every rule in marketing. No casting. No script. No consent. We decided to shoot first and ask for permission later. The results speak for themselves,” adds Daniel Fisher, global CCO at INGO.
Anyone who sees themselves in the new campaign is invited to contact Amstel to claim their “fees” for their “work,” which in this case is a year’s supply of Amstel.
“Today, so much of life feels curated and staged, and we wanted to focus on the moments where there is no pressure to perform. Those are the moments that matter most in life, where we feel truly appreciated for being who we are, and those are the moments this initiative celebrates,” says Vanessa Brandao, Global Brand Director for Amstel at Heineken.
Image credits: ‘Shot Without Permission’ is an advertising campaign created by INGO and shot by photographer Javier Tles for Amstel
