Zero gravity channel idents and promos created for Space Week on Nat Geo.

Creative agency/production company: Brothers and Sisters

Client: National Geographic Channels UK/International

How it was done: The creative team took various props and a G-Force One airplane to zero gravity, using two camera crews to film different scenarios at the same time to make the most of the eight and a half minutes available.

Travelling to the Nevada Desert in the U.S., the team experienced weightlessness in a specially-adapted Boeing 727 aircraft, called G-Force One.

The aircraft is the same type of plane used by NASA to train their astronauts, and it performed a series of high-altitude flight movements known as parabolic dives.

During each parabola, the plane climbed at a 45 degree angle to approximately 10,000 metres before freefalling rapidly in what is known as a parabolic curve.

The top of each curve allows 30 seconds of true weightlessness - achieving zero gravity.

Headed up by creative directors Steve Shannon of brothers and sisters and Lee Parker of National Geographic Channel UK, the crew of 14 people experienced 17 parabolic dives, giving them just eight and a half minutes to record the idents.

Strategically positioned camera crews captured each angle, ensuring that every second of zero gravity was recorded on film.

Each time zero gravity was achieved, every member of the crew on board was sent floating - lights, cameras and props in hand - as the action commenced.

Each of the 13 idents is centred around NGCI's yellow border, the symbol of the National Geographic brand.

In keeping with the channel's commitment to exploration, the idents are ‘experiments' in zero gravity with various objects.

One includes a collection of pool balls being hit by the cue ball; another includes the bursting of a balloon filled with water; and crew members sliding up the walls of the plane, throwing each other to play catch.

Credits:

Creative Director: Steve Shannon
Copywriter: Thanh Chu
Art director: Pedro Garcia
Director: Danny Vaia
Production company: brothers and sisters/Serious Pictures
Producers: Tracy Macassey and Ben Croker
Editor: Billy Mead
Post-production companies: Glassworks
Audio post-production company: Hi-Pitch

Watch it: From Monday 1 December on National Geographic Channel (not US)

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