The Trophy We Never Entered — The Night We Took Home an Award

Some projects you hand over to a client with the feeling that you've made something more than a job. And then, a few months later, someone hands you a slab of glass for it and says your name into a microphone. That's exactly what happened this autumn.

How We Even Ended Up There

We never submitted an entry. We have to say that upfront, because it sounds improbable. The spot we shot for one of the food brands was entered into the competition by the client themselves — not a word to us, purely as a surprise. We found out about the nomination from an email we spent the first half hour treating as spam.

When it turned out to be real, the studio fell into a silence you don't usually hear from us. Then someone opened a calendar and worked out that the ceremony landed on exactly the day we'd planned to be shooting somewhere else. Classic.

The Night of the Ceremony

The hall was exactly what you'd expect: too many lights, not enough legroom, a host talking about "the power of storytelling" between one category and the next. We sat in the third row, convinced we'd mostly come to eat dinner and clap for everyone else.

When our name was read out, none of us stood up right away. A second of hesitation, a glance that said "did he actually say VIDMO," and then that clumsy walk between the tables where you always snag someone's handbag.

What Was Actually Being Rewarded

It's easy to think an award is for the result — for what ends up on screen. We picked ours up with a different conviction. This was an award for the decisions no one will ever see: for insisting on shooting on film instead of digital, for the one shot we redid fourteen times, for the client trusting us when we proposed something stranger than they'd ordered.

What We're Taking With Us

The trophy now sits on a shelf in the studio, between a used coffee mug and a spare lens, and every so often someone clips it with an elbow. Good. We don't want it to become a little shrine. It's there to remind us of one thing: that it's worth making things a touch braver than is expected. Because those are the decisions someone eventually notices.