An Inside Look Into Creativity at OPPO

OPPO prides itself on innovation. How do you convey this in your content?

To effectively convey OPPO’s innovation into the content, we must integrate technology into the narrative and showcase them in either everyday situations that users can relate to or in hyper-realistic/exaggerated scenarios to highlight the functions.

What's the most important aspect of a TVC?

I believe the most vital aspect of a TVC is the story. Only a good story can engage the audience emotionally while delivering a clear and compelling message. High-quality execution of visuals and memorable music will also help but the top priority is the narrative.

OPPO's slogan is "Inspiration Ahead." How do you find inspiration for your work?

Inspiration can come from anywhere and anyone. Simply talking to people and observing around could spark something. The Internet is in touch with what is happening in various industry trends and changes around the world. Sometimes we research data and that could also help bring insights and ideas to the table.

What are the biggest challenges you face when creating content? 

There are always hundreds of external challenges from changing digital and market conditions, but with such a large organization, the biggest challenge often comes internally. Creativity tends to drop when many partners are involved. In my experience, it's better to streamline the decision-making process in order to maintain a cohesive direction and stick to the original vision.

How do you balance creativity with the unique needs of different markets?

This depends on the type of content we are making, whether it’s for the region or market-specific. For regions, we cannot have ideas that go into specific cultural nuances (unless they are all equally represented) but still need to have something relevant and unique to the region. For market-specific content, we can apply deep local insights and make it as relevant as possible. This can allow for more fun and unique executions.

What's your proudest piece of creative content?

I have been fortunate to have been in a few projects that have had great creative films but probably the one that has the most sense of achievement was the one for Find X3 global launch. The whole project was written, shot, and delivered within 3 months and at a budget far lower than what one would expect for such an epic-looking film. The icing on the cake was the soundtrack music from the legendary Hans Zimmer which was not originally intended for the film but a management decision was made to allow it to be used.

People have shorter attention spans than before. How do you make your content eye-catching? 

Firstly, say what you want to say in the video and get out. Never overstay your welcome so be efficient with the video time. Secondly, having striking visuals, interesting camera techniques with great music tends to help to hold attention much longer. Thirdly, have an interesting or topical narrative to keep the audience intrigued or guessing.

How has AI impacted your work?

AI has been immensely helpful in saving some time searching for visuals and coming up with initial first-thought ideas, but we still need some time to polish and make it more specific as usually, the output is very generic. For now, AI cannot provide sharp or whacky ideas that the human mind can provide but I feel this is just a matter of time.

What do you see in OPPO's future?

The future of OPPO certainly has a lot of potential and is full of promise, but being a manufacturer of one the most important devices a person can have, we must keep up with the technology of the industry as well as constantly come up with our own innovations to provide meaningful benefit to users and society as a whole.