Nice.

Dreamy. But I wish the music bed had some strings.

This is the famous Sony Foam City advert that I've been waiting so long for? This is it? I think this would have been received much better without all the pre-leaked hype. All this makes me do is wish I was there in the foam, rather than here watching the ad.

I reserve the right to be wrong, but it really isn't doing it for me!

Balls and Paint were amazing, but this doesn't live up to the hype for me either. There are some touches that are amazing (pink house and all images without people in, for example), but... all that footage and this is the best edit they could come up with? I know the former ads are for Bravia and they do make the job of keeping up appearances all that more difficult... There's that 'but' again...

Having said all that, when I'm at home, watching telly-vision with two beers down my neck I'll be amazed. Maybe it's a slow burner?

Then again, I can already see it's dividing opinion and the ad world will be full of comments, so people will talk about it and ultimately that's what they're aiming for.

And if nothing else, the like.no.other tagline is still a beauty. :)

4696 people read this (so far) but only four had the balls to comment?

Perhaps people are just stunned. (and it's 7764 viewings now) edit: 17022 views. Holy shit.

Would that be Bravia Balls?

The photos all over the web are so much better than this ad, which can be described as "dreamy" at best. I don't know if it's the hype that has set me up fr a letdown, or if the ad is actually kind of boring.

Also, that foam can look like debris.

It was great to be there

It is very dreamlike, giving the impression that the foam just appeared or fell from the sky one day, like snow. I would have enjoyed it more if I hadn't seen the behind-the-scenes clips. Instead of thining "wow, look, it's falling from the air", all I could think of was hosepipes and shouty directors.

Like the other Sony ads, it probably looks better full-size.

I think it would have been a good ad for Maytag or Whirlpool washers.

It lacks a story. It feels very set up...which of course, it is. But I think that's why I liked Balls better than Paint. You could have imagined a truck having dropped its shipment of coloured balls or something. Where as Paint and Foam both are shown in such a way that they are set up more as stunts than a story or what have you. All do have nice cinematography though, and that helps.

I think you have it exactly, Caffeinegoddess. It's that whole, 'suspension of disbelief' thing.

I've changed my mind about this ad. Last night when it came on TV in the middle of loud obnoxious and annoying ads it was nothing but dreamy and beautiful. It really made me think of all the beautiful moments one wants to photograph. The music score really helped set that mood, it was the polar opposite of all the other crud on TV. Rated 5 hearts.

How many people love the ad, and have never experienced a heavy winter snowfall? How many people who don't love the ad have experienced a heavy winter snowfall? I'm just curious.

Here's one for your statistics - not terribly wowed, come from Kiruna (so yeah, I've seen proper winter)

Just because I tend to not like Wikipedia: ;-)

Kiruna Kommun

Despite having the TV on about 18 hours a day, I still haven't seen the ad anywhere but on this site -- but they're running follow-up spots already. That's getting a bit previous, isn't it? Surely, having spent the money to make the thing, Sony ought to keep showing the original for a reasonable time to make sure everyone knows what the "snippets" are referring to. If I hadn't seen the thing on Adland, I'd be completely baffled.

And for TDD's informal survey, I'm left lukewarm by it, and grew up in St Louis with plenty of snow in the winter.

I saw a follow up last night and I have to say it made more sense as it was replicating the time-lapse/stop animation sequences you'd get with loads of stills. Made more sense to me.

I've seen several variations on it now, each one tailored for a different camera, or video camera, with different shots and music. It's all beginning to make a lot more sense to me. All that shooting gave them a campaign, not just one ad.

What's weird for me is that the later versions I'm seeing make the campaign so strong, but the initial one just made me switch off. Perhaps that was all part of the plan?

Maybe that's because we knew X-billion details about the ad before we saw it? A bit like a film you heard so much about just kind of falls flat when you finally see it? I think that is what happened to me. Well, that and the web didn't do the "silence" of a quiet piano ad justice. It really is nice when it cuts through all the other super-noisy screaming ads in one commercial block. Like a whisper, it makes you pay more attention then.

Hit. Nail. Head. :)