Have you seen the new Gala Bingo Paddle Pals commercial? Aquabatix was heavily involved in that advert coming to life.

Production company Outsider contacted Aquabatix not only for body doubles that could perform in the water, but to also create the choreography for the commercial, whilst creative agency Antidote pulled the whole advert together.

Gala Bingo launched their successful ‘Bingo Like A Boss’ brand in early 2020 and wanted to expand on that campaign to encourage the U.K. to be a little ‘extra’. Four new adverts were put into production to be released in the Summer of 2021. The idea behind the Paddle Pals advert, was a young lady and her grandma in the paddling pool in their back garden. They get lost in a world of artistic swimming, formerly known as synchronised swimming, performing their own creative routine. Aquabatix had the task of creating water choreography that fitted into a paddling pool, as well as moves that could also be done by the two actresses on the shoot. Aquabatix worked closely with the Director Chris Balmond and Creative Director Tim Ashton with their ideas bringing the storyboard to life. 

The body doubles from Aquabatix appearing in the advert were former European champion Andrea and former junior British synchronized swimmer Millie. Aquabatix had a rehearsal day trying out paddling pools and what would work in them, plus also a pool was used for a couple of shots, with a paddling pool surrounding used with the floor cut out, in order for a couple of moves to like spins to happen, but with the magic of film still look like it was in a paddling pool. Renowned underwater cameraman Zac Macaulay who Aquabatix has worked with on numerous occasions filmed all the pool scenes.

On the day of the shoot, the doubles were made up to look exactly like the actresses, whilst Aquabatix choreographer Adele, took the actresses through their paces learning some ‘armography’ and also teaching them how to float in the paddling pool for a couple of moves. Then the professional Aquabatix swimmers took over, performing the harder moves before heading over to a garden swimming pool for those shots. 

Launched coincidently on the same day as the artistic swimming competition started at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, the Paddle Pals commercial premiered during GMB on Monday August 2nd.

For Aquabatix to help with your underwater movement, water choreography and body doubles was in water productions, contact us today on info@aquabatix.com . We are located both in London for the EMEA region and LA.