VO5 was once an iconic force in British haircare, bold, expressive, full of energy. But it had lost its way. The brand needed a reset: new packaging, a new visual system, and a reason for Gen Z to care. As part of the launch in January 2025, I was brought in as motion designer, editor and assistant director to take those concepts from storyboards and translate them into social content that actually worked in motion.
The brief was product benefits, but the real challenge was making the brand behaviour feel as iconic in the edit as it does on the shelf. The Amp pulse, that signature beat that takes hair from ordinary to extraordinary, needed to land as the centrepiece of every route, not just a graphic afterthought. Getting that right meant exploring transitions that could carry the energy of the pulse through the cut, and building motion graphics around it that felt like a natural extension of the brand rather than a layer on top of it.
The result was content built to stop the scroll on TikTok, Instagram and Facebook with before-and-after style storytelling and the kind of visual rhythm that feels native to the platforms Gen Z actually lives on.
All three creative routes were fully storyboarded ahead of the shoot, detailing each scene, product placement, graphics, and UI. Turning those boards into animatics took it a step further, allowing us to refine timings and explore motion graphics possibilities before we ever set foot on location. By the time we got to the shoot, every decision had already been made.
Shooting everything in a single day on location in South East London with a full team of talent, hair, make-up, and wardrobe meant there was no room for error on set. Every shot was storyboarded and every route tested as animatics beforehand, so we knew exactly how long each scene needed to be and could line up product shots in-camera to make the match cuts as clean as possible in post.
By the time we arrived on location, every decision had already been made, which meant the day itself could focus entirely on getting the right look, the right context, the right person. The BTS reel gives a real sense of how much thinking went into making it feel effortless.