Wieden + Kennedy New York and director Brian Beletic used the Sound Of Time audio-to-visual software package in a new campaign for Nike's Jordan brand.

Two spots in the "Trunning" campaign (trunning refers to training by running) star Jordan-sponsored athletes boxer Roy Jones, Jr. and baseball player Derek Jeter. The Jones spot shows the boxer trunning both on a cold city street and in a swimming pool; the spot is scored by Mr. Oizo's (a.k.a. Partizan director Quentin Depieux, creator of Flat Eric) "No Day Massacre," and thanks to the software, his movements and the film itself reverse and oscillate in time to the song's chunky techno beats. Jeter's spot is more introspective and shows the athlete leading up to and beginning a session in a batting cage; his spot is scored and visually punctuated by Portishead's "Roads." In both spots, the picture flows along with the music.

Art director Adrian Hilton and copywriter Tina Johnson worked with agency producer Gary Krieg to create the spots. They say that showing the behind-the-scenes training undertaken by these pro-athletes also features the shoe products in question; for example Jones, Jr. really does trun underwater, and there is a specialized Jordan brand shoe for aquatic running.

"We tried to take in account the sport in each of the spots. Roy's is more of a basic technical training thing, so the shots up front are repeated at the back end of the commercial to play off the technical aspects of boxing; the Derek spot is more introspective and is a totally different vibe. With Derek, you are more in his space and you get the opportunity to observe his trun underwater, and there is a specialized Jordan brand shoe for aquatic running.

"The Jeter spot is about going to the batting cages. The Portishead song with him walking through the hallway to the cage and doing stretching with the bat uses the Sound Of Time software throughout," says Johnson.

Beletic explains how the software was used to build both the look and the emotional content of the campaign: "You can isolate parts of music, and tell the computer that whenever that happens within a song, for something to take place."

For this commercial, we told it to flip editing forwards or backwards however many frames depending on where we were within the spot. The final outcome is whatever effect you are doing, it appears to be very on beat. Thechallenge and the intent was to use that program as a tool to help enhance the personalities of the athletes," explains Beletic.

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