Dolby was losing its presence and needed to reinforce its relationship to the movies. We worked with Academy Award winning Moonbot Studios and Oscar-nominated sound designer Steve Boeddeker to create an animated short film called “Silent”.
It told Dolby's story: how sound technology has transformed movie history and celebrates how storytellers, inventors, and technology work together to create cinema magic.
The sound was created by Oscar® nominated sound designer Steve Boeddeker (The Avengers, X-Men).
"Silent" debuted at the Scientific and Technical Academy Awards on February 15, 2014.
Dolby “Silent”
Silent achieved its goal of reinforcing Dolby's endemic role within Hollywood, both to industry and consumer audiences. As a sign of this success, it was the first brand piece to ever take part of an Oscars event, it debuted as Netflix's first ever-animated branded content piece and was featured by Samsung and Amazon.
The film gained praise from the media as it was featured as Vimeo's 'Short of the Week' and also on USA Today's 'What to Watch' list. It was nominated for an Annie for Best Animated Short Subject and 5 Emmys with 2 wins. In addition, 'Silent' ran in the film festival circuit, in trade events, and in hundreds of Dolby Atmos theaters worldwide. All without any paid media.
Dolby "Sound" cinema trailer
The character 'Sound' from 'Silent' became Dolby's brand ambassador and was featured in Dolby's 29' cinema trailer. The trailer demonstrates Dolby Atmos technology which allow filmmakers to precisely position and move sounds anywhere in a theatre - even overhead - to heighten the realism and impact of every scene.
'Sound' was such a success that Dolby created a sequel to "Silent" titled Escape" with original music by Imogen Heap.
