It is a truth universally acknowledged in advertising that a financial services company in possession of an F1 sponsorship must be in want of a race car to put in its commercials. Standard Chartered, however, found itself in the awkward position of being an official Formula 1 partner without an actual team — and therefore without an actual car to film.

The solution involved an art director, a pencil, and a great deal of what might be called digital extrapolation.

Marcello Costa, a partner at the London AI studio Misideal, co-directed the resulting spot, "Move Ahead," with Tino of Stink for Leo Singapore. The brief arrived in the conventional manner — script, storyboards, the usual chain of approvals running from production company to agency to client. "It being an AI film makes no difference in this," Mr. Costa said.

The difference came in the execution. Misideal operates under a code that prohibits inputting copyrighted material into its AI systems, which meant Mr. Costa could not simply feed photographs of a real 2026 F1 car into the machine and ask it to apply imaginary livery. He picked up a pencil instead.

"I sketched a car by hand," Mr. Costa said. "I made drawings of the car with all the details that I wanted in there and then I input that into the AI and said, 'OK, make a 3D render of this sketch.'"

Mr. Costa admitted he knew little about Formula 1 before the assignment. He learned quickly that the cars change every year, that the changes are subtle, and that enthusiasts would notice if his creation failed to pass as a 2026 model. The livery — the placement of logos and colors — proved the most vexing element, requiring multiple rounds with the agency. (There being no real car to copy, every decision was, in effect, a negotiation.)

The production moved between hand and machine: adjustments in Photoshop, designs rendered by AI tools, images fed back into the system with requests for single alterations. How reliably does the AI follow instructions? "I'd say it's like 50-50," Mr. Costa said. "Each time you're prompting, you're kind of rolling the dice and hoping for the best."

The main performers were cast and photographed in a studio, their likenesses licensed for digital recreation — a hybrid approach that has become something of a house style at Misideal. Whether full AI production saves money remains, by Mr. Costa's account, a complicated question. What it solved here was access: the ability to create a car, a race, and a crowd during a season when getting a film crew trackside was not an option.

Standard Chartered's tagline in the spot is "Now is your time." For advertisers considering AI production, the more relevant question may be whether now is quite ready for them.

Original story published in The Drum: "Why an AI director picked up a pencil to make Standard Chartered’s F1 ad | The Drum"