Japanese firms take ads to new heights

Japanese firms take ads to new heights

Tantri Yuliandini, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The Russian Soyuz TM-33 rocket blasts off into space leaving a
trail of fire on the horizon. A glimpse of the blue Earth below
is seen from space. An astronaut looks out the window, and
leisurely sips some Pocari Sweat from a squeeze bottle.

The newest television commercial from the Japanese health
drink, Pocari Sweat, was made in cooperation with Russian
cosmonauts Captain Viktor Afanasiev and Flight Engineer
Konstantin Kozeev, in the Russian section of the international
space station some 400 kilometers above Earth.

The commercial also marked a breakthrough for the
international space station for functions that were purely
commercial instead of its usual scientific tasks.

Yasuyuki Ikegami, the senior advisor of PT Inter Admark Dentsu
-- the Indonesian representative of the Japanese advertising
giant Dentsu Inc. -- said that the television commercial was the
world's first full-fledged filming in outer space.

He said that the plan for an outer space television commercial
had begun in June last year, with full cooperation from the
Russian side. Soon after, Japan's health drink producer Otsuka
Pharmaceutical was selected.

"We had to find a very good reason to why a product is needed
in space," Ikegami said.

He also said that the Russian cosmonauts had to film the whole
commercial themselves as it would take far too long for
professional cameramen and art directors to train for space.

But getting inexperienced people, albeit professional
cosmonauts at that, to use a video camera and actually shoot a
commercial to be broadcast around the world was nevertheless
risky.

So besides intensive training in basic video camera usage, a
200-page shooting manual was created and translated for the
Russian cosmonauts.

"We couldn't afford to make any mistakes," Ikegami said.

In September, the two Russian cosmonauts were trained and on
Oct. 21, 2001, they shot off into space with a container full of
different versions of Pocari Sweat to cater to the different
markets.

A video of the making of the commercial was shown to
Indonesian journalists in the media conference last week, and it
was eerie to watch one of the cosmonauts move a can to a certain
angle, and then watch it hang suspended in mid-air when he took
his hands off it. What is more, when he gave the can a little
spin, it continued spinning on its own without stopping. This was
the effect of low gravity in the space station.

The directing was not left to the cosmonauts. Instead, real-
time remote direction from Baikonur space base in Kazakhstan was
provided. The tape was ready by mid-November last year, and the
new commercial was broadcasted on Japanese television early this
year.

What does a Japanese health drink got to do with astronauts in
space? A lot apparently, and not only for the purposes of making
a TV commercial.

Sports medical doctor Haryo Tilarso said that 60 percent of
the average adult body was made up of fluids, consisting of
natrium, calcium, potassium and fluoride, which are all necessary
in keeping acid and alkali balanced in the body so that it is
able to adapt to the environment.

In an infant, that amount is about 80 percent, while in adults
it decreases to between 50 percent and 52 percent.

"That's why we are very concerned when a baby suffers from
diarrhea, and that's why old people have lots of wrinkles,
because their body contains a lot less water," he said.

In space, a person is more susceptible to the loss of body
fluids, aeronautical specialist doctor Sukarto said. He said that
while people normally lose 2.5 liters of bodily fluid a day
through urinating, sweating, breathing and passing stools, in
space the body could lose a lot more, and suffer dire
consequences.

Without the Earth's gravitational pull, the blood that
normally pools in the legs would collect in the upper body
instead, causing the heart to enlarge. The body responds to this
flooding of the heart by increasing the output of urine and
decreasing the urge to drink. Both these actions decrease the
overall quantity of fluids and electrolytes in the body.

"When you look at astronauts smiling and laughing, well the
experience is no laughing matter actually as it really doesn't
feel too good having your upper body bloated and you feeling
light-headed," Sukarto said.

When a person loses too much body fluid, it is important to
replace it. The human body can actually replace a limited amount,
as well as by drinking a lot of water and eating, but a sports
drink such as Gatorade and Pocari Sweat helps to quickly replace
those lost fluids, he said.

"When a person does a form of exercise or sport for less than
one hour, the body can replace the necessary fluids, but
exercises taking more than two hours at a time are hard on the
body and a person should drink a lot of water," Haryo said.

The new commercial will be aired on Indonesian television this
month on private TV stations Indosiar, RCTI, SCTV, and MetroTV.