Nike x Serena willams’ legacy

When the GOAT says she’s “evolving” from tennis, how do you honor her? Answer: With an AI match-up of the ages.

We celebrated Serena’s legacy by traveling back in time. Leveraging AI we created a match-up between Serena from her first Grand Slam in 1999 and her most recent in 2017. Out of thousands of AI matches, we visualized how Serena’s game evolved over time and how she made her mark on the world of tennis.

HOW IT WORKED

Harnessing the power of AI, we modeled each era of Serena’s playing style, decision making, shot selection, reactivity, recovery and agility based on archival footage. Building on the vid2player technique developed by Stanford University, we were able to bring models of Serena to life in over 130,000 virtual games and 5,000 matches.

Airing the match up

Rather than airing all 130,000 games (enough to stream for an entire year if played back-to-back) we aired an abbreviated match-up on YouTube LIVE and promoted it to fans around the globe. The gameplay was broadcasted the day after Serena announced her “evolution” from tennis, reaching over 1.69 million of Nike’s subscribers and breaking Nike’s organic viewing record.

AWARDS & REcognition

Cannes Lion Grand Prix | 2023 Digital Craft: Curation of Data
2 Clio Awards | Gold for Sports and Gold for Digital & Artificial Intelligence
Clio Award | Silver for Branded Content
Webby Award | Winner for AI, Metaverse, and Virtual Technical Achievement
D&AD | 2023 Shortlist Digital Use of Data & Digital Design / Data Visualisation
Victorian Premier Design Award
Ad Age “Nike AI Ad Pits Serena Williams Against Serena Williams”

TEAM

Nike Team: Rafael Paes, Aaron Belchere, Dawn Weeman, Leslie Robarge, Jordan Hoagbin, Trelawny Davis, Chrysi Diamond, Sarah Barkley Porter
Agency Partner: AKQA