Peter Rigby is creative director at Saatchi & Saatchi, Toronto.

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Most great advertising starts with a well-defined brief that is single-minded and focused, a spark waiting to be fanned into a flame.

But who carries the ultimate responsibility for really making that happen?

Those of us who work inside the advertising business believe that it’s the role of the creative team to begin the process by finding the most original and memorable way of communicating with consumers. At best it uses a real consumer insight as its starting point, at worst it’s just wallpaper.

Creatives don’t work alone and can’t take all the credit, after all where would we be without a client with a problem? The account person, planning, media buyers and producers, all play a part in finding the advertising solution, but when tv is the chosen medium who do we entrust with the task of bringing our efforts to fruition? A total stranger, someone who we’ve so far kept out of the process, the film director.

So where d’es the director fit into this process? As a rule he only gets his first sight of the intended script when we in the agency have finished mangling it into submission. We hand him the fully approved straitjacket and expect him to sprinkle his magic and astound us with his vision. Is it any wonder that so many tv spots on air today rely so heavily on production values, as if techniques can hide a weak idea, and when the director’s lack of involvement in the creative process limits his ability to bring more to the party.

Filmmaking is an art that few of us in advertising really understand, yet we continue to use directors more as technicians than visionaries. Let’s give them a break, involve them early on, use their storytelling strengths. Only then should we work techniques in that the film needs and not as something to hide the lack of a real selling idea.

I know that involving a director too early in the process isn’t always possible but let’s at least try, because their skills go way beyond just shooting off film stock. I find it curious that we are quite prepared to decide on which music house to use by commissioning demo tracks way before any prepro.

The first person to have a crack at ‘visualizing’ a script is usually the renderer who d’es the presentation boards.

Why not the director?

Maybe another solution to the dilemma would be a return by agencies to presenting scripts to clients rather than storyboards, then we might sell ideas and leave the execution to the experts.

We are incredibly fortunate in Canada in having more than our fair share of directorial talent. Last year Saatchi & Saatchi launched the First Cut Award in an attempt to bring to the fore young Canadian directors. The response was overwhelming, 45 directors, each looking for opportunities to contribute to Canadian advertising.

Already this year’s First Cut Award is attracting numerous reels of even fresher talent. Let’s not waste the opportunity to let them contribute more to better advertising. We all need their vision, let’s show them we mean it.