Tourism NZ launches campaign to discourage photo cliches

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New Zealand’s tourism agency Tourism NZ has launched a new tongue-in-cheek advertising campaign to urge tourists to stop “travelling under the social influence" and avoid photographic clichés like Fedora-wearing women in flower fields and figures sitting in quiet contemplation.

In the age of Instagram, it has become increasingly common to see certain types of photos enter into popular culture on social media, which in turn, inspire scores of tourists to emulate the same photographs.

Case in point the popular Wanaka Tree in New Zealand’s South Island, or nearby Roy’s Peak which has become a popular selfie spot. It even featured in a viral post from 2018 that showed the 'social media queue' leading up to the hotspot.

Now, in a push to encourage tourists to “share something new,” Tourism NZ's latest video campaign series is built around a park ranger who zealously responds to alerts of tourists who are posing for photos “under the social influence.” 

Played by comedian Tom Sainsbury, the ranger races around, with megaphone in hand, reprimanding tourists for perpetuating social media-inspired tropes. 

When Sainsbury says, “we’ve seen all this before,” the ad encourages travellers to experience all the other things New Zealand has to offer, and not just what they’ve seen popularised online. 

From a photographic perspective as well, the campaign serves as a reminder to tourists and travel photographers to be more self-aware of clichés when taking photographs of commonly-visited places or commonly-featured subject matter. 

As part of the campaign, travellers can enter their out-of-the-box travel photos in a competition to win a $500 domestic travel voucher by sharing their creative shots online with the hashtag #DoSomethingNewNZ. Just don't enter a "run-me-over" photo set in the middle of a road if you want to win.

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