In honour of the Cannes Lions advertising festival, now taking place in sunny France, The Knowledge team has selected three advertising campaigns of the past year. Take a look at our choices and let us know what you think.

Channel 4”s Paralympics campaign

First up, is Channel 4”s great Paralympics campaign. On 17 July 2012, at 9pm exactly, Channel 4 unveiled its Paralympic trailer, Meet the Superhumans, simultaneously across 78 different UK TV channels.

The trailer and subsequent campaign, created by the broadcaster”s in-house team 4 Creative, changed the way Brits viewed disability and the Paralympics. With “Thank you for the warm-up” and “Meet the Superhumans” a high, thrilling bar, far raising the normal level of expectance was set. And luckily the event did not disappoint.

According to statistics by fellow-broadcaster BBC, more than 11 million people tuned in for the opening ceremony, this compared to the less than 3 million people in the UK who watched the previous opening ceremony of the Paralympics in Beijing.

John Lewis Christmas campaign snowballs

Called The Journey, this ad, which is set to a cover of Frankie Goes to Hollywood’;s Power of Love, suddenly made us feel Christmas was near. Though effectively a push to buy your loved ones” affection, it never had that feel to it.

The narrative of the 90-second ad, which costed the company £6m, was more one of old fashioned storytelling – which we heart. The John Lewis campaign – annually so anticipated that broadcasters are showing teasers of it – was this year created by advertising agency adamandeveddb.

Channel 4 goes French

Oui, we can”t help it but again, praise to Channel 4. Roughly two weeks ago, the broadcaster announced an all French ad-break with subtitles during the first episode of its French zombie drama, The Returned.

We saw L”Oreal, Renault, Bel Boursin and Emirates pass the revue – each ad carrying its own subtitles. The adbreak was introduced by a French voiceover.

We list the stunt in our top campaign as it is the first time a UK broadcaster has ever broadcast an entire break of French language adverts.

The themed break was collaboratively managed by Channel 4 Sales, working with agency partners ZenithOptimedia, MGOMD, OMD and Starcom.

Do you agree or disagree with our choices for impressive ads of the past year? Let us know your opinion via our Facebook page or LinkedIn group.