Early last week, Earth Hour's 2011 TV commercial began sweeping the globe with a call for people everywhere to take action for our planet and switch off their lights for one hour at 8.30pm on Saturday?March 26.

Volunteers form the 'pixels' that make up the images in Earth Hour's 2011 TV commercial.

But Earth Hour 2011 – and its people-powered TVC - comes with a big plus this year and encourages everyone to go ‘beyond the hour' by doing something that has ongoing benefits for the environment.

"The concept behind the ad goes along with the idea of Earth Hour, of people coming together to achieve a unified goal. The ad itself involved over 100 people coming together to form various images that pertain to Earth Hour," says commercial director Greg Jardin.

"We have the image of a globe, we have the image of a bike because this year is 'Earth Hour Plus', so in addition to people turning off their lights, people are encouraged to do one other thing to save the environment - so in this case it's ride their bike to work," he added.

Developed by the creative minds at Leo Burnett and produced by Radical Media, the ad's over 100 Earth Hour volunteers illustrate that every pixel counts – quite literally.