September 19 2014 | Leigh Taylor
blue through & through
cardiff blues –season ticket campaign
Ever wondered what goes into creating a campaign for a client? We followed one of our projects from the initial brief through to creation and completion, so that you can see the process that an agency goes through when coming up with an impactful creative campaign.
Our client, the Cardiff Blues, came to us with a challenge; to come up with a new campaign that would encourage Blues fans to renew their season tickets. It had to reflect the passion that fans feel for their team, as well as provide a strong visual to grab people's attention. It also needed to be a rallying call to the fans to get behind their team for the season ahead.
The Ideas
With this in mind, the team got together to discuss some ideas around the general theme of passion, being part of a team and what it meant to be a devoted rugby fan. Concepts were thrown around, along with a miniature rugby ball, and much coffee was consumed! Eventually the list had been reduced to a few simple but effective ideas, each of them highlighting one element of the pride and passion that characterised what it meant to be a Blues fan. As Head of Content and Creative, it was my job to take away these broad ideas and add the headlines that would bring them to life.
The Scamps
At this stage, the three strongest ideas were 'scamped' by one of our Graphic Designers. These are basically rough sketches to give a broad idea of what the finished artwork might look like. It's a cost effective way of testing an idea without going to the expense of buying images or shooting photos. These scamps were presented, along with an idea of how the theme could be expanded for other media, to the team at Cardiff Blues to find out what they thought.
The Chosen Approach
The creative approach that was chosen to be developed was 'Blue through and through'. Everyone agreed that it screamed passion and also gave an opportunity to use some of the talented, young home-grown players in the campaign.
The Photo-shoot
The next stage was to arrange a photo-shoot around the training schedules of the players. This was attended by our Design Director, Geraint, who was there to help direct the photographer on what was needed from the shots and get the required 'performance' from the players. With Josh Navidi, Cory Allen and Rhys Patchell chosen as the faces of the campaign, bodies were painted, shirts were ripped and a new campaign was born.
You can see more in the Behind The Scenes video.
The Design Stage
The following day, the photos were sent to the Uprise offices where Nathan, another of our Graphic Designers, got to work on enhancing the images. Gradients, textures and filters were used to re-touch the images, adding a bit more drama to the players' already passionate performances. Once the look of the campaign had been agreed, it was then adapted to the various executions that were required, including outdoor, print leaflets and online banners for the Cardiff Blues website.
The End Result
The Blues then launched the campaign to run throughout the summer. For us, it's another campaign completed, and we'll be monitoring the results from it. In the meantime, we'll be on to the next brief for the next client and the whole process will start all over again! Written by Leigh Taylor, Head of Content & Creative.
All images copyright Uprise Marketing
Posted by Leigh Taylor on 19 September 2014 at 8:46 AM
Categories: Design