The Works Ltd

The Works did the UEFA Champions League Final event branding for Munich this year. It has a very Picasso/Cubist feel to it, especially with the blue colours, it reminds me of one of Picasso's pieces of a guitar player all in blue.

I must say after the Manchester Utd vs Manchester City game, I am not keen on blue right now, but I shan't bring football politics into this...!

Fantastic design, and the images below show how the branding will work across the deliverables, such as tickets, event entrance etc. I love how the colours have been used to create shapes which make up the whole image, for example the gradients in the blue have created a swoosh type shape for the 'footballer' on the right.

Gangibob

http://www.gangibob.com/

They are a motion graphics studio based in Manchester. They love to push their creativity to the limits to create unique motion graphics and animation.

This is their showreel, demonstrating a variety of projects. What I seem to pick up from companies showreels is the amount of energy and high quality, impacting visuals. There never appears to be a dull moment, making them very dynamic and engaging.


Gangibob won first prize at D&AD for the yellow pencil award for its outstanding contribution to advertising. Watch the winning film: Simple but brilliantly executed.

Hello Charlie

Well its been the Brits tonight, so I had my eyes peeled for the end credits as to who the Graphic Designers were behind the design...Hello Charlie.

Based in Bristol they have a very impressive client list, and have produced some wonderful pieces of work.
Their showreel demonstrates a range of high end motion graphics, and film, unfortunately I can't embed it:
http://www.hellocharlie.co.uk/uploads/c34afeab28ace921b3877fd59de5b942.flv

They have designed a stunning ident for Disney and did the motion screens behind Coldplays tours in South America and Europe. Below are some screen shots from their exciting and energetic showereel:

Not To Scale: U.F.O

Another part to Not To Scale is the Unorthodox Film Organisation...

'...an eclectic directing collective based in Paris, France that has developed a steadfast following by working for a multitude of international clients..

This is a motion graphic for the guardian, using cartoons to depict films. Very simple and cleverly executed:

http://nottoscale.tv/director.php?director=ufo&project=the-observer-and-the-guardian-film-quiz

Not To Scale: Vincent

'One half of Vincent is former film industry Art Director and lead Animator John Hill....In 2006 he worked as a Design Director on the ITV rebrand for Red Bee Media where he met Vincents other half Rheea Aranha.  '

Vincent is part of Not To Scale,  and have done an MTV Top Ten ident, and in-programme features.

http://nottoscale.tv/director.php?director=vincent&project=mtv-top-10

The overall visual is bright and colourful, with a futuristic feel to it, emphasised by the electronic sounds in the music. The spherical objects are like disco balls but remind me of planets. For something like this I imagine Cinema 4D would be used as it is very three dimensional, with lots of different things going on - also there is the use of the three dimensional space, not just the objects.

Bottletop

A studio based in Nottingham, their expertise is in motion graphics, animation and video production for broadcast and web.

They do a lot of design for television, including title sequences:

Gadget Show:

I love the colours used here, and the almost three dimensional element that features.

They also created a title sequence for ITV1 for a late night screening programme called Xposure, using stock film and treatments:

The style visually suits the content, for aspiring new bands, I like the rough sketchy visuals which accompanies the heavy jungle beat in the background, if it was a visual with really clean curved lines it wouldn't work. Also, I love the colours, and the treatment to the type as it changes font quickly, and looks like its moving. The lines across the screen add to the grungy effect.

I absolutely love this produced for Oracle :Created using Photoshop, Cinema 4D and After Effects

http://www.bottletop.co.uk/oracle.html

Glassworks

A high end post production facility in London with speciality in 2D, 3D, Smoke and other disciplines. They have produced work for adverts to films to promos with offices in Amsterdam and Barcelona too.

They had involvement with this ad - which I love how the camera moves through the clouds, I created a similar effect in After Effects last year/module, using multiple semi opacity layers of cloud films to create the effect of moving through the clouds, I am sure Glassworks have something much more technical for this, as you can tell the clouds are much more cloud-like than my attempt.

Text has been added in at the centre of the potential areas for Insurance saying 'We help here'. At the end the 'Zurich help point' image rotates on the y axis and at the 90 degree point this layer finishes and the 'Zurich because change happenz' appears from this - this is something similar to work I have done before.

Tomato

PROMOTION/BRANDING/PRINT/MOTION

Tomato is a company I have been following for 5-6 years. I first discovered John Warwicker's CD cover work for Underworld while at JLC doing my A-Levels. Liking their experimental style, I have still been following their progress, and they just get bigger and bigger!

This is their title sequence reel featuring motion for Human Traffic, James Bond and many more...
As it can't be embedded i have posted a link: http://vimeo.com/19071330

This is a montage of the graphics they have created for numerous projects including Human Traffic, a Ford advert and various other works: http://vimeo.com/18700094

2011 work:
Underworld Album Cover

Branding for Asocialist menswear company:

These two pieces of work are completely different but their experimental style is typical of tomato.

These are two print ads for Ford KA - a very surreal, abstract and three dimensional approach with the concept 'seek and you shall find':

Beautiful designs - with an interesting colour palette. The colour clashes in the first example actually work really well, usually I hate bright pink with lime green, but this is effective and eye catching. Each print is actually a puzzle too, within the 3D objects and hand made textures there are multiple hidden cars in each one, 8 in the first and 14 in the second one.
The different perspectives create depth and almost a playground for the concept, as there is much more flexibility to hide the cars.

Their work for Smirnoff is brilliant, some really cool effects have been used on the type using liquid bubbles. The post production took place at Glassworks using Flame.
Here are some stills from the commercial:

http://vimeo.com/18700094
I would love to create something like this!

Believe Media Film Production

BRANDING/PROMOTION/FILM/MOTION

With offices in London, New York and Los Angeles - Believe Media have some pretty impressive work under their belt for some huge clients. Their London portfolio includes work for Tom Ford, and some of their directors have produced work for Dr Dre & Eminem (music video)- directed by Allen Hughes, Audi and a lot more.

Their partners Tomato (a company I have been following since A Level) have some equally as impressive work, for clients such as Smirnoff, Guiness, Adidas, Ford and they even did the Graphics for Quantum of Solace.

Pringles - Athlete




A really bad copy of the Pringles advert by Animal - another part of Believe Media. Great concept, and I love the little animated pringle logo at the end, very appropriate for the content.

Playstation - Victor




Directed by Marcelo Burgos - this is another strong concept for a Playstation Advert, about living in a state of play, hence the baby's head on an adults body. There are some simple motion graphics at the end that finish the advert off well.

The LSD Group

FILM/MOTION/PROMOTION

The LSD Group (formerly Lipow Stoner Design) are a creative studio in New York with expertise in concept, design, animation and production. They have won awards for some of their work, and have produced some stunning pieces of work for example the titles to the David Blaine 'What Is Magic' programme.

Marian Lipow's journey to starting LSD is quite how I would like my journey after university to begin. She started at the bottom as a lowly designer and worked her way up to Creative Director doing projects for the likes of Good Morning America. I would love to know how she made her break into this industry.

Their montage reel is impressive and can be seen here: http://www.lsdgroup.com/#/work/Reel/

I hope one day I have a reel as exciting and as varied as this!

A print ad for Animal Planet by the LSD group:

Screen shots from a motion graphic for Scripps - Hidden Invaders:

The colours used for this are effective, black white and orange. The motions graphic is in a 3D space with the camera freely moving around the environment. This I understand is for a programme about termites - the orange dots are possibly a minimalist, nicer looking interpretation of a termite! The 3D lettering is bold and promotes a serious tone. I think a programme like Cinema 4D may have been used to create this mainly for the 3D spaces and objects.

Red Bee Media

This is a company I genuinely want to work for, the work they produce is just brilliant. They produce work for the kinds of clients I want to work for, e.g. television channels like the BBC. This is what they have to say: "Crazy times call for a different kind of thinking. Because in the eye of this massive change, connecting viewers to content is the ultimate endgame. And that’s where we come in. No matter what screen, no matter what platform, Red Bee Media can make those crucial connections. Our powerful blend of creative, technical and strategic expertise will create demand for your content, then ensure you deliver it to the widest possible audience." They have won lots of awards, mainly for their BBC work which spans the BBC1, BBC2, BBC3, BBC4, BBC Sport, BBC World, CBBC and CBeebies. They produced a campaign for BBC Knowledge their challenge was to: "Create a campaign for BBC Knowledge to support the launch of its re-brand around the world. Its main aims: to deliver the brand proposition “liberating knowledge” and the brand values “wonder”, “ideas” and “passionate personalities”." Here are some screen shots from their video, as it cannot be embedded. The views and camera work are fantastic and really delivers the idea of wonder, and worldwide views.

The second part involved celebrity interview revolving around the question 'When did you last say wow?' - the celebrities used are very influential and are Professor Brian Cox, Bruce Parry, Louis theoroux and others.