ITV
2008
...leopard-print thongs, studded leather suitcases, handcuffs and a six-pack of beer; this was no ordinary banner.
Devised and created to promote the second series of long-running ITV comedy Benidorm after a successful first, the brief of this advertising creative was to get across the wildly disparate personalities of the returning characters into a single banner and make viewers aware of the TX of the first episode.
As fans of the show might imagine, the creative team's scamp for the MPU execution was a little eyebrow-raising - containing black leather stilettos, a rubber duckie, leopard-print thongs, studded leather suitcases, handcuffs and a six-pack of beer; this was no ordinary banner. It was also the first, and hopefully last, time I ever had to scour image libraries for a butt paddle with OUCH emblazoned across it, so this creative at least has the honour of that dubious distinction...
Each scenario - based on what the show's characters might pack for their holiday - was carefully sourced from image libraries and cut out in Photoshop. The separate elements were arranged so they sat well together, and colour-corrected so that no one element was distracting from the others. Images of a briefcase were manipulated in Photoshop to provide a distinct version for each character, whether clad in the Union Jack or red leather.
The myriad of assets were then exported as PNGs to be animated in Flash, where the main issues were in keeping the file size of such a graphically rich execution below 50kb, and making the movement of the briefcase lid look convincing.
The postcard endframe was my own added touch as a vehicle to hold the gaudy Benidorm logo and tie it in to the rest of the banner.
