MTV Switch

In May and June this year I designed and created the MTV Switch site, which is all about raising awareness about environmental issues, and features exclusive spots created by 180, Ogilvy, Cake, WK12, Y&R and Lowe.

It was a huge thrill to get paid to design spaceships (MTV Networks Europe were adamant about the space theme, which was just fine with me!), and it was great to see it all get turned around in a relatively short amount of time. Once the site had been designed, both in terms of the artwork and the interface, the talented David Terranova, whom I've worked with on a number of occasions now, got involved and developed the working Flash site. All the content is XML driven and editable by the client, and he did a pretty tasty job on the animation too. We wanted to keep the effects subtle rather than going OTT, as is tempting with the space theme, and personally I think he did a great job of enhancing the atmosphere found in the original artwork.

First of all I got to work on the ship interior, as this is where the interface was going to be. I really wanted there to be lots of strong angles in the composition, and didn't want it to be obviously created by human hands.

Next a colour study was needed, so I scanned the drawing in and got to work in Painter. Taking the reds and beiges from the MTV Switch logo just gave it a really strong mood, and from that point it was all about carrying that through to each design.

The final version ended up being like a stretched version of the original, with lots more detail incorporated, and an extra console squeezed in.

I can't take credit for the logo, but this was the only asset that existed when we got started. We wanted it to be part of the craft, so the perspective of the exterior 'shot' had to take the angles of the logo as a starting point. The first version of the ship looked a bit too much like a small craft, so as I developed it I pushed it towards what felt more like a space station, albeit one that looked like it could move if it needed. Initially the idea was that the ship should be in deep space, hence the red backdrop below, and the more menacing feel. But later on when we incorporated the earth, it just lifted the colour palette, and also tied everything back to the campaign itself.

The corridor also started out as a loose study, which was then worked into a high resolution, 'high definition' rendering. It was important that the artwork didn't look like a cold 3d render. The idea was that it should be more like the beautiful painted backdrops you see in anime, with all that really strong light bloom. Well, somewhere between those two approaches anyway.

As a freelancer it was great to work with a client like MTV directly, especially when the job involved both concept artwork and web design elements. It's not too often that I get to utilise both my illustration and design skills on the same project. I'm really pleased with the final result, as very few compromises needed to be made. It's rare to see something so close to your original vision out there, so thanks to everyone involved for helping make sure it all ran so smoothly. Hope you like it too!