For CALL OF DUTY's first official launch in China I was honored the role of Creative Director to lead the creation of a series of branding and promotional material. The scope included logo designs, branding, logo animations, activation concepts, event installations and activities, promotional giveaways, key visuals, posters and a live action trailer featuring Chris Evans.
AWAKEN THE SOLDIER WITHIN
As a component to the promotional material we early on developed a tagline for the the game. The line "AWAKEN THE SOLDIER WITHIN" is a call to action for everyone to jump into the experience and live out their action hero fantasy, because we all have a fighter, a hero, a soldier inside of us all. Now is the time to awaken it.
BRANDING
LOGO DESIGN
For CALL OF DUTY's first official launch in China I was tasked to delevop a series of branding and promotional material, starting with their logo and nameing for the game.
LOGO ANIMATION
Along with the design of the logo, we were tasked with animating it. I did the animation above myself and below you can see it appear in their gameplay trailer that ANT FARM in Los Angeles created.
Here you can see the logo animation in action in this trailker created by ANT FARM.
EVENTS
PHOTO BOOTH EXPERIENCE
At the CALL OF DUTY ONLINE booth during TGC (game expo in China) I worked on a photobooth experience that let visitors gear up and create a poster that was instantly accessible over mobile. The experience was a huge success as even employees from other games stood in line to be featured on a CALL OF DUTY ONLINE poster.
3 samples from the over 950 posters created during TGC.
CYBORG-ZOMBIE MODE
We were also tasked with creating a seperate logo for the use of a cyborg-zombies mode in the game. The look of the chinese characters was inspired by the sharp knife-claws that the cyborgs-zombies used to slice you open with.
CYBORG-ZOMBIE BOOTH EXPERIENCE
A few months before the launch we created the full experience for visitors in another TGC expo. This time the booth took the visitors on a 3 stop journey in groups of 6 to experience their newly announced cyborg-zombies mode.
1 - MISSION BRIEFING
A hired actor, taking the role as a general is briefing the team using a custom built 60" touchscreen table. Here the visitors gets to understand the game mode, the objective, and interact with content from the game to get a better understanding before jumping into the action.
When ready, a video message from within the game pops up the screen and tells the general to send out his troops.
A hired actor, taking the role as a general is briefing the team using a custom built 60" touchscreen table. Here the visitors gets to understand the game mode, the objective, and interact with content from the game to get a better understanding before jumping into the action.
When ready, a video message from within the game pops up the screen and tells the general to send out his troops.
2 - EXPERIENCE THE GAME
The visitors gets escorted up to the second floor where we have top of the line gaming rigs put in place. They play through the mission with the developers standing by to answer any questions and also to get instant feedback from the visitors.
The visitors gets escorted up to the second floor where we have top of the line gaming rigs put in place. They play through the mission with the developers standing by to answer any questions and also to get instant feedback from the visitors.
3 - TEAM PHOTO
Before they leave the booth we designed a last stop where they get to gear up and take individual and group shots against a green screen. Instantly the photos gets generated into highquality looking posters for them to access over mobile.
Before they leave the booth we designed a last stop where they get to gear up and take individual and group shots against a green screen. Instantly the photos gets generated into highquality looking posters for them to access over mobile.
The user can change the background of the photo directly on mobile to choose an enviroment that fits the pose better.
THE LAUNCH
KEY VISUALS FEATURING CHRIS EVANS
We created a series of posters featuring Chris Evans. These were to use for both out of home advertisement as well as digital box art and other promotional content.
LIVE ACTION TRAILER
For the launch of the game we created a live action trailer showcasing 4 hotel employees sneaking away from work to take a break and play some CALL OF DUTY ONLINE. Throughout their experience they are faced with challanges and a suprise appearence by no other than Chris Evans, and in the end even the clumbsiest player have awoken the soldier within himself to save his new friend.
Shooting this film was an amazing and complicated experience. Over 80 people were involved, shooting in Taiwan and having the post production done from Shanghai, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Los Angeles.
As a true Call of Duty fan, I made sure to sneak in eastereggs and references only hardcore fans like myself would find and understand. On the less hidden side we made sure to add in around 30 items and references to the actual game. Everything from weapons to movements.
The star of the trailer, Chris Evans was an amazing guy to work with thanks to his expertese as an actor. He really helped lift the production to a higher level and the audience loved him.
The trailer was released in China exclusively and received over 21 million views in less than a months time.
