The Challenge:
A channel stunt with a group of recent political documentaries, was planned to air during the run up to the November 2012 Presidential Election. A wrap-around concept was needed that would engage viewers and allow different political conversations to be aired.
Fact: in 2012 the USA was at its most politically divided with the exception of the civil war…How could this subject matter be woven into a theme month?
The Solution:
Thinking about the political climate, I wondered if the 2012 election might have all the signs of being a tie. I originated a number of titles around this theme, with “Split Decision” being picked by the client. I find that brainstorming a title can be a great way to originate concepts. Titles need to be pithy and journalistic to grab attention. “Split Decision” is actually a boxing term for a situation in a fight where there is no clear winner. It occurred to me that the party-political animal symbols could get the idea across of the spilt (the Republicans use the Elephant and the Democrats use the Donkey). I like duality in graphics and I found that by creating a visual where the two creatures merged could be a very simple and direct way to represent the idea of a tie. This graphic showed the opposing political animals being pitted agains each other and charging towards each other to form the hybrid ‘elephonkey’.
The Result:
The team at Participant media loved the concept and it helped drive the audience to the films by adding some colour to what could have been a more conventional solution.
