Thornberg & Forester Packages NASCAR for Fox Sports

The NASCAR Sprint Cup Series 2012 is well underway, following the record-setting FOX Sports broadcast for the rain-delayed 2012 Daytona 500, which drew 36.5 million viewers, and last Sunday's equally sensational Subway Fresh Fit 500 at Phoenix International Raceway.  For its on-air elements used to promote each race this season, Fox Sports Marketing Group turned to award-winning design and digital production company Thornberg & Forester (T&F).

 

NASCAR's excitement draws from many fascinating and somewhat dangerous facets, and when they all come together in a race, the thrills are tangible across all the senses.  T&F's design system for this year's NASCAR on-air package for Fox Sports extends diagonal patterns from NASCAR's logo, along with other 3D design elements representing a myriad of interconnected pieces within a larger structure, to artfully reflect drivers, fans, broadcasters and racecars within each promotional piece.  Project deliverables from T&F include a :30 promo, the main title for NASCAR on Fox, full-screen graphics for 12 tracks, IDs for 13 drivers, B-roll holders/animations, scanline tracking for specific cars, transitions, backplates and more. 

 

"T&F produced some really unique and beautiful style frames that we loved instantly," said Robert Gottlieb, Fox Sports Marketing SVP/Group Creative Director. Fox Sports lead creative on the project Josh Nichols added, "It was a really exciting challenge to translate such a cool pitch into a thirty second NASCAR promo."

 

"Fox was looking for a fresh look for their NASCAR coverage this year," said T&F creative director Frank Pichel.  "They wanted to make something that felt new and different for them and for NASCAR.  Elegant, beautiful, and subtle were all words that they used to describe what they were looking for."

 

T&F presented several original ideas for the project, and two of the treatments generated the most excitement.  Animation tests produced for both directions led to the final choice.  "Fox really had faith in us to lead the way outside their normal zone," Pichel added.  "The main challenge was to make it feel unique and beautiful with such a simple palette of objects and colors."

T&F's artists used a combination of Adobe Creative Suite, Adobe After Effects, and Maxon Cinema4D for this project, and finishing was handled in Autodesk Flame by Fox Sports.  

 

Along with Gottlieb and Nichols, credits for Fox Sports Marketing Group also include CMO Eric Markgraf, VP Bill Battin, executive producer Jason Dodd, editor Curtis Roen, Flame artist Simon Holden, graphic designer Ryan Zunkley and sound designer Chris Fina.  T&F's credits include head of 3D Vi Nguyen, executive producer Elizabeth Kiehner, producer Javier Gonzalez, designers Frank Pichel, Scott Matz, Adam Grabowski, Mike Burgoyne, Jorge Peschiera, Yuki Nakajima and Angela Zhu, and animation / compositing artists Mike Russo, Mike Burgoyne, Yuki Nakajiima, Jorge Peschiera, Frank Pichel, Keith Endow, Ken Krueger, Adam Grabowski, Russ Porchia and Joe Russ.  Music is courtesy of Elias Arts' executive producer Ann Haugen, producer Val Scinto, composer Michael Fraumeni, and creative director Dave Gold.  

 

For more information on this project, please visit www.thornbergandforester.com.