第29届北京奥运会开幕式 (Beijing Olympics Opening Ceremony)

Olympic Games 2012: ceremony highlights

Stadium UK: BBC Olympics title sequence revealed

"RKCR/Y&R, Red Bee Media and Passion Pictures' director Pete Candeland turn the UK into a giant sporting venue for the BBC's Olympics marketing trail and title sequences

Super-stylised athletes are seen competing in Scottish lochs, terraced streets and around London in the film which will be used across all the BBC's TV and digital Olympics content. The film also features Five Steps, the Olympics 'theme tune' written by Elbow.

RKCR/Y&R developed the concept, the animation was by Passion and the sequence was produced by Red Bee Media. It will be used for the BBC's 2012 title sequences and on desktop, mobile tablets and 'connected' TV content. A full two-minute, 40 second version will be premiered on BBC ONe on July 3. 60, 40, 30 and five second versions will be used throughout the Games."

(Creative Review, 2 July 2012, 10:12)

Fig.1 BBC "Stadium UK" created by Agency: RKCR/Y&R; ECD: Damon Collins; Creatives: Jules Chalkley, Nick Simons, Ted Heath, Paul Angus; Production company: Passion Pictures/Red Bee Media; Animation production company: Passion Pictures; Director: Pete Candeland.
Fig.2 Published on 24 Jul 2012 by "london2012", the London 2012 Olympic mascots Wenlock and Mandeville.

Hand Crafted United Airlines Animated Ads

"[United Airlines commercials have been] created by artists from around the world, including South Africa and India, each of the six spots paints a picture of optimism and exploration using unique artistic forms such as shed bird feathers, colored sand and plastic modeling clay on glass. Custom scores of George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue were performed by members of the L.A. Philharmonic Symphony and in one of the ads, Grammy award-winning American jazz legend, Herbie Hancock, and the classical world-renowned Chinese concert pianist, Lang Lang, who is performing live during the opening ceremonies, played a piano duet. The voiceover tag line is read by Robert Redford. ...

[1] 'Sea Orchestra' (60 seconds) – 'Sea Orchestra' is a lively and visually rich commercial that introduces United's new international first and business class cabins. In it, a United airplane crosses the ocean and is serenaded by an orchestra of animated sea creatures that are playing a unique version of Rhapsody in Blue using tubas, violins, French horns and the Indonesian gamelan. The score was created by Shy the Sun, a South Africa-based directing team, which used hand-drawn textures, computer animation characters and photographs of water, reefs and skies.

[2] 'Heart' (60-seconds) – 'Heart,' United's new brand ad, portrays the connection between a husband and wife and United's role in reuniting them. The commercial depicts a woman leaving her husband to fly to Europe for a business presentation. As she says goodbye, she leaves her heart behind as a symbol of her love. The musical score for 'Heart' is a piano duet of Rhapsody in Blue performed by Herbie Hancock and Lang Lang, who recently performed Rhapsody in Blue together at the 2007 Grammy Awards. Using stop-motion animation and paper puppetry, California-based director Jamie Caliri and his team, place dimensional cardboard puppets in miniature sets that were shot frame by frame.

[3] 'Two Worlds' (60 seconds) – 'Two Worlds' is a celebration of color and beautiful images that portrays United's effect on international travelers. In it, a weary business traveler leaves a mundane, monotonous black and white world and enters a fantasy of color, representing United's new international first and business class service. When he lands, he is once again in a black and white world, but has brought a bit of the magic of the new United experience with him. The commercial combines two different and distinctive animation styles created by directors SSSR, a Norwegian and Japanese team, who was responsible for the monochromatic world that was mostly computer-generated with a hand-crafted feel, and Gaelle Denis, a French director, who was responsible for the colorful fantasy world that uses using live action, computer generation and matte paintings, including textures such as Japanese rice paper.

[4] Moondust (60 seconds and 30 second) – 'Moondust' is a luminous, dreamlike commercial with an artistic interpretation of flying in United's new international first and business class cabins. The spot focuses on United's 180-degree, flat-bed business class seats and is animated to a spare, intimate interpretation of George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue. Ishu Patel, an Indian-born and Canadian-based animator, used his world-renowned back-lit technique in which a thin layer of plastic modeling clay is applied to a glass plate that has a 1000-watt light positioned beneath it and an animation camera above it.

[5] Butterfly (30 seconds) – 'Butterfly' is a fluid, animated commercial with an artistic interpretation of flying in United's new international first and business class cabins. The spot focuses on United's 180-degree flat-bed business class seats and comes to life against a violin version of George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue. In this spot, the Polish director Aleksandra Korejwo manipulated colored salt using shed condor bird feathers on a black canvas positioned under a downward-facing camera."

(United Airlines press release, 8 August 2008)

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Beijing Olympics (2008) Medal Count Map

"Circles are sized by the number of medals that countries won in summer Olympic Games. Use the slider to view past Olympics, or click on a country to display a list of its medal winners."

(The New York Times)

[Interestingly although the map appears to have been created as a simple representation of the global medal tally the map also quite eloquently reveals aspects of the changing economic fortunes and political leanings of particular countries. Note for example Germany''s Olympic success prior to the Second World War and Eastern European success during the Cold War.]

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