By now, most individuals within the Philadelphia space have most likely seen at the very least one billboard that includes the Independence Blue Cross (IBX) 2024 advert marketing campaign, that includes folks posed on or beside giant, blue, three-dimensional IBX letters.
These letters aren’t a digital design — they’re actual. In our adverts, the persons are interacting with precise bodily IBX letters. We’ve additionally despatched the IBX letters to numerous occasions, the place the general public can work together with them, too.
And once they’re not in use, they dwell in our foyer and elsewhere at our 1901 Market Road headquarters.
The letters themselves are already fairly spectacular. However Calvin Tan and Marie Thresher from the IBX Inventive Companies workforce have discovered a complete new utility for the letters. They’ve labored out how one can undertaking pictures or movies onto them in three dimensions utilizing a method known as “projection mapping.” Right here’s how that occurred.
The Thought
Projection mapping has been round for a while. It has been used to create the whole lot from the singing busts at Disney’s Haunted Mansion to the beloved vacation mild present at Philadelphia’s Metropolis Corridor.
Calvin Tan, a lead web communication coordinator on the IBX Inventive Companies workforce (in addition to an achieved magician), had seen projection mapping being utilized in numerous contexts, and questioned if there was a manner for IBX to make the most of this know-how.
He approached his colleague Marie Thresher, Inventive Companies’ senior movement graphics designer, with the concept of projecting video onto the three-dimensional IBX letters for the 2023 IBX Well being Care Discussion board. “I noticed I’d want somebody like Marie to assist me with this,” says Tan. “I began speaking to her about it, and she or he obtained actually excited.”
The Course of
Tan researched what software program could be required; Thresher created the animation. Then, the 2 associates pitched the concept to the Inventive Companies management workforce.
Marc Balara, director of Inventive Companies, embraced the concept and authorized the acquisition of the software program. “Marc was actually giving us the inexperienced mild to study it and check it and see if it really works,” Tan famous. “His help on buying the software program and permitting us to study it was large.” The price of the software program was an funding, however dealing with the projection mapping in-house was far cheaper than hiring an out of doors firm to do it.
Chris Counter, supervisor of digital and graphic design at IBX, commented, “All of us obtained tremendous excited as a result of it’s a enjoyable, immersive manner of storytelling and it captivates folks.” He added, “Now we have actually good management that acknowledges new know-how, or simply helps issues we’re enthusiastic about doing. They’re keen to place the funding into it.”
The letters had been 5.5 toes excessive by 11.6 toes broad. It was necessary to map the projection to their actual measurements or else the animation wouldn’t be efficient.
Tan and Thresher elicited assist from a number of departments at IBX, particularly the audiovisual and constructing services groups. “Collaborating with different groups was important; we needed to lean on one another for lots,” Tan commented. “Everybody was actually enthusiastic about it from the start. Different departments had been keen to assist.”
The Outcomes