News Broadcasting
BBC to conduct marketing campaign around the Olympics
MUMBAI: BBC has announced that BBC Sport’s marketing campaign for the forthcoming Olympic Games in China will be based upon the traditional Chinese folklore Journey To The West.
The campaign, which will air in late July, will include animations and music especially produced by Jamie Hewlett and Damon Albarn.
BBC Sport Executive Producer, Jonathan Bramley, and the Head of Marketing and Communications, Louisa Fyans, decided to produce an integrated titles and marketing campaign based on the folklore Journey To The West for the Beijing Olympics.
BBC Sport executive producer Jonathan Bramley said, “This has been a really exciting collaboration – to work with such renowned artists as Jamie and Damon is a real plus for BBC Sport. Their treatment of the trail and titles will kick start our Olympic coverage in a really different, energetic way.”
Hewlett and Albarn worked alongside the BBC to adapt Journey To The West, an epic quest for enlightenment, into the Olympic trail and titles. The London-based pair developed the animation and music especially for the BBC.
The campaign will feature the characters of Monkey, Pigsy and Sandy using Olympic sports on their journey to Beijing and the Bird’s Nest stadium. The sports represented include gymnastics, hammer, sprinting and diving.
Artist/designer Jamie Hewlett said, “The idea is that you tell the entire story of Journey To The West in a two-minute opening sequence, which is basically them on their way to the Olympic stadium, the Birds’ Nest stadium.”
The Beijing Olympics marketing campaign will feature promotional activity across TV, radio, online, mobile and interactive. It will also play throughout the Beijing Olympics programming via title sequences, in programme graphics and set design.
A two-minute sequence is being created that will be played out in full as well as 60, 50, 30, 20 and 10 second versions, which will be used for trails and titles.
BBC Sport Marketing worked with retained agency RKCR to develop the strategic direction and creative realisation of the idea. Red Bee Media produced the trails and title sequence with Zombie Flesheaters and Passion Pictures.
The aim is to target younger audiences through high profile websites such as Facebook, Bebo, MSN and social networking sites as well as mobile activity.
The folklore is based on characters taken from the story of Monkey King, one of the four classic novels written by Wu Chen-en during the Ming Dynasty (1500–1584).
The story has many layers of meaning and may be read on many different levels such as a quest, fantasy, personal search for self-cultivation, or a political/social satire.
The story is an account of a monk, Xuan Zang (602-664), who went to India in the 7th Century to seek Buddhist scriptures to bring back to China.
News Broadcasting
CNN-News18 to air live counting day coverage for five state election results on May 4
The channel is rolling out its biggest election coverage machinery yet for results day on 4th May
NOIDA: The votes have been cast. Now comes the reckoning. CNN-News18 is pulling out all the stops for results day on 4th May, when counting begins across five battleground states — West Bengal, Assam, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and the Union Territory of Puducherry — in what promises to be one of the most closely watched electoral verdicts in recent memory.
The channel’s coverage, titled Battle for the States: The Verdict, kicks off at 7am and runs through the day across linear TV, connected television and YouTube. It is the culmination of CNN-News18’s multi-format editorial initiative, Battle for the States, which has tracked the polls from the beginning under the theme Road to Power.
At the operational heart of the coverage will be the Live Results Hub, the channel’s central command centre built to collate, verify and process real-time data flowing in from reporters stationed at counting centres across constituencies. The hub combines newsroom intelligence, analytics and on-the-ground reporting to deliver what the channel promises will be the fastest and most accurate results coverage in English news.
Leading the on-air charge will be primetime anchors Rahul Shivshankar, Anand Narasimhan, Aman Sharma, Nabila Jamal and Shivani Gupta. They will be joined by a wide panel of commentators including author Chetan Bhagat; GVL Narasimha Rao, senior leader of the BJP; Smita Prakash, editor of ANI; activist Saira Shah Halim; political analyst Sumanth C Raman; Abhijit Iyer Mitra, senior fellow at IPCS; Amitabh Tiwari, founder of VoteVibe; columnist Abhijit Majumdar; Nalin Mehta, managing editor of MoneyControl; political analyst Tehseen Poonawalla; senior journalist Subir Bhaumik; and political analyst Manojit Mandal.
Shivshankar, who serves as editorial affairs director at CNN-News18, set out the stakes plainly. “Counting day is one of the most watched events in the electoral cycle, where speed and credibility are tested in real time,” he said. “Battle for the States: The Verdict is built on that promise, combining ground reporting, sharp analysis and cutting-edge election technology to give viewers the clearest and fastest route to the verdict. On May 4, CNN-News18 will once again be the nation’s most trusted channel to witness democracy in action.”
Smriti Mehra, chief executive of English and Business News at Network18, framed the coverage in broader terms. “Elections are defining national events, and audiences turn to brands they trust in moments that matter,” she said. “CNN-News18 has consistently led from the front in every election coverage, and this special programming reflects the scale of our ambition and editorial strength.”
The channel has form here. It claims to have been India’s most preferred English news destination for election results for the past 20 years, covering everything from the 2024 general elections to the Delhi, Maharashtra, Bihar and BMC polls on the back of what it calls an “Always First, Always Right” record. Five states, one day, and a nation waiting for answers. The clock starts at 7am on 4th May.
