So. Many. Options.
This was quite the interesting project, in that I did very little editing or motion design. BUT, I used some old programming/scripting skills to create a really streamlined UI for a semi-dynamic content (video) generation tool for Nike and their World Cup 2018 football players in the Emerging Market territories.
What? OK, let me explain…
I was given a template file by Nike that I had to use in order to output over 100 different variations…each one unique, based on the Athlete home country, the culturally unique translation of the tagline (i.e.: slang uses and idioms for the word ‘Believe’), and the specific footwear product that they wore.
100 athletes X 11 countries X 7 football cleats = ~8000 possible options. Oof.
I dusted off the old brain and then built a really streamlined system in After Effects using scripts to link 3, just 3, slider controls to manage the entire option selection that was based off a spreadsheet we generated from a custom asset intake/upload portal we created.
Role:
Motion Design, Toolkit Scripting
That control panel there does EVERYTHING!
I started with what appears to be a really reduced project file…this is the timeline:
Each one of those comps has a ton of content that is being controlled by the sliders in the image above…when you adjust the slider for the athlete image, it advances to the correct frame and displays the appropriate athlete:
Selecting the athlete’s shoe advances multiple sequences of animation to show the correct football cleat videos in several locations:
And then selecting the athlete’s country runs a whole slew of commands…it swaps a flag emblem on the back of the shoe, as well as updating a type field to have the associated translation of the tagline.
And then here’s the cool part: once this is set up, I can send it Premiere Pro and control everything from there! If the client comes back and says “Neymar from Brasil changed his cleat to the Magista Low” it’s about 20 seconds of work before rendering out a new file…because sliders!
here’s a random output: