Agency:
Story Company
Client:
Reeperbahn Festival 2019 —
Opening Show Animation
Role:
Styleframes,
3D Animation
Brief
Story Company Berlin commissioned an opening show animation for Reeperbahn Festival 2019 Europe's largest club festival, held across 90 venues in Hamburg's St. Pauli district with 50,000 expected attendees and 425+ international acts.
The deliverable: a 3D animated ident for the opening show, displayed on the festival's main screens and distributed on YouTube.
No rigid brief the direction was to create something that visually captured the festival's aesthetic for that year.
Tools: After Effects, Cinema 4D, Octane
Platforms: Exhibition, Social Media
Credits:
Production: Story Company
01 Process
Discovery — Story Company provided the festival's visual identity and color palette for 2019. From there, the concept was mine to develop. I studied the festival's physical environment (the furniture, stage design, spatial layout) as the starting point for the animation's world.
Concept — I developed the concept and translate the festival's physical spaces into 3D animated stages. Each set represented a different music genre programmed at the festival rock, jazz, pop, and alternative built as miniature venue environments with their own atmosphere, objects, and textures pulled directly from the festival's brand assets and artist lineup.
Styleframes — Each genre stage was textured with festival colors, artist references, and genre-specific props. Neon lighting was used to recreate the feel of being inside a club or backstage referencing the actual visual character of Hamburg's St. Pauli district where the festival takes place.
Production — Full 3D build in Cinema 4D, compositing in After Effects. Concept, design, and animation handled independently. Story Company and the client reviewed and adjusted as needed throughout the process.
02 Key Creative Decision
I used the festival's physical furniture and spatial identity as the structural basis for the 3D sets. The furniture became stages. The brand palette became lighting and texture. This grounded the animation in something the festival's audience would recognize as theirs, while giving it a scale and dimensionality that felt appropriate for a main-stage opener.
03 Results
- One animated indent delivered for live event main screens and YouTube
- Screened at the opening show of Reeperbahn Festival 2019 in Hamburg
- Concept developed and executed independently from brief to final delivery
04 Conclusion
A festival opener seen by 50,000 people sharpens your ability to self-direct.
On this project I learned to use the client's existing physical world as a creative anchor when the brief is open.
