Imaginary Forces gives the National Football League an entirely new look and feel with the above opening sequence for Thursday Night Football on Prime Video, which debuted September 15 with a game between the Kansas City Chiefs and the Los Angeles Chargers.
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Instead of offering the typical live-action sequence of spectacular catches, throws and tackles, the sequence goes in a completely unexpected direction with a mix of 2D and 3D animation and motion graphics. Each week, Imaginary Forces will offer a new bespoke sequence with new music, featuring that week’s featured teams. Week one’s opener started with Foreigner’s classic “Feels Like the First Time.”
“Our lineup of designers, animators and illustrators tackled Prime’s creative brief with our cinematic approach to create something very untraditional for the NFL while using old school design techniques,” noted Imaginary Forces on its website.
“Referencing Saul Bass and Krazy Kat, we merged 2D cut-out drawings with 3D CGI to highlight the nostalgia of repping fans’ favorite football teams while rooting for Prime’s new features like alternate streams and real-time stats. With each week comes new Easter eggs and a soundtrack to drive the visual. We interchanged the jerseys, highlighted the stars and storylines to keep superfans fired up and freezing frames every Thursday night.”
Football fans should have fun each week checking out what’s changed in the opening sequence, what that week’s Easter eggs reveal and which song gets to usher in that week’s game.
This week, the Pittsburgh Steelers take on the Cleveland Browns at Pittsburgh’s Acrisure Stadium.
READ MORE: Stash
CREDITS
Client: Amazon Prime
Agency: Imaginary Forces
Executive Creative Director: Peter Frankfurt
Managing Director/EP: Tiffani Manabat
Creative Director: Grant Lau
Editor: Ian Gibson, Chris Hall, Marty Pugeda
Lead Animator: Jahmad Rollins
Cel Animator: Lyuben Dimitrov, Matt Everton, Taik Lee
Storyboard Artists: Tyler Gibb, Jaclyn Bautista
Designers: Angela Zhu, Steve Fuller, Chris Salvador, Kathy Liang
Lead Compositor: Ned Piyadarakorn
2D: Nader Husseini, Christian Arnsparger, Nick Baquero, Alphonse Swineheart, Lilly Lin, Ella Lee, Cindy Shon
3D: Kevin Sanchez
Animator: Nader Husseini, Christian Arnsparger, Lilly Lin
Illustrator: Tomoki Echigo
Technical Director: Jake Ferguson
Previz: Siddarth John
Head of Production: Ryan Burcham
Senior Producer: Sean Sullivan
Assistant Producer: Nic Luong
Coordinator: Aaron Carlos, Cameron Davison
Music: Foreigner “Feels like the First Time”
Tags: amazon prime video hot spots imaginary forces main titles national football league nfl prime video thursday night football