Proud Creative leads wild card team on S4C new ident

Welsh broadcaster S4C relaunched its on-air and off-air branding last week, including its first new-look screen idents in almost 15 years.

S4C plumped for a wild card consortium of specialist designers led by Proud Creative. It has just revealed that the design and branding included input from Onedotzero’s consultancy arm, Folk Design and Rare. The rebrand has been overseen by S4C creative consultant Dylan Griffith and extends to graphic, on-line and 3D design.

Despite heavy competition from the established screen design fraternity last year, the bunch won a five-way paid pitch for the job, thought to be worth just £500 000 at the outset (DW 6 July 2006).

The Proud consortium has now been retained to film a further ten sequences and is about to film the fourth in the new series, says consultancy creative director Dan Witchell. Six new screen sequences have gone live in the Welsh region, with four more ready to go in a few months time. The ten idents – Chairs, Festival, Lights, Buoys, Droplets, Rides, Buggies, Frisbees, Trollies and Balloons – were shot in different locations in Wales by director Simon Ratigan and took as their theme the idea of ‘uncontrollable attraction’.

Last week, Griffith described the creative work as having ‘an inherently Welsh tone of voice while avoiding the use of conventional Welsh icons’. The approach aims to reach the viewing sensibilities of a broader public.

The first ten S4C screen sequences can be viewed at www.s4c.co.uk.