The Deck of Many things: Official Trailer & illustration Campaign
Dungeons & Dragons
THE DECK OF MANY THINGS:
D&d Expansion Product
MARKETING CAMPAIGNS:
Trailers, Illustrations, and Social Media Photography
VENDOR:
Internal Sub Contractors
PROJECT CHALLENGE: This contract was for an interim art directorship covering for a paternity leave. Izzy needed to familiarize himself with product lines, marketing schedules, campaign pipelines, and each team in an extremely short amount of time.
The challenge of this role was manyfold. Beyond downloading all of the above, Izzy needed to take the reins of multiple projects simlutaneously and guide each campaign to a satisfactory landing. As these fell into place he needed to pitch and deliver the next product pushes and prepare tactics for the smooth return of the full time art director.
The following are a few examples of what was accomplished in those three months, each campaign completed with drastically limited budgets.
PRODUCTS:
NA views
FRANCHISE:
50m+ PB
$816m+
The goal here was to learn the established aesthetic as quickly as possible and insure it was maintained.
The Phandelver and Below sourcebook had a marketing campaign in full swing when Izzy joined the team. Most of Dungeon & Dragon’s product campaigns at this point were composed of a commissioned illustration, motion graphics trailer, and a social media prong.
Izzy helped guide the final stages of the illustration and the last few iterations of the trailer.
Dungeons & Dragons next large product campaign was Planescape: Adventures in the Multiverse. Izzy led the marketing team for this project to explore a more whimsical approach. Traditionally, as D&d is a fantasy table top role-playing game the goal is to hit the aesthetic pillars of that genre. However, Planescape is a potpourri realm with wild combinations of creatures, characters, and locations beyond imagining.
Leaning on the idea that this is a world outside the traditional and filled with the outlandishly beautiful, Izzy and the team developed a more fashion forward aesthetic, literally building out a “chic week” inspired trailer, supported by faction tactics centered on style.
Applying the fashionista concept involved exploring fresh and fun directions for the illustrations and graphic design tactics.
Izzy art directed the Deck of many things marketing campaign, Guiding the look and tactics of the project from pitch to polish.
Working with a brutally modest budget Izzy needed to develop an economical approach to product photography for each of the 66 cards in the set. Working with a photographer he pitched solution that surprised the entire team.
He directed the photographer to build a cheap version of Disney’s Volume stage with a large LED monitor behind the subjects staged on matching surfaces. The lighting from the image on the screen behind each card would affect the ground and figures in the scene, planting them in a realistic feeling background, that had the pricetage of a lightly Photoshopped stock image.
Guiding the product photography crew, Izzy managed to get film quality product shots well within budget.
