The Manchester Animation Festival launched in 2015, and in 2017, we were delighted to deliver the festival’s press and publicity for the first time. We’d met the team through our work with our animation clients and with a team of huge animation fans at Sundae, we were delighted to be part of such an up and coming event.
The festival is a three-day celebration of all things animated. From short film competitions, feature films, retrospective screenings, workshops, networking events, panel discussions, masterclasses and talks from the industry’s best and brightest.
With animation really taking flight in the North West with the likes of Factory, Mackinnon & Saunders, and CHF producing and creating a huge chunk of the UK’s animated output. The BBC and ITV have now moved to the thriving Media City, making Manchester a significant UK hub for creativity and media.
We wanted to really capitalise on both the strength of the festival’s incredible programme, and the emergence of the North West as an animation powerhouse with our messaging. We spread the word about the Manchester Animation Festival UK wide, and were able to amplify the 2017 festival, with an impressive national broadcast campaign.
Key national broadcast activity included an interview on BBC Breakfast with Will Becher, Animation Director of Early Man, who hosted a talk at the festival, and brought two of the puppets direct from the set for an exclusive view.
We also achieved a piece on BBC Radio 4’s Front Row around the Ivor Wood retrospective event. Ivor Wood expert Joseph Wallace, and Ivor’s widow and sometime animation partner Josiane Wood both appeared for a talk through the magic of the late animator.
This was bolstered by a fantastic regional broadcast coverage, with a TV piece going out on ITV North West Tonight, exploring the relationship with sponsors (and another of our clients!) Factory and the festival. Additionally, we had TWO interviews on BBC Radio Manchester, with Will Becher, and festival director Steve Henderson, plus A Week in My Life for Steve on Prolific North.
We also secured a profile of The Simpsons writer Josh Weinstein in print, with Broadcast Magazine, one of the major television trade outlets. Josh is responsible for Strange Hill High, a CBBC programme that we also had the pleasure of working on and is currently working on Disenchantment.
The festival’s lineup announcements was covered in the bulk of the animation trade outlets, including Animation World Network, Creative Boom and Animation Magazine, amongst others, and we had listings coverage in the Manchester Evening News, Sight & Sound, and many more.
The festival teamed up with the BBC to host a family day the weekend ahead of the animation festival’s launch, which we announced and was covered by Manchester Evening News Online, as well as parenting bloggers What To Do With The Kids and Daddy Daydream.
We generated almost 65,000,000 opportunities to see, and we helped cement the Manchester Animation Festival’s reputation as the go-to for everything animated, and the biggest and best animation festival in the UK.
We wanted to really capitalise on both the strength of the festival’s incredible programme, and the emergence of the North West as an animation powerhouse with our messaging.
