Supporting INSPIRE-ing Businesses (sorry, couldn’t resist)

For a number of years we’ve been supporting a local business awards scheme, the INSPIRE Business Awards, which are organised by one of our lovely clients, Destination Basingstoke.  This year was no exception, and a few weeks ago saw the culmination of a year of hard work from all at ‘DB’, as the awards evening took place at the Hampshire Centre Court Hotel, right on our doorstep (very handy for the trip home afterwards… trip being the ‘key word’).

Nearly 500 people representing businesses from all over north Hampshire attended the event on Thursday 10th November to celebrate their success, and twelve Awards were presented to businesses from all sectors and sizes.  As part of our involvement, we sponsored the New Business of the Year Award category, with our very own Jacqui doing us proud by presenting the award on stage to the very deserving winner “Gig on the Green”.  They are a new venture developed by Yateley Sports CIC, who created a very successful and profitable entertainment event in a very short timescale from a shoestring budget – we like a bit of resourcefulness and that is exactly what these guys showed to the judging panel.

But our involvement didn’t end there. After delivering a completely new look website for INSPIRE earlier in the year, as well as an e-newsletter template to help Destination Basingstoke promote the event to local businesses, we also got our teeth into a bit of motion graphics for the awards evening.  We were asked to develop a short introductory video, displaying a compilation of sponsors videos recorded by our friends at Sardine Media, to welcome everyone to the event.  We also created a second video with messages from each of the individual sponsors.

Our motion graphic was produced using Adobe After Effects to fit a 16 x 9ft display that sat above the main stage. Being an award ceremony we wanted to get across the ‘sense of success’ through the animations, whilst staying true to the Inspire brand. We achieved this (even if we do say so ourselves!) by combining the sponsor videos, dynamic cinematic titles and a variety of lighting and lens flare effects, all syncing to the uplifting beat of Kasabians ‘Fire’.

If you fancy a peak at what we did, you can skip off to YouTube here.

A fantastic night was had by all, and Jacqui summed it up best: “It was a great night, and a pleasure to see all the local, talented businesses being applauded for their hard work.”

We’re already looking forward to next year. Maybe not all of us though, some enjoyed the evening more than most if you know what we mean… not naming any names… are we John? Hey-hey.