Developing a Cinemagraph For Ernie Ball Guitar Strings

Getting the Attention of Marketing Professionals

For this project we were tasked with creating a cinemagraph for a branded product. The choice was entirely up to us, so I went with something I know. Because I am a guitar player myself, I decided to go with Ernie Ball “Slinky” guitar strings.

The first step in this project was really getting to know the client.

Ernie ball was a pedal steel guitar player, who opened the first guitar only music shop. He set up guitars he sold with custom strings, because he saw a need for a lighter gauge string and was turned down by fender and Gibson. He soon developed a loyal clientele, and eventually sold the shop to make strings only.

They have been in business for over 60 years being founded in 1962, and are an industry leader with their products available in 5,500 music stores and over 120 countries, grossing over 40 million dollars annually

Our Target audience is guitar players of all ages and skill levels. Over the years there have been many famous musicains who have used These strings including: Jimmy Page, Paul McCartney, Angus Young, Keith Richards, Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton, and Pete Townshed.

The Challenge of Showcasing a Known Product in a New Light

Because this brand is so well known amongst musicians you may be wondering why we chose this product to market. The reason behind this was that many musicians are very particular about what equipment they use, and can be pretty set in their ways.

The Goal was to use social media to reach out to the next generation of guitar players and possibly convert some seasoned veterans.

Why Choose a Cinemagraph

Cinemagraphs are still photographs in which a minor and repeated movement occurs, forming a video clip. They are published as an animated GIF, and can give the illusion that the viewer is watching an animation. This format is perfect for social media and websites due to the same file size of the image.

Additionally, 92% of mobile viewers share videos, 85% of Facebook videos are watched with sound, there is a 49% faster revenue growth as opposed to non-video users, and 64% of consumers make a purchase after watching a branded social video.

The Challenges of Production

As with any production, there are certain challenges that need to be overcome. First, we had to come up with a concept that would get out our client’s message. The concept we chose required a “grungy” setting, guitar, lighting, and additional people to help the process go smoothly. The difficulties we faced were finding the right lighting and atmosphere, and also being still enough to get the shots we needed.

The Solution

The solution was to create a 1080×1080 cinemagraph for social media.The client wanted something simple that shows the strings in use, and gets their message across The idea was to have the person playing a simple riff, and then bending sharply up on the “g” string, because that’s what gave ErnieBall the idea to make the custom strings in the first place. The timeline would be about 4 hours of shooting, making sure that the lighting is right and all the components that need to stay stationary stay stationary, with another 2 hours for editing

Creating a Value Proposition

The original idea was to have a slogan like “slip into something slinky”, but that may not be quite right for the audience, or the message.

The new text that would appear on screen with an image of the strings is “The Name that Changed the game”. This better suits the message that they were trying to convey

Drafting a Story Board/Critical Stimulus

To crate the cinemagraph, we first made a story board in Miro. From there we were able to collaborate with our peers, and get feedback we used to make the final polished product. By doing research on the company, and studying other cinemagraphs, we were able to make something simple and eye catching that properly conveyed our client’s message.

Putting it All Together

Here is the visual process starting with the origonal sketches to the digital prototypes, and the final product.

These were the preliminary sketches. We had two ideas, the first being a singer Playing the guitar, while the hair on their head moved. This Idea related very little to our product so we decided to go with the image of a person playing a guitar riff and bending the strings.

This was the first Digital Prototype, but it wasn’t quite right.

This is one of the variations of the final Digital asset

This is the second version of the final digital asset. We wanted to have two similar looking cinemagraphs, because they appeal to different groups of guitar players.