Our opening sequence for The Burning Issue

Sports, drama and debating are separate activities at high school, but out in the real world – in rare and glorious occasions – they overlap. The TV show “Burning Issue” is a forum where the gloves come off and all aspects of sport and its stars are debated.

Sports content creators Inverleigh approached Jumbla to produce broadcast TV packaging for this slick and unique concept. We whipped it up by combining photomontage and 2D animation.

The client wanted us to create something reminiscent of the Pop Art movement, in particular the “comic book” work of Roy Lichtenstein, who produced compositions that documented but also parodied with tongue-in-cheek humour. The stylistic influences would also be reflective of the show’s vibe: playful, insightful and amusing.

Sport’s biggest stars out of context

The video takes some of the biggest names in sport and removes them from their normal playground into a comic book strip. Alongside humorous captions, which showcase individual personalities and set-up what feature is coming up next, this encapsulates the essence of Burning Issue - a lighthearted look at what people love about sport aside from the action.

In addition to the comic strip inspired visuals, Jumbla also replicated how the human eye navigates around a page for slick transitioning between each sports star or story. This keeps the audience on their toes while maintaining interest levels.

How we turned static comic content into an interactive animation

We started with a shortlist of photos, from which Inverleigh picked its favourites. We then used Photoshop to create the iconic “pop art” style. Separating the subjects from their backgrounds, we then reduced the colour palettes in the shaded areas (to remove gradients and create a “flatter” look), mixed in halftone patterns and added outlines. The rest – framing pictures, adding text bubbles, animating the camera – was done in After Effects.

Aside from the intro, Jumbla also provided broadcast assets for the program, including lower-thirds, transitions, bumpers, quote boards, and commercial break outros. We were able to supply the client with source documents, so their in-house editors would be free to modify and tailor these specifically to each episode.

The hard work of our designers effectively captures and reiterates the spirit of the program: modern and jovial, but also smart and relevant. Our red-hot team were really on fire with this one!

You can check out more of Inverleigh’s exciting projects here.