Online Advertising : Six Feet Under.

I have choosen to work on the season 5 dvd's release of the famous serie Six Feet Under.
I hesitated a lot before starting my banner about which kind of banner could be appropriate and original for a serie announcement.
Then I decided to work on a viral calendar ( step by step) because it's a good way to generate a buzz. The first event of this calendar could start with a simple banner, like the one that I have done. Then another one, with the trailer, and finally, a miniwebsite.
But to be very efficient, a viral calendar must be very singular, unique and original, that's the more difficult! It must be attractive and interactive, it's a good way to cause curiosity to the net surfer.
I started my banner by first taking the pictures of Six Feet Under on the web, finding the more relevant for my concept. I just wanted to have a picture with all the actors, for the end of the banner, and also a picture of the season 5, the dvd cover.
Then, I went to a cemetary to take pictures of the tombs, the crows and the vaults. It was interesting because British cemetaries are so different from the French ones, here, they are creepy, authentics and they perfectly match with the cliché of the horror films.
So I have work on my pictures, creating a lot of layers, with transparent background which will be used for my animation on flash. The differents kind of layers that I used are : the background, the landscape, the sky, the tombs and the crows.
At the end of the animation there is a transition with the cemetary universe and the presentation of the new dvd.
The technical aspects of my animation are actually very simple, like motion, mask, guides, alpha. As it was a simple banner I was not obliged to use javascript. But it would be possible and probably better to use it, because it would be an interactive banner, then more interesting for the user. I think if had more time and knew more javascript I would have done an interactive expanded banner. I know how to do that, but only without an animation inside!
So, the guiding principle of my banner uses some kind of horizontal slides with all the layers, except for the crows, I put a motion guide to make seems them flying in the sky.
I was inspired by the serie of online advertisement by DIESEL, they used this system and I found that very interesting and clever because it's very simple but effective!
Sometimes "less is more"!