Culture

Students get real billboard produced

Very exciting news. Here's a press release issued today by the University's Press Office:

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Students have designed a billboard poster showcasing the choice on offer to shoppers at one of Lincoln's top retail spots.

The advert for the St Marks shopping centre in Lincoln was unveiled on Monday 29 March near to the junction of Broadgate and Silver Street. It is the brainchild of final year students from the BA (Hons) Creative Advertising programme at the University of Lincoln. Fellow undergraduates from the university's BA (Hons) Contemporary Lens Media course were responsible for the photography.

The witty advert depicts a mantelpiece strewn with dozens of clocks and timepieces - with the tongue-in-cheek warning: "With so much choice, you might get carried away."The university was first approached by St Marks with the brief for the advertising campaign last summer.

Gyles Lingwood, senior lecturer and programme leader for BA(Hons) Creative Advertising at the University of Lincoln, said: "After a number of meetings with the client to determine the strategic approach for the communications, we set our third year students a competitive brief to see who could come up with the best concept for an advert for St Marks. We drew up a shortlist of the best ideas and the shortlisted students then had to present their ideas to the client."

The chosen design was devised by students Adrian Matthews and Alice Keegan, who teamed up with student photographers Karl Abbott and Carl Bingham, to create the ad. Alice said: "This was a really useful experience for Ade and I, we learned so much about the practices of the advertising industry. We were able to work with a real client for the first time and art directing the photographers gave us a great introduction of what the production process is like in the business. It was a lot of hard work, but definitely worth it in the end! We are very proud of the final result."

Gyles added: "There's a very simple message behind the ad - that there are many shops at St Mark's with a great deal of choice - but it's been done in a very amusing and eye-catching way."

The billboard is not the only high-profile ad created by University of Lincoln students that will have caught the attention of Lincoln shoppers. Recent Creative Advertising graduates Mike Cuthell and Phil Monks worked on the latest Nike TV advert featuring Wayne Rooney and Fernando Torres.

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Just out of interest, here is the original client visual by Alice & Ade - it's impressive to see how they successfully maintained the original concept and art direction in the final billboard:

Very well done to Alice and Ade and many thanks to photographers Karl & Carl. The final ad looks great and you should all be very proud of your first billboard in the public arena. Hopefully, the first of many....!