The Hollywood Walk of Fame immortalizes achievement in the entertainment industry. And with more than 10 million visitors annually, this high-traffic site can also serve as a prime location to promote a client’s artistic wares.
Wanting to bring music back to the forefront of the entertainment scene, Eruption Music Group (EMG), an entertainment branding company, staked its own plot on the Walk of Fame with a dramatic wallscape at the intersection of Selma and Vine streets to market recording artist Marco Bosco’s latest iTunes record.
Owner of the 80-foot Sunset Strip wall space, Van Wagner Outdoor referred EMG to MetroMedia Technologies (MMT) for the print work. No stranger to producing colossal billboards, MMT accepted the challenge without hesitation.
Bosco – who is not only recording artist but also writer, producer, EMG’s CEO, and, for this project, art director – teamed with graphic designer/illustrator Eric “9” Lopez for the creative. They shot the original image in front of the Capitol Records building, then enhanced the design using Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator to add damage to the Capitol Building and to “make the road and sky appear more dramatic.”
“In designing this billboard, I had in my mind statues like the Perseo (Perseus) in Florence and the Botticelli paintings at the Uffizi,” says Bosco, who was born in Italy. “Billboards can be used amazingly if you have the mind and sense of perspective to do something more than just advertising.”
With the design complete, MMT’s prepress department prepared the images and used a proprietary RIP. MMT has achieved G7 master-printer certification, a standard of best practices for achieving visual similarity across all print processes, but even with such credentials the proofing process presented some problems and required several rounds of proofs.
“Marco is very picky about color tone, and sometimes in sending the files back and forth during proofing, the colors can seem slightly off. And on art like this, one wrong tone can screw up the whole board. But, MMT definitely nailed this wallscape,” says EMG’s Aaron Braunstein.
To output the 21 x 81-foot graphic, MMT utilized its proprietary printer – a drum technology that uses acrylic-based paint. Lightweight, 8-ounce vinyl was chosen per Van Wagner Outdoor for outdoor durability. With the help of a Viking crane, Van Wagner successfully installed the wallscape.
To support the billboard campaign’s branding initiative, EMG collaborated with Delta Airlines to create an EMG music channel featuring Bosco singles on all flights worldwide. The channel features an unreleased Bosco track that can only be heard in-flight. His single “I Wonder” will also be played on Delta’s boarding-music program.
A total of four billboards were produced and displayed around Los Angeles. The campaign also continued in New York City with a billboard in Astoria, Queens, paying homage to the birthplace of Bosco’s career.
“My company and I decided to purchase one board for a long period of time to establish our brand and presence in the city that has given me the heart, inspiration, and knowledge to bring this business to another level,” Bosco explains.
MetroMedia Technologies
www.mmt.com