“Evocative, creepy and intriguing.”—juror Allegra Burnette

“Entertaining advertising for the entertainment business. A creative and industrious Flash piece really works in an otherwise all-too-common site interface.” —juror Deb Koch

Overview: The Web site was part of an overall campaign to promote the film that also included outdoor, broadcast and print advertising. It served to build interest and hype surrounding the film by creating a unique online experience that immersed the user in the mood and tone of the film without giving away the plot.

• 41 SWFs totaling 15MB
• Extensive use of sound effects synced to user actions
• Effective reuse of movie dialogue
• 3 months, 8 people

Comments by D. Garrett Nantz and Joshua Hirsch:
“Sony Pictures envisioned the Identity site intriguing their Web audience with the concept, ‘What is it?’ as opposed to the traditional whodunit themes often used in this genre.

“With this idea in mind, we began thinking more abstractly about our approach. For weeks, we worked on creating disturbing compositions, unsettling sound design, strange interactive sequences and repetitive video clips to lead the end-user down a path to nowhere.

“Teamwork was critical on this project because of the short timeframe. To stay ahead of the clock, we decided to have each team member act as designer and animator. It actually turned out to be a great way of working. Each designer felt a strong sense of ownership and the final result demonstrated our subtle observations and understanding of the vision for marketing this film on the Web.

“The experience we wanted to create with this site required us to utilize Flash’s sound and video capabilities to the fullest extent. What resulted was the creation of a code library for handling sound that we have used on every project since.

“Sony Pictures trusted us with their vision and it paid off. But absolutely one of the greatest moments came when the director of Identity, James Mangold, called us personally to congratulate us on how well we had conveyed his film. It’s rare for a well-known director to take time out of a busy schedule to give us feedback. We thank him for that.”