A stellar case study film is an essential tool to help you win top advertising awards. Working with the right production team ensures your video submission will be a competitive element that helps push you over the top.
We’re Diagonal Media (DGNL), and we often partner with Awards Experts on case films for major awards shows such as Cannes Lions, Clio, Effie, and Festival of Media Global Awards. We’ll break down what, from our extensive experience, helps you get the best results.
Get Organized
When you’re launching a great marketing campaign and you know that campaign is going to be award-worthy, you better prep for that case study film from the get-go.
We’ve seen the last-minute scramble teams go through so many times, and it’s not necessary.
The more you prepare, the better prepared you’ll be to win.
Gather Campaign Assets, Early
A good case study film includes specific campaign assets such as…
- Video content or images from the campaign
- Earned media and consumer responses
- Overall results of the campaign
Again, we strongly recommend you begin collecting these assets from the onset, rather than rushing to pull them all together at the end of the year.
A quick tip: Create one shared folder (with clear naming) as soon as the campaign launches. If you do nothing else, do this. It saves hours later.
How to Brief Your Creative Team
At Diagonal Media we share a ‘creative brief’ template with you at the start of a project. The brief includes a lot of important considerations for how your case study film will unfold.
We strongly recommend setting time with your team to align internally on these elements, such as: desired tone, voiceover, music, as well as any visual or graphics/animation references you’d like to share.
Also helpful before you brief any production partner:
- Who is the decision-maker (and who needs to sign off)?
- What’s the deadline, and what are the review rounds?
- What awards show(s) and categories are you aiming for? (This affects structure, emphasis, and even length.)
How to Get the Best Results
It all begins with the script. We want to hear the exciting story behind your campaign.
- What challenge did your client present with?
- How did your campaign work to fulfill the needs of your client’s brief?
- What were the (stellar) results of your campaign?
Then we create a script from your story, in three simple acts…
Challenge
Process
Results
When you combine a powerful script with undeniable evidence of a campaign well-done, through arresting visuals, earned media/consumer responses and overall results, you’re placing your team in the best position to walk away with a win.
Design for Emotion, Not Just Information
Our Motion Designer Desmond Du shares the essential role design plays in shaping your audience’s experience: “When planning animation for a case film, it helps to define what experience you want the viewer to have, not just what information you need to include. Design and animation is most effective when it’s used to clarify ideas and create emotional lift early on, rather than added later to decorate a finished script. At its core, this is all about “show, don’t tell.” Coming in aligned on a few key questions helps set that foundation:
- How would you describe the core message or problem in one line?
- What should the viewer feel and understand from the beginning?
- What’s easier to show with animation than explain with words?
- What transformation should the viewer experience by the end?
This clarity helps the creative team to communicate the full value of your campaign through storytelling, not just reporting.”
Here’s one case film example we’ve produced:
Wanderlab Studio by Trip Advisor
x Team DGNL
Guest contribution by Diagonal Media (DGNL). You can explore more of their work here.
A great case film is rarely “saved in the edit.” It’s won in the prep: the right assets, a tight story, clear approvals, and a brief that gives your production team what they need to do their best work. Huge thanks to Diagonal Media for sharing their process. And if you’re planning Cannes (or any major awards run) and want support shaping the story, choosing categories, and packaging your submission end-to-end, that’s exactly what we do at Awards Experts. Get in touch now, and we will pull together the best team for the job.
