AJC Connect
At AJC Connect 2024, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution set out to reintroduce itself as a modern media powerhouse with a soul—“For The Greater Atlanta.”
At this first-of-its-kind event, advertisers, community leaders, and partners gathered together to see AJC in a new light.
Elevation was responsible for the design, production, and execution of the media for this event, with our main focus creating engaging content for the 95-foot wide screen.
AJC Connect by the Numbers
3 Hours
14 Speakers
200 Attendees
61 Renders
62 Cues
95-foot wide screen
Watch the reel and read on to get the scoop on how we brought this event to life.
Reading Between the Lines: The Creative Challenges
Leaning on our years of live event experience, we asked the right questions from day one—assessing venue quirks, content constraints, and audience flow. We quickly identified the following challenges.
95 Feet, Zero Overwhelm: Filling a massive 95-foot wall with impactful visuals—without overshadowing the audience.
Light Bounce & Shadows: The venue’s existing projection setup wasn’t built for large-scale content and stage presentations, requiring extra care to avoid glare and seat obstructions from the presenters and panels.
Planning, Flexibly: Ever-changing run-of-show, event space layout, and projector technology kept us on our toes.
Usage Rights: To comply with the proper content usage rights, we had to utilize unconventional sources of video content.
Design in Focus: Our Approach
Our team created a cohesive content approach, with a few goals in mind.
Visual Variety… Like the sections of the paper itself, each section of the presentation had its own distinct style. This helped keep the audience engaged across multiple hours.
…While Keeping a Unified Brand Look: Consistent messaging and visual identity across every touchpoint was crucial. While each section had a distinct look, every projection and graphic all still felt like AJC’s essence “Substance & Soul.”
In total, we created over 60 renders, incorporating graphics, animations, photography, and live action footage.
Fitting the Venue
We created the content with the venue in mind.
For the best show, we offset the center of the media to the audience’s center, rather than the center of the wall. We relied on bold, high contrast graphics to combat any glare in the room. We also kept playback as simple as we could to accommodate the technology available at the site.
Have we mentioned that the screen was 95 feet wide? We purposefully slowed animations for maximum visual impact without overwhelming the audience.
Our team was on-site for setup to ensure everything looked just right.
Every detail, from arrival to final speaker, celebrated AJC’s new direction.
Hot Off the Press
The team at AJC envisioned the event with two experiential modes: Curiosity & active participation during conversation hour, and inspired listening during talent-led presentations.
Throughout the 3 hour event, our 95-foot canvas created an immersive backdrop that reinforced AJC’s visual identity and supported their vision — grabbing attendees’ attention at key moments and then filling the background to support the message of the speakers.
AJC Connect 2024 provided a rich showcase to tell the story of the newspaper’s transformation, while creating deeper connections with community leaders, advertising partners, and influencers.
It was a great pleasure to help AJC’s vision come to life in a big way. Our thanks to the team at The Atlanta Journal Constitution for the opportunity.
“Beautiful work, Elevation! y'all are phenomenal partners and beyond talented! Thank you for bringing this to life!“
Amanda Turnbull T2 Strategy
Credits
Client: Atlanta Journal Constitution
Creative Director: Ned Reid
Design Director: Jason Johnson
Producer: Amanda Turnbull, T2 Strategy
Production Company: Elevation
Creative Director: Stephen Cocks
Creative Director: David Hendrix
Senior Designer, Animator: Sean Kiley
Senior Producer: Alina Klopach