Monday, 10 December 2007 | Levent OZLER
Trollbäck + Company Traces a Tumultuous Year in US History
for The History Channel's "1968 With Tom Brokaw"
 1968.mov ( 7MB ) - Viewed 67 times
Visual and conceptual creative studio Trollbäck + Company has designed a show package for an immersive two-hour special on The History Channel, "1968 With Tom Brokaw." The event premiered on Sunday, December 9 at 9 p.m. ET/PT.
In the colorful open, a collage of archival footage underscores the powerful dichotomies of the year that was the nerve center of the 60s, from the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Robert F Kennedy and violent anti-Vietnam demonstrations to the power of flowers, flourishing idealism and flowing drugs.
Invoking the effect of newspaper print, the open captures the intensity and significance of the time. As if firmly sealing the events' place in history, a thin film of halftone dots covers the many layers of imagery that are interwoven with commentary by people who experienced the turmoil as well as younger people now realizing its aftershocks. Among those interviewed: musicians Arlo Guthrie, Michelle Phillips and Bruce Springsteen; comedians Lewis Black, Tommy Smothers and Jon Stewart; the politically involved Andrew Young, who was with Martin Luther King Jr. when he was assassinated; Pat Buchanan, then a speechwriter for presidential candidate Richard Nixon; and Robin Morgan, a feminist leader.
"We wanted to offer a fresh angle on an era that has been explored so many times before us, and really get to the soul of it," explains Jakob Trollbäck, creative director of Trollbäck + Company. "Rather than letting ourselves be influenced by the commercial art of the 60's, we looked to the contemporary artists of that time for inspiration, most notably Robert Rauschenberg." Rauschenberg's 60s work incorporated found images-photographs transferred to the canvas via the silkscreen process. Previously used only in commercial applications, silkscreen allowed Rauschenberg to address the reproducibility of images, and the consequent flattening of experience that that implies.
Earlier this year, Trollbäck + Company created an image spot for "Hippies," another History Channel documentary special event.
The show package for "1968 with Tom Brokaw" includes an open, lower thirds, logo animations, a promo end page and an affiliate page.
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