Few players in the dynamic signage business can claim a lineage back to 1989. But ScreenPlay Inc. can.
The Seattle-based multimedia developer started as a video store operator that cut its teeth producing movie trailers for broadcast on its own in-store TV monitors. The company soon began selling VHS content to other video stores and eventually to other retailers. Today, ScreenPlay provides customized multimedia environments for retail, hospitality and other consumer service businesses.
This track record was valuable for developing a digitally enhanced retail environment for Be Iced, an Edina, Minn.-based retailer of pre-owned but upscale jewelry. Initial content development was extra challenging because the retailer is not supported by specific brands. The nature of the retail story is therefore somewhat less straightforward.
The display of multimedia content was conceived through an inclusive creative process that involved storeowner Gary Ross and Storeworks, the developer of Be Iced’s showroom environment and brand imagery.
In the Be Iced flagship store, the original physical installation was a 42-inch plasma display in portrait mode, suspended in mid-air in front of a glass wall and connected directly to a hidden DVD player (since replaced by a PC-based controller). But this very basic configuration is not about the hardware, it’s about the power of a single display screen to affect and interact with its environment. From the onset of the project, the multimedia component was considered to be a key component of the environmental context. For example, the screen is located next to a 10-foot waterfall fixture, which complements the motion of the on-screen media with an accentuating aqueous evanescence.
According to ScreenPlay’s Steve Lovell, the original six-minute creative loop was conceived during a series of brainstorming sessions among the design, marketing, graphics and audio-visual principals. “The multimedia content development really began with a high-level brand audit of the client’s goals,” says Lovell. “We looked for all available factors to help set guidelines for how the AV integration should work within the space. That included the color palette, still images, catalog pages and any other collateral. We then storyboarded the concepts for the client to get an idea of how the images help tell the story of the store.”
Ultimately, ScreenPlay authored a silent “fashion-art” presentation that layered video, custom animation and colors over Be Iced’s still images, augmented with content from ScreenPlay’s library of licensed images and videos. The effect is further enhanced by an ambient electronic music program.
Once the store had opened, it became apparent that the digital screen could communicate a broader range of information in the same space. Replacing the DVD-based delivery system with ScreenPlay’s ScreenCast broadband network service, content is scheduled and updated remotely (by ScreenPlay). This upgraded version allows more flexible scheduling and has broadened the nature of the content to include promotional messaging and employee education.
Photos by Steve Lovell, Minneapolis