The Lions brand film opens the awards show at Cannes Lions, engages on socials, and represents the brand year-round across all platforms. For Lions' 70th anniversary, the brand wanted to shift the focus on the teams and the process behind the work. "In the Making" was a brand film that celebrates the entire journey to the trophy: the late nights, the dead ends, the breakthroughs. The chaos of making something from nothing.
AIRBNB | Made possible by Hosts | Bonnie & Clyde
Inspired by Airbnb's use of real photography to carry emotional brand narratives, we sourced behind-the-scenes images directly from agencies who had submitted work to Lions. Real teams. Real pressure. Real stakes.
MODERN FAMILY | S6E16 | Connection Lost
The photos carried real weight. To tell the full story, we paired them with motion graphics. Guided by the storytelling of 'Connection Lost' we connected the BTS content through UI elements.
THE stripped-back interface
The interface-driven format let the brand tell an intimate story without attaching it to any one person.
Just a stripped back digital workspace: notifications, messages, file uploads, design tools. The BTS photos grounded the story in reality. The motion graphics carried the emotional arc.
Screened before every awards ceremony at the 2023 Cannes Lions festival. Played on large screens across the venue and during breaks between talks and presentations.
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On social, it became the most-liked post in Cannes Lions' Instagram history at the time of release. All engagement entirely organic.
INSTAGRAM: 257k views | 8,709 likes | 101 comments
11 shares
Numbers are combined from two Instagram posts (same content, two aspect ratios)
YOUTUBE: 15.8k views
"A witty spot that celebrates the frantic nature of campaign creation and the glory of the rewards it can bring." - shots.net
PRESS
"Brilliant, wonderful, absolutely incredible. Many congratulations, this really is world-class work."
Philip Thomas, CEO, Ascential Futures
"The amount of feedback on social, already, is absolutely overwhelming. Balint and Naomi were two of the most professional and positive individuals I've EVER worked with. You made the entire process so unbelievably easy and were incredibly patient with me — but creative AF when you needed to be."
Motion lanugage adopted in 2023-2024 campaigns.
Clare Barry, Creative Director, Cannes Lions
The motion graphics language I developed became a creative system that the brand adopted across subsequent campaigns. It became a scalable creative framework that allowed Lions to tell personable, human stories without relying on any single individual as the face of the brand.
Lions Intelligence Promo (2023)
Social-first campaign extending the interface aesthetic into product marketing. Collaboration with Lisa Evernden, Senior Motion Designer.
Lions Intelligence Promo (2023)
Promotional campaign for the Lions education programme. Creative direction by me, edited by Rhys Norman, Junior Editor.
CREDITS
Creative Lead — Balint Danyi | Creative Director, Cannes Lions — Clare Barry | Creative Director, Ascential Studios — Dina Elrayyes | Senior Motion Designer — Lisa Evernden | Producer — Naomi Hartridge-Dawes
LIONS BRAND FILM
MY ROLE: Creative Lead
Storyboard development, script development, briefed and created motion graphics, edit. In the final stages, worked directly with Simon Cook, CEO of Cannes Lions, on creative revisions.
2023