Story
The film starts as an argument, not a timeline. What the piece is for, who it is speaking to, and the single idea it has to leave behind.
Flagship case study · 2024
Rise Up NYC
Integrated Brand + Digital Transformation
A season built around innovation and growth: a refreshed brand, a new website and a new social strategy — connecting millions through music and community.
The mandate
Refresh a cultural
institution without
dimming it.
The 2024 strategy focused on innovation and growth. The brand needed to reflect vibrant culture while making its messaging more accessible; the digital experience needed to widen the door — more people able to find the work, follow the season and take part in it.
- Scope
- Brand, web, social, campaign
- Season
- 2024
- Focus
- Innovation & growth
The system
Five moving parts, one machine.
- 01
Brand Refresh
A refreshed identity built to reflect vibrant culture while making the messaging more accessible.
- 02
Website Experience
Rebuilt to be ADA compliant while keeping an engaging, user-friendly interface and the brand's appeal.
- 03
Social Strategy
A new social strategy across Instagram, Facebook and Twitter, designed for conversation rather than announcement.
- 04
Paid Amplification
Paid social extended reach to millions of new viewers and fans beyond the existing audience.
- 05
Digital Content Ecosystem
Event schedules, artist features and campaign films working as one connected system.
The work
One system,
every night of the season.
Each show arrived with its own date, borough, artist and genre — and had to read as the same festival every time. The creative was built as a system: a fixed typographic frame and color logic that could carry a reggae headliner, a soul legend or a salsa night without being redrawn.
The result is recognition at a glance. Different faces, same festival.
Campaign in motion
The same system,
moving.
Teasers, artist promos and borough cuts extended the identity into feeds — including a Spanish-language cut so the invitation reached the audience in its own language. Short-form supported the season; the recap film closes it.
Best with sound on
Season teaser Victor Manuelle · Spanish-language cut Fat Joe · Show promo Sean Paul · Social reel Staten Island · Event promo
How the motion work is made
From concept
to screen.
The motion work often begins well before the first frame. Concept and story development, scripting and voiceover copy, footage curation, creative direction and production, supplemental AI-assisted imagery and motion, and — for many of the promotional films — original music, brought into one cohesive experience.
01 02 Script
Structure, beats and voiceover copy written first, so the edit has language to move against rather than music laid over footage.
03 Image
Footage sourced, reviewed and curated; stills selected and organized. Where a beat is missing, supplemental imagery is produced — including AI-assisted material used as a production tool, not as authorship.
04 Motion
Stills brought into movement, sequences assembled, pacing directed. The visual narrative is built as a whole rather than trimmed into one.
05 Sound
Original music composed for many of the promotional films, so score and cut are developed together instead of negotiated at the end.
06 Experience
Words, image, movement and sound arrive as one piece — and as one part of the wider campaign system it belongs to.
Portfolio-level description of how the work is made. Scope varies by film.
The impact · Rise Up NYC 2024
- 12M+Social impressionsAcross the season's owned, earned and paid social footprint.
- 8M+People engagedAcross Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.
- +35%Engagement growthVersus the prior year.
- 1.2M+Unique website visitorsRouted to schedules, artist features and ticketing moments.
- +40%Average session durationVisitors stayed longer once the experience was rebuilt.
Figures reported for the Rise Up NYC 2024 season. Paid social amplified reach to millions of new viewers and fans beyond the existing audience.
Accessibility as design
A wider door,
same room.
The website was updated to be ADA compliant while keeping an engaging, user-friendly interface and the brand’s appeal — event schedules and artist features designed for easy navigation without giving up the aesthetic.
- ADA compliant website experience
- Messaging made more accessible without flattening the culture
- Easy navigation held alongside the aesthetic
- Broader accessibility and inclusion across the audience
Cultural impact
Seven Entertainer’s Keys to the City.
Seven iconic performers took the festival stage and were recognized for their contributions to music and culture.
- 01Keith Sweat
- 02Patti LaBelle
- 03Sean Paul
- 04MC Lyte
- 05Victor Manuelle
- 06Machel Montano
- 07Fat Joe
The story in motion
The season, in its own words.
Everything the strategy set out to do — the brand, the boroughs, the stages and the people — lands here, in the 2024 recap film.
Sound onFilmRise Up NYC 2024 — Recap film
Five boroughs, ten free concerts and a season of music, culture and community — the whole story, in motion.
Best with sound on
The system continued · 2025
Built to run
again.
Later-season creative shown as brand evolution only. These pieces sit outside the 2024 results above — they show the system holding its shape as new dates, boroughs and artists arrive.
2025Save the date
2025Borough placement mockup
2025The Bronx · August 7
- Growth·
- Inclusion·
- Celebration
Innovating with intention — updated branding, accessibility, marketing and digital strategy — expanded audience reach and strengthened the festival’s impact, connecting millions through music and community.
Back to signature workContact
Let’s turn vision
into movement.
Available for select creative direction, brand strategy, leadership consulting, vision coaching and transformation engagements — with hands-on execution when the work calls for it.
Complex work often calls for discretion. Confidentiality is simply part of how an engagement is run.
Fortune 500 + enterprise consulting experience · Select engagements confidential
ccs@cchristopher.net