Best of Behance: Out-Of-Home Advertising

For those of us living outside of major cities, it’s easy to overlook the importance of out-of-home advertising, commonly abbreviated as OOH. With digital advertising, we can deliver our ads to targeted audiences with surgical precision and use analytics to further optimize our ad creative even after it’s been deployed. Despite the advantages of advertising online, OOH remains an effective means of indiscriminately reaching large numbers of people, making it an important part of brand systems and advertising campaigns.

When designing OOH, there are a number of unique considerations to take into account and it isn’t as simple as taking the same content from social and scaling it up to fit the proportions of a billboard. Viewing distance is the biggest hurdle to tackle. Unlike digital ads, where there is a clear expectation for viewers to be holding their phones or seated in front of their computer screens, OOH needs to work at a variety of viewing distances. Viewers might be standing a few feet away, across the street, in a passing car or train, or on the sidewalk below in the case of billboards.

Another advantage of digital advertising is the additional space provided by captions for housing more information as well as a link to a site or route back to the account where viewers can learn more. With OOH, you don’t have that luxury. It needs to capture attention and provide viewers with everything they need to know before it’s left their line of sight. Effective OOH is about striking a balance.

With that said, let’s take a look at some of the latest and greatest Behance has to offer.

Source: Matias Falk

Source: Matias Falk

Source: Matias Falk

Source: Matias Falk

First up is the identity for Ficta, an interactive performance festival in Buenos Aires. Designed by Spain-based graphic designer, Matias Falk. The identity makes clever use of a modular geometric motif that can be used as both a container and abstract pattern. I’ve seen similar approaches utilized by art museums where exhibits are constantly changing, and the system needs a flexible means of highlighting coming attractions while maintaining cohesion and brand recognition. In this case, the shapes are born from the movements of the performers themselves. The success of this system across its various OOH applications comes down to its conciseness. The images are intriguing while also communicating the context of the festival and the accompanying type strikes the perfect balance of information density. Viewers know exactly what the event is, when it’s taking place, and how to learn more if interested.

Source: Kota Iguchi

Source: Kota Iguchi

Source: Kota Iguchi

This next campaign was created by Kota Iguchi for Air Max Day 2022. OOH isn’t limited to just wheatpaste posters and billboards anymore. Many displays are now digital, presenting a whole new world of opportunities for creative expression. Part of what makes this particular display in Tokyo so interesting is the fact that it wraps around a corner. This quality gives the display an inherent sense of 3-dimensionality and really helps to sell the mind-bending quality of the visuals. While the visuals are clearly the star of the show here, the qualities that make this campaign successful as OOH are similar to those of Ficta. The visuals grab viewer’s attention and the text is concise while still communicating everything they need to know.

Source: Jessica Fecteau

Source: Jessica Fecteau

Source: Jessica Fecteau

This next award-winning OOH campaign for Lacoste demonstrates that sometimes less is more. In a campaign in partnership with the International Union for Conservation of Nature to raise awareness of endangered species, designer Jessica Fecteau chose to simply subvert expectations. By using Lacoste’s well-known mark and replacing the iconic crocodile with each of the ten endangered species being featured, they created a surprising moment that had audiences doing a double-take. The accompanying text simply stated the purpose of the campaign and directed viewers to local boutiques where the special event-specific polos could be purchased. Despite the simplicity of the visuals, this clever concept was attention-grabbing nonetheless, and the campaign as a whole meets the criteria of successful OOH.