Masterpiece Downton Abbey was a British-American historical period drama. It became the highest rated and most watched television series on PBS since it’s inception, and the third most watched television series in the world by the third season. At it’s peak, it achieved an average audience of 10.2 million for the season 4 premiere and won a slew of industry awards including a Golden Globe Award for Best Miniseries, a BAFTA award and 6 Primetime Emmy Awards including one for Outstanding Miniseries. In social media, it achieved a Twitter audience of 1.53 million, which saw roughly 66,000 tweets.

As a senior interactive art director, along with the various digital units I designed and produced, I mostly focused on developing a social media based interactive concept to help promote the series. I also worked with creative director, David Wilder, to concept and design animated Timesquare billboard units for the season 4 premiere a few days after New Years.

The idea for the season 4 social media concept was to have fans ‘Downtonify’ their name based on a series of Downton Abbey questions and British themes. They would then in turn share the name generated through social media channels.

Take a glance at the mockup animation below, which will walk you through the experience.

I also had the opportunity help design and concept animated Timesquare billboard ads, alongside my creative director David Wilder..

Here are the initial storyboards.

Here is the second round of boards.

Here are the final animated ads below.