Our Favourite Virtual Awards Events
With the fun and spectacular awards evenings we all look forward to being cancelled during the pandemic, Giggabox stepped up to recreate the magical experience we all love. In this article, we will discuss three of our favourite Virtual Awards Ceremonies that Giggabox has produced over the last few months, discussing what made them so successful and a joy to be a part of.
L&Q People Awards 2021
L&Q Group are a non-profit organisation that create better places to live by delivering high quality homes, neighbourhoods, and housing services which people can afford, primarily across London and the South East. L&Q asked Giggabox to support them in running their People Awards 2021. Firstly, one of the main reasons why this awards event was so enjoyable was the fact that its primary goal was to recognise employees and volunteers from all areas of the business. Awards evenings often tend to solely reward those higher up in the business, such as members of Senior Management, but these People Awards 2021 celebrated some of the extraordinary colleagues during a very extraordinary year. Examples of some of the award categories from this event included ‘Hero of the Year’, ‘Inclusion Star of the Year’, and ‘Inspirational Manager of the Year’.
Streamed via Vimeo, this awards ceremony utilised our landing page Virtual Event Solution. The landing page was created by our in-house design team, being signed off two weeks before the event went live. The benefit for the use of our landing page solution in this case was its lower cost to produce, along with its fully customisable nature. With this, our web developer created the aesthetic bespoke to the client’s needs. Being streamed to an online platform meant that the reach was also maximised. Everyone who wanted to attend the People Awards could watch and interact with the event from the comfort of their own home, not requiring them to organise and/or pay for their own transport to and from a venue.
This awards ceremony involved a combination of live and pre-recorded content. The majority of the video stream involved live content, including the introduction piece and closing remarks by L&Qs Chief Executive, along with the awards acceptance speeches. Being predominantly live meant that this event produced a highly authentic experience, close to what would be expected from a Live Event. This left only the awards nominations announcements to be pre-recorded. The announcers recorded these videos themselves from home, then sent them to Giggabox before the event. This enabled the Giggabox production team to play the VTs into the stream seamlessly, with the appropriate lower thirds and wipe transitions for each award winner.
AHRC Research in Film Awards
Since 2015, the Arts and Humanities Research Council have organised the Research in Film Awards, showcasing the best films that are inspired by or directly linked to arts and humanities research. Judged by a panel of industry experts and leading academics, the winners were announced at this special awards ceremony, with a total prize fund of £25,000. Some of the awards categories included: ‘Best Research Film of the Year’, ‘Best Animated Film’, and the ‘Inspiration Award’.
Being a spectacular Virtual Awards Ceremony, on top of our usual responsibilities, one of the main tasks given to the Giggabox production team was to create an opening VT for the evening, as well as montage films for each awards category featuring all nominees. This is where our in-house video production team came in, being able to quickly edit some short films to the highest quality.
With many different awards to be given over the course of the evening, each having to be announced and followed by an acceptance speech live on air, each speaker had to be prepped beforehand. This is where Giggabox’s Online Brief and Green Room Virtual Event services came to do its magic. Two days prior to the awards night, as usual with Giggabox-produced Virtual Events, an Online Brief was organised involving our events team and the client. This was important for going over the event schedule and to go through the usual pre-event checklist to ensure the smooth running of the evening. Additionally, Giggabox’s Production Assistant was at hand to run the Green Rooms for the host and each presenter to make sure that all involved were prepared before going live, as well as to go through technical checks, such as audio quality. This meant that this event ran incredibly smoothly, without any unwanted disruptions, and with all involved knowing exactly what to do. We have written a case study on the RIFA Awards, so to read more on this event, click here.
Foster Denovo Annual Awards Ceremony
Filled with many laughs and much applause, we were glad to be involved in Foster Denovo’s Annual Awards Ceremony. This Virtual Awards Event featured a multitude of well-deserved winners, but most notably, began with an opening from well-renowned comedian, Justin Moorhouse. This thoroughly enjoyable opening session made for a highly successful evening.
Much like the previously mentioned Virtual Awards Events, Foster Denovo’s Annual Awards Ceremony utilised our graphics package extremely well. This included holding slides for the introduction screen and for each awards category, lower thirds for every speaker and every winner, as well as wipe transitions and confetti animations, creating the ultimate awards night aesthetic.
The Benefits of Hosting Virtual Awards Ceremonies
Potentially the most relatable benefit of Virtual Events is time. Think about how much time you save attending a Virtual Event as opposed to attending a live one at a specialist venue. Instead of having to organise travel for yourself, or even for all attending, with Virtual Events you have the luxury of everyone attending from their own home or office and going about their day as their regularly would.
Another note to consider is cost. Virtual Events are significantly cheaper to run than Live Events. They require less financial input from both the organisers and the attendees, who would typically have to book transport and accommodation.
Here at Giggabox, we are seeing more and more companies take advantage of sponsorship capabilities with their Virtual Events, especially online awards ceremonies. This can come in many forms, from sponsoring individual awards to the entire event.
If you require a production company for your event or would like any information regarding Virtual Events and the options available to you, contact Giggabox today
hello@giggabox.co.uk | 01280 735050 | www.giggabox.co.uk
Post written by Philip Barnes – Marketing Assistant at Giggabox