Ago 31 2007 | Pitches

Another success for Southampton Uni student

Matthew Benjamin, a student from Southampton Solent University, UK, who goes by the alias Franky Maverick, has taken a second win our international competition for young creatives.
He received a prize of £250 for his idea ‘Protect & Serve’ that answered the brief to create a cool brand experience for Jeans.

This was the final challenge for the 2006-07 OpenAdTalent awards that were created to help prepare students for employment.

Matthew created a fake Special Forces Unit called ‘THE SWAT TEAM’ (Special Women & Tactics) to protect and serve the cool brand image of jeans.

Peter Harold, an OpenAdTalent judge and award winning former creative director said: “I thought this idea best expressed the brief. It 's a fun, sexy and relevant idea, really well developed and worked out and, I would imagine, be enjoyed by everyone who takes part, especially the strip search part.”

The young creative initially had success with OpenAdTalent at the start of this season’s contest while in his second year of university. Now about to enter the third year of his advertising degree he said: “To be able to make ads and get a bit of a reward is great, hopefully I can win a few more and it will help land that first job.”

The winning idea can be seen on the OpenAdTalent site. The winners’ billboard shows the idea in full along with more of the judges’ comments.

Runner-up in the competition with an award of 100 GBP was Astrid October from Manchester Metropolitan University, UK, for her idea Denim Identity Inner City Photo Studios. The remaining students in the top 5 were: Maria Fernanda Berríos, UNIACC, Chile for her idea Naughty Avatar, Renzo Vacarisas, also from UNIACC, Chile for his idea Jeans Odyssey and Janez Žepic and Jaka Florjancic, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia for their idea Jeans Art.

Shortlisted students included: Ashraf Foda, Manchester Metropolitan University, UK, Kelly Heffey, Chester University, UK, Emilian Dechev, New Bulgarian University, Bulgaria and Roger Fuentes, UNIACC, Chile.

The university to take the overall prize of 2000 GBP will be announced on the OpenAdTalent site soon.

OpenAd.net members can see – and buy - the students’ entries in our Gallery.

Arriba ^