Picture this: the Canes are playing at home. You’re in line to fill your novelty “beer stick” along the concourse of Lenovo Center. You hear the bass of the jumbotron followed by the crowd’s roar; it’s your sign to take your seat.
On the screen, a video plays with snippets of fan cheers and Canes players’ celebrations. Red strobe lights run through the crowds. The towels are swinging and the adrenaline is pumping. The moments before the puck ever drops solidifies that this is playoff hockey, and you’re about to experience it. The memorable moment of being in that arena is exactly what the Canes’ creative team wants to accomplish.
Other WRAL Top Stories
“We have a mission to really story tell and share the experience of our team and our players, but also what it’s like to be a Carolina Hurricanes fan,” said Hurricanes Senior Creative Director Cato Cataldo.
The 13-person creative team is responsible for the social media videos you see on your phone, the playoff towels that drape across your seat and the videos that boom across Lenovo Center.
If the players are the experts on the ice, the creative team is the expert in the control room. They work out of a booth overlooking the arena. It’s filled with panels and screens, where they read the pulse of the room and respond with the proper music and video to keep the excitement alive.
What ends up on the jumbotron starts on a computer. A vast array of colorful clips masterfully spliced together so that when an animation of the Stanley Cup emerging through red static appears, the crowd goes wild.
“Everything you see is from the previous home game,” Cataldo said. “So a lot of fan images, a lot of previous action shots from the previous game, then we get into really a piece that is supposed to be homage to everything that makes up Carolina.”
For the postseason, the team starts by building a campaign around a slogan. This year it’s “Sound the Siren” - a nod to a hurricane warning. The slogan guides their work throughout the games.
The videos go through multiple iterations of editing, motion graphics and color-correcting, with each team member bringing their own unique skill. The Canes’ visuals have gained national attention for their ability to rally a crowd.
“A lot of times it’s right up to the deadline, we are really a lot of times piecing together those final audio tweaks and video tweaks,” Cataldo said.
It’s a job that involves long hours, a lot of travel, and a lot of rewards.
That’s what we want to get through to our fans, is that they’re supporting a great group of people, and I think that’s really cool to be part of,” Cataldo said.