On Monday, Sept. 8, the nationally syndicated morning talk show The Daily Buzz will unveil its new image and brand identity, all elements designed by Full Sail students in two separate contests. The new show image, logo and website will launch nationwide.

The five student winners of the second contest – and one from the first contest – will be in the studio audience Monday to watch The Daily Buzz unveil its new look. Monday’s show will also feature a reality TV-style video of the students working on their winning design. The five most recent student winners are all from Computer Animation: Jounier Ruiz, Jorby Ruiz, Donavant Bryant, MarKeviss DuPree and Arturo Gomez.

Last year’s winners, all students from the Digital Arts & Design program, created the color schemes and logos that the Computer Animation team worked from to build the animated logo and intro.

Computer Animation team captain Jorby Ruiz said his team studied the television program’s previous opening and analyzed their target audience to come up with a plan for a new intro. Ruiz said the old introduction had a “city” feel, and they wanted to emphasize the idea that the show airs not only in hundreds of U.S. markets, but also in Europe.

“We wanted to keep... the city feel that they had, but we learned that their show was also being shown in other countries, so we came up with the idea that if we were to have elements from the different cities around the world, people would feel a little bit closer and would relate to the intro,” said Ruiz.

To do this, they designed the logo to spin around a “media” world, accentuated with monuments like Mt. Rushmore, the Statue of Liberty, the Space Needle, the Eiffel Tower and Big Ben.

The group also wanted to add a cartoonish element to appeal to a younger audience. “We still wanted to target the audience that they are currently targeting, and we also wanted to target a younger audience, and so for that reason we wanted to go cartoony,” said Ruiz.

As winners of the re-branding contest, the students will receive name credits for both the television broadcast as well as The Daily Buzz website, and have significant professional credits for their portfolios before graduation.

“All the students are now going to have credits on a nationally-syndicated show. That’s incredible,” said Bill Galbreath, Program Director for Digital Arts & Design. “To get a credit on a TV show is about as good as it gets.”

Ruiz said that more than anything, his team was happy that their client – The Daily Buzz – was pleased with the results of their efforts. “When they saw the scene, they were happy, they were thrilled with it,” related Ruiz.

Doug Gealy, President and C.O.O. of ACME Communications, owner of The Daily Buzz, echoed the sentiment.

“This is one of the most exciting ways we have expanded upon our relationship with Full Sail University,” said Gealy. “This endeavor has far surpassed any of our expectations. The student design teams wowed us from the start, from their storyboard presentations to their final product.”

Steve Bailey, vice president of Marketing and Promotions for The Daily Buzz said that moving the show’s production to campus in 2007 has been a win-win situation for students and for the program.

“Broadcasting live from the Full Sail University campus provides us with motivated student talent which is at the heart of a unique creative collaboration,” said Bailey. “We are excited to do something that we think has never been done before which is to launch a complete image redesign for a forward-thinking younger audience of a national television program without an outside design or marketing agency, and instead allow students of that exact demographic to present their fresh perspectives and original vision.”