Advertising and Branding (ADBR)

Every great campaign begins with an idea that sparks the creative process. Equipped with a clear understanding of strategy, audience and brand purpose, students leverage industry trends and begin to concept these big ideas. Guided by the brand brief, students practice skills of copywriting and art direction to execute original solutions to brand problems.

Development of prototypes is the first step in realizing innovative advertising concepts. Through exploration of industry-standard production workflows and technology, students hone their concepting and ideation processes and produce a variety of compelling branded content.

Successful communication of brand experiences includes expertly crafted typographic voice. In this course, students explore the essentials of typography as they apply to advertising, learning how to strategically incorporate typographic elements to create dynamic solutions.

Brand storytelling drives engagement by connecting consumers with the ethos of a brand. Students explore the essential skills art directors need to craft powerful campaigns that resonate with consumers through storytelling, visual design and strategic problem solving.

Successful brands offer experiences that engage their consumers beyond the use of products and services. In this course, students explore the ecosystem that surrounds branded interactive content and create interactive solutions that enable engagement between brands and audiences.

Copywriters give voice and personality to brands. This course surveys how copywriters use written and verbal communication to create and express authentic brand personalities. Students learn fundamental ideation techniques as well as the basics of brand voice development and cohesive campaign writing.

Innovative brands engage with their customers through solutions that respond to the user. From packaging and mobile applications to virtual experiences and gaming, multi-platform strategies are the keystone for today's most recognized brands. Students approach the world of brand engagement through a multi-platform perspective and design innovative solutions, from physical to virtual.

Strategy is the compass directing creative brand solutions. In this course, students merge an understanding of the brand, its purpose and target audience to reveal insights and create meaningful briefs that propel compelling solutions. Students study the strategist's role as a catalyst for creativity across agency departments.

Sophisticated brand communication requires a symbiotic relationship between language and design. In this course, students expand their understanding beyond the fundamentals of typography to produce visually stimulating and emotionally engaging brand messages that captivate and persuade audiences across platforms.

Advancing copywriting principles across various platforms, students produce a consistent brand voice that enthusiastically engages the target audience at multiple touchpoints. Students learn to combine creative strategy, conceptual ingenuity and the written word to take brand stories into captivating campaigns.

Students synthesize their art direction skills to create sophisticated campaigns that stimulate, delight and surprise target audiences. With an emphasis on brand voice, adaptive problem solving and immersive storytelling, students engage a target audience and solve a brand objective.

Students refine their copywriting skills, developing campaigns that forge deeply enriched connections between brand and audience. They create immersive brand narratives and synergistic stories that generate participation across platforms.

Creative technologists create connections between diverse platforms and technologies to facilitate dynamic brand engagement. In this course, students conceptualize and build imaginative ideas grounded in technology as they learn project roles, workflows and platforms for developing innovative branded content.

Campaigns define the way people think about and experience a brand's presence. In this course, students conceive the overarching visual look, tone and personality of a brand. They create campaigns to launch new brands or refresh and reposition established ones.

In this studio course, students explore the ongoing relationship between advertising and popular culture. Through research and project execution, students experience how advertising can be shaped by the emerging trends, desires and fantasies of the very target groups it seeks to persuade. Students also learn about and create campaigns designed to start new trends based on a specific, or projected, cultural climate.

From previsualization to post-production, art directors and photographers collaborate to successfully capture a brand’s creative vision. Fulfilling the role of art director, advertising students partner with their peers in photography to develop concepts, direct photo shoots and craft original, high-quality images for multi-platform brand engagement.

A brand’s ability to directly connect with consumers through meaningful communication is a key aspect to engagement. Students in this course will develop the advanced skills to write compelling long-form brand narratives that are both tactical and targeted. This includes native content, weblogs, interactive promotions and direct response materials.

Today's brands are choosing brand films and social content solutions to connect with their audience through emotion and energy. In collaboration with copywriters and other creatives, students engage in all aspects of this process, including concepting, storyboarding and production. The innumerable choices they make — from casting and scripting to lighting and camera angles — transform ideas into compelling, effective brand stories.

The spirit and essence of a brand's story comes alive through film and reaches expanding audiences in an instant. In this course, students refine their ability to develop concepts and write scripts for brand films and social content with an eye toward identifying influencers and creating contagion.

Blending the fantasy of animated storytelling with allure of branded content, stop motion advertising allows brands to engage their consumers through a distinctive art form. Through on-set collaboration, students gain key professional skills to become art directors and stop motion auteurs. Art direction students work with lighting, cameras and production planning to generate animated, stop motion narratives for branded content.

From on-board pizza delivery ovens to snack bags with embedded breathalyzers, successful brands harness the power of technology to create innovative, product-based solutions that extend and reinforce the connection between the brand and the user. Students apply advanced knowledge of multi-platform applications and emerging technology to develop user-focused products that extend a brand's ecosystem.

The ability to create a groundswell of intrigue with a brand's message is vital to advertising. In this course, students learn the power of using brand entertainment channels to develop contextually impactful concepts that drive story creation between brand and audience.

Students in this course curate their personal brand and build a portfolio that highlights a command of strategic thinking and well-crafted prototypes, demonstrating multi-platform brand engagement. They refine their portfolios, learn to network successfully and to present themselves as advertising professionals.

Internships offer students valuable opportunities to work in a professional environment and gain firsthand experience to help them prepare for careers. In an approved internship setting, a student typically spends one quarter working with an on-site professional supervisor and a faculty internship supervisor to achieve specific goals and objectives related to the program of study.

In this pinnacle course of the program, students advance their area of focus in the advertising discipline and complete a multi-platform solution in an environment that mirrors professional practice. Students curate expertly crafted brand experiences that incorporate all aspects of a fully realized campaign from research to implementation.