So on February 2 2015. Boomerang Europe will get a whole new look including which will, for the first time, include a brand new logo. Gone is the swirling blue line as a b&w box takes it’s place. With a week to go until the rebrand, let’s take a look down the memory line and remember Boomerang Europe’s previous looks.

Boomerang Europe launched on May 2. 2005, almost ten years ago, and it’s initial look was really great. The swirling blue logo was the main part of it and it was going through many different scenes with classic cartoon characters who would usually say their catchphrases. On air logo was a transparent, light gray writing.

It wasn’t until March 28.2012. that Boomerang got a whole new look. The logo was still the same and it was still swirling around the screen but this time it found itself in many different, mostly natural environment. The look was very colorful, it included different animals and characters that were not cartoon related and also a brand new music theme that repeated itself, with slight variations, in every ident. Word from Mainframe, who created the look: We created 5 connected environments for the Boomerang line and logo to exist in. The line is the most important feature for the channel, it represents the heritage of the channel and has long been used as a connecting element in their branding.

The 5 enviroments: Sky: Featuring flying rhinos of all things

Land: Flamingo, duck and purple crow

Sea: Fishes, squids, etc

Underground: Moles who work as miners, always ready for the next discovery

Space: Pink, four legged aliens

The environments contain a collage of 2D and 3D assets that take inspiration from content such as old Looney Tunes cartoons and remakes of classics such as The Pink Panther and Garfield.

To accompany the line we designed and created a set of characters for each environment, adding slight subversion, such as birds living on the ground and heavy mammals ruling the skies.

The packaging utilises all the environments, the Boomerang line linking them and resolving as the logo at appropriate points. Humorous situations were created for the background characters, designed so as not to distract but enhance the experience. No gags that may suffer from repeatability were chosen and we were very careful that the line or content took centre stage.

As well as the traditional packaging deliverables, such as end boards, menus, bumpers and ID’s, we also created stunt event packaging. We adorned the environments and characters with bespoke treatments for movies, halloween and Xmas.

Almost all the animation was achieved with After Effects, some small assets were created in Cinema4D. The characters were rigged using the extremely useful DUIK plugin and the puppet tool for added detail.

All packaging was supplied as AE templates with pre-rendered layers and simple processes to update them. Literally hundreds of templates were produced so they could be mixed up and kept as varied as possible throughout the schedule.

2015 look: by Art and Graft, B&W box added, new CMYKV color scheme (what is this? CN?): An isometric grid underpins every composition and provides a framework for a series of ‘diamond events’ – each one a uniquely animated flourish . Built with adaptability in mind, these diamond events were entirely interchangeable in the toolkit, giving an almost infinite number of combinations and possibilities across the outputs. This design system permeates the channel – every bumper and wayfinder a touchpoint of the core branding. . The moving, modular motion flows into every hour of the day pulling together IP and brand in pixel perfect harmony. The branding also served as a “playground” for the channel’s iconic characters

2018: Box logo acts as a button which causes cartoon characters like Tom from Tom and Jerry and Scooby-Doo to do silly things, made by Beautiful Creative. Now time for my fictional AU: Boomerang UK January 2025

What era would Kikoriki, The Owl and Co, Doraemon, Monster Allergy and George of the Jungle best fit in