My New Favorite Futbolista (MNFF)

Client
NBCUniversal, Telemundo, LX News

Year
2022-2023

My New Favorite Futbolista [Footballer] is an award-winning sports podcast produced by NBCUniversal. Through interviews and other unique content, the show gives viewers & listeners an exclusive, behind-the-scenes look at world-cup football and the athletes who compete in it (See More).

Building completely from scratch, NBCU needed a fresh identity and every asset, dimension and file-type possible to promote MNFF. Given the great privilege of leading the design process, I sought to establish an effective title/logo and identity system that could work across multiple mediums.

MNFF Podcast

Producers
NBCUniversal

Art Direction
Hi-Tone Images

Translated in both English and Spanish, the show was hosted by former footballer, Juan Pablo Angel and sports journalist, Eric Alvarez.

The telecast version of the show can be seen on NBCUniversal’s flagship streaming platform, Peacock, while the audio version runs across all common streamers, Spotify, Apple Podcasts & more.

MNFF Trailer

Producer, Editor
Fernando Hurtado, NBCUniversal

Art Direction
Hi-Tone Images

This is the debut/test trailer for My New Favorite Futbolista

Logo/Title + Identity System Briefing

Origin Sketch

As originator of the concept, LX News was adamant about staying within the parameters of their newly established brand standards. With that in mind, I decided to work backwards in creating the logo/title, by starting with a few ‘type-lock‘ sketches of their standard, Montserrat Bold font.

Typography

The Montserrat Bold font can be viewed as ‘derivative’ to many, but it also provides a clear, legible presence. Working with the font made me consider ways to make the final shape scalable and multi-functional, yet still readable.

Primary

Color Palette

The pre-existing LX News colors of Orange/White/Black opened a beautiful doorway in my mind as I began developing the concept. After seeing the swatches, I knew that some insinuation of ‘heat‘ or ‘flames‘ needed to be represented in the final iconography.

Logo Iterations

After sorting through potential brand colors, and considering the direction of ‘flames‘ or ‘heat’ emitting from a football (or soccer ball,) I began creating the vector shapes [seen below] illustrating ‘movement.’

After exploring different type-locks and combining them with the new ‘heat‘ and/or ‘movement‘ vectors, it led to the below iterations. In the end, I was able to fine-tune the previous iterations, combine the elements and finalize them into a multi-functional, scalable logo.

Iteration 1

Iteration 2

Final result

Style Explorations

Completing the logo/title allowed for generating a small-scale identity system. Utilizing modules from the ‘movement‘ vectors and football (or soccer ball), I created style frames and threw a grunge texture into the back-drop—along with the brand colors—to provide a gritty, athletic tone.

Considering NBCU and Telemundo planned to film MNFF in a studio, my aim here was to create visual elements that could subtly sit in the background. They could live on TV-monitors or even break down into printed collateral like step-repeat backdrops.

Style frame 1

Style frame 2

Static Modules

Once the MNFF logo/title and visual identity elements were defined, I then pivoted to NBCU and Telemundo’s requested digital collateral. Shown below are only a few of the dozens-upon-dozens of marketing assets and templates I generated in order to help the studios promote the new podcast.

Podcast Thumbnails

YouTube Thumbnails

MNFF Banner Ad (Spanish)(Twitter/X)

Social Media Quote Card

Animated Modules

Once I completed most of the static digital elements for MNFF, the fun would begin in animating them. Shown below, I created a short title open, plus in-show transitions, in addition to program end-cards for multiple screen formats.