When Star Wars was released on BluRay, eBay gained exclusive rights for the launch. eBay created a fan portal, full of exclusive movies, concept art, and a curated set of Star Wars collectibles and memorabilia. I led design on three components of the initiative.
The portal design was finalized by the time I got there, so I focused on the video & trivia experience. Each day exclusive videos, trivia, and concept art were ‘unlocked’ for one of the movies in the saga, counting down to the Blu-ray release.
I designed the video section made it clear how many there were, how many were viewable now, and when to come back for the next 'unlocking'. The trivia and concept art 'hot spots' on the page used animation to make them obvious and clickable.
During the week-long run-up to the launch, the home page and global navigation featured Star Wars characters peeking out from behind the logo - a position we internally refer to as the ‘doodle’. On launch day, Darth Vader and the Death Star took over the home page.
For this part, I had to sift through the entire LucasFilm library to select the right set of images. (Has a designer ever told you how fun their job can be? This was one of those times.) After that, I composed, arranged, and typeset them in several different applications.
The Blu Ray launch was heavily promoted across every channel. We have a large variety of advertisement that happens across eBay.com, email marketing pieces, and partner websites.
I created a family of banner ads for every application, with several variations of messaging, translated into five different languages, and laid out for thirteen different banner sizes.
This was a first for eBay, so we really didn't know what to expect as far as traffic, engagement, and other metrics. But it was considered a success, and the campaign definitely boosted sales for Star Wars memorabilia.
I'm very happy with the movie and trivia showcase. Our usability testers found every feature without prodding, we got kudos from LucasFilm for the quality of our work, and it was just great fun to be part of a cultural event.