When Match Point League came to me, they had two non-negotiables: a logo reveal that earned its lighting cue, and a video that worked equally well in a 15-second pre-roll and a 45-second hero edit. Here’s how the cut came together.
The brief
America’s first tennis and pickleball matchmaking league wanted a piece that felt like a championship final — but compressed into the time it takes to scroll past a story.
The structure
I built the cut around a three-act compression: the empty stadium, the players entering, the moment of contact. Everything else gets cut. Every transition is motivated by a real physical event in the frame — a ball striking, a player turning, a light igniting.
The logo reveal
The brief said “motion-tracked tennis ball.” The right answer turned out to be a pickleball — heavier silhouette, harder edge, reads at thumbnail size. We tracked the bounce through three live-action plates, then handed off to motion graphics for the final logo lock.
The grade
Stadium lighting at twilight is the look you want and the look you can’t shoot. We graded the night plates as if they’d been lit with a single warm key, then crushed the blacks just enough to keep the brand color saturated against them.