FIFA World Cup 2014 – Intro Draft Animation - サッカー栄光のイレブン

The 2014 FIFA World Cup hosted by Brazil, a nation that has come to represent the very best of football, was never likely to be just like the others, and is considered itself by many football fans alike to be one of the greatest ever staged. Held from 12 June to 13 July 2014, this edition proved extraordinary in all sorts of ways, with packed stadiums and passionate crowds treated to thrills, upsets and a record number of goals.

At the time of the 2014 bid, FIFA guaranteed in 2003 that the tournament would be in South America (CONMEBOL), in line with its then-active policy of rotating the World Cup’s hosting rights amongst different confederations. Only Brazil and Colombia formally declared their candidacy, but after the withdrawal of the latter from the process, Brazil was officially elected as hosts unopposed on 30 October 2007.

By innovation, the 2014 World Cup had introduced goal-line technology, or GLT. Being similar to the ‘hawkeye’ in tennis, GLT tracks the position of the ball in relation to the goal-line, with the aim of eliminating human error when deciding whether a goal has been scored or not. This edition also sought the first World Cup usage of the so-called “vanishing spray”, which was used by the referee to mark out the requisite 10 yards on a free kick.

The 2014 tournament was won by Germany, claiming the country’s fourth World Cup title and its first since Germany’s reunification in 1990, just as Mario Götze volleyed a left-footed shot into the net to pin down a Leonel Messi-led Argentina, and to secure a 1–0 victory after extra time. En route to the final, Germany had manhandled Brazil hard in front of a home crowd, defeating them at 7-1 in what would be the host team’s heaviest margin of defeat in history. Brazil would eventually finish in fourth place after falling to the Netherlands, 3-0, in the third-place playoff.

Celebrating the culture of samba, the favelas, Brazil’s flora and fauna, and the country’s passion for the game of football, the official title sequence for the 2014 FIFA World Cup was repeatedly shown on-air right before and after the broadcasts of every match, and was designed by Derby-based motion graphics studio Boxframe. The firm had pitched in 3DR Studio, in which they designed, modeled, rigged and animated all the digital assets for the opener. This here is a draft animation at the time when the title sequence was still developed just several months prior to the World Cup.