Above the Influence has been one of the most enduring and successful social initiatives ever undertaken by the government. While we made dozens of videos and TV commercials, most of our efforts were focused on creating content, forums, events and activities that encouraged teens to make and share their own personal interpretation of what Above The Influence means. We were constantly documenting, gathering, curating and promoting their art, photos, fashion, videos and words.
To get the ball rolling, we created multiple ads and posters to inspire our teen artists. Each poster featured a text-in code, that when texted, would download the poster as wallpaper.
Then we hooked-up with deviantART.com, an online artist community of 14.5 million members.
DeviantART's members created 2,306 utterly original pieces during the 2-month run. Favorites were featured on various platforms, including abovetheinfluence.com.
And each week a new piece was chosen as the profile pic on the ATI Facebook page. This not only showcased the young artists, but also drove more teens to the contest.
We commissioned SoCal punk artist, Aaron Kraten, to create a series of animated banners that ran on music sites like Pandora. This was a Webby Nominee.
Summer is a particularly vulnerable time for teens. We created this messaging site so they could support each other over the break.