FCB’s new captions take Digital Craft

THE WINNER of the Digital Craft Grand Prix for 2025 is ‘Caption With Intention’, entered by FCB Chicago on behalf of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, Rakish Entertainment and the Chicago Hearing Society.

‘Caption With Intention’ is a long-overdue evolution of the closed captions that appear at the bottom of TV and movie screens. Last improved in 1971, the goal was to create captions that do a better job of conveying emotion and meaning for the 430million people with impaired hearing that rely on them.

Jury President Naoki Tanaka

The new captions use colour, animation and technology to improve syncing with the action, distinguish between speakers and capture the volume and intensity of every word on screen.

Jury President Naoki Tanaka, chief creative officer, Dentsu Lab said the Jury asked itself three questions about the 554 entries from 49 countries they reviewed: “Does it move the heart? Does it change lives? And does it contain a sense of obsessive passion and madness? The work which rose to top matched these criteria.”

In the case of the Grand Prix winner, he said that it also shone through because of its simplicity: “Behind the scenes this entry is deeply crafted, but it is simple and accessible to use, which is important because it is ordinary people who experience it.” AI came up in a lot of entries, Tanaka said. “We really felt the acceleration of AI and data this year. The AI-based entries that rose to the top were the ones that really understood how to use AI for a creative purpose.”

FCB Chicago also won a Gold Lion for ‘Caption With Intention’, while FCB New York picked up two Gold Lions for ‘Tree Correspondents’, on behalf of Hyundai.