Limitations as a creative tool
Ah, limitations. So often, they're an unwanted obstacle, getting in the way of that project at precisely the wrong time. Budget cut? Athlete time down from one day to one hour? Your first choice of kit already in use on another shoot?
Working in the wild world of sports content, we've faced these all before. It's expected when working with athletes, teams, and sponsors, who are all under plenty of pressure throughout the year.
But here's the thing—limitations don't have to be bad news. At Cut Media, we see them as opportunities to enhance our projects instead of holding us back. After all, you only get diamonds under intense pressure.
Here are the ways we use limitations as a creative tool at Cut Media.
On the set of the world’s smallest bike launch
1 - Limitations spark creativity
Ever handed your creative team a brief and a blank white page, hoping for their next award-winning concept? Sometimes, you’ll get lucky, and they’ll fire into action, but other times, the opposite is true—a lack of direction risks disjointed thinking, creative frustration, and going around in circles. Without clear guidelines, it's really hard to know how far to push an idea.
This is when we introduce limitations to the creative process.
Leading the pack: over 100 “what if?” cards. Brainstormed by the team and dotted around the studio to break out of creative blocks you find yourself in. Think of them like the bumpers in 10-pin bowling, giving you direction when you're feeling stuck. And hopefully, striking gold.
“What if we could only use stills?” What if we never showed the product?” What if there was no athlete?”
The answers to these questions will 100% bring up ideas that would never have been considered if you had just faced the brief and an empty whiteboard. Being boxed in by limitation can help lead to out-of-the-box thinking.
2 - Limitations lead to unique solutions
Creative Director Andy when he’s had another lightbulb moment
In the studio, we often argue about who the better problem solvers are: creatives or producers.
Whether limitations are natural or forced, they're always part of the creative process. Like it or not, we’ll never have unlimited budgets, and we always have to work around athlete schedules. These are daily limitations we have to deal with.
If limitations are unavoidable, let’s use them to our advantage. They force us to approach problems uniquely, leading to clever, creative, and original solutions.
By asking how we can add value to a project or best invest a budget, we can connect to the client’s audience in powerful, impactful ways.
Budget is cost, but solutions add value.
And the best way to add value is through ideas. Not just the one big idea that forms the basis of the concept but the thousands of ideas that come together to develop and complete the project. Every good idea, no matter how small, can add value.
3 - Limitations enhance collaboration
Content creation is a team game, and we believe in collaborating at every step of the process to overcome limitations.
Sharing ideas, resources, and skills, we work and play as a team in every aspect of the creative process. Whether it's in the creative, production, marketing, or HR side of things, we've found there's no better way to overcome a creative block than to ask a studio bursting with energy for new ideas.
By collaborating, we can combine our skills and talents to create the best possible experience for our client's audience. Each element, from copy to sound design, can be an ace card. And combinations? A royal flush.
While we love adding limitations to our creative process, sometimes we can't avoid them. Here are two of our favourite projects from recent years where we harnessed the obstacle in our path to develop more imaginative solutions.
“What if we only had 15 minutes with 3x World Champion Max Verstappen?” Capturing the best F1 shot ever with Red Bull
Santa Cruz 5010: Get creative with your surroundings
You’ve probably heard us talk about this one before. The big launch of Santa Cruz’s flagship trail bike relocated from a star-studded Greek road trip to our Senior Creative’s back garden in Glasgow thanks to the events of 2020.
In this case, we took on the forced limitation of the pandemic and challenged ourselves with the campaign tagline to: ‘get creative with your surroundings’. What if we took it literally?
Next thing you know, we were 3D printing a miniature bike, digging trails through flowerbeds, and racking up over 39 million views on YouTube.
Cervélo x Team Sunweb
Every year, cycling teams and brands face the same dilemma: How do you announce your new partnership when you can’t show athletes using shiny new kit until the contract kicks in on the first of January?
We tackled this problem for Cervélo back in 2018, playing with the limitation by showing Sunweb’s top riders doing all they could to get their hands on their new kit.
You can safely bet we wouldn’t have come up with this concept without the limitations forced on us by team contracts—proving partnership announcements can be fun and creative, too, even within the constraints of contractual obligations.
