AI-Powered Storyboarding for High-Performance Ad Campaigns
Case
Study
Macbook Air
DURATION
June 2024 - August 2024
ROLE
Senior UI/UX Designer at BLKBOX.ai, AdTech SaaS Product Suite, redefining how brands conceptualise ad creatives. Led the end-to-end design of Ideate (BLKBOX.ai Product). Ideate is an AI-powered tool designed to solve creative fatigue by automating the process of ad ideation. I led the design of this product end-to-end—from data-driven UI flows to high-fidelity interactive storyboards.
Overview
About
WHAT WAS THIS PROJECT?
Ideate is an AI-powered storyboarding tool built at BLKBOX to solve one of marketing’s biggest challenges: generating fresh, high-performing ad concepts at scale. Traditionally, brainstorming ad ideas involved weeks of analyzing performance data, reviewing competitor content, and aligning creative teams. Ideate compresses that entire process into minutes. Powered by large language models and creative intelligence, the tool analyses client and competitor ads, identifies narrative patterns, and generates structured storyboards—complete with creative briefs—to guide ad production.
Product Vision
WHAT DID WE IMAGINE?
Creative teams often lose time in research and guesswork just to generate one good ad idea. We imagined a faster, smarter way—where data, trends, and storytelling come together to spark high-performing concepts instantly.
That’s what Ideate delivers: AI-powered storyboarding that turns insights into ready-to-execute ad ideas in minutes, helping teams move faster and create with confidence.
Context
Background
WHAT’S GOING ON?
Ad fatigue is real—and it's costing brands performance. Marketing teams are under pressure to constantly produce fresh, engaging creatives, but traditional ideation is time-consuming, subjective, and often disconnected from performance data. With markets evolving rapidly and campaigns getting shorter, creative teams need a faster, more intelligent way to brainstorm ideas that actually work.
Ideate was born from this gap: a tool that blends data, AI, and storytelling to help teams generate effective ad concepts in minutes—not weeks.
Problem
WHAT DID WE IMAGINE?
Creative teams are under constant pressure to deliver fresh, high-performing ads. The traditional process of analyzing past ads, conducting market research, and aligning teams takes weeks.
Marketing managers and creative leads needed:
- Faster turnaround for idea generation.
- Data-backed concepts that align with performance
- Visual structures to guide creative execution
Opportunity
WHERE CAN WE GO TO?
Ideate uses AI to bridge creative thinking with real-time performance data. By analyzing winning ads and extracting patterns from
client and competitor content, Ideate
generates ready-to-use storyboards that guide both creative direction and execution. This gives teams a smarter starting point—backed by insights, not guesswork—and transforms ideation into a scalable, strategic process.
Ideate
Transform data into ad storyboards—fast, smart, and ready to perform.
How might we help marketers generate high-performing ad concepts—quickly, confidently, and without creative burnout?
Design Goal for Ideate
Our research showed that marketing teams face major bottlenecks in the ideation phase—spending weeks on performance analysis, creative briefs, and scattered brainstorming sessions. The lack of structure and data-driven direction often led to repetitive ideas or misaligned campaigns.
We found that creative success relied heavily on intuition, not insights—making the process unpredictable and slow. To address this, we designed Ideate with four key goals in mind: Speed, Clarity, Creativity Support, and Trust in AI. The aim was to create a platform where marketers and creative teams could go from data to storyboard in minutes, not weeks—backed by insights they could believe in.
Features
Intelligent Ideation
AI-Powered Storyboarding
Ideate transforms ad performance data into structured storyboards, complete with scene-level breakdowns, CTAs, hooks, and value propositions, ready for creative execution.
Smart Loading Narratives
Implemented progressive AI feedback with real-time labels like “Extracting Visual Patterns” and “Analysing Story Structure” to build user trust and maintain engagement during idea generation.
Reference Integration
Users can upload their own ads, select top-performing creatives, or choose competitor assets, enabling the AI to tailor results using familiar formats and brand styles.
User Control
Storyboard Editor
Designed a drag-and-reorder interface allowing users to easily edit, re-sequence, or regenerate individual scenes. Supports adding new scenes and duplicating versions for testing.
Versioning & Regeneration
Enabled exploration of creative variations with version history and one-click regeneration, facilitating quick experimentation and internal alignment.
Microinteractions
Crafted clear, calming modals for key actions like unsaved data, credit use, and errors—helping users feel informed, in control, and confident at every step.
Performance & Usability
Project Dashboard
Developed a grid-based layout displaying all ideation projects at a glance. Users can filter by product, campaign goal, or creative stage to access storyboards quickly.
High-Intent Inputs
Enabled exploration of creative variations with version history and one-click regeneration, facilitating quick experimentation and internal alignment.
Seamless Handoff
Facilitated direct export of storyboard details into the team's creative production workflow allowing user to request an ad video through it, eliminating the need for additional documentation.
Creative Briefs
Each storyboard includes editable briefs—messaging tone, visual guidelines, audio cues, and CTA recommendations—ensuring creative execution aligns with performance data.
Storyboard Detail View
Structured key sections like Storyline, User & Product Insights, Creative Elements, and Guidelines. Added features like scene reordering, regeneration, manual edits, and version history. Included a creative brief module with CTA suggestions, messaging tone, and visual/audio guidance.
Core Experience
Entry Point Integration
Created dual entry flows:
- From Analyse: Users can transition into Ideate after reviewing top-performing creatives.
- From Ideate: Users can initiate new projects and begin ideation from scratch.
Project Setup Flow
Designed a guided, multi-step form to collect key inputs such as product URL, target audience, visual references, aspect ratio, and creative guidelines, optimized for both marketers and designers.
Project Configuration & Settings
Built flexible project settings to customise AI behaviour based on brand, tone, or campaign type. Enabled collaborative commenting and editing for smoother team workflows.
Trust-Building AI States
Developed informative loading states that transparently convey AI processes.
Impact
What did this product change or improve?
By bridging performance data with AI-generated storyboards, Ideate significantly streamlined the ad ideation process. Creative and marketing teams could now move from data analysis to execution-ready ideas in minutes—not weeks.
- 60% reduction in brainstorming and concepting time.
- 2.3× increase in creative output quality.
- Improved alignment across cross-functional teams.
- Reduced reliance on external creative strategy or manual research.
- Positioned BLKBOX as an AI-first thought leader in Ad-tech innovation.
Reflection
How did I feel working on Ideate?
Designing Ideate was a deeply rewarding experience—it merged creativity, AI, and strategic thinking in ways I hadn’t explored before. Working alongside growth marketers, analysts, and creative teams gave me insight into the real challenges of ad fatigue and concept burnout. I loved building something that empowered teams to think faster and bolder. It was also fulfilling to design for trust in AI—a space that’s still so new, yet full of potential.
Copyright
Yashasvi Kishor. All rights reserved