New Iron Imager Crowned!

Congrats to the ridiculously youthful Brad Leask, Network Imaging Producer for NOVA Entertainment, Melbourne, Australia, who is now sporting the title of “World’s Best Imager” as the winner of Benztown’s 6th Annual Iron Imager competition held on Friday, May 5 at the Worldwide Radio Summit in Hollywood. Leask went head-to-head with the 2016 Iron Imager Champion (and fellow Aussie), “Sideshow“ Mike Andersen, Triple M Imaging, Southern Cross Austereo of Sydney, Australia.

To compete for the Iron Imager crown, Leask and Andersen demonstrated their world-class imaging skills by producing a cash giveaway promo for a format that was unannounced until the day of the live competition. This year’s format was Rhythmic CHR. The guys used handpicked elements from several of Benztown’s 23 production libraries and an original script created by the Benztown team to create their killer promo in just 60 minutes. Judges for 2017 Iron Imager were Ken Charles, PD of KNX 1070/Los Angeles, Cat Thomas, VP of CHR for Cumulus Media and Benztown Imaging blog readers.

Dave “Chachi” Denes, Benztown President, said, “I often think to myself and hear others say that we don’t see a lot of millennials interested in working in our medium. At just 23, Brad has proven that not only is Gen Y interested, they’ve got some incredible chops!” Leask remarked, “Wow, what an awesome experience! It was a huge honor competing against Sidey. He is a great guy and we had so much fun together. A massive thanks to the Benztown team for having me out to L.A. and for shining a light on imaging people all over the world. What a crew! Bring on next year.”

Fun Fact: Benztown took home the honor of “Best Domestic VO/Imaging Production in Radio” at 2017 Worldwide Radio Summit Awards.