Some activations rent equipment; this one built a product. Across multiple dates in June and July 2026, during the FIFA event period, the Canadian Premier League ran a custom big head photo activation with Booth Empire in Toronto and Vancouver - a start-to-finish pipeline that photographed fans, painted their faces digitally in CPL colours and handed them back as oversized physical paddles. More than 1,100 physical big-head paddles were delivered across the program.
The Assignment
Operating during a period when soccer attention in Canada was at its peak, the league needed a sports fan activation that produced something visibly, unmistakably its own: a physical object fans would carry, wave and photograph, stamped with CPL identity on both sides. The program had to run across multiple dates and two cities, mixing physical production days with digital-only experiences.
Designing the Big Head Photo Activation Workflow
The guest journey compressed a full production pipeline into a single visit. Fans were photographed on-site, and background removal isolated each participant from the scene. AI-generated face paint was then applied in Canadian Premier League colours - a digital treatment that turned every portrait into a supporter’s portrait. Each guest’s head was composited onto a custom oversized fan design, printed, and applied to custom-cut PVC, with CPL branding across the reverse side.
The result was not a photo of a fan. It was a manufactured piece of fan equipment with the guest’s own face on the front and the league’s identity on the back.
Built as a Production Line
The physical activation days ran as genuine on-site manufacturing. Multiple DNP DS820 printers operated as a coordinated production pool, so print capacity scaled with demand rather than bottlenecking behind a single device. Downstream of printing, each output still had to be applied to custom-cut PVC before it reached the guest - a fabrication step most photo activations never attempt at event pace.
Demand justified the machinery: lines remained active throughout the physical activation days. The program’s multi-date, two-city structure added a second layer of complexity - the Toronto dates included physical big-head paddles, while digital-only big-head experiences ran on additional dates in both Toronto and Vancouver, extending the campaign’s reach beyond the fabrication days.
Key Results
- More than 1,100 physical big-head paddles delivered
- Multi-date program across June and July 2026
- Activations in Toronto and Vancouver, combining physical and digital-only formats
- Continuous queues throughout the physical activation days
Delivering over 1,100 fabricated physical products - each one photographed, treated, printed, cut and finished on-site or through the program pipeline - demonstrates capacity well beyond standard photo activation volume. The number represents completed branded objects, not simply camera captures.
What Made It Work
The output was a product, not a print. A rigid PVC paddle with the fan’s face and CPL branding is built to be carried into stadiums and photographed for years.
AI treatment personalized at scale. Digitally applied face paint in league colours gave every single participant a bespoke supporter look without a makeup chair or a time penalty.
The printer pool absorbed the crowds. Coordinated DNP DS820 units meant sustained queues translated into sustained output.
The two-format structure stretched the budget’s reach. Physical paddle days delivered the flagship product; digital-only dates carried the same concept to more fans in more places.
Build a Similar Big-Head Activation
Booth Empire develops custom big head photo activations and other fabricated-output fan experiences for sports organizations across Canada and the United States, including AI image treatment, coordinated high-volume printing, custom PVC fabrication and multi-city deployment.
Contact Booth Empire to discuss custom fan activations, AI image treatment, fabrication, and multi-city deployment for your next campaign.
