NUMBER OF THE DAY

Total number of visitors to my blog. Today. On January 1st. At 1 p.m. No kidding!

 

INVISIBLE – how a homeless man turns transparent

Intelligent ambient media concepts examine new ways of interacting with their surroundings. They blend in to stand out. A good ambient installation beats every billboard in making a message visible. Or invisible! Here is how we made a man dissappear.

CREDITS:

Client: fiftyfifty street magazine
Agency: Euro RSCG Duesseldorf
Creative Directors: Florian Meimberg, Torsten Pollmann, Felix Glauner
Art Director: Jean-Pierre Gregor
Copywriter: Till Koester
Production Company: CONGAZ Visual Media Company

 

NET NUGGETS 12/01/08

How stuff works.

After tagging Air Force One, DROGA 5 goes viral again. For Guitar Hero World Tour.

At least one belongs on every christmas wish list: GENERAL ROBOTS

Hypnotic and very very addictive: AUDITORIUM

 

BOOORING!

A meme. Well.
I was never gonna take part in any of those blog chain things. But because I like sneaker-seb and because he was the one who tagged me and because that movie that’s just on TV really sucks and because the cutest 12-weeks-old boy on this planet just just got tired of playing and fell asleep right next to me and because I just opened another bottle of wine and because I’m a little drunk – I’ll do it.

OK. Six boring facts about myself. That’s easy.

1- I take a tattered grey bunny with me whenever I travel to productions. It talks to me.

2 – The bunny’s name is also the password to my WLAN at home.

3 – My mom is the only person that still calls me by the very silly nickname my friends gave me back in high school.

4 – I used to be an acolyte in a catholic church. My (identical) twin brother and I were always appointed on christmas and easter masses because we looked so symetrical next to the altar.

5 – 18 years ago, when my twin brother’s not-so-intelligent girlfriend came over to our house, I pretended to be him. She didn’t notice.

6 – Last February, I had a lucid dream.

That’s it. According to the rules, I have to “tag” six other bloggers. Sorry, guys! Your turn.
roObin, Hemant, Sascha, Nijko, Beers & Ideas (that counts as two!)

THE RULES
• Mention the rules on your blog.
• Tell six quirky yet boring, unspectacular details about yourself.
• Tag six other
• Go to each person’s blog and let them know they are tagged.

 

WHODUNNIT?

A whodunnit (for “Who done it?”) is a complex, plot-driven variety of the detective story in which the puzzle is the main feature of interest. The reader is provided with clues […] before the solution is revealed.

(WIKIPEDIA)

WHO DONE IT:

Advertising Agency: WCRS, London, UK
Creative Directors: Yan Elliott, Luke Williamson
Art Director: Kit Dayaram
Copywriter: Tom Spicer
Agency Producer: James Lethem
Director: Chris Palmer
Production Company: Gorgeous
Editor: Paul Watts at The Quarry
Post-production: The Mill
Audio post-production: Wave

 

WHO IS JOHNNY X?

SONY ERICSSON enters the arena of branded entertainment. “Who is Johnny X” is a webisodic online thriller in 9 parts. A man wakes up in a nightly Bangkok street. The amnesiac hero tumbles through the Thai capital on his mission to rediscover his identity. His companion: SONY ERICSSON’s iPhone rival  Xperia X1. The smatphone helps Johnny piece together his forgotten past. And along the way demonstrates its innovative features and personalizable interface.

The fast-paced web drama was directed by Stuart Douglas (Nice Shirt Films) and shot over a 10 day period in Bangkok.

But even though the mini series is quite diverting and very well-produced, it leaves a stale aftertaste. Because everybody who hasn’t lost their memory will notice that Johnny’s fight against the oblivion seems just a bit too similar to Christopher Nolan’s reverse-chronology masterpiece “MEMENTO”.

 

QUOTE OF THE DAY

People don’t read ads. They read what interests them. Sometimes it’s an ad.

(Howard Gossage)

 

NET NUGGETS 10/29/08

UMERIC reloaded. The Sydney based motion design studio relaunched their website. A visual feast from down under.

Explosive slow motion skateboarding directed by Spike Jonze. Epic.

Revealed: The true secret of GUINNESS.

MACHINE GUN IN WATER. Oil on canvas. The strange and beautiful art of Benjamin Anderson.

 

The visual voice of Guinness

Wow. I just saw my personal commercial of the month. With “Spoken word” for Guinness beer, Saatchi & Saatchi London brings us a powerful piece of film whose impact doubtlessly exceeds its 60 second duration.

US directing collective SHILO, known for their design-infused approach to storytelling, shot the stunning ad in a New Jersey harbor. The philosophical monologue of “spoken word artist” Ainsley Burrows is illustrated by animated visuals that seamlessly blend into the live-action performance. Full marks!

CREDITS

Advertising Agency: Saatchi & Saatchi
Creative Director: Tim Hearn
Production Company: Shilo
Director: Shilo
Director of Photography: Martin Ahlgren
3D: Tamir Sapir
Music & Sound Design: Human

(VIA)

 

INSPIRATION TO GO – PDF mags

Print is dead.
(the internet)

They are easy to compile. They are space-saving. And they don’t wrinkle: PDF magazines are a powerful promotional tool for agencies and design collectives to showcase their work. Their content spreads from graphic design, illustration and typography works to in-depth articles and interviews on just about any field of visual and communication arts.

One of the biggest virtual newsstands is PDF-mags.com. With hundreds of PDF magazines from across the globe, the fast-growing site is swiftly becoming the hub for online magazines.

 

DIESEL goes porn. Almost.

Pretty funny. Even though the idea evokes a couple of déja-vus.

(VIA)

 

Breaking the law with NIKE

The most important thing when it comes to outdoor advertising: The perfect placement. Like at this chinese metro station.

(VIA SOJAHUND)

 

BLAB! – of sad aliens and beautiful monsters

“It’s like The New Yorker – for mutants.”
(THE LOS ANGELES READER)

BLAB! magazine is the brainchild of Chicago-based art director Monte Beauchamp, who painstakingly edited, art directed and designed every issue since its debut in 1986.
“America’s leading anthology of sequential storytelling and narrative illustration” features the provokative work of some of the world’s most exceptional comic illustrators and graphic artists.

The latest issue is being kicked off with an exhibition in Los Angeles. The BLAB! Show. The opening party is tonight!

BLAB! founder Beauchamp used to work as an advertising creative before he wholeheartedly consecrated himself to his magazine. By the way: The annual publication doesn’t contain a single page of advertising.

 

MY BEST WORK EVER

Welcome, Jonas!

 

QUOTE OF THE DAY

(Found by JPG)

 

NO SIGNS – when a city falls silent

They deleted every single public advertising space in a Vienna shopping district for two weeks. They turned a church into a Starbucks coffee shop. And they sold tickets for trips to the moon.

The irritating art projects of Christoph Steinbrener and Rainer Dempf invade public spaces and are provokative examinations of today’s consumption patterns.

TAKE A TOUR

 

NET NUGGETS 08/15/08

Finally: The first live TV commercial.

A film school diploma work in Hollywood quality – The social commercial THEY WILL COME TO TOWN was nominated for the 2008 Young Director Award in Cannes. Director: Thilo Ewers

Why you might want to use a human translator. Seen in China.

The inflatable toast. The Glow-in-the-Dark Flesh Eating Zombies Play Set. The Sky Diving Sigmund Freud. The Bacon Flavored Toothpicks. And a couple of really strange things. All to be found at Archie McPhee.

 

15 reasons for going to work

 

Muppets 2.0

Waldorf and Statler on: The internet.

 

The best ad ever. And how to ruin it.

Sunday, January 22, 1984. 96 Million people are watching the Superbowl Final Los Angeles Raiders vs. Washington Redskins in Tampa, when early in the third quarter, a 60 second commercial changes the world.

Apple’s mindblowing allusion to Orwell’s “1984” was directed by Ridley Scott with a production budget of $900.000. It only aired one single time, but the film is indelibly imprinted in the minds of Mac users across the globe and is considered one of the most influential commercials of all time.

More than 20 years after that sledgehammer hit the screen, ARNOLD WORLDWIDE in Boston brings it back with an interesting and scary experiment: The creatives put the commercial back into an early pre-production state called “animatic”, an animated storyboard with a narrative text. And then they tested it. In a focus group, under real life circumstances. Real people recruited to evaluate the ad.

What you are about to see is what happens to strong advertising ideas every day. Ideas that are highly emotional and deeply touching. Ideas that are never going to unfold their power because they will never end up on screen.

This is why most ads suck.

This film was used as an opening video for the 2007 Hatch Awards.
Directors: Roger Baldacci & Lawson Clarke

 

QUOTE OF THE DAY

The worst day in an ad agency beats the best day a bank ever had.

(Crispin Porter + Bogusky Employee Handbook)

 

NET NUGGETS 07/27/08

Auto Couture – Fashion designers dress cars.

Ode to the Mac – A music video solely composed of Apple Macintosh desktop clips. And another proof that idea beats budget!

Logo remixes – Designer Mario Amaya challenges our viewing habits.

Painful and hilarious – Photoshop desasters

Oh, and if you ever come to Duesseldorf, and are up for some really good food and fantastic wine – make sure to drop by here!

 

GIGAPIXEL – the world’s largest photographs

Nowadays, everything can take pictures: Cellphones, mp3-players, watches, even sunglasses come with built-in cameras. 2 Megapixel dwarfs that transform our world into chunky pixel mosaics. Modern day diaries in 72 ppi. And life looks pretty shallow in lo-res-land. Where’s the detail?

Here: xRez Studio is a Santa Monica company that creates extremely high resolution gigapixel photographs. The high-res images are complex compositions of hundreds of single shots created with extensive motion control gear. The images enable the creation of immersive digital environments and are being used for visual effects sequences, fulldome theater-presentations or large-scale exhibition prints.

°°°VISIT SITE°°°

 

CITROËN commercial “Newspaper”

CITROËN’s promotion campaign hits the next round. A small story about a large interior.

Agency: Euro RSCG Duesseldorf

Creative Directors: Torsten Pollmann, Florian Meimberg

Art Director: Jean-Pierre Gregor, Sebastian Kaiser

Copywriter: Till Koester

Producer: Meike van Meegen

Production: Markenfilm Berlin

Director: Henry Littlechild

 

QUOTE OF THE DAY

With $100,000, you could build a very nice house and live in it forever. Or, with that same amount of money, you could shoot a TV spot that’s 30 seconds long and will run for a few months and then go away forever.

(Crispin Porter + Bogusky Employee Handbook)

 

NET NUGGETS 05/20/08

Become a movie producer. In the world’s shortest film.

“Cabin crew, prepare for landing.” A day in the life of air traffic over the continental U.S.

Necessity is the mother of invention.

99Rooms. An “industrial art” project by Kim Köster.

PAPERVISION 3D. Demo for the open source realtime 3D engine for flash.

 

I WANT THAT!

ABDUCTIONLAMP.COM

 

THE F-WORD, REVISED.

A couple of months ago I told you about a senior citizen bus travel provider who didn’t seem too aware of the impression it might leave to typographically abstract the two diacritic dots in his family name to create a company logo.

I just spotted one of his buses again. I think he noticed.

(For non-germans: The umlauted vowel Ü can also be spelled UE.)

 

 

STRANGE ATTRACTORS – fashion meets digital art

With his rock star dalliances and a desire to marry high-art style and low-brow subjects, Cubitt sits at the photographic edge.

(Eyemazing Journal)

“Shock photographer” Clayton Cubitt, a.k.a. Siege, is known for his radical visual concepts that travel between fashion and porn.

Together with generative artist Tom Carden, he created an eye-popping black and white series using an interesting technical approach: they wrote a sofware that generates particle simulations with gravitational restraints and merged the results into the fashion shots. Interesting: They first created the “particle paintings”, then the portraits.

The powerful visuals were published in MetroPop Magazine.

 

COMPUTERIZED TORTURE GARDEN

Where do ideas come from?  

Sometimes they come from the sky. Sometimes they come from our dreams. And sometimes they come from a strange little machine called IDEA GENERATOR.

The practical widget was developed by TDB Special Projects. Random three-word-combinations stimulate the brain and may be the seed for the next big idea. (VIA)