I love how Thomas Hicks combines live action with hand drawn elements. Crank up the contrast and you have beautiful abstracted atmospheric vignettes.
In an over-saturated YouTubed world, it’s always a pleasure to discover a unique voice with soul.
I was ready. Really ready. I wanted to sit back and laugh while Pfizer spewed out jargony phrases worthy of bullsh*t bingo about Twitter. Boy, was I disappointed.
There’s a hope that these guys might actually get it.
Though, while they get it, they’re not quite sure what to say. Or more specifically, what they’re allowed to say. Although there are currently no federal rules around what pharma companies can and cannot say through social media, Pfizer has chosen to take the conservative route.
It continues to be interesting to watch how Twitter has accelerated the discussion of social media strategy in large companies. It’s quickly made executives looked down upon when they can’t answer that question.
More and more I’m hearing folks in the advertising industry finally starting to talk some sense.
Mark Earls former head of Ogilvy’s planning offices in London speaks here about the perils of a multi-channel execution of a single “big idea”. Today, many agencies and brands continue to focus on consistency rather than effectiveness. This is certainly evident in my recent blog post on MasterCard.
There is a quibble I have with something he said - though it might be semantics. He aligned the term “big idea” with “big insight”. Big insights are very different than big ideas. Many ideas, strategies, and executions can flow from a single insight. And while one insight might rise to the top, the second, third, fourth and fifth aren’t far behind. The key with insights is to get the ones that no one else has. Patrick Edson from MillerCoors talked about this a few months ago.
Earls quickly touches here on the decreasing relevance of the 30-second spot and how products and services are the future of advertising.
So what’s slowing the industry down?
Minds are boggled with how to structure awards shows around things that actually provide consumer value vs brand impressions.
;-)
Whilst I was browsing Apple’s site for info on Snow Leopard, I came across the “leap forward” we can expect with the new release of QuickTime - QuickTime X.
I have to say that I like the new branding. The integration with the Q and the X and the lens-like treatment are nice touches. The new minimized application interface is slick and takes its cues from the iPhone.
Coincidentally, as I was searching for a video to include with my last blog post I first landed on a page with an embedded QuickTime movie. My immediate reaction was “ugh”. Somehow QuickTime has become associated with “heavy” and “sluggish” - at least for me.
Why is that?
Well, on the flip side of things, I also associate QuickTime with “image quality”. I watch all of my movie trailers on Apple’s website (or my AppleTV).
But in the span of a typical week, I watch all/most of my videos through some type of Flash-based player. And for myself, along with countless other bloggers, embedding these Flash players onto our sites is super-simple. Not so, for QuickTime movies.
When I came across that embedded QuickTime today it made the site feel dated too.
In Apple’s pursuit of quality they missed a huge part of the market. I’ll be honest, I have no clue what their strategy is there. With YouTube using Flash (and possibly the speculated new Google format in the future), it will be tough for Apple to make a dent. Arguably they’ve missed the boat on this one.
And does the average Mac user even really get what QuickTime is? Between apps like iTunes or Front Row kicking in when a user inserts media, when do people have the need to launch QuickTime?
For video professionals however, the QuickTime brand is very relevant. So has QuickTime mostly become the stuff of pros?
Let me know what you think.
When I moved to New York over a decade ago, the very first cultural excursion I made was to a show that was part of a week-long marionette performance. I’ve always had a thing for marionettes. But with the lack of marionette performances and the many distractions NYC provides, I haven’t seen a show since.
Years later, in the Fall of 2002, I wandered into an unassuming gallery in a then-quiet Greenpoint Brooklyn. It was there that I discovered the disturbingly beautiful artwork of Erik Sanko and Jessica Grindstaff in their exhibit Til Death Do Us Part: Marionettes & Musicboxes.
I recently dusted off the show’s postcard, which has been staring down at me from a shelf in my office ever since, and decided to look them up online.
I kicked myself for not looking them up sooner. I found that I missed The Fortune Teller, a marionette play that they jointly produced through their recently formed Phantom Limb Company. The show’s soundtrack was composed by Sanko and Danny Elfman. Turns out that Sanko is an accomplished musician as well, having played with The Lounge Lizards and John Cale.
I’m hoping that this Winter I can get my marionette fix. Phantom Limb Company will be doing performing their new puppet theater piece American Faust. Best mark the calendar now.