Documentary to Watch: “Helvetica”
More about typography and design history than about the Helvetica typeface itself, this documentary does well to entertain and inform. Detailed and nerdy enough for design professionals to love, but still dumbed-down enough for anyone to appreciate. Great music too.
Content is King, Story is Gold
A production house in Los Angeles called Halo-8 has announced what they call “EtherFilms” – a new mode of storytelling that breaks the traditional, passive consumption model and introduces a narrative discovery where the viewer can choose to jump between story lines, media types, and extra content.
This new type of storytelling is being dubbed “transmedia” – where multiple medias and extra content are combined to create a story “tree” – is raising skeptical eyebrows of Gen Xers and Boomers who are missing the point: creative consumers like taking control, and this isn’t just “multi-media marketing,” it’s the beginning of a evolutionary shift in storytelling. (Turn to page 40 if you want to take the blue pill, turn to page 50 if you want to take the red pill.)
Content has and always will be king, but presenting a sleu of content is called story. And story is gold.
We seldom appreciate the manner in which a story is told, but how many times have you met someone who is a “bad storyteller” or “good storyteller”. The medium and manner is just as important as the content itself. Take for example: The Antikythera Mechanism and The Art of Storytelling, where merely fascinating anecdotal content is transformed into an epic story via a great soundtrack, impressive visuals and some killer cinematography. (Click the link to continue reading about this subject, scroll down if you want to read about other stories.)
Music Moves
I love music. It alters your state of mind. “Music. Moves. People.” I quote my favorite Jedidiah shirt: “Music affects all mankind in one way or another. It can cause tears or laughter, pain, or joy, anger or peace, hope or dispair….but most important….it MOVES.”
That being said, I think that more important than what you listen to, is when. You wouldn’t listen to your favorite Jimmy Buffet track while trying to get pumped for teh game. Right now I’m listening to my soft-electronic-inspirational Pandora channel to help me think introspectively. ‘When’ is always a factor in listening to music whether it’s a conscious consideration or not. If your girlfriend or boyfriend dumps you, you’re going to listen to you’re ‘I’m-sad-and-I-hate-the-world-right-now’ or ‘break-stuff’ playlists. A while ago I tested my theory by playing my ‘happy’ playlist after such a break up. It worked; albeit not very well – it still altered my state of mind.
Portraits of the Sun
Pretty much anything looks cool in slow motion. Multiply that by 24 cameras and GE will give you an impressive new look at something that’s already fun to watch. Add some insightful music and a few interesting facts, and you’ve got a campaign worth blogging about.
Lego Table
I love it when two opposites are melded to create a deeper takeaway; like a kid’s toy used to create a business tool. How perfect is this: a conference table built from Legos. It says ‘curiosity and imagination of a child, but with the diligence and ingenuity of an adult.’
Thoughts On Fashion
Fashion has a bad rap. People who are into it are labeled as self conscious, self centered, narcissistic materialists. But if you think of fashion as art, the world becomes a more interesting place and those fashionistas aren’t so bad anymore. People watching and taking notice of fashion on people, it’s pretty mundane. Until a pair of green shorts walks by. Or a sharp jacket. An orange belt. It catches your eye the same way a painting does.
It should be appreciated as such.
People who explore with their clothing are artists. Their body is a canvas and their closet is the palette.
Acts not Ads: HumanKind by Leo Burnett
When you think of advertising you think of crap. Most advertising is crap. Same shit different day, right? Not according to Leo Burnett
Wherever there’s a problem, there’s an opportunity. In a sea of bad ads, the cream rises to the top. Over the past few years, renowned and traditional agencies have begun to take this untraditional approach. “Power to the People” you might call it. Where brands influence behavior by utilizing their resources to do actual good, rather than just try to sell product.
Simplicity in Art Direction
The effective ad is the concise ad.
Braille Watch for the Blind
Haptica Braille Watch Concept from Haptica on Vimeo.
Bridging the gap between underserved markets and mass consumerism is a new company called Haptica. Their first venture along this direction hits the nail on the head: The Braille Watch. Designed with competencies in simplicity and beauty, it is a paradigm of design; form and function manifested.
The Haptica concept hopes to improve the quality of life for the blind through innovative and thoughtful design. Haptica presents a logical alternative and replaces the archaic products currently available. Often people with disabilities may feel self-conscious about their challenges; poorly designed and unappealing assisting devices are a part of the problem. Recognizing a problem and seizing an opportunity, Haptica fully embodies this quote from Yeves Behar, one of the leading industrial designers of our time: “Great design is a way to tell people that you care about them.”
www.hapticatech.com
Textbook Guerrilla
When done right, ambient and guerrilla marketing can make a tremendous impact. If targeted and executed properly, a simple idea can give vast value to a brand in the minds of consumers, throughout the blogosphere, and to the company’s bottom line.
Fretex is a secondhand clothing chain based in Norway that’s a derivative of The Salvation Army. During Oslo Fashion Week, the brand created awareness by setting up a surprise catwalk for the current owners of their future merchandise: everyday folks on the street. This example epitomizes a perfect guerrilla marketing tactic: it’s unique, buzzworthy and generates awareness, it’s cost effective and easy to execute, it’s targeted to the perfect market at a relevant time, and it follows brand guardrails and filters to a T.