Get On With It

the forest or the tree?

    Honestly, what really comes first? I see the forest, and then my eyes eventually settle upon a nice, little tree. What comes first? The idea or the strategy? I'm still working on that one. In one of my campaigns I have had so many different ideas, a veritable forest of deciduous and coniferous and every variety in between. I know the perfect tree is nestled in there somewhere.

    What idea in there is really going to best express the message and resonate the best with the target? Which will make them take a lasting notice? Maybe I need to step back and gaze more at the forest. My tree might be hiding. Maybe I should take a strategy class (oops, next term). Alright. I'm going to keep looking, and hope a bird or something lands on the little guy today. It's ironic that this is for the NRDC campaign.

hahahaha...ow.

 

Lately I've been listening to Demetri Martin's comedy CD, These Are Jokes. It's always interesting because I'm either listening on my iPod or on my computer and either situation is equally awkward when someone sees you laughing. What I love about Martin's particular brand of comedy is that it's so creative and dynamic. He uses props, music, one-liners, anecdotes, word-plays, pictures, & pretty much anything you can conjure up. I love when someone exposes their own inner monologue. Listening to Martin is like listening to all of someone's random thoughts, observations, and hypothetical musings. If you want a taste take a look at this overwhelming collection of Martin's quotes. I thought of just picking one, but it turned out to be an impossibility. When talking about "creative generalists" Demetri Martin definitely qualifies. He's a comedian, actor, musician, writer, filmmaker, poet, artist, not to mention his affinity for palindromes and who knows what else. Here's the start of his comedy special, Demetri Martin. Person.

hands on

For me, a vital part of creativity is getting off the computer as much as I can and doing something by hand. It's good to make stuff. Here are a few of my latest projects from my basic design class. The first is a monastery bound journal I'm going to use as my new creativity/idea journal for sketches, collections & collages. There are many different ways you can bind your own books, and there are tons of projects out there I want to tackle using this process. You can gut Moleskine journals and fill them with your choice of paper. Here they rebound magazines using a wonderfully effective method. I'm hoping to get a group of students together soon to make some of these and experiment with a solvent transfer printing technique from another classmate, Dave Rose.

My second project was an intervention with my surroundings inspired by the work of British sculptor, photographer, and land artist Andy Goldsworthy. I got to get my hands dirty at 8 am, and it was great fun.
 

Ok Go: content breeds content

First Ok Go had a new video "A Million Ways."

Then that inspired another video "Ok Go! Vs. Lego."

Then Ok Go introduced treadmills to the culture by way of a tricky tango in a new, infectious dance meets running meets music way with "Here We Go Again."

Then that inspired a whole slew of videos with everything from Ok Go's dancing logo to hippos to more Legos in "ok go treadmills."

It even inspired the commercial for Nike +.

And a Ok Go YouTube dance competition.

72andSunny + SSSR = Zune

So minutes after my last post, I became rather curious about the SSSR animators and decided to explore. Just like that I found out that the wise folks at 72andSunny in Los Angeles had felt so engaged with SSSR's talent that they had them do a bit of a brand film for Zune. Great stuff.

not so Subtle mixed media

    Here's a great creative project that I saw the other day. It's a trilogy of music videos from the group Subtle. It was animated by a Norwegian-Japanese collective called "SSSR." What I love so much about this style is that it combines computer animation with raw, hand-drawn materials.

    Right now I think so much creative work we see relies too heavily on the computer. It's too polished. While this video challenges my imagination, it's still real. It's raw. I think there's a sort of digital revolution coming where now everyone is beginning to know the tools, but they're beginning to experiment. The technology is also much more accessible and enticing now. Soon we're going to see more things like this. Not with this same look, but we'll see more instances where technology is used to enrich projects rather than manufacture them.

    I can't wait to see more curious combinations. This one gets its unique look from largely black and white images taken from combining drawings, animated models, cut-up film, and 3D computer graphics. With this kind of creative innovation Subtle's "Swan Meat" won best music video at the British Animation Awards 2006

last night i dreamt advertising

I've had dreams about advertising before. Not conspiracy theory, subconscious dreams, but I've dreamt about process, deadlines, people and pieces of advertising I've been looking at popping up from time to time. Last night and several times last week it was different. I dreamt about concepts. It was the same type of brainstorm moments I've felt while falling asleep or showering. The downside is that I couldn't recall the wonderful brain spill within five minutes of waking up, but what if I could? I know how crazy my subconscious and conscious levels of creative thought are, and I'm still learning to tap them. If somebody could come up with some sort of cognitive video camera, I'm sure I could dream up some great advertising for it...in my sleep.

In honor of my dreams here is a great Spike Jonze Adidas commercial I love to watch from time to time. Great concept. It's like brain matter on screen with a vivid aesthetic, not to mention an unbelievable song ("Hello Tomorrow by Karen O (Yeah Yeah Yeahs) & Squeak E. Clean).

people + one million + art = change

    The One Million Masterpiece is an online project that's calling to artists and non-artists alike to submit one million pieces of work to create a unique snapshot of society. I hope to submit something over the weekend. It's much cooler than I can explain, but I love the sense of community, content and randomness. When you submit work, you can decide where to place it. Do you want it to fit in or stand out? What will it look like in the end? Will we learn something? It's an opportunity to make a statement about the world in an engaging way. Eventually the completed piece will be published and shown in galleries. Each entry costs a small fee and the project hopes to raise $6.5 million for a variety of global humanitarian and environmental organizations. This is just one example in cool collective experiments online that can be an agent of positive global change. Bravo.

A Periodic Table of Visualization Methods

I found this Periodic Table of Visualization Methods browsing through Guy Kawasaki's How to Change the World blog although it seems to be making the blog rounds. This is so neat in several ways. I'd love to experiment with more of these. It also goes with this trend of making information more tangible, more visual, and more accessible. More on that later.

incoming: iPhone: OMG

    I have yet to be disappointed with an Apple product, and now comes the Apple iPhone (not till June though). Is it too good to be true? Will my wireless company even let me buy it? Aside from one trooper of an LG phone, every cell I've had has been hyped and then sucked. The Motorola Razr fell short. The Chocolate...a bust. I'm hope this new gem has all the kinks worked out before it goes public, and that it lives up to the buzz.

    I'm not surprised that this product is coming out, although I am a bit surprised it took quite this long. Companies are learning that consumers really want a more integrated product. They want phones, internet, music, photos, GPS, basically a small computer. This may not be something for everyone right now, but the technology is going this way. I won't be surprised if Apple's the first to do it (completely) and the one to do it best. So far no one's been able to match the iPod (errr...Zune.)

    Needless to say I'll be waiting patiently (while I save some dough) & I better not be disappointed. I'll probably be able to cough up the $495 asking price by the time my current cellphone contract expires and Apple's undoubtedly unveiled their generation four iPhone. Ugh.