ShipShape: Client Profile

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We have featured in our accountant’s quarterly publication, “ShipShape”, where MD Stephen discusses how we have grown in 2011 and where we’re aiming to go in 2012. Read an extract from the article below…

“Content is King is a strategic and artistic partner to some of the world’s biggest businesses, creating film and video content to deliver corporate communications, brand and consumer marketing and investor relations.

“We are a team of film-makers with a genuine passion to create something special, each and every time,” explains Managing Partner Stephen Liddle. Recent work has included films for use in a digital medium, direct-response TV campaigns, corporate cinema and animation.

One-stop shop

Stephen says that Content is King differs from other production companies in that everything happens in-house, from hatching the creative solution through to the final cut. “There are three main advantages to this,” he says.”

To read the rest of the article, click the on the image below.

 

Aldi: Like Brands, Only Cheaper

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Aldi started their new advertising campaign in the latter part of 2011, and although I liked the adverts (and so did the rest of the nation – their ‘Tea’ advert was voted the nation’s favourite advert of 2011), I never felt the burning desire to talk about how clever, simple and appealing they are.

Until now. Late last night whilst watching CSI (my guilty pleasure), I saw the best Aldi advert to date: ‘Fish Fingers’. Finding this one was a bit of a challenge as they oddly have already released a fish fingers advert using a cat, but thanks to Twitter I found the little gem of a video.

Yes, I am that simple that I will laugh at an old fisherman saying “Well, there you go then: a fine pair of pollocks.” That is all that it takes. To be fair, this fellow ad blogger was won over by the ‘Low Fat Cereal’ advert which was weird (not unlike their ‘Washing Up Liquid’ advert – apologies for the quality). Seeing and loving this advert inspired me to take a look at their other pieces of work, and there are a lot of things I am loving about this campaign.

Firstly, I love that they are 20seconds. Short, sweet, and to the point it proves that you don’t need long meandering aspirational adverts for supermarket chains (Sainsbury’s) or to use all the staff from a regional accented store (Asda). Secondly, and perhaps oddly, I like the fact that they have titled each of their adverts. Simply ‘Tea’, ‘Mayonnaise’, and ‘Wine’ surely have helped viewers find these adverts on YouTube to catch a re-run!

Thirdly, is the strap-lines for the campaign. There are two: “Like Brands, Only Cheaper”, and “Like Aldi, Like the Price”. This new initiative has been brought in to highlight how high in quality their own-brand produce is in comparison to recognised brands (Heinz, Kellogg’s, Fairy, etc). Their aim essentially is to encourage current customers to buy own-brand over the more expensive options that are in-store, which may sound strange but brand loyalty is a big thing nowadays. It can be difficult to convince life-long buyers of Heinz tomato ketchup that Aldi tommy K is in fact the one for them. (There are some interesting debates on this point in the comment feed on this article.)

Apparently the campaign is working, as share prices and sales have risen, so it looks like the clever cloggs at McCann Manchester know what they’re doing!

Kudos, I have been won over. (Unlike this woman, who just likes gin.)

Content is King feature on The Drum

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The excellent work we’ve been doing with Kia for their YouTube channel has been featured on modern marketing and media website, The Drum.

From car launches and iBrochure film to the Geneva Car Show, we’re proud to be working with such a great client, and such great cars!

You can read the full article on the website, or by clicking on the image.

P&G launch Co-Branded Advertising with Old Spice and Terry Crews

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Terry Crews first appeared in Old Spice advertising back in 2010 with his spots for Old Spice Odour Blocker Body Wash, creating a completely different image for the brand compared to ads featuring “The Old Spice Man”, Isaiah Mustafa (also debuted in 2010). The formula of shouting, explosions and the sung musical end frame (which makes me laugh every time) took it to a new level with Flex, where the product was “too powerful to let the advert end”. At which point Terry Crews goes on a mad green-screen enriched rampage, kicking down buildings and blocking odour, quite literally.

A year of Mustafa making women everywhere swoon, peaked in July with their interactive “Responses” campaign where tweeters, bloggers and the like could pose their questions and get as close to real-time responses as possible from the man himself. A total of 184 video responses were posted, including ones to Ellen Degeneres, and even a marriage proposal.

Back to the present, and Crews is back on our screens (or on YouTube, for UK readers) with more outrageous adverts, directed by the same duo of the Flex ad: Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim from the “Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Good Job“. But this time, they’re taking it to the next level, with co-branded advertising with other P&G products.

Procter and Gamble have launched their “Smell is Power” campaign featuring 5 adverts, where Old Spice is too powerful to stay within the boundaries of its own commercial, this time invading those for P&G products Bounce and Charmin. Craig Allen, creative director at Weiden + Kennedy approcahed 10 P&G brands he thought might be interested in working alongside Old Spice. He said “We went with open arms to these brands and said we want these to be 100 percent your ads until Terry breaks in.” (via NY Times) Which is exactly what they’ve done to great effect.

The Bounce commercial in particular is brilliant. Everything about the advert screams ‘Bounce’, a woman with her laundry, product placement, and… BOOM Terry Crews entering on a jet ski through the side of the house shouting about Old Spice. Not only does it continue the theme that “Smell is Power” with Old Spice, but I think also gives Bounce a certain amount of kudos for agreeing to go in on the co-branded advert.

Procter and Gamble have said that they’ve returned to Terry Crews as the face for their Odour Blocking products as they feel he resonates with the younger audience they are targeting, and is the “epitome of power”. They’re certainly not wrong there – this is a man so ripped it’s almost intimidating (have you seen those pectorals?!).

I’m particularly impressed that a company as family-orientated as P&G have taken such an advertising risk, and airing something as ‘breakthrough’ (excuse the pun) as this is sure to raise questions in the advertising world: is co-branding the way forward for advertising? Will other parent brands start bringing their products together on screen? (As Kraft have begun doing with the products themselves.) Where will Old Spice go next? Joe Berkowitz speculates that perhaps eventually we’ll be watching ads, inside ads, inside ads a-la “Inception”…?

One thing’s for sure, for a body wash and body spray brand, they seem to be doing pretty well at marketing to women (Mustafa = so dreamy) and men (something that perhaps Lynx need to take a lesson from…).

(P.S. If you haven’t seen Terry Tate in the Snickers Superbowl advert from 2003, you must watch it here.)

Do it With Flare

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The kids stared in awe at the thin, blue ghost

 

‘What are those blue lines that keep running across the screen?’ my wife asked whilst we were watching JJ Abrams latest blockbuster, Super 8. I was enjoying Abrams’ evocation of Steven Spielberg’s early suburban sci-fi ventures (and had no desire to hit the pause button), so gave the short answer:

‘That’s lens flare’.

Thankfully this satisfied her, and I didn’t have to  expand further on the type of lens flare (anamorphic; a result of using widescreen lenses) or what causes them (I’d have burbled something about direct sources of bright light refracting through the lens, and anamorphic lenses not being circular, so they stretch the light out and…. then I’d have looked it up properly on wikipedia whilst she edged towards the door, sighing and shaking her head. Again.)

As you can see in the shot from Super 8 above, lens flare can be pretty obtrusive. Abrams took a lot of flak for his ‘ridiculous’ and distracting flare-addiction in his previous film, the Star Trek reboot. But he’s hardly alone in overusing this trope, in an age when every advert on TV seems intent on distracting you from what you should be focusing on. So why do film makers persist with it, when it’s easily avoidable in the modern age?

How many types of flares can you spot?

Go back and watch pretty much any film made before the 60s and you’ll struggle to find lens flares anywhere in mainstream cinema. They were avoided at all costs by film makers who saw these ghostly halos as aberrations that would draw the  attention of the viewer away from the actors and scenery and onto the camera itself.

Watch a home movie or documentary from those times however, and lens flares abound; as the camera operators either didn’t have the equipment, time or desire to keep them out of shot.

So this quite beautiful effect that can be achieved by pointing a film camera  with a glass lens at a strong source of light, became tied to notions of ‘authenticity’ and ‘integrity’. And when those values became key to the countercultural uprising in the 60s, the look and feel of cinema was revolutionised in accordance.

Suddenly, lens flares were all over cinema like a glowing, circular rash. They helped give key films of the era such as 1969′s Easy Rider a spontaneous, sun-kissed edge that chimed with the times. The great pioneer of American independent cinema John Cassavettes used flares brilliantly in the opening scene of 1976′s The Killing of a Chinese Bookie (one of few films whose title should really come with a spoiler alert). Not only do they enhance the  vérité of the world we’re thrust into, but they also make Ben Gazarra’s character look incredibly cool. Filmmakers of the 80s were clearly taking note.

But perhaps the most important way that lens flare was deliberately integrated into the grammar of cinema was through sci-fi. Master of composition Stanley Kubrick used flares throughout 1968′s 2001: A Space Odyssey to bring to life its pioneering special effects work and make us believe that he’d really put a film camera into orbit, onto the moon, and beyond the stars. Take the flares away and his astonishing vision would look significantly more drab and sterile. He planted the flaws to deceive us.

Without the flare it’s just a black snooker ball in the foreground and a torch in the distance.

And so, in the past 40 years, lens flares have become a key tool in convincing moviegoers of the reality that has been constructed before their eyes. Even early computer animated films such as Shrek and Toy Story added flare to scenes – and they don’t even involve cameras or lenses. But then, there’s software galore available that will artificially add lens flare to your scene, and extremely effective it can be too. We’re certainly not shy of using it here at Content is King.

In a digitally-dominated world, where work never degrades and flaws can be erased at the click of a mouse, lens flares may perhaps be the final survivors from the analogue age, thanks to to their intrinsic beauty.

Just dont overdo it, eh JJ?

     
STOP SHINING THAT THING IN MY EYES

OSCARS FOR DOGS – I DON’T THINK SO

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Over the past couple of weeks, there has been quite a lot of speculation that a dog may be nominated for an Oscar for his performance in The Artist. And, over the past couple of weeks, this speculation has made me crosser and crosser! Therefore, this morning, as speculation reaches fever pitch and with the nominations due to be announced this afternoon, I just could not hold in my outrage any more!

Now, correct me if I am wrong, but Oscars are all about honouring talent; nominated and voted for by their industry peers. In my mind, this makes an Oscar even more special, it symbolises that you have recognition, respect and admiration from the people you work with.

Therefore, nominating a dog is not only disrespectful to the other professionals, but also just down right stupid! The dog (Uggie, I believe he is called) does not and never will UNDERSTAND the Oscars. He will not comprehend that he has been nominated for an award and nor has he been dreaming of this recognition all his life. There will never have been a point in his life where he decided to become an actor. Being in this film was not a conscious choice for Uggie.

More importantly, the dog WAS NOT ACTING! Uggie was trained to do whatever he had to for the part, probably encouraged along the way by doggie treats. Uggie did not spend hours learning his lines and getting into character, pondering ‘shall I play him as an angry dog, an enthusiastic dog or a shy dog?’

It comes down to this, dogs are not humans and nor do they have the same level of comprehension that a human does! They should not be treated as humans and so it stands to reason they should not be considered for human recognition.

If anyone should be rewarded for Uggie’s performance, it should be his trainer Omar von Muller who made the decision for Uggie to work in the film industry. Von Muller will have worked with the Director of The Artist to get the shots they needed to make the film work. Now, that takes skill.

So, if I was part of the Oscars nominating committee, and really set on recognising Uggie, I would say vote for von Muller as a fair vote that everyone will appreciate.

The Good, the Bad and then there’s David

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Think of all those brilliant tv ads featuring the likes of Lionel Messi, Kaka, Roberto Carlos and Wayne Rooney showing off their incredible football skills and loads spring to mind. Now think of all the great ads featuring current and ex-footballers having to act a bit as well and the list is…well, a tad shorter.

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Lynx Launch for Women, with ‘Attract’

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I know what you’re thinking ladies: that your prayers have been answered. Lynx, the brand known by us as being the lazy man’s eau de cologne, has released it’s first women’s fragrance.

Unfortunately, and comically I’m not joking. I did the tiniest bit of research before writing this article, and asked the guys in the office if they buy Lynx and why. Answers: “I like the smell, and I wear it when I don’t want to wear an anti-perspirant.” and “I don’t like the smell, and I don’t wear it because I prefer to wear an anti-perspirant.” I’ve also heard a friend say that you only wear Lynx if you want to smell like you’ve doused yourself in alcohol. But enough about the product.

Aimed at us, ladies, and produced by their agency BBH, this advert is slick. I like the way it’s shot to heighten anticipation and builds tension: roof-top shots, lots of running etc. The grade is nice; dusty and in-keeping with the gloss look of the others they’ve been making recently (‘The Final Edition’, or ‘Angels Will Fall’). It looks good, the soundtrack works, and the style is engaging but I couldn’t help but feel that it is reminiscent of bigger and better ads that have gone before. The two that come to mind are the the old Levis advert, “Odyssey” advert (also by BBH, all that running, and now that I’ve watched it a few times the models look really similar too), and for some reason, the Sony “Two Worlds” advert for their 3D TV (by Grey, I think it’s probably to do with the feigning passion and coming together at the end).

The news broke on Brand Republic’s Marketing site this morning, and the ad is currently available to preview on YouTube, and on their Facebook page with the full campaign going live on 1st February (supported by digital and outdoor activity). Apparently, the fragrance is going to be released as a special edition for women, and as a permanent addition for men: I’m guessing that they’re hoping that this will increase sales by creating a rush mentality with consumers.

Will the advertising work? Gender-specific targeted advertising isn’t something many of us take notice of as most products are aimed at either men or women; a fact I think is often over-looked. Fragrance adverts especially are advertised so specifically to men or women. For women, it’s to make them appear sexier, more attractive to the opposite sex, and more feminine. For men, it’s to make them appear sexier, more attractive to the opposite sex, and certainly with Lynx, more of a lad.

Can Lynx use one advertisement sell fragrances to both sexes successfully? I for one, am interested to see the results.

iPhoneography: A Credible Medium?

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My history of photography starts with my old 35mm Praktika camera, and my dad’s old lenses. I took a massive leap into digital photography when I got my Canon 7D, still holding onto the old 35mm lenses. I have loved and cherished these cameras and lenses for years and thought I’d never see the day when I’d consider using a phone as an alternative.

You can see why I find it hard to accept ‘Phoneography’ as a real photographic medium. Is it going to come down to me choosing between my DSLR or my iPhone? No, it won’t, but it appears ‘Phoneography’ has really started to become more of a credible medium.

I’m not one to judge before I try this out (thats not true), so I got myself an iPhone purely for this reason (thats also not true).

There is so much on the internet to read about ‘iPhoneography’ and I’ve resisted joining in, but this last week I’ve really got involved. It’s kind of like being initiated into a cult… somewhere inside you, you know it’s morally wrong, but you really want to drink the Kool Aid.

So i started with the basics, and slowly, after reading about all these different exciting apps… I bought more.

There are over 5,000 photography apps in the App store… so I stopped buying apps.

I was browsing around and read Katherine Lightner’s blog about being addicted to the app store and saw to it that I vanquish my addiction early, seeing as I can’t really afford to be blowing my lunch money every day on apps. Apps dont fill you up (or do they?). Her blog was also a HUGE help in showing me the basics of iPhoneography.

If you’re looking to get started, first things first get reading an established blog like www.iphoneography.com. They are really up-to-date on daily free apps and have loads of articles about taking a good photo on the iPhone.

The apps I really support are the ones that don’t just give you a number of presets and say, “Right, here’s what everyone else is using, get in line”; because all of your photos come out looking exactly the same as the last mug that’s brought the app (cough cough hipstermatic).

I found the best way to avoid this, was by using multiple apps: I cant stress this enough! Of course its down the photo you take and the photographer behind the lens, but taking a photo on an iPhone is always going to look like a camera phone photo. Essentially what we are all trying to do is make these photos look like they’ve come from a ‘real’ camera. Some of the apps have simple, subtle presets that are great to start with, then I usually follow this up by using something more detailed to get the look I want. The apps listed below are the bulk of my camera bag…

 

Luminance
This app was free and one of the first photo apps I got! IT’S INCREDIBLE! The amazing thing about it is the huge range of tweaking and colour correction you can do to your images. It also comes with some presets which can be altered.

 

Camera+
The normal camera that comes with the iPhone is okay, but this just has those few more features that make the original photo a little bit more adjustable later. The seperate focus and appature points give you full control over each photo.

 

PhotoSynth
This is the best panoramic app I’ve used! The joy is, it’s made by Microsoft and you can’t use it on Windows phones! Totally worth it! It creates a huge panoramic image and then plots it in 3D space, so you can re-create you bedroom, if you lack the imagination to do something good with it.


Snapseed
Though it’s quite pricey for an app, it fits the bill as being one of the most comprohensive editing tools on the iPhone. There are so many options for fine tuning! If you’re serious about photo editing (not just applying a filter) then get this app!

 

Juxtaposer
This is the most detailed rotoscoping app for the iPhone. If you’re into putting dogs heads on people then you’ve just found your app equivalent of a soul mate. It lets you layer photos on top of one another and stamp parts of images then saves them to the library.

 

So i drank the Kool Aid, and got swallowed up by the metaphorical monster that is the app store…

I soon come to realise that all I’m doing is desperately trying to convince people to join the cult. I end up showing everyone photos and trying to trick them into asking, “Wow, how you do that?” and I gleefully say, “WELL, funny you ask, its all done on my iPhone!”. I realised I’m just eager to give the illusion that they are not taken on my iPhone, and with the help of all those apps, its almost possible! I’ve even started adding my photos to my flickr, which I swore was going to be for my ‘good’ photos only. I guess I can’t fight the fact that I enjoy using my iPhone for photography, and I enjoy having a mini photoshop at my fingertips. I like feeling part of a movement in photography; it’s not like the film to digital movement, it’s just a development in digital photography, right? I know I’m never going to go on a shoot with my iPhone and attach a new lens, set up a usb light rig, put it in flight mode, edit on the fly and send them off to Vogue!

So in conclusion (finally) I’m going to keep using my iPhone: apps can only get better and
more advanced, and as sad as it is to admit, the practicallity of it is astounding! It just means that when I use my Praktica and my Canon DSLR I know it’s going to be a special photo, not some throwaway, faux-filterd nonsense!

 

 

SOPA vs. The Open Web – FIGHT!

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Today marks a dark day for the world wide web. Literally.

Many high profile websites, including Wikipedia (the 6th most visited site on the web) have invoked a vouluntary ‘blackout’ in protest against the ‘Stop Online Piracy Act’ or SOPA.

A bit of background for those not in the know; SOPA is a US proposed bill that aims to place harsher restrictions and penalties on those who would seek to pirate copyrighted material on the internet. The proposed powers that would stem from this bill would range from increased jail-time for piracy offenders, to greater control over ISPs to monitor and provide information on offenders.

So why the big ruckus? Surely (for the most part) people agree that Piracy is a bad idea, and that anything that could help to limit the effects should be welcomed.

In my opinion, the problem comes not from what the bill represents now, but what it could come to mean in the future. Much like the stop and search powers given to the British Police under the Anti-Terror act, these amendments to our civil liberties are often made with the best intentions, but end up being twisted into something else.

Those backing the bill argue that the Internet is a lawless domain, a badlands where piracy, hate crimes and unsavoury images are rife. Where, they protest, are the controls that exist in the real world? Why isn’t there a virtual police force cracking down on the ne’erdowells of the web? As such the danger from this stream of thought is that what starts with anti-piracy, could easily extend into full-blown internet censorship.

The internet has succeeded as a free and open resource since it’s popular adoption in the mid-nineties. Sure, it contains it’s share of illegal material, but just like in real life, we as individuals make the moral decisions whether or not to partake in them.

The SOPA bill is a very dangerous idea, which if left unopposed could snowball into a force that could entirely change the face of the online world forever.

Dan Vallint-Riggs

eHarmony finally sells to singles.

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Come the new year, we all expect the flurry of workout DVDs being released by frantic ab-wielding fitness-freaks encouraging us to join their apparent cult (can you tell I don’t go to the gym?). Amongst all these hilarious titles (for example, The Only Way is Essex with “The Essexercise Workout”) I noticed a little gem of an advert, surprisingly for “eHarmony.co.uk”.

Internet dating is not the easiest thing to market, and telling love stories, although the goal essentially, isn’t perhaps the best way to sell that kind of service. Match.com, claim that they are recreating the moment you realise you have a spark with someone, with their “Love Story” adverts. The first set in the music shop, has been followed by the “Girl on the Platform” advert airing at the moment. Really, they seem to be showing people how you can meet someone in ‘real life’, thus surely eradicating the need for an online dating service…? You can read more about the production of the advert here.

After their ‘Profile’ adverts last year, eHarmony.co.uk have, I believe, nailed it. The theme of this campaign is that being single can be amazing, and to give that up you have to meet someone equally amazing to make it worthwhile.

Obviously, there are a lot of other things that make being single awesome, but given that eHarmony adverts tend to be shown at very family-orientated hours I think that they’ve chosen some great content. I’d have liked to have seen more shots of our ‘single lady’ out socialising more, instead of sitting on a bus, or standing at the end of a pier. And perhaps more of a glint in each other’s eyes at their apparent first meeting, instead of standing holding hands, but other than that critique I genuinely think it’s a nice, neat little advert. Beautifully graded and nicely framed and shot, it does well to create a rose-tinted image of the single life-style before throwing a gent into the mix.

Kudos, eHarmony. I think you’ve finally managed to tune in and sell to singles.

Ellie D’Silva