EOC Final Project: First Thoughts

First thoughts: iPad: relearn your world (relearn…everything. Simplicity, control, life. At your fingertips…literally.)

This particular ad would be designed to highlight the “life-altering” qualities that can be contained within the iPad. Specifically geared towards the elements of everyday life that people see in one dimension such as how they read books, how they watch TV, how they receive digital entertainment in general, and the fact that it can now be brought with you everywhere and is available at the tip of your finger. It’s the first step in a larger technological evolution that will change your life, and it’s worth the tiny bit of effort needed to learn it.

Week 7 EOC: Exciting Ad

In this ad for the new Lion Camp at the San Diego Zoo’s Wild Animal Park, the creators accomplish several elements all at once. The first and most striking is the simple fact that it’s funny. It presents a very human emotion being displayed by an animal (Zebra), doing something that is almost entirely impossible, cringing in fear and desperation to get as high and far away from something as it possibly can by climbing up the back and neck of a Giraffe. Immediately we identify with emotion the animal feels, as we have all felt something similar at times. Then our eyes pan downward and we see why such a ridiculous thing might happen. The Lions have arrived. And suddenly the emotion connected to the add becomes clear. We are both afraid, and excited at the possibility all at once. Bringing us directly into the ad’s design principles:

Composition: This particular ad holds a tall frame, likely useable inside a magazine spread. It makes good use of space with a large amount reserved for an understandable and amusing image, with a small amount of text at the bottom. It is easy to understand and uses its space to communicate both fear and excitement, and the subtle need to experience both.

Negative shapes: The reason this image stands out and is easily recognizable is the simplicity and strong use of negative space around the animals. The animals are beautifully framed on either side by light blue sky allowing the viewer to see the animals and the emotion they evoke.

Visual Hierarchy: The ad begins by leading our eye top and center to the very clear image of the Giraffe supporting the weight of the very frightened Zebra. Our eyes take a moment to register what we are seeing, deciphering the emotion, and then the image leads us down into the header (explaining the emotion we are seeing), the content text, and then where we can go to experience this excitement/emotion for ourselves, the San Diego Zoo.

Illusion: The illusion of this ad helps to promote the emotional effect of the ad, something that we know and immediately recognize to be impossible, but funny and understandable all at once. The Photoshop artist did a beautiful job making the illusion believable, which in turn opens the door for us to look to the bottom of the ad and see exactly why the Zebra (and ourselves) feel the knee-jerk fear and excitement at the coming of the lions.

Week 6 EOC: Make 'em laugh

This very popular commercial first aired at this last year’s Super Bowl. A commercial for Doritos corn chips, it went on to become one of the most talked about commercials of the entire Super Bowl spectacle, which for many years now, has nearly become more of a forum for funny and impressive commercials to entertain the massive TV audience, then it is about the actual football game. Sad? That part’s up to you.

In any case, this commercial worked. I personally heard about this ad from many different sources as part of Doritos ad campaign to have independent film makers come up with the best ideas to sell Doritos.

The humor of this ad comes mostly from the juvenile appeal of physical comedy favored by many American’s. In this ad a selfish jerk of a man is enjoying a bag of tasty Doritos, meanwhile taunting a nearby dog by not giving him any. But hold on, justice/vengeance/retribution is all served as the dog (in a very amusingly human gesture) takes off its anti-bark collar and puts it on the annoying man who refuses to share his chips. The revenge fully unfolds when the dog barks, sending the man into a convulsing set of electric shocks (normally meant to keep the dog from barking).

The humor of this ad comes from several angles. The jerk, clearly deserving of some form of punishment for taunting a poor animal is given his just desserts, at the hands of the very “stupid/helpless” animal he was torturing, no less. Secondly, the humor appeals to anyone who has ever seen an animal abused or mistreated and wished the vengeful wrath of God (or your chosen deity) down upon the abuser. In many ways it is the humor of role reversal. And though the particular topic of animal cruelty is not an amusing one, the thought of someone who deserves the role reversal is. Another element of the humor also comes from the comical element of seeing a dog perform actions (or obviously thinking things through) in a distinctly human manor. It’s an old sympathetic fallacy, but it’s still funny, even today.

EOC Week 6: Jerry Metellus

Take all your experience with you:
Everything that you’ve done with your life before this moment in your career or what have you has a use. You can use all that experience to further what it is that you do, or will do. It’s all useful and relevant. Take the opportunity to learn all you can and use it to you advantage and you’ll be surprise how far you can get.

There’s always someone better or more creative…so arrogance is a waste of time:
It truly doesn’t matter how great or wonderful or creative you think you are. The fact of life is that thousands of people emerge into the same position as you every minute, and there’s always going to be someone who’s as good or better than you are. This is a simple fact and it means that any attachment you might have to your pride or the fact that you might be good at something, drop it. There’s always someone better so the best possible thing you can do for yourself is understand that and work hard to make yourself better, always staying at the top of your game. Arrogance gets knocked off the pedestal, skill and hard work gets supported.

Know your stuff…even if the industry is always changing:
The digital media industry, even fashion and all other facets of design are always changing. In photography you used to have to know your trade well, and whatever you could not accomplish through sheer skill could be done in post production. Now, a photographer doesn’t need photo skills as much as Photoshop skills in order to create good photos. But the fact still remains that good skills and truly knowing your industry is what is going to make you great at what you do. Take your time and really learn what you’re doing, whether that’s photography, design, web design or what have you. You will always be better when you work to learn those fundamentals.

Week 5 EOC: Ad Categories

Endorsements: “Got Milk” Ad campaign. A brilliant and widespread, yet very simple message features a whole slew of celebrities from all different walks of life inspired several generations of children and adults alike to reintroduce themselves to the benefits of drinking milk. The celebrity element of this ad extends itself far beyond the typical celebrity appearances, using references from movies and fictional characters alike, appealing to a hugely diverse target audience who were given the opportunity to understand that they too needed milk.



Demonstrations: “P90X Home workout system.” This program is several years old, I myself used it at one point, but through relentless infomercial based advertising and demonstrations combined with countless positive testimonials and undeniable results, this has become a home fitness juggernaut, and it doesn’t seem to be slowing down in the least. Even amongst the professional sports communities and everyday joe’s alike, this exercise program promised a lot and delivered for a marginal payment (compared to your monthly gym membership) and only asked for a little dedication in return.



Recognition: “Verizon’s ‘Can you hear me now?’ spokesman.” Due to the use of a single well placed phrase in a very specific and understandable context, Verizon wireless created an instant pop-culture craze with the be-spectacled Verizon everyman, tirelessly trotting the globe to make sure your mobile phone service works almost everywhere. Never mind the near infinite number of comical references made to this pop-culture figure, the statement made its mark, and you would be hard pressed to find someone who owns a mobile phone that doesn’t know the reference.