Famouser

Not a virus, but an actual bug living in one of the creative directors’ screen. Crazy.

“we figured the best way to tell our story is to make our website one.”

The new BooneOakley website isn’t a website at all; it’s a series of linked youtube videos with embedded navigation that tell the BooneOakley story. Love the simple art direction, and the story on the homepage is great. Even if people don’t use the links, they’ve got everything they need in the 3:00 video: some engaging content, thought-provoking work, and contact info right there. But using the links would be a good idea, because the rest of the site is just as fun.

Something tells me that their Google sponsored result is going to come true…

via @timtastic

Now if only they had True Blood, Dexter and Lost, I could give up cable for good.

http://www.hulu.com/labs/hulu-desktop

I know this has been posted a trillion times already, but I had to share this beautiful stop-motion animation piece shot by Tomas Mankovsky… On his floor. Really inventive, and beautiful soundtrack rounds out the experience.

Via http://www.booooooom.com/2009/05/28/sorry-im-late/

I love it when bands aren’t so precious with their product; allowing people to participate in the experience of creating music is a great way to connect more deeply with an audience. Radiohead and Arcade Fire have done this with tremendous result, and its nice to see younger bands following in their technological footsteps.

Some more interactive videos:

I am loving this all inclusive home theater furniture from Geneva. Looks beautiful, and the specs are even better:

Adam and Jon, advertising creatives (not sure where they work, if anyone knows, shout it out), have launched stealourideas.com, a nice little site where they bring those dead ideas to life. I’m really digging the art direction here, simple sketches and hand-written boards that get their ideas across simply and elegantly. No commentary on the work, just a simple idea brought to life purely. Some nice iPhone app stuff here, as well as conceptual print ideas that they are bringing to life for real clients (not their clients, though).

Here’s their manifesto (see if you can spot the typo!):

And now, they are doing it for the rest of us: email them your brief and they’ll give you some ideas so you can take the day off. Not sure if that is a not-so-loosely-veiled attempt at earning freelance gigs, or if they’re down to do it publicly for free (I suspect the former) but either way I am digging their style.

Add it to the reader: http://stealourideas.tumblr.com/

It’s almost like I can hear the client briefing: “We need to figure out a way to make Miracle Whip cool. Facebook + Twitter + browser plugin = cool & young, right?”

The Zingr firefox plugin essentially gives you the ability to leave notes, or ‘zings’ on web pages, and post them as notifications to your facebook or twitter pages. From what I can tell, your friends also have to have the plugin installed in order to read your Zings, which are limited to 160 characters.

So I ask this. How is this any different from posting a link to facebook through their ffx plugin, or even posting a link to twitter? There you can comment on the link in the native space, and nobody has to have a plugin installed to see what the hell you are talking about. I guess the potential for a conversation on top of a page is interesting, but there’s no way for people to find that stuff unless you convince a bunch of friends to add it and participate. Regardless, I added the plugin and fired it up.

My experience might have been better if, after installing, I could see all the Zings that are already living online. But I can’t figure out a way to do that, so I was feeling kinda lonely with this thing. I didn’t really know what to do with my newfound commenting power. So I went to the Zingr forum on their facebook page to see if there was any action. There were four comments on the discussion panel: one trademark infringement claim and three requests for technical assistance.

So I left a little Zing there myself.

And then this happened….

Now this damn Zing is following me all over facebook. When I navigate to another page, it just stays there. Shouldn’t it only pop up on the page I leave it on?Ah well, I think I’ll uninstall. It was an intriguing idea, but in the end it actually convolutes the process of sharing information by putting unneeded, if not interesting, technology and an extra step between the user and their friends.

And don’t even get me started on Miracle Whip, I am a Hellman’s man for life.

This is a great example of how to connect more deeply with an already engaged audience of fans. Three clicks to hook up with facebook connect, and my profile was on the FWA homepage. I was actually meeting with a prospective client this morning and I used this site as an example of how easy it is to leverage the conversation around a brand that is happening in social spaces. Make it simple to be a part, and people will participate.

http://www.thefwa.com/50million/

GTIproject.com is a microsite created for the UK version of the VW GTI. I had one of these cars while I lived in boulder, and damn, was it fun to drive through those mountain passes. I still regret trading it in for a station wagon. (well, kinda… part of the deal with the wife was that I can get the GTI R20 when it comes out next year Anyway, like I was saying… Restraint and simplicity… Right. It is extremely difficult to build a compelling driving game in flash. Due to technical and bandwidth limitations, you typically have to cut out one of the things that make a driving game fun: great graphics or real physics. I had to do it on Rooftop Racer, and I think these guys did it well.

By keeping the car on a slot track, and using video instead of 3D, they solved the technical problems while still making the experience fun and immersive. It’s fun to whip the ‘prototype’ slot car GTI around the track, and the story is simple and fun (overly-dedicated engineer is obsessively protective of his prototypes). Love the multicam view when you crash as well, makes losing as much fun as winning.

http://www.gtiproject.com/

I got nothing but a big green box and a link to download Silverlight.

So.. Wait.. I can’t watch the video? I can’t even find out about your new products without installing your other kinda-new products?

Personally I don’t give a shit if it’s free, but the only time I’ve ever had need or reason to install Silverlight on my machine was so I could participate in a Windows-based ad campaign. First in I’m a PC, and now this. I’ll state it plainly, Microsoft: you’re not going to force or coerce adoption of your technology by holding your advertising campaigns hostage. I suspect you’ll just find that a lot of people won’t watch your ads.

I guess I can just state that I’m not a PC and be done with it.

Words cannot express how excited I am to see this film, but what I love about this blog is the depth and range of artistic influences that Spike and his collaborators share. Honestly, I didn’t even realize it was a blog built around the film at first, because the content is so rich. If you’re expecting all-WTWTA-all-the-time, prepare to be disappointed… In a good way. The content here goes way beyond the film.

From the creators:

http://www.buzzfeed.com/gminor7/in-b-flat-4pu

What was I thinking?!?

Friday I snuck away with Steve and Joe for a monster of a lunch, one that kept me nearly comatose for the better part of the day. We split two burgers and a porterhouse for two. The key lime pie was definitely not my idea… But I partook.

Modernista! was also nominated for Jay-Z’s ‘Brooklyn, Go Hard’, an innovative open-source video that we created for the launch of (RED)Wire. Sadly we didn’t take home a pencil for that one, but it will be featured in the One Show book later this year. That is quite an honor on its own.

Truly, though, it must be said that the best part of going to award shows is getting to see all the amazing work from around that world that you missed. My favorite: Axion’s banner concerts. Really innovative use of space. Funny, engaging, and well-executed.

http://www.axionweb.be/nl/bannerconcerts/

And of course, it was great to see Goodby Silverstein and Partners take agency of the year. Their interactive vision is the best in the business. Soul-crushingly good execution, and they never leave their user behind. Most impressively, they don’t just make great interactive work for one or two of their clients: they consistently do it across the board. Congrats guys, a well-deserved honor.

At the end, we were treated to a great performance by We Are Scientists. Also pretty much the only picture I managed to snap. Damn, I have to get better at that stuff.

For a full list of finalists (winners coming soon as well), go here: http://www.oneclub.org/os/announcement/
 

That was, until the ping pong wars started.

We ended the night with a ridiculous group version of ping pong, where everyone gets a chance to hit the ball, then must put the paddle down and rotate to the left. Then the next person returns, puts their paddle down, rotates, and so on. If you miss you’re out. When you get down to two people, you must put the paddle down and spin in a circle. Needless to say, large quantities of tequila and spinning in circles are not good bedfellows.

On an unrelated note, the camera on my iPhone sucks ass. Like more serious ass than most iPhone cameras, I think.

Go to the site, vote on your favorite, or submit your own. My favorite so far is ‘hamthrax’. Nicely done.

http://renametheswineflu.com/

Thank goodness, I was looking for an image of AF1 teabagging a nuclear power plant on CompFight, but I couldn’t find anything…

Check out the gallery here: http://animalnewyork.com/2009/05/white-house-shoots-down-air-force-one-photo/

Here’s the final list of agencies that will move on to the next round, in no particular order:

MMB580
EVB
Modernista!
22 Squared
Stick and Move
Creature
BBH NY
Duncan Channon
McCann SF
Colle + McVoy
McKinney
McGary Bowen
Crayon
TBWACHIATDAY
Attik
Fancy
Mono

It goes without saying that we are extremely excited to be a part of a groundbreaking project like this, and we’re looking forward to the chance work against this very talented group of agencies. I have no idea what this process will involve, but we’ve been assured that it will not be a typical pitch. Amen to that. Good luck to everyone involved.

Here’s a link to the final posting: https://twerbose.com/t7958

As one commenter ( domanijon ) aptly noted, “The industry has definitely been acting its age lately – after all i guess it is a confrontational teenager right now.”

I didn’t comment on the post. To be honest, I don’t really want anything to do with that conversation. A lot of the companies represented there are ones that I have either had great experiences with, or hope to work with in the future. So I’d rather just stay out of it.

In my experience, I’ve always looked to interactive agencies to help bring a conceptual idea to life. I’ve never hired an interactive agency to fill a conceptual deliverable that is needed to round out a campaign. Of course, that is because I am mainly an interactive creative… That’s my job. But big traditional agencies with no interactive capabilities do this all the time. There are a lot of old-school creatives out there that for whatever reason (fear perhaps?), still think interactive is a joke.

One needs to look no further than at comments like this: “You are hired help. Nothing more. If it isn’t you, it will be someone else. Flash = picking lettuce.”

#more

We as an industry need to make this right. Because the process of working with external interactive agencies is in most cases, crucial to making great online work. The reason is simple, and it’s not because traditional agencies suck; they don’t (well, ok, some do). It has to do with creating opportunities further develop the work.

This was explained to me by a well-known commercial director during an interview we did for a behind-the-scenes video (the director will remain nameless because the campaign is still unreleased). One of the questions had to do with his opinion on the process of working with agencies. He said he loved working with agencies, but that there was a simple reason that directors don’t work in agencies: because the work would never get any better if they did.

His argument was that the process of selecting a director actually created a new creative opportunity to push the work further. The massive amount of energy required for an agency and client to come to agreement on a campaign is exhausting. If the director was a part of all the conversations that led to him/her directing the spot, the work would never evolve. They would get beat up along with everyone else. But having the director enter the process at a later stage allowed them to change their perceptions of what the work should be. And the work gets better as a result.

His example was in reference to creating television. So how is this different from the interactive process? It isn’t. And we shouldn’t be treating it like it is.

The work we do as interactive creatives working on the agency side is best when we use this crucial opportunity between client approval and production to more fully develop our creative. When this new perspective and a new toolset is added to the mix, we have an opportunity to challenge the campaign and push it further.

Which is why all of the great shops that were (or weren’t) mentioned in the AgencySpy article need to be a valued part of our process. We should be using them as partners, and they should get credit for the work they do. But based on what I read this weekend, we’ve got a long way to go.

The article, and ensuing shit-storm can be found here: http://www.mediabistro.com/agencyspy/opeds/op_ed_digital_done_right_and_three_companies_that_seem_to_get_it_part_1_115508.asp

Who knew high blood pressure could be this funny. I’ve got it, and I’ve just been ignoring it for years. Hopefully I’ll find myself in a situation like this, and it’ll pay off some day.

via: http://www.mediabistro.com/agencyspy/campaigns/ha_ha_who_knew_blood_pressure_could_be_hilarious_115049.asp

Anyway, I’m kind of geeking out at the fact that Shep has just designed Lance’s Giro bikes. Lance posted these pics on twitter today. The yellow Madone is amazing, really great details. I love what Lance is doing this year with his custom bikes, I think this is the fourth edition so far.

Here’s a link to Lance’s gallery on twitpic: http://twitpic.com/photos/lancearmstrong