We had to create our very own advertisement for a product.
Me and Michelle worked together and we came up with the idea of producing a pixilation animation advertisement, as it would allow us more freedom with our creations. We wanted to use the idea of advertising the career of photography. We set up two tripods, both with a DSLR D40 camera on top. Strangely enough, I actually came up with the idea of taking photographs of a camera taking photographs! We asked if we would be able to film our advertisement in the PCA Gallery, and when the result was positive we set up there. For our animation, we moved around the gallery and took photos of certain pieces of artwork. The audience would be unable to see the gallery, other than through the the photos that were being taken. At the end, the Nikon camera in view stays stationary, whilst the other camera slowly moves anti-clockwise around the Nikon. It stops at the front of the camera, and the word "Nikon" is written at the top of the screen, and then the slogan appears at the bottom "Capturing Life's Artistic Side".
Storyboard Page 1:
Page 2a:
Page 2b:
Page 3:
Storyboard By Me
Treatment
We open on a blank white screen.
As the camera starts to move backwards we see that it is a white wall.
Now we see a camera filling up most of the screen. The camera moves around the room taking photos of various things, which are of different pieces of artwork. We don’t see these pieces but we can see the photos that were taken of them on the camera’s screen. This continues until the end where the camera in shot is still and the camera filming moves around it in a half circle to stop at the front of it and the word ‘Nikon’ appears at the top of the screen and the slogan ‘Capturing Life’s Artistic Side’ appears at the bottom.
The song ‘Holiday’ by the band Green Day is playing all throughout the advert and the whole piece is filmed using Pixilation.
Subvertising is the creation of spoofs or parodies of corporate and political advertisements. They either take the form of a pre-existing advertisement or they are a creation of a new advertisement based upon an advertised product.
Adidas – Aids Subvertisement
The designers of this subvertisement cleverly turned the pre-existing logo for Adidas products into a logo for a campaign against the rise of deaths each year caused by Aids, or HIV.
They adapted the logo for a political reason, and used Adidas because of the suitability of the logo, but there isn't any known reason for a connection to be drawn between Adidas products and Aids.
The three peaks of the logo have been re-designed into three peaks of a graph. These have been numbered and dated top represent the number of those who have lost their lives in the past three years.
Calvin Klien subvertisement
This subvertisement is a take on the usual Calvin Klien underwear advertisements. The subvert is demonstrating the way that the Calvin Klien models are an unrealistic representation of men. The slogan 'Reality For Men' is a take on the writing 'For Men' that occasionally appears on their advertisements. It is trying to demonstrate the difference between the 'usual' yet undesirable men and the 'fake' yet attractive male models that are used on advertisements. The subvert mainly just shows the hairy chest and beer belly of the overweight man, who is standing with his arms raised so that his armpit hair can be revealed. His head is not in the frame, which reflects the usual layout of the adverts, as occasionally the models heads are also out of the frame. In the original, the model is 100% hair free and covered in oil. It's more than likely that his 'six pack' has been enhanced or created on Photoshop.
The Honda Statement: “Being a fleet operator isn't easy. There's so many things you have to consider. The desirability of a car. Your duty of care to drivers and the environment. Keeping your fleet on the road as much as possible. And of course, whole life costs.
We understand difficult. That's why the new Accord is sportier and sleeker and it's driving dynamics have been benchmarked on the BMW 3 Series. It's packed full of advanced safety features and the engine has been totally re-engineered to make it clearer and more fuel-efficient than ever before. And the residual values from CAP and EurotaxGlass are very strong, competing with other premium cars in this class.
It wasn't easy to achieve these things. But we think you'll appreciate that.”
The skydiving advert campaign consisted of a series of four short teaser adverts that explained little snippets into the statistics of skydiving. The adverts mentioned nothing about Honda or cars, the only clue of anything was an address being shown 'difficult is worth doing.com' which at that time directed viewers to a blog that talked about the ins and outs of skydiving but mentioned nothing about the upcoming live skydiving advertisement. Here are two of the four teasers:
The aim of the short adverts was to “give people insight, let them to a certain degree, without letting them know what was happening” Honda account director at W&K London, Jonathan Tapper. He also believed that “By giving people understanding about the ad before it launches, not after, it gives substance and authenticity to what Honda is saying.”
The final advertisement in the Honda advert campaign, consisted of several skydivers jumping from a plane and whilst in free fall, forming the letters H.O.N.D.A to advertise the well known brand name. Honda were relying on the public recognising it as an advertisement for a new car etc. from just the name.
The skydive was filmed and aired to the public live on the 29/05/08 at 8.10pm during the final break of Come Dine With Me on Channel 4. The reason for this live advertisement, was to demonstrate the meaning and point behind their slogan 'Difficult Is Worth Doing'.
They're is a strong connection between all of Honda's TV advertisements. They are all around two minuets long and in each the car is he last thing to be advertised. In the majority, it's hard to actually tell the advertisements belong to Honda, until the last 15seconds or so, where either the car or the name Honda is revealed to the audience. Honda also like to be “open about how they made them because the story behind the production is often as interesting as the commercial itself.”
Guinness have a strong theme throughout all of they're advertisements. These themes are all running in conjunction with the product of Guinness Beer. For example, all of their advertisements are in black and white, to reflect the dark brown and cream colours of the beer.
The target audience of the beer is of course men so throughout all of their advertisements mainly and occasionally only men are shown.
The main theme behind Guinness advertisements is the slogan “Good Things Come To Those Who Wait”. This slogan forms the bases for all of the adverts, as they experiment with ways that the slogan can be expressed. In the Guinness 'Surfers' advert, it shows a group of men waiting around for ages, until the perfect wave finally appears. They ride it into the shore and some members of the 'competition' are lost beneath the waves. The white crest of the waves have been shown as galloping white horses, as they are the visual for a well known metaphor.
In the 'Domino Effects' advert, the idea behind it is another showing of the well known slogan. E idea is of course that a domino effect takes ages to set up, but is so perfect to watch when it is finished. Domino's creates the visual for the long time spent building the run, and then the joy released when the run complete showing the visual “Good Things Come To Those Who Wait” slogan.
We are constantly surrounded by advertisements. They are displayed by public transport such as in trains and on the side of buses, along the roadside on the billboards and in shop windows. On the television, programs are actually interrupted for a commercial break. Even on the radio we continue to be bombarded! With so many products and experiences being advertised, similar groups of products have to be advertised in a way to make them stand out against others.
When products for men are being advertised, an aggressive pose, or a moody, tough demeanour in TV advertisements is often used. The whole idea of this is that aggressive men are quite often portrayed ‘tough’ and women are known as being attracted to men that are tough or that appear to be tough. Anold 'Versace underwear’ advert, is a good example of aggression being used, the man is made to look aggressive because he is shown to be in a fighting - boxing stance, and he appears to work out regularly, shown by his ‘six-pack’. The underwear itself is topped by a band which looks like a boxing belt, which links to the pose and represents winning, giving the impression that you are a winner and become tough and popular like a boxer if you buy this product.
Similarly, in this Calvin Klein print advertisement, the model that has been picked also has the type of ‘six-pack’ body that probably most men dream of having. This makes the product of the perfume appeal to the target market of men because it gives the impression that if you wear this product you become the ‘man’ and will look great. Also, due to mediation, this model also has the body that women like, so this also makes the buyers of this product think that they could 'get all the girls' because they’re wearing this tough aftershave.
Using these methods of advertising such as the hot male model in nothing but his boxers is a commonly used technique to help to sell a product and make their message stand out. You can find examples of advertisements using gender to their advantage throughout the entire advertising business and also throughout the media.
The old moving image ‘baby love’ advertisement for Diet Coke would be a perfect example of a well constructed moving image advert designed to sell a drink product. Obviously the design colours of the Diet coke can are black and red writing and the rest of the can is silver, and the main colours that are used in the advert are silver, red and black. The man that is featured in the advert walks into a unisex clothes shop holding a can of diet coke which he drinks to refresh himself after being outside in the hot sun. The coke can that he is holding is always positioned so viewers can see the logo at all times. The man is wearing a black shirt, but is shopping for a silver one (the link with the colours) and when the woman who is standing outside the shop turns around to look at him through the window, after seeing him drink from the can, is wearing a red dress. The window she peers through has red writing on like the writing on the can, and the glass itself reflects the sun to appear kind of silvery. This gives an impression of the can, and also that the can brought the man and the woman together. This is backed up by the mans attention being brought round to the lady, by her opening her can of diet coke, again with the logo showing for publicity reasons. You can see in the background cars driving past all the way through the advertisement and they are all either silver or red coloured. This advert shows the attraction between men and women and they act around each other. (Really sorry, Unfortunatly I haven't been able to find a version of the advert ANYwhere! But it was 'Diet Coke - Baby Love' advertisement). However, here is a still taken from the very end of the advertisement:
Do you often see a male drinking a diet coke? Usually it’s a Pepsi Max. Men don’t drink diet drinks because they are commonly aimed at women who are trying to lose weight due to mediation putting out the idea that women should be slim. Men don’t wont to appear to be dieting because that means they have to admit to being overweight and far from perfect, so advertisers and the manufacturers of coke have had to come up with a way of kind of tricking overweight men to eat and drink healthier. This is where the product name of ‘coke zero’ came from. The product design itself is designed to look cool with the colours black, red and white being used. In the advert the advertisers tried to make the product look like an action drink rather than a diet drink. The whole action movie theme gives across the message that by drinking the coke zero products they will turn into some sot of action man, when the reality is just that a chubby man will lose some weight and not be embarrassed about it.
In advertising people control the standards of what adverts can be seen and which ones are not fit to be broadcasted. The ASA stands for ‘Advertising Standards Agency’. Their job is to make sure that all adverts meet the standards of the advertising codes. The ASA are an independent body which was set up in 1962 by the advertising industry to monitor the exceptions of the rules which where and still are laid out in the advertising codes. They stop misleading, harmful and offensive advertising. They also make sure that all sale promotions are carried out smoothly and try to help to reduce commercial mail that is unwanted. This includes mail that is sent through post, email and text messaging. They regulate the contents of advertising by following up complaints which may have been made about advertisements. Also they monitor adverts themselves to spot problems.
Some advertisers have really pushed the boundaries of advertising to the extreme and have been forced to withdraw their adverts. This Print advertisement was forced to be withdrawn because it was “Likely to cause widespread and serious offence to readers”. This advert was created in the first place to make a fashion statement far different from all others, and the quote ‘killer Heels’ was a visual witticism on the expression ‘killer heels’ and was designed for viral advertising in order to get the idea across.
Many advertisers try to embark on a ploy to create adverts to be purposely banned to create an effect between viewers of an: ‘oh my goodness, did you see that advert?’ approach to shock viewers and get the message behind the advertisement across easier, by creating an advert without limitations.
There are many ways of creating adverts to cause an effect on the viewers in order for them to get their message across. Shock tactics have been proven to be very effective through a way of viral advertising. The advertisers which push the boundaries of advertisement so far as to get the advert banned, I think are the only ones which actually manage to get the public talking and thinking about the state of the society at the moment and as long as they stay pushing the limits in the right direction, then I agree that it is right for them to do this.
We watched a short scene on the processes that went into the production of the Fruit Shoot print advertisement. As the Robinson company is commonly known for producing squash juice drinks, they had to put a lot of effort and time into the production of the Fruit Shoot advertisement. This was because they had to make the target audience of mums understand that the drink was a juice that didn't need to be added to water. They also had to sell the product as a solution to managing to get kids to eat 5-a-day. They wanted the drink to attract the attention of families as a solution of healthy eating.
In the advertisement we watched, we saw David Beckham playing football in a park with Johnny Wilkinson.The idea was to produce an advert in which David would look more ordinary, in the way of his clothes and his actions. There was also an element of the advert in whichboth stars were teaching each other the tricks to their different sports, this tells the consumers that stars also needed teaching occasionally. The aim was to make the icon of David easier to relate to and understand for fans and consumers making the products become a connection between him and them without causing problems of the consumers believing that the products were above them because of David's advertising. The majority of Adidas advertisements feature celebrities as a way of making the Adidas products more noticeable and interesting. Sport personalities such as footballs David Beckham or Tennis's Roger Federer are used in Adidas and other sport brand advertisements because they help to sell the cool sporty lifestyle that the products such as trainers offer.
