Campaign

'I think we're in a play' - Fringe Highlights part one

I (lol) had a very appreciated day off last Friday. And in a naïve attempt to get away from advertising for a few days, I joined some friends on a jaunt to Edinburgh for a little artistic nourishment.
 
How wrong I was. There is no such thing as escaping advertising. First off, I was travelling only a carriage down from the whole BBH creative department on their summer jolly. So I got a quick update on Bill’s postcard collection which has taken a turn for the vintage. I managed to resist joining them in their 11 A.M. boozing. And I caught up on the news since we left black sheep towers in March.

Then later we crossed paths at the brilliant Idiots of Ants. A sketch group formed by some guys we went to university with, they've just been shortlisted for the Comedy Awards, rightly so. They had some really clever material. The opening sketch was a plaful dabble in post-modernism, where Nazi soldiers suddenly realise they are actors. ‘I think we’re in a play. I think these are just costumes!’ Again, I couldn’t get away from advertising even then – I kept thinking how much it reminded me of the recent ‘mini – I think we’re in a viral’ viral.

As ever, an essential part of one’s edinburgh experience involves tempering your outbreaks of FOMO (fear of missing out), as you walk round and see that all the things you weren’t OCD enough to book back in January 2007 are now sold out. The Faulty Towers Dining Experience being one of them. Just round the corner from the Pleasance courtyard, it's a restaurant where they hire actors to perform as Basil, Manuel and Polly while you eat. From the little show we caught through the window, it looked amazing. Complete with sound effects of smashing glass and Manuel being hurt in the back room.

The flip-side of not being too anal about booking stuff up is that you find yourself with spare time for spontaneous hidden treasures. One such gem was Matt Harvey and his stand-up poetry show 'Wondermentalist' on the Sunday afternoon. From the moment he started, this understated master of wordsmithery had me in uncontrollable hysterics. He's not just mind-blowingly insightful and lyrical, his delivery is hilarious too. Check him out at Mattharvey.co.uk
 
Then came his his anecdote about being paid copywriter rates to write Ode to a Spud. As it turns out he was recently hired by Archibald Ingall Stretton... to write a poem for their Love Food Hate Waste campaign. There really is no escaping 'adland'! But then I guess you never do when you're a creative. And that's the fun of it. Being inspired by all sorts of stuff you see, making a note of it and then forgetting all about it. 

Anyway, have run out of time and space, so more on Matt Harvey and other highlights in a second blog.

***Girls - Hot new friday night make up tips***

******* Contact the incredible Nina Chakrabarti for your weekend makeover. Choose from permanent or wash off markers. ********

I (Nat) love these images. So tribal and futuristic. Could this be a clue as to where make up is heading 10 years from now? Maybe we should move our coloured markers and fine liners to the make up bag? Just think, we could do scamps on our faces..

(Only joking.
These images were done for Seattle magazine “I Want You”.
Check out her site. She does beautiful things with pens.)

The Dark side of the Moon

I (Nat) went to see new British film Moon a few weeks ago, and thought  it was absolutely brilliant. I really, really loved it. Partially funded by Trevor Beattie, the film was made with just two million pounds. Which goes to show that with the right team, you can make 'proper' films without the need for big studios and massive wallets.


It was all filmed with just one actor, Sam Rockwell. He plays the character Sam Bell, a lonely guy who has been send to the Moon for three years to harvest Helium 3 to send it back to Earth for their energy source. Being completely isolated up there, his sanity begins to dissipate before long. There's no live communication to earth so he has to make video messages and send them to his wife and daughter. Ironically, Sam Rockwell was away from his girlfriend for months on the shoot, echoing his character's feeling of desolation. Which must have helped him 'find his motivation' no end.


Because Rockwell plays multiple characters of himself, in the form of clones, it's easy to forget when you're watching it that there's only one actor. Each scene was redone and redone, with him playing a different clone each time. A one man show, it must have been an exhausting process. What is also great about this film is that the 'twist'  is dealt with quite early on do you spend the rest of the time concentrating on what's really going on rather than waiting for the big reveal.


The only other character is the robot assistant 'Gerty', played by Kevin Spacey. His voice is incredible. Totally sinister, but totally not. You spend the whole time not wondering if he's on the dark side or not, wondering is he a goodie or a baddie?

Our friend from Glue Gavin Rothery was the Visual Effects Supervisor, part time stunt man and Production Concept (meaning he designed the film's aesthetic). He also has a cameo appearance in it - did you spot where? According to Gavin, everyone interprets Gurty differently, many of them projecting things onto this faceless character.

We've been promised us a couple of 'making of' videos that show how the movie was made in miniature. We'll put them up soon, but for now, go see it for yourself. Here's the trailer.
 

The Breakfast Club

On the day when the great John Hughes, director of one of my favourite films sadly passed away, Nat and I went to the Campbell Lace Beta Breakfast Club for Campaign bloggers and commenters. It was great fun, the food was delicious and we learned many things.

One, that you don't need a fancy sign above the door to open an agency. Two, that Campbell Lace have a row of awesome little thinking pods, where, once installed, you're on full display to all Carnaby shoppers while you brainstorm. And three, that 'thumbs up' and 'double thumbs up' are now back in fashion - according to fellow ex-BBHer, Mark Threlfall (pictured in action).

Thanks very much for having us guys. Nice to meet you in person!

And good to put a face to a name with Campaign's Colin, our long-suffering web-editor, who has been there for us in times of techno-mares for over a year now (6th pic down on the left).

P.s. Does Barry Manilow know that you raid his wardrobe?

Jiggery pokery from facebook

Farcebook is having a tough time of it lately.

It appeared that a facebook advertiser had lifted the photo of his wife, Cheryl, from her profile without her permission. She had failed to switch off a facebook setting that allows the company to use a member’s pictures in ads sent to their friends. An embarrassed facebook removed the ad and issued a statement distancing itself from the practice of lifting photos without consent.

Read her blog entry on the matter here (and discover how to prevent yourself being used in dating ads). And see the official facebook statement here.

So why do people keep getting their knickers in a twist over their privacy policy? It's probably something to do with their small print being utterly incomprehensible.

This reminds me of a funny thing I saw a while back where an agency had a go at 'translating' the changes in terms and conditions of farcebook, to quite comedic results.

They took one sample sentence which we’re meant to read before clicking ‘accept’.

‘By posting User Content to any part of the Site, you automatically grant, and you represent and warrant that you have the right to grant, to the Company an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense) to use, copy, publicly perform, publicly display, reformat, translate, excerpt (in whole or in part) and distribute such User Content for any purpose, commercial, advertising, or otherwise, on or in connection with the Site or the promotion thereof, to prepare derivative works of, or incorporate into other works, such User Content, and to grant and authorize sublicenses of the foregoing.’

‘If you post any content (that's photos, wall posts, songs, videos, status updates and notes) on this site, you give us (Facebook) the right to:

• copy it

• use it in public

• reformat it

• translate it

• use excerpts from it.

So the content has to be yours, or you must have the right to use it.

We can also use your content to advertise or promote Facebook. And we can grant other people a licence to use your content to advertise or promote Facebook, too.’

In short, if you can't say something in plain English, don't say it at all.