Outnumbered

We have recently got into the TV program Outnumbered on BBC1. The kids are hilarious and its semi improvised which makes it even better. We suggest you go and watch it now on: http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/search/?q=outnumbered.

Pete the Meat Puppet

What is this? It's just another one of their weird and kooky virals. It's the darker side of diesel and I must admit, I'm intrigued. And It's the catchiest song i've heard in an advert for a while. What a weird video though. Diesel seem to be on a roll with their advertising, you know you've made it as a brand when you can do whatever the hell you want without overtly mentioning your brand.

Robin Rhode

Last weekend I took a trip into London and went to the Southbank Centre to see an Andy Warhol exhibition. It claimed it would show him in a new light. It didn't, he is still a brilliant artist but a scummy person. However, by buying the ticket to see Andy Warhol, I also got free entry to see Robin Rhode and that was well worth it. Using the simplest of materials - his body, chalk, pavements and walls he manages to produce amusing, socially aware, clever and well art directed pieces of work. It was a nice introduction to this artist and I'm looking forward to seeing what he produces in the future as I am not sure how far this medium he has chosen will take him.

Bat For Lashes

After seeing Bat for Lashes at a Radiohead gig last summer I’ve become totally obsessed. Natasha Kahn’s music is very visual and haunting. She is an artist in all aspects of the word. I love her music videos, 'What’s a girl to do?' being one of my favorites. Her music could be described as mature gothic sounds for those willing to be whisked off to beautiful faraway lands. Take a look...

This Is Boredom.

We were set the task to make a quick little film about boredom, here's what I made...

It's nearly Christmas!

Well, it's nearly time for Christmas and I can't wait to go back home to my beautiful city of Galway, Ireland for a wee while but first, there is still lots of work to be done. We got results from the X-factor week; Sarah and I are very pleased we got into the top 5. We should be sorting out mentors, which is exciting. We've handed in our books for an assessment and hopefully we should get them back sooner rather than later, so we can make changes and go on a few book crits before the holidays. Oh, and guess what time it is… it’s panto time. So there, that’s the update for now.

The Fall

I recently watched the film The Fall and I thought it was awesome. The film is directed by Tarsem Singh and is executed in dazzling fashion. It is such an exotic, fanciful story, so loony and imaginative and outré. I loved it. I think this is how stories are supposed to be, full of imagination and so removed from reality in places yet it sucks you in totally. The lines between reality and fiction totally blur. I think this film is a definite must see.

Beardyman

Well, I've been recently introduced to some pretty interesting youtube videos, check them out:

Beardyman 'Monkey Jazz'



'Star Wars' An acapella tribute to John Williams

Diagonal Thinking?

So, I was was surfing the web, having a read of other people’s blogs to see if I could find anything of interest. I found Dave Trott's blog, which was very interesting, and I found the blog Scamp and then I found this blog called 'The forum for junior ad creatives' and I came across a post about the IPA's Diagonal Thinking test.

What is diagonal thinking I hear you cry? Well, apparently it's the ability to switch effortlessly between linear, logical thought process to lateral, creative ones and it seems to be the defining characteristics of people who do well in the advertising industry. According to the IPA, only 10% of the population can think diagonally. And if you score more than 90% in the test, you can print off an IPA certificate, which, says IPA director general Hamish Pringle, you can then attach to your CV as proof of your talent, which will become your "passport to adland".

I'm not going to lie I was intrigued. I wanted to take the test but then, what if I failed? I have enough worries about University and Advertising as it is. Is this what I’m supposed to be doing? What if I never get a job? Am I actually good at this? And if I fail this test should I just cry in a corner somewhere and give up on advertising totally? I have these thoughts sometimes but I generally just scrunch them all up in a ball and chuck them out the window. I am good at this and I know that I am going to succeed. Even if I do fail the test it doesn’t matter, it’s just a silly test on the Internet and it probably doesn’t mean anything at all. I shall take the test. If I succeed that’s fantastic, if I fail I shall never tell a soul that I even took the test and then still become über successful in advertising and prove everyone wrong including that silly little test. Ha!

So I did the test, and it turns out I am a diagonal thinker. Thank god for that. But what a horrid little test to make me worry and doubt myself. Can this kind of thing really be measured in a test? If you want to worry and panic and doubt yourself, why not try the test now www.diagonalthinking.co.uk

Bad Things Happen Indoors

I just think this advert for the Toyota RAV4 (Saatchi and Saatchi, Sydney) is hilarious. Its disgusting but it makes me laugh everytime!

Bucks V Miami

Well, yesterday evening it was time to go back to Saatchi and Saatchi for the BNU V Miami Ad School FACE OFF. The product was Evian water. Difficult enough as trying to advertise water is a bit like trying to advertise Oxegen to people and expect them to pay for it. But anyhow, we gave it a go. When we got to the agency we were all asked to put our work into envelopes and then we had to present whatever was in the envelope and sell it. That was a lesson in itself. I find presenting daunting but when presenting someone elses work it is that bit easier, less nerve racking and I found I could really fight for it. Now I just have to apply that to when I present my own work and not get so nervous! Anyway, after everyone had finished presenting, Rick and Steve who were running the workshop were not impressed at all. Everyone seemed to have missed the mark slightly. Oh dear. Well, I suppose its all a learning curve. Sarah and I won with our campaign, Rehab for Raindrops. It was about the waters dirty past and how the French Alps is like Rehab for the Raindrops and makes it pure again so it can become Evian. So, we were the least shit out of a shit bunch. Woo. So the score BUCKS 2 - 0 Miami.

Feedback

Well, we won at Saatchi and Saatchi! Everyone did really well I think and the guys at Saatchi's gave us some good feedback, heres what they said about us:

Sarah & Fiona: Brilliant. 'Are you spontaneous? Prove it' was a fantastic argument. It put people into a position where they felt obliged to participate or risk being shame-faced. Their execution of getting people to pose with mannequins was brilliantly naughty and very cheeky. Really well done for getting the full 20 participants. Top overall campaign. 9/10

So thats all well and good but now its time for the Miami Bucks FACE OFF. We have to come up with a kick ass campaign for Evian water. We'll let you know how we get on.

X-Factor

So for the last two weeks we've been having an X-factoresque week with advertising agencies in London, doing campaigns and seeing who did the best ones. Thursday night was the finale with Saatchi and Saatchi, who set us quite a different brief from any other agency.

The brief was to go around London and get 20 people to do something for us. We weren't allowed to say that we were students or that we were doing it for Saatchi and Saatchi so we had to come up with a good enough strategy so people would actually do something for us.

First of all Sarah and I went to a cafe to sit down and think for a bit. We came to the decision that we were going to try and get people to stand in shop windows and pretend to be mannequins. We weren't sure how to go about doing this so first off we went around to the shops and asked if it would be OK to get random people to stand in their windows. Surprisingly they all said no, apparently its illegal. So, how were we going to go about this? We decided we were just going to do it without asking and our strategy to get people to do this was to ask people if they were spontaneous. Many people straight away said yes. So we asked them to prove it. We told them we didn't think people were as spontaneous as they thought they were, people were like robots now days and never had fun anymore. People immediately took us up on the challenge.

We were off, it all started quite smoothly, we got 3 people to pose in H&M's shop window but then the security guard noticed what we were doing when the forth person went in to pose. Our poor forth person, I'm not going to lie, I felt a bit bad. We weren't the ones who got in trouble, he went in and when the bouncer told him to get out the poor guy started fighting our cause, he told the bouncer he was just having a little fun. Things got heated quite rapidly and we had to go in and break them up before anything bad happened. He was shouting at the security guard that he was just being spontaneous and that the security guard should have fun too but that he had a shit job and probably didn't know how to have fun. When we finally got him out of the store we apologised but he said it was OK and that he was just angry at the security guard, he just didn't know how to have fun.

Well, after that incident we decided to move on. It took us a moment to recover from but we managed to get more people to do it, and we think they all had a little bit of fun. In total we managed to get 22 people to do it, which we thought was quite good, we ran into a little bit of trouble in other shops, when I say we I actually mean the people we got to pose who were fighting our cause, we were just standing outside taking pictures. Many people wanted us to send them pictures via email so we will. All in all, it was a fun day, and I think the guys at Saatchi's actually liked it.