# 25 Website

I’m really excited about this. For a long time I’ve been wanting a portfolio website, but I just never got off my butt and made it. DeviantArt is a lot of fun, but it really doesn’t work as a professional site for my art. I’ve always been annoyed that they had to name their site “deviant” art. It conjures up images of semi-pornographic photography. Not really what I’m going for when I hand someone my card or say, hey, check out my art website.

Well, here it is. My brand spanking new website! I’m open for commissions.

http://kathrynlillie.weebly.com/index.html

Check it out!

#24 Inspiration: Mihai Criste

Like Salvador Dalí? Well, surrealism is still going strong, and there are many incredible artists producing beautiful, intriguing work today. Here is my inspiring artist for the day: Mihai Criste.

"Self Portrait" by Mihai Criste

To me, his work represents exactly what I’m trying to learn as I make my way in the world of advertising. As James Whistler said, “An artist is not paid for his labor but for his vision.” As an art director, your ability to come up with ideas and then interpret those ideas as visuals is the most important thing you bring to the table. Mihai’s work shows that he can do both. His work is symbolic, intriguing, and perfectly executed. He has the kind of mind that would be well suited to solving problems in the idea industry.

Some of my favorite pieces by him:

"Forbidden Fruit" by Mihai Criste

"Metaphysical Door" by Mihai Criste

"Never-ending Chronicles" by Mihai Criste

Check out more of his work at his deviantart site http://mihai82000.deviantart.com/ or his blog http://www.mihaicriste.blogspot.com/

#23 Unretouched Ads

Would an un-retouched ad make you more inclined to buy a beauty product?

Makeup Forever HD Foundation Ad

Dove's Campaign for Real Beauty

Here are two ads that are “un-retouched.”

First of all, what is the definition of un-retouched? We can assume that while they may not have been edited to the point of looking unrecognizable, they have been at least adjusted to have the color and contrast look right. From working with photos and doing my own editing, I know that very few photos are perfect right from the camera. Despite the fact that the photos for these ads were taken by professionals with the means and skill to photograph their subject flawlessly, I still think that at least a little color correction went on.

That being said, let’s talk about the Makeup Forever ad. First of all, I love the brand. Their products consistently deliver high quality and intense pigment. I have yet to buy something from them that doesn’t live up to its claim. I do own the foundation that this advertisement is for, and it is the best foundation I’ve ever used.  So, this ad has a leg up in that it is advertising a quality product. It lives up to what it promises, which is a rare and wonderful thing.

Would I buy this product based on the ad? I love that the photo used resembles the set-up of a Facebook photo. This is the kind of picture you see as many girls’ profile pictures. She looks like she’s ready to head out on the town, and is taking those pre-party pics with her phone. Given, she’s got a pretty flawless face to begin with, but you can actually see pores on her skin. It’s so much more real than any other foundation ad, where the model’s skin is airbrushed into absurdity. This ad would inspire me to buy the product, because I feel that it can actually offer me the flawless skin it promises.

Next, let’s look at the Dove ad. I appreciate the fact that the Dove ad uses “real women.” Because it was such a well known campaign, a lot of debate went down about how much the photos were retouched, the casting call for “flawless” real women, etc. I like the idea and the execution of the print ads was good, but these ads don’t work for me because there has been too much controversy behind them. Dove’s parent company, Unilever, also owns Axe, whose advertising is exactly what Dove supposedly stands against.  It was extremely hypocritical to have a campaign claiming to be a revolution that would make real beauty culturally accepted while simultaneously putting out degrading, sexist ads for another brand. In this case, the means (great execution and ads) don’t justify the ends (a campaign with seriously flawed morals).

# 22 Pinterest – Social Media is infinite

When we think we’re starting to get a grasp on utilizing one type of social media, four other kinds of new media spring up.  It’s a quick-paced, ever-changing world that you have to be willing to be forever relearning.

I had known about Twitter for some time now and had remained hesitant about getting an account, but once I got an account I’ve been checking it daily.  Instead of using Twitter for networking purposes, I’ve found that its true power in its learning capabilities.  I’ve found artists, design labs, studios, and ad agencies that update their feeds with tutorials and new mediums.

This being the case, I’ve heard about Pinterest booming up out of nowhere and thought maybe it would delightfully surprise me like Twitter did. Oh god, yes it does. Personally, I don’t think it is as useful professionally, but it sure is a lot of fun. And addicting. Did I mention addicting?

#21 Typography – Painting pictures with words

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, but maybe only 30 of those words apply to the message you are trying to deliver.  Sometimes words are worth more than their pictorial equivalent.

Here is a good example of words that get straight to the point.

This picture could mean many things, but the statements that embody the missing leg narrow the message

# 20 “font:ecafepyt:” Typeface in Design

As an eternal artist and aspiring art director, I can’t ignore typeface in design.  If you ask a graphic designer what their favorite font is, what do you expect to hear? You will hear a resounding “Helvetica”.

Several design sites that I’ve come across claim that new designers flood their work with Helvetica text and it is harmful to their work.  I came across a good analogy for this. Just because your favorite pair of pants are bell-bottoms, it doesn’t mean you should wear them most of the time.

http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2010/12/14/what-font-should-i-use-five-principles-for-choosing-and-using-typefaces/

Font should be tailored to fit the project and design appropriately.

My passion for art resides more in imagery and paint strokes. Not only can text magnify the effect of an image by tenfold if used effectively, but the appearance of the text is just as important so I need to hone my ability to design typeface effectively. I came across this simplification of the families of font that I found helpful.

http://justcreative.com/2008/09/23/top-7-fonts-used-by-professionals-in-graphic-design-2/

# 19 The Prius Marketing Problem: Creating status-quo with advertising

Advertising can do amazing things.  It can change an image.  It can change views and values.  It can even cause revolutions.  However, at the end of the day, advertising is about selling a product or service.

That becomes a problem when you look at what the consumer wants.  Mainly, they want to be set apart from others by what they buy, or rather, they want to fit in with ‘the better crowd’.  The job of advertising is to set the product or service apart from the competition.  This means that advertising inherently creates a division among people based on what they buy.

The Prius situation:

The main appeal of owning a Prius is to be more eco-friendly since hybrid cars are better for the environment.  Understandably, people want their Prius to look different than other cars – not necessarily look better; just different.  This was evident when hybrid cars starting resembling standard cars.  The result was a decline in sales.  People wanted others to recognize their decision in buying a hybrid car.

# 18 Balancing the upside down pyramid and storytelling in YouTube timeframes

How often do you press the skip ad button before you can even tell what is being advertised?  This is especially problematic for movie ads where they will have the ‘green screen movie preview thing’ up for the entire 5 seconds you have to sit through before you can skip.

vs

The first five seconds tells a short story.  Setting: downtown of a big city.  Conflict: humans running for their lives.  Right away the audience is drawn in to some degree whether they are wondering if there had been a natural disaster or if it’s the zombie apocalypse.

Advertisers use pacing and attempt to make the viewer curious of what’s happening, but that kind of ad won’t work if you can skip it after 5 seconds.  Either shell over the bigger bucks for that 15 sec / 20 sec ad lock or modify the ad to follow the old upside down pyramid routine.

# 17 Embrace the Crazy

Ever since Charlie Sheen’s ejection from Two and a Half Men, he has been labeled wild and unstable.  Many celebrities who have had their reputations shattered or changed substantially rebound with commercials or interviews trying to explain where they were coming from such as Tiger Woods’ father commercial set out by Nike.

However, Charlie Sheen decided to just go with his new crazed persona.  Commercials that feature him and promotions for his recent tour show him as an eccentric lose canon.

Though I’m not much of a fan of Charlie Sheen, these ads force me to respect him more for embracing how the world views him instead of trying to spin his image like the Tiger story. This ad works because it tells the viewer that Direct TV is fun. . . almost as much fun as being Charlie Sheen.

Then again, going the Gary Busey route may be more lucrative than maintaining a pristine public image

# 16 Shark Bus Ad

This ad was informing people that National Geographic Channel now had their own equivalent of Discovery Channel’s shark week.

Om nom nom

Simple, yet brilliant.  There isn’t anything complex about this ad.  This ad works well because it’s just well-placed and clever.