Through My Eyes

The Most Astounding Fact Ever

Sun, 11 Mar 2012 22:09:08 -0400

25. Website is Up and Running

Mon, 05 Mar 2012 05:16:00 -0500

24. Amazing Movie Trailers, Terrible Movies

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 21:52:00 -0500

In the world of movies the trailer is the production company’s way of advertising the movie and hyping it up and getting people excited to see it. The problem is movie trailers to me can be considered some of the most misleading advertisements out there. I am going to list 2 trailers for movies that I went in thinking that they were going to be really good based on the trailer then I found myself leaving the theater feeling like I just wasted $10.

The first was for Clash of the Titans

This movie turned out to be a disaster, there was terrible acting, a terrible story, and all the visuals in the trailer turned out to be a lot cheaper and cheesier once the actual movie came out. Overall it was just a cheaper version of what was put in the trailer.

The next one is for Dreamcatcher

This trailer makes it seem like this movie is this suspenseful thriller possibly involving a natural disaster based on the animals running away and the military helicopters. Or maybe about a murderer or some disease that broke out. But no where in the trailer did it let on the impression of it being about parasitic aliens killing people. Well that is exactly what it is about. So when I go see a movie thinking it is about one thing then it turns out it is the complete opposite of what I was expecting that will generally piss me off. The same goes for any misleading advertising, if you lie or mislead the consumer about your product then generally the reception will be very poor.

23. Best Slogans Ever

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 20:30:00 -0500

In my personal opinion there are two slogans that I would consider to be the greatest slogans ever. In order to receive an honor such as this I feel that the slogan needs be recognizable and when it is heard people should immediately think of the brand it is connected to.

The first one being Nike’s slogan “Just Do It”.

The 2nd one is “Breakfast of Champions” from ~~Toaster Strudel~~ Wheaties

22. Shepard Fairey "Hope"

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 16:39:23 -0500

Shepard Fairey has become one of the world’s most renowned street artists and is responsible for two of the most iconic images in the art world today. They are the Obama Hope poster that arrived during the 2008 election. The other was called “Obey” and it featured the face of Andre the Giant.

Shepard Fairey faced legal ramifications over the use of the AP Photo of Obama and they were seeking damages. He agreed to pay the fee to use the images but Fairey said “What damages? I made this image more popular then it ever was.” He fought these claims and this video is an interview in which he talks about his views on copyright in the art world.

“Every spoof gives more power to the original.”- Shepard Fairey

Obey Campaign Website

21. Keep Moving Forward

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 15:52:00 -0500

“You’ve gotta hit as hard as life. It isn’t about how hard you hit, it’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. How much can you take and keep moving forward? That’s how winning is done.”- Sylvester Stallone

Excerpt from his movie Rocky

Remember to keep moving forward.

20. Brackets Everywhere

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 15:22:00 -0500

March is here which can only mean one thing and that is March Madness. Every March the NCAA hosts the college basketball championship tournament. It has become one of the most iconic events in sports history. It is back again this year and CBS and Tuner Sports have teamed up to create this ad campaign directed at getting the casual fan or less likely viewer to tune in this March to watch the tournament live. They used many different interests like fashion and news and incorporated the NCAA’s iconic bracket into all of them. This ad was both funny and interesting, and hopefully it is successful in bringing even more people to enjoy this year’s tournament action.

For more information on this ad campaign please read this Huffington Post article.

Coverage begins March 13th on TruTV, TNT, TBS, and CBS.

19. Social Media Advertising

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 14:56:00 -0500

Social media sites are quickly becoming the most widely used sites on the internet and this has given rise and fueled the world of online advertising. We are living in the social media revolution and advertisers have noticed. Here is a video that tells us many facts about how social media has taken over and the current impact it has on peoples everyday lives.

Currently Facebook and Twitter are the two of the biggest social media sites being used today and both are making strides to make it so user generated and commercial advertisements are not turning into clutter taking up screen space. Twitter for example is now using promoted tweets and ads to allow brands to get their message across to the consumers. Facebook is interesting too, because like the video said, the average Facebook user spends 55 minutes on the site per day. That gives companies almost an hour to get their message out there. So how are they doing it? Well many businesses and brands have their own pages and groups to promote the company and its products, but that is no longer enough. So Facebook has generated a method for businesses to market their products to the demographic that they are looking to convey their message to. Because Facebook has access to all your personal information, likes, and interests, they know exactly the types of ads you are more willing to see. Facebook can now put you into various demographics based on age, gender, interests, and friend activity. Then the business or brand can tell Facebook the particular demographic they want their ad to be shown to and Facebook will make it happen. For example I like basketball, and my friend likes the NBA and ESPN so I receive a lot of ads about March Madness and NBA games. It is a simple tool that helps prevent people from receiving ads they are not interested in which makes them more willing to look at them.

More Info:

Social Media Trends

Tips for Effective Social Media Advertising

18. Tips for Quality Writing

Fri, 02 Mar 2012 22:07:00 -0500

I have came up with many tips to quality writing but I am going to give you my top 5 tips to ~~good~~ awe-inspiring writing.

1. Keep a Journal: This is the one place where you can keep all of your thoughts, emotions, ideas, and works in one place. For all you guys out there that think this is a diary and you are too tough for those need to wake up and see the advantages of a journal. It is a convenient place to keep track of all your ideas and thoughts to avoid losing them and it can be used to look back on when you are in need of some inspiration.

2. Always carry a notebook: Great ideas come to you all the time and many people are probably like me and sometimes forget these ideas if we do not write them down. That is why you should always carry a notebook around because you never know when an idea will come to you or something will inspire you. With a notebook you will never forget these ideas as long as you have it.

3. Never try and emulate your favorite writer: Be yourself, there is no reason for you to try and mimic someone else’s work if you truly believe in your own writing ability. Yes there are many inspirational writers out there but you should only take inspiration from certain aspects of their writing and try to make them reflect your ability in your own writing style.

4. Edit, Edit, Edit: Never assume that your writing is perfect because that will more than likely show in your writing if you make said assumptions. Editing is one of the most important parts of writing because it allows you to catch the errors you didn’t catch before hand. Never turn in an essay, something graded or critiqued that was done with a one and done approach. If you turn in something that was not edited, I guarantee that there are multiple errors in the assignment.

5. READ: For something that can be so enlightening, inspirational, and informational I do not understand why so many people refuse to read or do not enjoy reading. Read novels, magazines, online articles, movie scripts, etc. It doesn’t matter what you read as long as your are reading something. Some of the greatest writing is what gets published and if you ever want your writing to get to that level you have to read. To quote one of my favorite film writers Quentin Tarantino:

“I’ve had people write that I’ve seen too many movies. In what other art form would being an expert be considered a negative? If I were a poet, would I be criticized for knowing too much about Sappho? Or Aristotle?”

The same goes for books, you can never read too many books. The more you read the better your writing will be. Lastly I want to leave you all with something that I believe is one of the best and well written scenes in cinema history.

This is a scene from Reservoir Dogs written and directed by Quentin Tarantino.

To read the full script of this movie click here.

17. My Interest in Advertising

Fri, 02 Mar 2012 20:55:00 -0500

There are many reasons why I am in the position I am today. I have nearly completed college with an advertising degree and I am about to be thrown out into the real world. But what is it that compelled me to try and spend the rest of my life creating advertisements? Well I could tell you that I enjoy ads and wanted to create them myself but what advertising major doesn’t share that same mindset? The real reason is that I respected so many of the various inspirational ads that were being produced. If you know me well then you will know that my life is heavily centered around everything in the sports world and that is why many of my favorite ads are from sports brands and products. One of my all time favorites was from Nike and it was called “Fate”. David Fincher directed it as well, which if you know me well then you will also know I have a love for movies.

I really liked the whole story of the two football players growing up in completely different areas and spending their entire lives working at something until fate brings them together for that one moment in their pro careers. It is very inspiring because it preaches hard work pays off and it uses the badass theme song from “The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly”.

As for another ad that really motivated me to get into advertising it was the Michael Jordan “Failure” ad that was ran by Michael’s brand Air Jordan. It was one of the more inspirational ads that I had ever seen. Michael Jordan is known as the greatest basketball player of all time. To see him tell the world some of the failures he came across in his career was nothing short of incredible. His quote from the ad said,

“I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. 26 times, I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.” - Michael Jordan

That is what inspires me, knowing that even some of the most successful people had their own fair share of failures and yet still overcame them and gained success. It gives me hope that if I continue to give it my all, I too can overcome my faults and failures and move on to create my own success. It is ads like these that I can only hope I will be a part of someday.

16. Online Advertising Trends

Fri, 02 Mar 2012 20:07:00 -0500

Around the globe more and more businesses are starting to use online advertising as a way to get their business or product out to the masses. Rather than explain it myself and confuse you I would like to show you a video that explains the trends in internet advertising this year and how to better your brand with online advertising.

This is where the future of advertising is at. Everyday more and more people are beginning to use the internet as their primary source for information and is prime location for any brand looking to get their name out there.

15. How to Market Yourself

Thu, 01 Mar 2012 22:11:00 -0500

If you ever hope to get a job one day you have to know how to market yourself because nobody wants to hire someone that doesn’t believe they are worth hiring. The first step in marketing yourself is to believe that you are worth selling. If you have no faith in you own abilities then why would anyone else give you an opportunity. Stop complaining about things and yourself. The sooner you stop making excuses and believe in yourself the sooner you can see the potential you have. Find your quiet space and when you can take 10-15 minutes of your day for just you and your thoughts, you will be much happier after and have clear ideas of what you want to do next.

Brand yourself and make yourself stand out in a crowd.

You need to be you, don’t try and be anyone else or pretend to be what you think other people want you to be. People can tell when you are faking things so you should just be yourself. People respect you for who you are and if they don’t then you probably shouldn’t associate yourself with them. Be yourself but be a good listener, if you want to be respected you need to be able to listen because people want to be able to know you are not just interested in yourself. These are just a few things that you can do to make yourself look better in an employers and fellow employees’ eyes.

14. Nothing Wrong With a Little Friendly Competition

Thu, 01 Mar 2012 17:43:00 -0500

Brands are always competing with each other to prove that they are the superior company in their specific field. Competition has always and will always be a factor when it comes to advertising. The best way to get ahead of the competition is to either make fun of the other company or prove you are better. Now the downside is making fun of other brands makes you look worse if you don’t do it properly. And it is also sometimes hard to prove you are legitimately better if you cannot actually or realistically compete with the other brand. So how do you compete effectively? Well Leif’s Auto Center ran a Super Bowl ad this year in Oregon that bashes all the ridiculous car insurance ads from over the past couple years.

This type of ad works because it takes what I consider to be crappy ads from other companies and jokes about their flaws without making any outrageous claims. It makes the other companies look foolish for what they are producing.

The next one that I’m going to show is a picture that was taken of a billboard war between Audi and BMW in Santa Monica, CA. Audi produced a billboard that displayed their newest car and used the slogan “Your Move BMW” to try and make the claim that they had surpassed the best that BMW had to offer. This is what BMW replied with.

This is how competition is supposed to be.

13. Sports Advertisements are a Step Above the Rest

Tue, 28 Feb 2012 18:25:00 -0500

As I am exposed to hundreds of advertisements on a daily basis and most of them are crappy, some deliver and are memorable, and others are absolutely fantastic. However sports advertising is consistently great and generally do not produce crappy ads. I may have some bias since I am a big fan of multiple sports. However I strongly believe that sports advertising has a lot more material to work with when it come to creating the ads. Their are two cable networks that produce and majority of sports advertising and they are ESPN and TNT. Other networks that have created special commercials for big events like the Super Bowl and March Madness include NBC and CBS. ESPN is currently the network that generates the most ads out of all the television networks. Here is a list of the 50 Greatest ESPN Commercials. Along with an ad that TNT recently produced for the NBA All Star game last weekend.

NBA All-Star Ad:

So what is it that makes this work? Well for starters they don’t have to lie to get people to watch the All-Star game and they already know the market they are advertising to. Also they have an unlimited supply of material to use. If you noticed later into the video they began to show highlights of previous All-Star weekends. That is the advantage that sports commercials have over other types of advertising. They have the access to show anything they want in sports history and require no other gimmicks to make the advertisement work. This ultimately leads the creative director to use all their creative ideas and combine them with the selected highlights that they so choose. Sports advertising is the one type that always gets straight to the point and makes it clear what they are advertising in a way that makes the consumer want to watch the games and teams that they are advertising.

12. The Rise of Pinterest

Tue, 28 Feb 2012 17:43:00 -0500

One of the newest sites in social media is Pinterest. Founded in March 2010 by Ben Silbermann. The site allows you to post pictures of your favorite things and categorize them to share with not only your Facebook or Twitter friends, but with the rest of the world as well. Currently Pinterest is in its open beta phase which means you can request an invite to try the site before it goes into its final version. An example of a Pinterest pin board is shown below.

Pinterest is currently dealing with copyright issues because they allow their users to pin any picture they want off of any website they are browsing. They have been facing criticism from various artists and photographers such as Getty Images, because photos and works from their sites have been posted on Pinterest without their permission. Pinterest has taken these claims in stride and have offered sites the option to install a meta code that blocks people from “pining” their images, or they can formally request that any of their work be taken off of their site.

The main focus right now is how is Pinterest going to gain an profit from their website. Since it is in the beta phase right now there is no advertising on the site. The company currently makes its money by redirecting its users to commercial sites that pay them for each user that gets sent to their site. It will be interesting to see how Pinterest implements advertising to the final version of the site. They will not be able to continue if they do not advertise on their site because they are not making a large enough profit to continue on without it. We can only wait and see.

11. Storytelling is What Sells

Sun, 26 Feb 2012 18:46:00 -0500

Storytelling is one of the most important elements of an advertisement. If used effectively it both sells the product without the consumer noticing what is being sold and it keeps the attention of the viewer throughout the ad.

The first brand to use storytelling effectively was Old Spice.

The other advertisement was from the Levi’s Go Forth campaign involving Braddock, PA.

Storytelling is a powerful thing, sell the product, sell the brand, or don’t bother making the ad.

10. Those Catchy Little Jingles

Sun, 26 Feb 2012 17:40:00 -0500

What is the impact of jingles on an advertisement? Do they work? These are a couple of questions you could ask to see if a jingle worked or not. But I am here to tell you that they rarely do. Bad jingles are one of the most common flaws of bad advertising. They don’t advertise the product and they are annoying and stupid. Fox example Fanta soda had their jingle in which they simply repeated the words wanta wanta wanta fanta. This is both annoying and terrible and does nothing more than insult my intelligence. This is the similar fate of so many other ads that try and use a stupid mindless jingle. However there are some exceptions to this. The successful ones take their time by using smart and well thought out lyrics and a well developed story. The problem is that these are almost impossible to find because there are very few of them and they don’t get the recognition they deserve. So i’ll leave you with the one of the jingles that annoys me the least and give you a warning message: Do not use a jingle in your commercials.

Everybody knows when you use a cat it is going to work, that is Advertising 101.

9. Quality Advertising Quotes

Mon, 20 Feb 2012 23:59:02 -0500

The first two are from David Ogilvy:

“A good advertisement is one which sells the product without drawing attention to itself.”

“Every advertisement should be thought of as a contribution to the complex symbol which is the brand image.”

The last one is from actor Will Rogers.

“If advertisers spent the same amount of money on improving their products as they do on advertising then they wouldn’t have to advertise them.”

8. Celebrities: The Downfall of an Ad

Tue, 14 Feb 2012 17:29:36 -0500

Celebrities have been featured in various advertisements since the beginning. Such as the recent Superbowl ad featuring Clint Eastwood. Or last year’s Stella Artois commercial featuring Adrien Brody. But do they actually benefit the product they are selling by appearing in the ad? I argue that a celebrity appearing in an ad does not benefit the ad because it makes the ad seem less believable and misleads the consumer. In order for an ad to work it has to make sure that if a celebrity is going to be used then they are going to have to make it realistic enough for the viewer to believe that the particular celebrity would actually use the product. I personally do not believe Clint Eastwood would ever drive a Chrysler and he isn’t from Detroit either so it really ruined the ad for me. As for the Stella ad, I interpreted it as over the top and trying to make the beer look a lot classier than it really is. Stellas cost barely over $1 so don’t try and make it look like something it’s not.

Speaking of failed uses of celebrities, Fiat is one of the worst offenders in recent memory. They used Jennifer Lopez in this recent ad.

This ad was victim to was is being called the Fiat scandal. Basically the ad had a very good story and idea where Jennifer Lopez returned to Brooklyn, which is where she grew up. The problem is she never actually went back to Brooklyn, instead all the shots in the car of her driving were a body double. Watch it carefully again you will notice all of the shots of her driving her face is cut off or it is too hard to tell who it is. This just proves that she has no interest in owning a Fiat or even taking the time to go back to her hometown. When she would be getting paid to do so I might add. This ad is just more unbelievable the more commercials they release featuring Lopez.

Another consistent offender is proactive.

There is no way that proactive is the only thing that is making Katy Perry’s skin the way it is. You can see her makeup in the picture above and those photoshop images of zits they put on the celebrities are ridiculous.

Use normal people, it makes it more believable and I can actually see them using the product. Plus it costs way less that paying thousands of dollars for a celebrity to sponsor your brand.

7. Dreams Spark Creative Ideas

Tue, 14 Feb 2012 01:52:05 -0500

Within 5 minutes you forget 50% of your dream, after 10 minutes 90% of it is gone. This is just one of 15 of the 15 Interesting Facts About Dreams. Dreams are the one time when your brain takes everything you have ever seen, heard, know, and done and puts them all together. Dreams are also the inspiration for some works of art. They represent a perfect opportunity to discover ideas that may have never came to mind when you are awake. Have a notebook by your bedside and whenever you awake from a dream, get up and write down every detail that you can remember. But remember you cannot wait you have to act fast. By doing this you will get a clear and organized list of what you are thinking about when you are asleep. You never know what inspires you and dreams are the one time when your surroundings do not interrupt your thoughts and your brain can work freely and think what is wishes.

This is called Dream Caused by the Flight of a Bee around a Pomegranate a Second Before Awakening by Salvador Dali. He was inspired to make this after a dream he had. But it also represents the crazy combination of random events and things that we dream about every night.