Absolut Stunning

Clearly, many talented students have worked their way through Creative Message Strategy this term. Although they've created ads in a variety of media for such products as Nutella, Ray-Bans, Mexicali Grill (local restaurant), these simple ads may actually pose the biggest challenge.

Please view but 3 examples of Absolut ads [& 3 manipulated photos of those ads by me!] The ads are directed at 35+ with emphasis on older segment of the target audience. Tone, witty, sophisticated. Feel free to offer your comments? Post them below.

Quick & Easy Illustration & Photo Manipulation Apps

Creating an ad, a presentation or just want to have some fun? Here are the names of some illustration & photo manipulation apps and a few examples of results: iMajiCam--take photos with many different filters, PhotoStudio--crop & manipulate photos from your camera roll, ArtStudio--someone described it as a mini PhotoShop in which you can import & manipulate photos or draw pictures & apply tools to them on screen, RetroCam--the first one I tried, fun but not as robust as the others. I chose the examples randomly & just to give an idea, albeit very partial, of the actual results achieved.

Creativity?

image from http://www.benefitcosmetics.com
click image to read text

Is advertising a creative enterprise? It's certainly a commercial one. Add creativity + commercialism; what's the answer?

Michael Schudson suggested Capitalist Realism as a way to conceptualize advertising and, by extension, a great deal of the creative work[mass] produced post-20th century. Capitalist realism evokes the concept "socialist realism" a stream of creative production associated with the USSR. [for those to young to remember, Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.]

Where does capitalist realism [top-down communication] end and self-expression [bottom-up communication] begin? Are there boundaries, are boundaries blurred?

These are questions to which I hope to receive answers [readers' versions of answers] in response to this blog entry.

I look forward to your input. Your friend, e