Now I Suck Less

Great moments in ad placement.

2009-08-31T16:25:00.003-05:00

I loved this baseball themed Kool-Aid ad. Its placement was auspicious considering what clip I was loading.

CNN.com you've done it again!

2009-07-11T10:48:00.002-05:00

Der Nurburgring

2009-07-09T08:59:00.003-05:00

While in Europe I went to the Nurburgring Nordschlieffe with my family. It was abosolutely one of the best experiences I have ever had and was more fun than can be easily described.

A comprehensive photo gallery

Back in Paris

2009-06-30T00:13:00.002-05:00

I'm back in Paris now, almost a year to the day from the last time I was here, but for a lot shorter of a period of time. It feels as if little has changed and that I still live here, it is nice to have that comme d'habitude feeling about a place. So far I have discussed many business opportunities, seen a few old friends, run my fastest mile and my fastest 5k, slept 5 hours in 2 days and have not felt like smoking at all.

I think France must turn me into superman or something.

Once again back its the incredible

2009-06-22T12:17:00.002-05:00

I have been gone for a while. I was away from home for 10 months. 10 months away from my wife, my friends, my whole life. I got a lot of good work done in those 10 months but i needed a break from the advertising life for a while to work on my book, work on rebuilding friendships and to spend with my wife.

I also didn't lead the healthiest lifestyle while on the road, so I have been working out and improving my fitness as well. I was turning thirty and realized that I had the average fitness of a fifty year old, and I needed to make some changes. I write this as I arrive back from a 2.5 mile run in 90 degrees. Something I did not have the ability to do a few months ago. Now i am running 5ks, I can't beleive how much can change.

sorry this post isnt full of weird pictures, or advertising or any stuff like that, just wanted to reconnect and open this blog back up for business now that the new site is up and I am ready to go.

I am headed to France and Germany next week for a trip to visit friends and family in Paris, then head to the Nurburgring Nordschieffe. I will have a full update with lots of info, I swear.

Way to go CNN

2009-05-24T09:10:00.002-05:00

From this mornings news.

Sticking to the broad based stories that matter to us all. Never sensationalized.

¡ROKKEN!

2009-05-08T12:35:00.002-05:00

This guy was just walking down Nicollet mall on a Sunday.

Some portrait photos

2009-05-05T11:28:00.002-05:00

I can't escape bacon

2009-04-25T11:16:00.005-05:00

omg!bacon!

Look at that guy. he ABSOLUTELY LOVES bacon. He makes bacon milkshakes and has parties in which he makes 4 course meals entirely of bacon. He has a wallet that looks like folded strips of bacon. His pants are being held up by a belt fashioned to look like bacon. At some point he has probably been on a bacon related vacation. He has toured the famous bacon making regions of missouri and crafted his own artisinal bacons while living with a rural hog farming family. He is a bacon type of guy.

Our recent national obsession with bacon is bothering me. I see pro-bacon T shirts, bumper stickers, bacon related blogs and a general two hundred fold increase in how much bacon is served on restaurant menus. Now we have micro ranched bacon, gourmet euro bacon, bacon chocolate bars and bacon in am million other places it doesn't belong.

Weds night at the Triple Rock: perhaps the perfect storm of hipsterism

I get it. Everyone likes bacon. Enough with the blog postings and scary menu items. Bacon ice cream doesn't taste good no matter how much everyone is into baconating every part of their meal now.

I can't wait for the eventual bacon backlash to start. To me it feels shameful and populist. Its impossible to watch a cooking show without seeing the chef needlessly add bacon to every dish and give you that commiserating, into-the-camera look and attempts to television bond with me over our presumed mutual love of putting bacon in everything we eat.

New Lexus stuff

2009-04-06T15:58:00.006-05:00

No kidding, I met this guy once.

2009-03-25T22:26:00.004-05:00

He is an expert on lasers and stuff. Makes arc guns. Been on discovery channel a bunch of times.

This picture of him kind of sums him up. I think its pretty hilarious. Its not staged. The guy is really weird.

new music mix

2009-03-23T10:01:00.004-05:00

I made a new mix last week in my first week back in Minneapolis. I have been sick for a week straight and had little else to do. Enjoy, no track listing this time so its more fun. This one is much more upbeat.

esper - francophile
http://www.zshare.net/audio/57485254a3f33d90/

This is the LA local morning show

2009-03-11T12:30:00.004-05:00

Good day LA is so insipid it has come down to this:

Now back to the studio for 3 to 4 minutes of prognostication!

Seriously? These are the choices? Did they even see the face she was making?

New music mix

2009-03-01T14:06:00.002-06:00

I just finished a new music mix. It is mostly electro and european indie dance stuff. Its a really long one at one hour and 30 mins. Check it out, a lot of these tracks are not commonly heard. Its more moody than dancey.

http://www.zshare.net/audio/56367203420ab859/

Digitalism - Taken Away (Instrumental)
Digitalism - I Want I Want
Digitalism - Pogo (Pogo Robotic Remix)
Justice - We Are Your Friends (Milke "Heavy Friends" Remix)
Justice - D.A.N.C.E (Alan Braxe and Fred Falke Remix)
Justice - D.A.N.C.E. (MSTRKRFT Remix)
Sebastien Tellier - Divine (Danger Remix)
Gentlemen Drivers - 2042 L.A Dreams
Dj Mehdi - Pocket Piano (Brodinski Remix)
Boys Noize - Erole Attakk
MSTRKRFT - Paris
Dj Mehdi - Signitune (Thomas Bangalter Edit)
Justice - Phantom Pt. 2 (Soulwax Remix)
Depeche Mode - Personal Jesus (Boys Noize Remix)
Justice - Waters of Nazareth
Benjamin Theves - Texas (Sebastian Remix)
LFO - Freak
A Trak - Hustlin' Hustler
MGMT - Kids (Soulwax Nite Version)
Digitalism - Zdarlight
Riot in Belgium - La Musique (JBAG's BoomBoxed Re-edit)
S'Express - Stupid Little Girls (JBAG's Boomboxed Remix)
VNDLSM Edit (Sebastian Ingrosso VS. Boys Noize)
Riot In Belgium - The Acid Never Lies (Boys Noize 909 Disco Remix)
Sainte - Mondkopf
Le Castle Vania - Trouble In Daylight (LA Riots Remix)
Mylo - Paris Four Hundred (SebastiAn Remix)
Midnight Juggernauts - Into the Galaxy

Album of the year

2009-02-27T17:50:00.006-06:00

Despite the neo hipsterish premise of mixing gangsta rap and electro (a path well worn by thehoodinternet.com, Ratatat and several others over the last few years) A Trak does it simply better than anyone else.

This of course excludes the super awesome "100 Million Dollar Sportswear" remix of Sebastien tellier's "Sexual Sportswear" but I digress.

Its the current "best music to make layouts to."

Which I do often.

In fact I doing it right now.

Stuff from Lexus

2009-02-24T12:10:00.003-06:00

The produced collateral stuff from the 2010 RX I did for Lexus.

The saddest costumes of all time.

2009-02-19T15:11:00.011-06:00

I have dreadlocks. They are clean, I didn't have to put coke in my hair or beeswax or disgusting whatever the hell people keep telling me I must have done to have long hair. Face facts, if you have certain genes, you can't grow your hair long and leave it alone and not have this happen.

Some quick answers.

Please dont touch my hair. I don't think you want random people's grubby hands in your hair either. If you ask nicely and aren't patronizing me than maybe. Kids are ok, they are just curious.

It smells like shampoo. That's because I wash my hair. I'm not some kind of dirty animal.

Nope, not a political statement, no less than any other person who has naturally occurring long hair.

Yes I am aware that the guy in counting crows also has a beard and dreads. He is also white. I'm not. I don't fucking look like that guy so please stop saying so. I don't go up to every clean shaven 50+ Asian man I see and go "Damn, so what was it like playing Sulu on the enterprise?"

Also that guy from counting crows can't sing and his music sucks. Deal with it.

Yelling "YEAEEAAAAH!" at me and then yelling "Little John" is not going to make me like you. I am also going to move away from you very quickly. This is one of the reasons why I can't be in Las Vegas.

Does this keep people from loving them and wanting them too? Hell no. Should certain people not have dreadlocks? Hell yes. If you look like this:

Time to shave your head.

The worst part is "dread wig" halloween costumes. It doesn't make you look like Bob Marley, it makes you look like Dan Aykroyd in "Trading Places"
LIONEL JOSEPH!

I also find pictures of them on the web to be incredibly sad looking. Here are some to entertain you and take you through the many different looks of the dreadlock wig.

The joint comes with this one. He looks totally like a black guy with dreads, always smoking on their paper towel roll sized joints. I hope it comes with a copy of Bob Marley's "Legend" as well so it doesn't disappoint. Also what's with the pink shirt? It looks like a nurse is smoking a doobie.

Ghost pirate! Its a proven fact that if you are black and a pirate you have dreadlocks. Because they scare white people. His facial expression definitely says "quest for booty."

"So my stepson and me were paint jamming to Phish tapes..."

Damn you Rob Zombie for introducing the heavy metal country western industrial goth s+m undead corpse dreadlock look. I can't believe men who look like this have had sex with anyone without large cash payments being involved.

Why on earth does anyone want to look like "Michael Bolton's creepy European counterpart after the Mexican vacation in Cancun where he foolishly got those hair extensions they saw the spring break girls getting, but then realized that his hairline is receding but said what the hell anyways" guy?

Congratulations you look like the Predator had sex with Niles Crane.

And my two personal favorites:

WHOOOOOOAAAAH BRAAAAAH! "ARE YOU LIKE... HOLDEN CAULFIELD MANG?"

"DID HOLDEN SHOW UP AT THE PARTY? NAH MEAN?"

A guy said this to me once and I had to look it up on the internet when I got home.

Is this a picture of a mannequin or a real guy? I am stumped. Seriously, I want to know. This has become my new favorite picture on the internet.

Some recent work for Febreze

2009-02-12T16:14:00.002-06:00

AmAp!

2009-02-03T14:34:00.000-06:00

Found around town

2009-01-21T12:45:00.001-06:00

This isn't politically correct

2009-01-20T19:36:00.001-06:00

I repurposed an image i made.

Random booth in LA

2009-01-20T18:57:00.000-06:00

T shirt industries selection one

2009-01-16T19:27:00.006-06:00

Some recent photos

2009-01-16T18:43:00.003-06:00

More sleepy guys

2009-01-12T12:40:00.004-06:00

Zippy's in Waikiki, 1:00 AM.

Lexus-related work based shennanigans

2009-01-07T15:23:00.004-06:00

Looks like someone got a "December to Remember"

The worst ad of the year, 2008 edition

2009-01-05T18:21:00.003-06:00

No its not "saved by zero." the incredibly average campaign for Toyota that the ad industry has decided to form a lemming like dogpile on. Its for yet again another celebrity sponsored energy drink, although it contains none of the panache and class of "Pimpjuice" or "CRUNK!!!!!"

I present to you "SPAZMATIC" the offical energy drink of the Insane Clown Posse.

Its oddly mesmerizing. And the stock music piece in the background totally puts me in the mood to "get lit" with America's favorite Insane Clown based hip hop group's "energy sauce."

Holiday card round 2

2008-12-19T19:59:00.002-06:00

I don't know if this is any less weird than the first one.

I am starting to look more like Sebastien Tellier

2008-12-18T19:20:00.001-06:00

I am starting to look more like him with my new sunglasses. I'm not sure however if this is a good thing or not.

I love this man so much. Here is him at the Eurovision song contest. Basically he made sure he lost as badly as possible. Which given the circumstances, I would have done too.

and here is the real video.

I need a white suit.

Selective shopping

2008-12-16T13:18:00.000-06:00

I still hate their too-tight hipster hoodies and coke porn chic ads but I do appreciate this sign on an American Apparel in the valley.

Hawaii bound

2008-12-15T12:59:00.003-06:00

I am going to be in Hawaii until the years end. I have a spectacular Vegas update coming sometime this week after I arrive. I'll be building out my website and spending some time with the family so if you live on the mainland, lease for the love of god look at what time it is before you call me, it seems like every time i switch more than 4 time zones 10 people I know call at the weirdest hours.

Awesome movie poster

2008-12-14T13:16:00.002-06:00

I should have asked them if this was for sale. This movie was only open in on theater in LA for one week, so I think I probably had a good shot, now some creepy jerk who isn't me probably has it.

My new neighbor

2008-12-12T13:11:00.002-06:00

I went to go look at a new apartment in Westchester near El Segundo. When we pulled into the building complex Matt pointed out a car to me that I just had to back up and see.

What a fine array of bumper stickers. I am taking bets on whether or not this is a man's car or a woman's car.

The bizzaro autos of El Segundo

2008-12-12T13:06:00.002-06:00

This guy was just chillin' in the lot in front of whole foods. Some local dude in a wheelchair and one of those ghetto bling Obama shirts was chatting to him.

I knew I recognized this guy from somewhere.

What sell out looks like

2008-12-10T13:22:00.000-06:00

Judging from memories of watching Tool videos on "The Box" (music TV you control) in the early and mid 90's I would have never imagined Maynard from tool sitting in the largest Whole Foods outside of Austin TX talking about his new winery with the soccer mom set.

But there you have it.

Holidays at work

2008-12-08T13:41:00.003-06:00

I made this site for our new holiday party concept at work at Team One. It's definitely not ordinary.

http://www.t1.2advanced.com/smilin_jack/

Official Holiday Card Business

2008-11-25T19:45:00.002-06:00

I may not mail this to my relatives. But I haven't ruled it out.

Candy Corn Soda

2008-11-25T15:05:00.003-06:00

When I was back in Minneapolis a few weekends ago I was shopping in the Halloween clearance section of Target with my wife when I saw this:

I figured 4 miniature cans for 90% off is just not the kind of deal that comes up too often. I ignored the fact that there was a pallet of the stuff there and it was virtually the only thing left in the clearance area and picked up a four pack.

It literally resembles fizzy piss. And smells way too strongly of actual candy corn. It tastes... well like candy corn. which is to say a small amount per year is sufficient. A very small amount.

I preserved my $0.15 receipt for posterity.

Overspecialization

2008-11-20T16:55:00.002-06:00

seems to me that when you have a legal license plate designation for "horseless carriage" you have overspecialized a slight bit down at the DMV.

Also I seem to share a ride home with some of the cast of "wacky races"

Crap that comes off my desk

2008-11-12T12:39:00.002-06:00

Show's over

2008-11-09T11:49:00.002-06:00

Went to "The Show" in Minneapolis on Friday. Ended up leaving with one silver award and two merit awards. I'm in the book above on 3 pages.

yay.

The most important store in Koreatown

2008-11-06T16:40:00.002-06:00

Now I don't have to make two stops anymore!

2008-11-04T13:07:00.002-06:00

Halloween Paris/Justice style

2008-11-03T14:24:00.004-06:00

Went to go see Justice play last weekend for Halloween at the Shrine in LA with Crystal Castles, Boys Noize and SebastiAn. 15,000 other people showed up. It was pretty massive.

This is a small clip from "We are your friends." The shouting from the crowd was crazy. Got to chat with Gaspard, Xavier and Pedro in French for a while too which was nice, I am now realizing I really miss speaking French on a regular basis and don't want my language skills to atrophy like they did in my last 8 year absence from France.

Back to the future

2008-11-03T14:22:00.001-06:00

Pretty sure this car didn't exist during this election, but way to go old school irony hipster!

Depardieu dans le maison!

2008-10-27T14:19:00.003-05:00

This would win any Halloween costume contest that I would happen to be judging.

ok, no. maybe this one.

7-11 sushi

2008-10-27T13:18:00.001-05:00

its fully cooked, and ready to go.

I'm feeling hungry.

This bar has a secret password

2008-10-21T15:45:00.003-05:00

Last Friday we went to the R Bar. It has a secret password. When the door guy was asked by two Paris Hiltonesque skanked up valley chicks why they had a password I admired his response:

"To keep people like you out."

I was also happy to see the ebullient Tigger sticker in the cab we took on the way over there. Perhaps put up in the hope that his smiling visage would decrease the frequency of reaching through the passthrough with a pistol and demanding all the cabbie's money by taking any would be thug into a childlike happy place where they would reconsider their actions and emerge from the cab a better person.

It was very dark inside. like it takes your eyes several minutes to adjust dark. the kind of dark that is the friend of the sexual predator, or the extremely marginal looking potential mate. Both seemed to be lurking in the various corners of the place. Sadly this is the best picture I was able to get in there. It kind of has the look of an old fish restaurant. The awning had some korean on it and the windows were all boarded up and painted black. There was no sign to indicate what it even was.

But the classy art in the bathroom pretty much redeems any poor choice of decor in the dining area.

And for some reason they had food. And a sanitation grade of "B" which to be honest was surprising as "C" seems to be about all our neighborhood can muster.

Meet Chester Pepperwell

2008-10-21T14:52:00.001-05:00

and his dearest and oldest friend Dick Van Egmund.

This is actually what I did for work this morning.

Three meats, one legend

2008-10-20T15:22:00.005-05:00

This is Joe. Joe used to make Bud Light commercials. With his love of 3 kinds of meat at once, I don't find that to be surprising.

A turkey burger in a hot dog bun wrapped around a hot italian sausage, topped with prosciuto. Wrapped in a dream.

This was at an entertaining barbecue filled with ad people. In fact there wasn't anyone there who wasn't in the ad industry in LA. MAS mpls was very well represented. All in a nice little 500sq ft house that used t be a whorehouse. A very charming whorehouse I am sure.

I got to take a look at the Venice canals. I was told this is where little golden haired children trailed by little brown skinned women emerge from every morning. No golden haired parents are seen. And celebrities live here.

Also we went to a liquor store to get some beer before we headed out to the BBQ. I swear this was the place from the opening scene of Menace II Society.

"YOU BUY YOU LEAVE!"

This is why I am glad I keep a camera nearby

2008-10-20T13:03:00.002-05:00

"Your subject matter is clear but sad"

Goldy the Gopher drinks here when he's shooting in LA

2008-10-20T12:47:00.006-05:00

So they don't have a discount for Minnesotans, and apparently they get asked that all of the time. Its kind of a dive bar that has be rehabbed into a hipster dive bar.

I was curious about "Gaucho's" the seedy subterranean Mexican gentlemens club next door but I figured I'd have to a be pretty impaired to end up in there where I'm sure you get slipped a mickey and wake up on a boat headed to Shanghai.

I asked for a drink with extra lime. They take their extra lime seriously apparently as they gave me an entire quartered lime for each subsequent drink. I wonder how much a whole lime goes for at a grocery store, I think I was getting a pretty good value for so much citrus.

Man, I love Craigslist

2008-10-19T16:20:00.003-05:00

Found this one on Craigslist Los Angeles.

I had better buy me a new car!

Caveat Emptor

2008-10-16T12:05:00.004-05:00

5 cents worth of plastic cups and 50 cents worth of ping pong balls combine into the dumbest $6.99 impulse buy of the century.

duuude brah, we tooootally need some sweet beer pong action with this keg brah!

Attaque préventive

2008-10-15T13:59:00.002-05:00

My old nemesis, Francois X has sworn revenge against me.

I have never had revenge sworn against me before, I find it pretty entertaining. His words were "perhaps not tomorrow, perhaps in 5 years, but I will surely take my revenge"

The crime? posting his picture somewhere on the internet. Francois X is a neo-luddite who believes "the man" is going to assimilate him if he has any presence on the internet whatsoever.

This is a man who called google to get his name removed from someone else's post once.

So I am starting a T shirt campaign. This is the "teaser design."

I want to photograph as many people wearing these shirts as possible. Looking into printing this week.

It's always "Beer 30"

2008-10-14T13:33:00.001-05:00

best. beer. packaging. ever.

Things overheard while waiting in a line for a bar in Downtown LA

2008-10-14T13:30:00.001-05:00

"EVERYONE who is ANYONE will be there"

"Oh my god! I almost left the house, and I saw myself in the mirror real quick and I realized I almost left wearing a black dress with a brown bag!"

"Oh my god, I mean Tom Selleck was in our office, and I just melted he is so DAMN SEXY."

The pantheon of Hollywood musical greats

2008-10-13T16:58:00.003-05:00

I went to Guitar Center in hollywood last weekend. It was the messiest, busiest, oddest Guitar Center I have ever been in. It was also filled with soon to be weeping their broken dreams away through a crack pipe on skid row wannabe scene/musician types.

But on the wall of fame outside one figure seemed to cry out to be photographed. With the Elvises and Bobby Darins and John Lennons there was:

Someone didn't read the news

2008-10-13T16:49:00.002-05:00

I guess someone at Capilano Honey thought it was a good idea to sell honey with a dead guy.

It's Miley!

2008-10-13T12:26:00.004-05:00

So I found these today at Ralph's

Looks like little wangs to me. Also nice photoshopping job on the teeth.

The Prius

2008-10-10T12:34:00.005-05:00

So after my flight into LA on the always loathsome Northwest Airlines I waited at perhaps the largest Hertz rent a car dealership in the world ( not surprising given this is LA) which resembled an airline check in more than a car rental place to get our brand new 2009 Toyota Prius. Our agency is covering a rental car since unsurprisingly we wouldn't be able to get to work without one. Since they don't pay for gas, we decided to get a Prius. It also came in handy since we are making ads for Hybrid cars, its nice that I am not completely ignorant as to the ownership experience.

Here is is. I insisted on the manliest color they had. Insisted. Please god anything but that baby blue color.

here is the yawning maw of its prodigious and sure to be completely unused cargo area.

Its not really bad as a car. It handles like shit, has touchy brakes and accelerates like an ox cart but the interior is pretty comfortable, except for the fact that it is difficult to see out of the windshield if you are over 6 foot tall. The Hertz Neverlost (TM) navigation creatively will give you different directions to work depending on what day it is and has an awful; and annoying interface but apparently works in that it got me to circuit city once and it knows where all the Targets in LA are. Also the bar that goes across the rear window is excellent at doing nothing except obstruct your rear view. Its all of the annoyance of a spoiler with none of the well... most spoilers don't do anything so I guess its just the annoyance.

My biggest problem with it - by a mile - is the fact that it only drives when it wants to. This is a brand new car, it had about 100 miles on it when I picked it up. When you push the on button, about 50% of the time it decides it doesn't want to go anywhere and wont let you drive it. It turns on then wont shift into anything but neutral. The 300 page owner manual is pretty silent on whatever "feature" causes this to happen. Jabbing the on off button repeatedly seems to make it eventually go into drive mode, but really, that's the most scientific solution I can find for the problem. Other than swearing at it and smacking the steering wheel.

LA Story

2008-10-09T12:08:00.003-05:00

I arrived in LA last Friday. Since then I have come to the conclusion that this city is mostly filled with weirdos. It didn't help that on my second night I went to a rave filled with skanky teens and sleazy "the hills" wannabes creeping me out with their ecstacy fueled gyrations. It was like watching a bad imitation of what raves used to be like seen through the lens of people who were 4 years old during the grand old era of the rave.

Here are some of the rather typical rave skanks. As with my experience with Hot Import Nights I felt like I had the possibility of catching chlamydia from the very air itself.

duuuude... can I give you a light show? Oh man I'm peaking.

I am working at an agency that does luxury cars. Everyone here is nice. Its really refreshing to have the creatives at the agency greet you and get to know you instead of treat you like an invading army like many of the French creatives seem to have seen us. I can definitely see why I have strangely never heard a bad thing said about this agency.

I also now live in an area rated by LAlife.com as a "2 out of 10" in terms of safety. Its always good to know i am about 500 times more likely to get robbed here than in Minneapolis. thankfully my insurance agent assures me that when all my stuff gets stolen by the local MS 13 I will be fully covered. This is what happens when you find a place to live on the other side of the planet from craigslist.com.

I also got to teach a class last week at Carleton College, my alma mater. I actually really enjoyed myself and got to tell a bunch of students taking perhaps their only design class that it really is an alternative for them to go into advertising, no matter how base of a career they may imagine it to be. I think maybe I got through to some of them, but you never know. A couple of them had surprisingly good work for as long as they had been designing. I guess its a side effect of the rockstar designer culture we have now that more teenagers are getting into busting out photoshop and making logos these days.

Its been a while

2008-09-01T17:14:00.001-05:00

I didn't post anything in September. However I did fill in my facebook profile quite a bit. I have been really busy working at Ogilvy and not spending too much time here. I'll try to find a few things to put up tomorrow.

More weird product names

2008-07-24T10:38:00.002-05:00

I bet the texture is smoooooth.

nihilists in France

2008-07-23T15:20:00.002-05:00

they burned the dude's Torino.

Then they burned this guys scooter.

The resulting fire scorched the very expensive looking building next to it up to the third floor. This is right on our way to work in a very chic neighborhood.

Go team Miami!

2008-07-12T12:54:00.002-05:00

first full group picture of MAS Ogilvy France. Superhero pose.

Who dat?

2008-07-11T07:34:00.002-05:00

More ethnic sensitivity in packaging

2008-07-11T07:18:00.003-05:00

ARRIBA ARRIBA!

Maybe if he was snoozing under a cactus this could have been slightly worse.

French breakfast of champions

2008-07-11T04:34:00.003-05:00

I found this with matt in the grocery store the other day.

The breakfast of Klansmen!

Prepare to engage

2008-07-03T04:26:00.004-05:00

So,

I am still in France, still waiting to start at Ogilvy here. MAS being as communicative as they are haven't yet told me when we are starting, whre to go or what time to show up. Our schedules tell us we are supposed to start monday but who knows, we don't have any confirmation or communication.

So far its been pretty decent weather until it rained yesterday and I went stir crazy inside the house.

We setup our media center here. This is what it looks like.

On y va

2008-06-25T00:09:00.004-05:00

I am in France now. I spent the better part of two weeks fighting a bad sinus infection in the USA before leaving, and now because of 11 hours on various planes it is back.

My first flight was delayed, so I was booked on another, spent 4 hours wandering around the airport, then went to Amsterdam instead of France. Once in Amsterdam Northwest promptly lost my luggage so now I am stuck here sick, without luggage or clothes or anything like that, in a house whre the Wifi won't work with my Mac.

I just want to take time to say that I absolutely, in every possible way detest Northwest airlines and I hope that all of their employees die in a particularly large and painful fire. I have never seen a group of people so willing to pass the buck or tell you whatever they need to in order to get you out of their face. They are truly the worst organization operating in America and I curse the fact that you can really only fly them out of Minneapolis.

Other than that its going fine. Updates to follow once I start walking around and doing things other than suffering from pain and wearing three day old clothes.

EDIT: special bonus!

Just got off the phone with the airline. Nobody knows where my bags are. They have effectively disappeared from the face fo the earth. Pretty much all of the clothing I onw, including half of it that I jsut bought is now missing and presumed gone. Its certainly not going to be here anytime soon. Apparently I have 100 eu to spend on new clothes the airline swears it will reimburse me for when I get back to the USA (3 months from now) but somehow I trust them about as far as I can throw a 747.

I am not having a good first day in France.

So I'm not having a good day now.

Look at what I am forced to do.

2008-06-14T22:18:00.006-05:00

I live in a condo. It is in Kenwood, in Minneapolis. Now Kenwood is a very nice neighborhood, brimming with wealthy liberals and their snot nosed throw rocks at your cars kids, drivers who can't see stop signs and routinely cut you off through them, and exotic sports cars being driven by octogenarians and teenagers.

And a liberal dose of toyota prius owners. One of them is white and is covered in 12 inch multicolored polka dots. I told my wife that that's what everyone in Minnesota would say summarizes Uptown to them, in vehicle form. Also I think just about every pink Vespa sold in the area for the last three years has been shipped here.

Anyways, the building I live in is one of the few ways you can live there if you don't have 5.2 million dollars to drop on a house. And it is full of wealthy single girls and a few guys who have tiny little dogs that leave piss acid onto the strip of grass out front and leave tiny little poops everywhere including hallways and any plant matter around the property.

Many of these people by and large haven't lived much of their lives around real world people, they sort of are living in an extended college lifestyle for however many years they have been out of college. They do weird things like play music in their condos with the door open to the hallway, close the fire doors and make a gladiator ring for their doggies to run around, or sit in their Acura CL Type S in the garage drinking beer, smoking cigarettes, eating fried chicken and listening to gangsta rap (simultaneously).

And sometimes they have gettogethers. From 1-3AM on friday and saturday night a stream of extremely loud people bump their way down the hallways and shout about getting laid, or drinking, or even such exotic and spicy topics as "who in here has any blow?" In any case afterwards when I wake up on saturday/sunday morning and find odd little things out of place, usually 1/3rd full beer bottles perched upon railings, fire extinguishers, mailboxes or benches outside sort of at random.

But today, we had another phenomenon: the night puker.

The night puker strikes randomly. It could be that girl in the party dress with one shoe and a martini glass you saw struggling with the elevator controls in the lobby, or the guy who had been pickling himself in bud lite since 1 o clock that afternoon. Who knows.

Suddenly I realized as I went to my car that the overpowering stench of a 13 drinks at 4 bars and late night breakfast pile of vomit was sitting right on the landing. Entering the gigantic communal garage I take note that pretty much the entire 100,000 square foot concrete room also smells like someone puked down there about 4 or 5 times.

After a busy day I returned home my wife insisted we take the elevator to avoid the pile of sick in the stairwell, and we noticed that now it smelled like industrial strength leaning products competing with the odor of bar vomit. I am sure the building custodian valiantly grappled with the pile on the stairs, but who could have tracked down them all in the garage, or really eliminated such a horrible odor. It was all she could do.

So I sat down while doing final reviews on my ads and made a little letter for my neighbors.

I think what I can take away from this is that its funny that I can't even make a sign without art directing it anymore.

Dealing with the devil

2008-06-10T01:58:00.004-05:00

So right off the bat, I am definitely not a GM fan. In fact, I pretty much hate everything that they do nowadays and wish they would just hurry up and go out of business as soon as possible so they stop clogging the roads with their (mostly) crappy cars and awful SUVs.

And it pains me to say so. My uncle Dutch worked for GM for most of his life. He was a great man, he had great ideas and a big heart, in essence he was everything GM used to be, and the loss of people like him made GM everything it is now.

I had to make some ads. Something neoclassical, involving using traditional elements and modern ones in the same layout. I really like the old "cadillac V" ads, I dunno if anyone else calls them that, but I do. They had gorgeous pictures of the cars and some old-timey model woman (I am sure they might have been called "broads" in that era) and they looked something like this:

Sorry, that is the best example I can find that I don't have to scan.

Anyhow, I wanted to make something that spoke to the dominant position Cadillac once had and to refer to their old layout style a bit. Here is what I came up with, and I'd like to think they are in some small way an homage to my late uncle, the kind of guy they could still use around the office at GM.

Some toilet humor

2008-06-09T00:47:00.005-05:00

So my copywriter Matt wrote me this weekend from Hamburg looking for me to do some quick AD work on some expensive European toilet paper ads. This is what I came up with:

I also finished off a bunch of ads for Psycho Suzi's today, but still feel like I need to tweak the balance on them. These need a final going over and re-tweak in a few ways too, but thought it had been a little while since my last post, so here they are.

Why I love my wife - Birthday edition

2008-06-07T00:48:00.005-05:00

So we went shopping tonight to get some new clothes for Paris (need to look a little less scruffy) and my lovely wife got me a birthday present in shoe form:

I am a pretty big puma fan as my wardrobe will attest, but these limited edition Scuderia Ferrari F1 Scattista Campioni Del Mundo (quite a mouthful) shoes are probably the nicest shoes I will ever own. I am a Ferrari F1 fan, covering the gamut of European motorsports I love that you cannot watch on TV in this country (also a MotoGP Fiat/Yamaha/Rossi fan as well as of course WRC/Subaru World Rally Team/Petter Solberg)

I am almost afraid to wear them too much and soil their perfection.

She also got me the OBEY supply and demand book, which also features a shot of the exact copy of one of the Shepard Fariey prints that hangs in my very bedroom.

Awesome.

I hate the wind

2008-06-06T15:53:00.003-05:00

So today I was out running errands on my scooter in gale force winds, parked outside of the pharmacy to go pick up some of my prescriptions and come outside and find it on the ground.

With a bunch of new scratches and a bent brake lever.

Goddamnit.

Gorgeous design

2008-06-03T01:50:00.004-05:00

Its not often that I see a concept mechanical design wise that makes me really wish it could be produced. I find a lot of my inspiration AD wise from mechanical design, and the new Mazda Japan concept team is really pushing the stylistic borders in ways that are derived from nature yet maintain a sense of classical engineering as well as an extremely futuristic look as well.

Now approaching midnight

2008-05-30T02:27:00.007-05:00

I went for another late night walk through my neighborhood, this time I remembered to bring my camera along. No tripod so I had to get pretty creative to get shots in the low light.

Taking this show on the road

2008-05-28T22:16:00.003-05:00

Well, found out the other day got accepted to the Greenhouse program at Saatchi + Saatchi and Ogilvy in Paris.

So now I am spending time tying up all the loose ends in Minneapolis as I'll be in Europe in less than a month. Excited and busy as hell now, so much to do, so little time.

Since I have been on a little one week break from posting, here is a magazine cover I did for Jinx magazine, which is about one of my favorite topics Urban Exploration.

Another poster - No Country For Old Men

2008-05-21T15:43:00.004-05:00

So I had to make a polish 1920's era feel handmade sort of poster for a movie released in the last year.

This is what I came up with, very happy that it came out exactly like I had it in my head. I made the blood from Hershey's syrup. I had to get my Wacom tablet box all chocolatey to get the "missing box" effect though.

All better now

2008-05-21T03:41:00.004-05:00

Well after spending a few hours on work, an hour with my wife and 2 hours randomly walking around the deserted streets of Kenwood past midnight I feel a lot better. Its a beautiful neighborhood and at this hour I definitely have the whole place to myself. I only wish I had brought my camera as there were so many things that were interesting to shoot, instead I left it inside from when I was trying in vain to take pictures of my PS3 menu screen to photoshop for my solo Future Lions effort.

Something about getting work done helps alleviate the stress of having to do it, because at that point in the moment of working you can't be doing any more than you already are. I like to fall asleep exhausted and with the sense of getting something accomplished.

And that's exactly what i'm going to do.

Since I have been slacking on the visuals recently and typing near unto novella length rants, here is an ad I did the other day as part of a series on Amnesty International.

I wrote the copy, and for once, I actually think it came out great. I really feel strongly about this subject so it was a little easier than most work I have done.

Frustration

2008-05-20T21:38:00.001-05:00

I get frustrated.

Its not the easiest thing to come home from 2 14 hour days in a row, sit down on my couch and get on with things sometimes. I know that one of the hardest things about advertising is getting personally involved with the work you are doing and being perpetually conscious of that is difficult.

Sitting here pissing off my wife about complaining about advertising things or school things she has no interest in isn't helping either of us as well. In fact I know its hurting our relationship that I am essentially busy and less than available for 60-70 hours each week.

Its difficult when you do work that isn't received well. Some people you can please virtually all of the time, some virtually none of the time. Great advertising is for perfectionists, and I have a feeling that perfectionists can feel let down all of the time as nothing is ever really perfect. This particular conundrum makes me feel like it can be very difficult to be in advertising. I feel there is something wrong when I take praise as nothing, but take criticism too seriously. Maybe its a byproduct of growing up with a lot of criticism and with the tutored sense that pride should be met with stoicism.

I wonder sometimes if this is the way its going to be forever. I have roughly 40 things due in a week or less and staring that down is difficult. If a partner leaves town for the weekend, or I can't find some extra time between work and school to squeeze things in its going to be a nightmare really nailing everything. This is the way it is. I accept that but it isn't easy to nail everything with so many concepts and different projects floating around, especially when one is an award show, which is the kind of thing that freaks out the inner perfectionist in me.

I get wound up about award shows. I want things to be as perfect as possible. When things are complex, its very difficult to do so, to step away and call it done. Yet at some point I am going to have to, it is just another thing in the lineup, another box to be checked off of the to do list and life will go on. But the desire to win won't let me drop things so easily sometimes.

I really wish sometimes I didn't have to juggle time between being in classes, being at work and being with my wife. Some weeks I feel like we are two ships passing in the night and don't have much time to spend at all. I think this is by far one of my biggest regrets to signing on to work and a full time school at the same time. I often wish I was 8 years younger and didn't have the responsibilities tying me down so much. Then I think that is merely self pity that is easily overcome by busting ass more and just working through the problem. I should spend more time working and less time worrying about the advantages I don't have, but wonder if I am not leaving change on the table by not fully committing myself to just school. When I am spending 6 hours each day doing something non school related and 4 to 8 hours a day at school I marvel at how I get through the weeks at all sometimes. It is definitely occasionally at the expense of my friends, my social life, my hobbies and most of all my time with my family which is to say my wife. I don't feel guilty for taking the time for my friends (which isn't much these days) and certainly not with my wife, but I do feel the repercussions when I am under the gun having lost a day or two of non class and work time on living my life. Or at least my life as it was before school.

The real problem comes when I don't have anything left in the tank. When it all catches up and you get stuck between the proverbial rock and hard place. Then busting ass and falling asleep at the computer at 1am come crashing together and its tough to find a way.

The worst part is sitting here typing to nobody, and feeling that by the time my exhaustion funk wears off I'll regret every word I typed. Its at least therapeutic to put it down somewhere, Ir really don't have anyone to talk to about these kinds of things.

now that's success baby!

2008-05-19T11:17:00.003-05:00

Classy banner ads like this can only mean one thing: clickthroughs!

I mean come on, there is absolutely no false hope involved with the guy leaning on the Lamborghini and promising you your wildest (not most tame, or reasonable, but wildest) dreams are only a click away!

YTMND: the next advertising frontier?

2008-05-15T13:00:00.003-05:00

I am a big fan of YTMND.com.

I like it because it defies description. It is the internet. Its nothing but what is on people's minds regurgitated a million times over, fads and memes, which become over time referential to each other and building blocks. It rose to prominence a few years ago with teh popularity of the "Picard Song" page, but I find it to go a lot deeper than that and is good food for thought for art directors. Like I am fond of saying about anime, 90% of it is crap, but the 10% that is good is pure genius.

What I like the most is that its so simple. Almost all are just a simple image, or a small animated gif with a text tag line and a snippet of a song.

What works about the best ones is the same thing that works with the great ads. Simple, catchy, funny, insightful, with its finger on the pulse of the internet cultural zeitgeist. The only point is to amke something that is instantly compelling, no more no less, just like the best ads.

And yet I have yet to discuss them with anyone in the advertising industry.

I have compiled a very short list of my favorites. I will warn you not all of them might be safe for work (profanity, not nudity) and you might want to turn your speakers off full blast for some.

http://steamsteamlol.ytmnd.com/
http://robertmarleysoffthechain.ytmnd.com/
http://ovenofpower.ytmnd.com/
http://lohanfacial.ytmnd.com/
http://timetraveler.ytmnd.com/
http://cosbybebop.ytmnd.com/ http://ninjaworksit.ytmnd.com/
http://iranpolice.ytmnd.com/
http://yahooracists.ytmnd.com/
http://zimmergonnasexyouup.ytmnd.com/
http://dmfedex.ytmnd.com/
http://tubesdance.ytmnd.com/
http://mst3krollfizzlebeef.ytmnd.com/

Halo 3 rant revisited

2008-05-13T21:08:00.002-05:00

So today in my concepting class down at the old Miami Ad emporium I voiced my displeasure with the Halo 3 campaign. So we all gathered around the mac and watched it together and talked about it.

We had a really good discussion about what everyone felt about the ad, I definitely probably did more than my share of the talking about how I felt disconnected from it. What was interesting was hearing people who really had a reaction to it justify and quantify why they felt that way.

One other student said that she too felt the way I did when initially watching it, disconnected and relatively bored, but upon hearing how it tied into someone else's childhood and how it made him recall playing army men with his friends and it swayed her emotions. It got her in the mindset for the ad to see it through someone else's eyes.

Now I understand that when we see ads we don't have a little guy next to us to explain what they are supposed to mean or what they might be getting out of it and that is kind of the reality of how it goes. But I found myself being lulled by the same explanations, the connections to childhood, the personification of the characters, all stuff that went over my head when I first saw it. Not to say that I still didn't think that it was not he best ad I saw at the one show by a long shot, but it improved with the testimony of someone who could explain it better than my friend Brad, whose explanation of "that ad was totally fuckin' badass" left me wanting for more explanation.

But then I thought what really got me was the craft. I was seeing the intricacy of the modeling, the vastness of the scope of the camera work, and I was respecting that. What I didn't like was that it was being dedicated to a string of cliches with a line that is either corny or inspired depending on who sees it. Perhaps I wasn't seeing the forest for the trees? But then again did that make me wrong to see it that way? Perhaps it wasn't coming to my attention as quickly and that is something the art directors could have worked on. Whatever the case seeing it through another person's eyes improved the experience somewhat for me, although I still found myself sans goosebumps when I watched it when I got home.

Was I buying into the post awards show hype of everyone poo pooing the winner because they themselves didn't win? I'd like to believe i'm smarter than that, or was it just that as I found myself being swayed by an opinion tonight I was swayed when I was hearing the opinions then? Again food for thought.

I really wish we would have more classes where we discussed our thoughts and feelings about "the big ads" it really is great to get that kind of interaction going. It seems like a big chunk of something that is missing at Miami Ad School.

You know that song...

2008-05-13T10:50:00.004-05:00

So there is an Ad running for Zyrtec right now. It starts with the "proto-mom" archetype (pastel light knit sweater, sensible white top, capris, white athletic shoes, momlike yet still a little attractive and cutesy) sitting on some steps.

She looks frankly into the camera, with an air of friendly camaraderie. Perhaps you are her guest for a sunny afternoon's tea time on her waspy suburban white-painted porch.

Then she goes ahead and says it. The worst line I have heard in modern ad history.

"You know that song 'time in a bottle?' Well now I HAVE TIME IN A BOTTLE thanks to Zyrtec!"

My god.

Fire that copywriter.

I was talking about this with my wife and really, you can just say "you know that song ______? now I FEEL LIKE ________!" and pretty much halfass your way through any headline.

My favorite was her suggestion. "you know that song 'wheel in the sky keeps on turnin,' well I have a wheel in the sky, and it keeps on turnin"

Blogmania!

2008-05-13T09:07:00.002-05:00

My wonderful 4am sleep deprived photoshopped face was in the AdRants roundup today.

I feel so very special.

I am a Nike gangsta

I am going to rant about the uber winning Halo 3 campaign now.

2008-05-12T12:17:00.003-05:00

I seriously don't get it.

to me its a bunch of little warhammer figurines and some slow motion photography. The first time i saw it i really did think it was a joke.

to me for something to be truly groundbreaking it has to be able to convince me or anyone else unfamiliar with the product that "whoa this is awesome I really should check that out."

Pictures of miniature guys who look like they came from Starship Troopers and generi-aliens shooting it out just doesn't do that.

but oh wait! at then end the faceless visor of the soulless hero looks at me! It says believe!

Believe what? That if this video game had zero advertising the whipped into a frenzy fanboy community of Xbox lovers would have never gone and waited in line for 16 hours to buy it at midnight? To me these ads only work on the evangelized. I know Xbox guys who thought they were pretty cool. these are also the same people who get excited when any big budget video game comes out. Its just part of the process.

What these ads didn't do was get people who don't care much about first person shooter aliens go boom games and make them into people who wanted to buy the game. To me the easy part is riling up the extremely fanaticized already existing consumer base, the hard part is getting anyone else to care.

making a museum of Halo 3 means I have to go somewhere to find it and then actually care enough to go in and look at it. The Ambient stuff by and large was all run in NYC, which is great, but certainly doesn't mean it gets exposed to 99.9% of anyone else.

I thought it was an ok campaign for firing up the fanboys, but best campaign of the year? I almost find that insulting to all of the other clearly better work that was produced out there.

and "believe" as a catch phrase does nothing for me. Beleive in robo man killing all the aliens? Okay... I've watched enough generic science fiction to have seen that before a million times. nothing is making this particular time personal enough for me to want to believe in. I just wasn't roped in by the sense of inclusion and personalness that apparently a lot of other people had when watching this ad. To me it was a string of war movie cliches with a corny line at the end.

One Show, part the second

2008-05-10T14:04:00.004-05:00

So Eric Rice and I were interviewed after the student exhibition and we both did some bridge barbecuing I guess. this was run on AdRants.com by the wonderful and talented angela (no sarcasm there).

Find more videos like this on AdGabber

pretty much sums up my opinion about things, sucks that innovative marketing only had 2 awards and neither one was gold. Oh well at least we are in the book and the traveling exhibition, the stuff that got merit for Innovative was way cooler than the stuff that won, and anyone reading the book can figure that out for themselves.

Little tokyo wrapup to follow when I get my camera to work. And I did a car interview for MPR this weekend so I am looking forward to also looking like a tool there as well.

The One Show, part One

2008-05-08T01:46:00.004-05:00

Had a great time tonight at the One Show, even though more than slightly bemused at teh accolades for the Halo 3 campaign which I don't really "get." I heard some hilarious Combos radio spots that had me laughing out loud and had a great time in great company. I got to see my friends Micky, Eric and Anthony and meet some of the other MAS NYC people and they were all a ton of fun to hang out with at the show and made me feel at home.

The afterparty was awesome, met some great people who I would have never figured to run into and had a lot of great advertising conversations with some people I consider to be very important in their opinions, even if they would deny it themselves. It was a little loud and the drinks a little costly but it was definitely worth it even though I arrived tired after a 4 vodka warmup and sitting captive in a theater for 3 hours.

Now I am off to my tiny twin bed to see what little sleep I can get before heading off to BBDO and Lowe tomorrow.

I am so glad I came here, I couldn't have imagined I would be talking to such great people, and the best is still yet to come.

All I have to say is...

2008-05-07T14:13:00.000-05:00

Book cover time

2008-04-30T23:32:00.002-05:00

Made some book covers tonight, thought that I would share them. I really love this book a lot, its about following around the Manchester united hooligans in the 80's.

for reference this is what I based the logo on for you non footballers:

Could it be the strangest auto ad ever?

2008-04-29T17:44:00.002-05:00

I have long loved the quirkiness of Citroens, from the oddly styled 2CVs and HY's to the super space aged DS, but this CX ad has to be the weirdest ad for a car I have yet seen.

Of course the decision to use Grace Jones has a lot to do with anything being weird.

Notice any similarities?

2008-04-28T19:46:00.003-05:00

Mitsubishi basically created a genre with its "religion" spot, in my opinion one of the best car ads ever made. It never really ran and by and large is only known by other advertisers, but it didn't stop one company from doing a direct reference to it and another for getting pretty close to its style.

what I like about these ads is that they all reference the cult followings behind the cars in different ways, but all seemingly are referencing the style or message of the original Mitsubishi ad.

and the BMW referential ad, with the ripoff seeming gran turismo footage (funny there are like 34634631465 evos in gran turismo and 3 BMWs...) The fact that it directly references the seldom seen Mitsubishi ad ("we didn't set out to start a religion") is odd from a company which by and large has a much bigger market presence than Mitsu and doesn't really directly compete for the same consumers, and even then the media buy for the BMW campaign was so large and the Mitsu so small that it virtually guarantees few people will get the joke.

aaaaand the Subaru version

at least Subaru did a slight changeup, my only criticism is it makes the older car look cooler than the newer one. Makes me glad I have the one in the beginning of the ad and not the one at the end.

The keys to the Lamborghini

2008-04-27T17:42:00.001-05:00

At 42 seconds in Michael Angelo says perhaps the most awesome thing I have ever heard said in seriousness.

I really need to get this guy into something.

Interesting design

2008-04-24T20:14:00.000-05:00

I saw this on an invitation I was sent. I loved it.

Internet nannies

2008-04-22T10:44:00.001-05:00

I jsut got an IM from my brother who was trying to read my blog from work. He got this friendly message from his browser:

Internet access to the requested website has been denied based on your user profile and organization's Internet Usage Policy.

User/Machine:
DEFAULT
IP:
206.158.3.10
Category:
Obscene/Tasteless

So I guess I have graduated to obscene and tasteless already. I wasn't even trying yet.

Michael Angelo moment of the day.

2008-04-22T09:38:00.003-05:00

Why isn't this man in ads? I mean they would write themselves.

Michael Angelo Batio Quad Guitar Solo

Fancy Ray ad of the day

2008-04-21T14:51:00.003-05:00

This man is made of some type of pure advertising gold.

Tire change complete, Telly Savalas is awesome.

2008-04-20T15:57:00.002-05:00

Due to racing I have to amass large amounts of tires and change them seasonally. This time managed to get all 4 mounted and swapped no problem, then jacked down my car only to find that the rear hatch had been rubbing on a pipe above my car, horribly scratching the rear hatch.

and I was all excited today up until now. Good day turned worse. Oh well, off to the driving range.

Also, I made this:
Telly Savalas is awesome. If you are a doubter, you need to watch this video.