Ford Has Finally Found a Voice

For years I really have not been able to tell the difference between Ford, Chevy, and Dodge trucks besides the logos on the front of the trucks. But at this point, with cable readily available while home for Thanksgiving break, a new campaign for Ford F-150's have rolled out and I am floored.

This great graphic style paired with the voice of Dennis Leary is amazing in my opinion. At this point I would never buy a truck, but if I did, I would go for a F-150. The way the type flows with the graphic treatment to it is so eye catching.

And honestly, the more you see the ads, the more you notice the little things that make you laugh when you see the spots. I don't know what agency handles the Ford brand, and I'm even more stunned that Ford has any money to advertise when they have no money to run their company. But that goes to show you, hard to sell a product without advertising for it. My industry will always be needed.

Bravo Apple

Last weekend the FIT hosted the annual AWNY Student Conference in NYC. During the main part of the conference, students attended certain workshops that interested them in all the different areas of advertising. One of the workshops I went to was about interactive advertising and one of the things that stood out in my mind was when she said that interactive is no longer about banner ads and landing paged, its more. But for my brand design course, we are now at interactive and can you guess what we are doing? Banner ad and landing page. Fun. But here is a fantastic banner ad, and of course, Chiat/Day doing work for Apple.

Web Design, Attempt #1

For my brand design class we had to create a home page for our company. My company sells high end, custom SCUBA dive trips across the world. This is what I came up with after a many critiques and just as many drafts. Comments are welcome.

Another path for design...

So today in my branding class Hayes Roth came to lecture and have lunch with a select few of us. Mr. Roth is the CMO (Chief Marketing Officer) of Landor Associates, which is the largest branding company in the world. He showed us case studies on Smirnoff, BP and and the second largest bank in Brazil. It was amazing some of the work that was put out by Landor. They updated the logo from British Petroleum from an old, green shield to a modern and exciting logo.

So the idea that going into branding would allow a design student to not only design advertisements solely, but everything a company has to offer is extremely appealing to me. I am by no means turning my back on advertising, I still want to go work at an ad agency and be an art director, it is just very cool to see new options open up in the commercial design area. On the advertising note, I saw a very cool campaign. It's a campaign to encourage voting turnout, and I think is very creative.

Wiki Ads, how to learn anything about anything

So I decided to work on a campaign for Wikipedia because I owe so much to it, and its fantastic free information. Honestly, half of the time I'm using Wikipedia is because I am playing a game my friends and I like to call "Five Clicks to Jesus". This is when you start by clicking the 'Random Article' button, and you now have 5 clicks to get the Jesus Christ page. I have never once not been able to accomplish this feet, it is a very addicting game.

Random Article:
Andrey Mizurov: A Kazakhstani professional road bicycle racer born in 1973.
January 20, 1973: President Richard Nixon was inaugurated.
His Democratic challenger was John F. Kennedy, and the race remained close for the duration.
John F. Kennedy was officially a Roman Catholic.
The Catholic Church defines its mission as spreading the message of Jesus Christ.

No matter where you start, you can always do it. And honestly, I feel like this translates into a good campaign that shows the dexterity and versatility of Wikipedia. Any and all comments are welcome.

Proud to be a Bomber

So at last nights Obama rally at around 12:30, a camera was passed up to the highest point on the quad and you can see us all singing the National Anthem. At around second 12 or so, you can see me, my girlfriend Jenn and my friend Connor on the bottom right of the screen. I am wearing the brown jacket. This is pretty cool and I am very proud to be an Ithaca Bomber right now.

President Elect Obama

Last night, after a two year campaign, Barack Obama was elected the 44th president of the United States. My friends and I watched election coverage from around 1pm until Obama gave his speech at Grant Park in Chicago. We just witnessed history from so many different angles, and I couldn't be happier. After donating time, money and effort, Obama was elected. And not on a platform of fighting or fear, but hope, change and challenging the status quo. I just want to say congratulations to President Obama, I am far more hopeful for the next four years than I had previously been, and congratulations to everyone who fought and voted for him and this election. Like he said in his speech, this was our victory and we will not forget this.

As soon as Obama's victory had been announced, students poured into the Ithaca College quad. Out of a campus of 6,500 students, where only 4,000 or so live on campus, I would say about 2,000 rushed to the middle of the campus and marched accros campus screaming and shouting. I have never been happier to be an Ithaca College student, or a college student in general.