Loving LOVING these illustrations and concepts. Straightforward simplicity and colourful, gives an impact visually. Agency M&C Saatchi is responsible for these creations for Transport for London.

The idea is to get Londoners out and about in their own city without having to travel cross the globe to get a taste of the countryside, farm or food in China.

----- Conveying a Smart Idea -----

Toyama Kitokito Airport have been saving little in between wait time at the airport luggage claim. Squeezing advertising in between your luggage, abeit knowing how annoyingly bombarding ads can be, is as fresh as it can be like the sashimi it's advertising for the restaurant shown below.

----- IBM -----

If only more advertising were this handy and useful. Brilliant concept and execution, not only does it benefit the company, it simultaneously transform a space into an interactive artwork.

statelysandwiches

-----  Boxy Nature -----

A Brazilian advertising agency Ageisobar developed an interesting direction for a campaign, advertising natural fruit nectar. By proving to consumers the nectar is 100% real fruit, they experimented a technique that has already been developed by the Japanese years ago: squared fruits. Taken two years to complete, they constructed a juice-box shaped mold which they fused with the fruit plant and regulated their development. Meant to cheekily resemble juice-boxes of the brand they are advertising, the technique and approach are interesting and cool, but realistically it's kind of creepy. At first I thought it was Photoshopped or a 3D rendering.  I never took interest in Japanese squared watermelons because the matter of messing with nature doesn't digest well for me. While innovating it is troubling; opens doors for future companies to take interests in manipulating natural farming of fruits and vegetables for the sake of brand identity (then again, manipulation of food production is nothing new). Imagine if all our fruits were grown with a logo implanted in the flesh. Creeeeeeepy.

----- Cartoons in Legos -----

Can you guess?

source

----- Advertising Blunders -----

Racist or not? **

EVERYTIME I see a dumb, slapyourforehead ad or commercial, I always blurt out, "seriously? Who was in that office meeting and said yes to this?" EVERYTIME. Somebody at Nivea did. Because this ad happened. "Look Like You Gave A Damn" is the oil being added to the already burning house. I get it; they're selling grooming products to help clean up unruly American males, but Afro hair means improper? Words should have been chosen carefully, and the head could have been used differently.

Could we have become a society where we judge too quickly and rebuke too apprehensively? Maybe it was an innocent idea, or unthoughtful idea. Overlooked? We could say humans feed power to the insult, and are too sensitive. If it was a depicted as a white male holding an unruly white male's head, would it have been a different outcome? Surely. I feel it's all in all a bad combination of everything: idea, choice of words and image. That's one thing, do we blame it on the person who said yes in the meeting, or the creatives who put this together and didn't have enough sense or courage to speak up and stop, or question? Some would say that it is not fair anymore, that we have to work on our tippy toes in fear that we might pass off racist ideas once ethnicity is involved, preventing multiculturalism from progressing; we control our own civilization. Maybe one day, race wouldn't be a problem, and things like this will be seen with neutral eyes and overlooked, with no intention of hurting or insulting. Designers are not paid to simply create, they are required to research as well, in this case, they did not research enough.

Here's the dealio:
** A black man is shown to be dressed well and groomed as opposed to the stereotype of Black Americans who don't and dresses "ghetto" or savaged like as depicted by the decapitated head of what appears to be an angry, Afro styled Black man. In bold text, it says "Re-civilised Yourself". Blatantly but surreptitiously implies that what he was before was uncivilized. **

Advertising at its best. It's so rare to come across one these days. Das auto ist gut.

----- Breast Cancer Foundation Singapore (Campaign) -----

Génie!