Posts Tagged ‘creativity’

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Make work worthwhile

Wednesday, December 21st, 2011
Written by: Barry Bruner

Many people use the terms “stress” or “overworked” when asked about their job. I’ll admit I’ve been one of those people from time to time. The last few years, though, I’ve tried to make a conscious effort to see the positive in everything at work — from coworker confrontations and generational gap issues to challenging client requests and policy changes. Sometimes these can be scary, and fear typically leads people to tell themselves a story that bad things are about to happen. They immediately assume the worst. My awareness of this thought process has led me to stop telling myself that story, and before assuming the worst, slow down to consider the positives.

Below are a few philosophies I’ve implemented throughout my career to help me stay positive and make my career a better life experience:

  1. Work hard when it’s time to work — play hard when it’s time to play. I don’t know where this saying originated, but for me, it was the motto of my college advertising professor. I remember him telling our impressionable freshman class this advice as if it were the single most important thing we would take away. He said it was the philosophy that got him through his many years as an advertising executive, and from that moment on I’ve tried my best to live by it. I’m lucky because at work I not only get to consult and propose marketing solutions to my clients, but I’m privileged to be able to train and mentor others along the way. That balance is very satisfying for me, and that’s the work part. When it’s time to play, I try to go big, typically taking a trip someplace new (far off, when I can) to explore and get away. Hiking and snow skiing are my typical escapes, with the mountains, deserts, and forests as my playgrounds. Extreme sports like bungy jumping, rafting, and mountain biking are always welcome considerations in my travel itineraries. If I can’t go big, I try to find time to hike the elaborate cornfields of Iowa. Okay, that’s not true (mainly because I fear snakes and moving combines), but I do try to find excursions around the region to experience new things.
  2. Don’t nibble. Again, I’m not privy to the exact origins of the Nibble Theory, but I know it dates (more…)

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Fibbing with Photoshop?

Tuesday, October 18th, 2011
Written by: Drew Jones

Demi Moore, Ann Taylor, and the ethics of photo alteration.

A few weeks ago, Demi Moore — actress, famous face, and wife of Iowa’s own Ashton Kutcher — got her hand slapped by the media for allegedly being airbrushed within an inch of her life in a series of images for fashion brand Ann Taylor.

Judge for yourself, but it seems pretty cut and dried. Heck, she looks more like Andie MacDowell circa 1993 than Demi Moore circa 2011. But, of course, this isn’t exactly news. And it certainly isn’t the first time it’s happened. In fact, chances are if you see an image in a major fashion publication, magazine, or catalog, some sort of Photoshop work has been done to the image.

They do it for an Ann Taylor catalog, and for every issue of Vogue, GQ, and Golf Digest. Yes Golf Digest photoshops images. And so do we. We do virtually the same thing on behalf of our clients every day at Two Rivers Marketing.

Let’s face it, the digitization of our business has made it ridiculously easy to create just about anything we can dream up. A wheel loader on the moon? No problem. Santa Claus cuddling a rabid wolverine? Give us five minutes. All you need is the right raw photography and a master Photoshop technician (like Two Rivers’ own Chad Halverson). Easy peasy.

But that’s not really what we’re talking about. Those things are obviously faked. The things that seem to get folks into trouble are when they try to pass something off as reality when it obviously isn’t. Demi and Ann Taylor didn’t get their hands caught in the Photoshop cookie jar because they touched up the image… they got caught because they went too far.

So where is the ethical line? When is it okay to retouch or alter an image in Photoshop and when is it not? And where do you stop? Well, not that we’re the sole authority on this sort of thing, but here’s where we come down on it: We use Photoshop to create a better version of reality, not a false one.

Okay, sure. But what does that mean?

It means we’ll use Photoshop to clean the mud off of a dirty skid steer. Or to turn a cloudy day sunny. Or fix the cracked windshield that happened on the way to a shoot. We also use Photoshop to fix lighting problems or match a paint color in a photo to the PMS color in the company logo. We might airbrush out a road sign that was in the foreground, or the guy in the background with the “I’m with Stupid” T-shirt.

In all of these instances, we’re accounting for the things that we couldn’t get 100 percent perfect when the photo was taken. We’re altering what was, yes. But not what could have been. It’s our responsibility to portray our clients’ products in the best possible light. And that’s where Demi and Ann Taylor missed the mark. They didn’t stop at removing the stray hair that was out of place or fixing the lipstick color the makeup artist got wrong. They pushed reality one step too far. And we noticed. Oops.

 

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Life, love, and fake football (and a bit of marketing, too)

Thursday, September 1st, 2011
Written by: Drew Jones

It’s that time of year. Time when grown men (and, increasingly, women) gather to divvy up NFL stars in the annual embrace of the inner stat geek in all of us we call fantasy football. I’m somewhat embarrassed to say I enjoy fantasy football. It makes the games more interesting to watch, provides a platform for harmless trash talk and gives my inner stat geek a hug every Sunday.

I’ve won my fantasy football league one time in 10 seasons. Despite the fact that this is roughly the same success rate I could expect by pure random chance, I feel it qualifies me to dispense fantasy football advice. Everyone who plays feels this way. We’re all experts … just ask us. But for me, it goes one step deeper. Because — and I mean this sincerely — I believe the answer to nearly all of life’s questions (love, money, happiness, marketing, etc.) can be found in the lessons of fake football. Understanding whether you should roll the dice with Arian Foster and his bum hamstring is not a dramatically different decision than whether to run the out-in-left-field campaign concept your agency is pitching you or sticking with the tried-and-true campaign you’ve been running for years.

So without further ado, five fantasy football lessons you can take to your draft and their marketing corollaries.

Lesson 1: If everyone else is doing one thing, do the other.

Success in fantasy football is about finding value. If everyone else is grabbing a pair of running backs at the top of the draft, buck the trend and go quarterback and wide receiver. Better to have a stud at each of those positions and chase quantity of quality at the running back position later on. The lesson: Start trends, don’t follow them.

Marketing Corollary: It’s one the simplest points to say and one of the hardest ones for marketers to follow: The point of marketing is to stand out, not blend in. I will repeat that, because it bears repeating. The point of marketing is to stand out, not blend in. “My biggest competitor is doing it,” is never a good reason to do anything. Most of the time, it’s a good reason to do something else. (more…)

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