Hasta La Creative!

This morning, Canon announced a “massive rebranding initiative” led by its creative AOR Grey New York.

The project runs under the new tagline “See Impossible,” and it includes several elements: a new logo, new tagline and new “digital hub” at a new URL that’s worth a click for the 3D spinning cube.

The general idea is to move Canon from being a producer of camera technology to being a sort of creative partner. First video spot, starring an aspiring filmmaker who refused to move to L.A.:

According to the copy, Canon wants to go “beyond photography.” Another spot below.

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Production studio O Positive enlisted the services of actress Jessica Chastain in a new PSA for The Nature Conservancy.

Chastain reads a poem by Matthew Dickman entitled “Our Nature.” The spot, directed by Peyton Wilson sets Chastain’s reading of the poem to a dramatic piano track, coming across more like a short film about love than a PSA, until it’s revealed that the love Chastain is talking about is her love of nature. As the 60-second PSA continues, the camera turns more and more to shots of the beautiful Sierra Mountains, and Chastain interacting with the natural world around her, ending with the tagline “Your first love wants you back.”

“I chose to be a part of this remarkable campaign not just because it spoke to my own love affair with nature, but also because it’s imperative to find a way to co-exist with nature so that this valuable and beautiful resource is protected, ” Chastain said in a press release. “I hope this film encourages everyone to rethink their relationship with the natural world around them.”

The spot, the second nature PSA featured here in two days, like Conservation International’s effort, sees The Nature Conservancy take a different approach emphasizing emotion.

“This is a departure for the Conservancy,” explains Jordan Peavey, marketing director for The Nature Conservancy in California. “Instead of a typical PSA where we explain who we are sand what we do in a very intellectual way, we worked with Peyton, O Positive and Jessica Chastain to create an entirely different type of story. One we hope will intrigue and inspire new audiences to remember their love of nature and to get involved.” (more…)

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The Richards Group today is launching the first-ever brand campaign in the 93-year history of the Texas Scottish Rite Hospital for Children (TSRHC).

Entitled “Moments” the campaign celebrates happy moments in the lives of several real TSRHC patients made possible by the hospital. In one spot, it’s a dancer who can’t imagine what her life would be like without dancing. We see her in the present day, and then flash back to her orthopedic recovery at TSRHC, preceded by the message, “These moments were made possible by these moments.” Similarly-themed spots include a horseback rider and a football player, each ending with the tagline, “Giving children back their childhood.”

“Using Texas Scottish Rite patients in our campaign brought authenticity to the hospital’s message,” said Stan Richards, president and CEO of The Richards Group, in a release. “By putting the focus on actual patients who overcame adverse circumstances, we can show how each one has gotten back to their childhood, fully recovered and happy, thanks to the good work of TSRHC.”

In addition to the television ads, the campaign also include digital, radio, OOH and print elements. Stick around for two more spots after the jump. (more…)

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AMV BBDO has a new series of ads for Snickers’ ongoing “You’re Not You When You’re Hungry” campaign, resurrecting Rowan Atkinson‘s Mr. Bean character.

In the longest of the three broadcast spots, Atkinson’s character finds himself jumping over rooftops with a group of ninjas, in a parody of kung fu movies like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Only, while his colleagues glide gracefully from rooftop to rooftop, Mr. Bean has a bit more trouble and eventually finds himself crashing through the roof to an angry group of warriors below. At this point, one of his fellow ninjas tosses him a Snickers, saying “…you can’t concentrate when you’re hungry, eat a Snickers” and he’s back to his old self.

The character is a perfect fit for the popular “You’re Not You When You’re Hungry” approach, and the spots are all pretty entertaining. In the remaining pair (featured after the jump), Atkinson’s character practices nunchucks and kata, with less than stellar results. Atkinson’s character is such a good fit — he’s certainly one of the best celebrities featured in the ongoing campaign — that you almost wonder why he hasn’t been featured before. (more…)

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Given all the recent drama surrounding the Cadillac account and the fact that it’s the end of the day on a Friday, we thought it would be a good time to look at some alternate work for one of the company’s campaigns.

Here, then, are two spots from Spike DDB – yes, the one run by Spike Lee and based nowhere near our neighborhood in Brooklyn — to promote the new Cadillac ATS sedan.

The first one, “Coding It”, seems to be about professional responsibility:

Note the old, corporate dude and his subtle nod of approval.

So you can away with using the word “chiseled” outside the Twilight fan fiction universe.

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With Halloween coming up at the end of the month, Goodby Silverstein & Partners has a new campaign for Rock the Vote that attempts to scare young people into voting, entitled “#CareLikeCrazy.”

In the above 30-second spot, a right-wing lunatic espouses his (scary) views on women’s rights, preceding his rant by letting you know he never forgets to vote. He says women, who “think they want equal pay” are just having their minds poisoned by feminism and its the responsibility of men to protect them from themselves. His psychotic rant is followed by the a horror movie scream and the message “He votes. Do you?”

Since, unfortunately, there really are people like this out there, this is a clever approach. For those who don’t think there’s reason to vote, it’s a reminder that sane, rational people are needed to cancel out the votes of people like this guy. Similarly minded spots take on other topics (with other crazies) like war, the environment and voting rights. (more…)

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Y&R has a new campaign encouraging New Yorkers to become organ donors on behalf of the New York Organ Donor Network.

In an animated 90-second spot, parts of buildings begin to fall off as the city is portrayed in dire health. A group collects the pieces, however, and assembles them into a heart which powers the city back up, as the Statue of Liberty breathes a sigh of relief, followed by the tagline “Keep New York Alive” and a message urging New Yorkers to become organ donors. The campaign is needed because as a state New York is well behind the curve in terms of registered organ donors.

“Next-to-last place—we are ranked 49th in terms of the percentage of state residents registered as organ donors—is not good enough for New York,”Glen Jacobs, executive creative director at Y&R, told Adweek. “We need to move the needle, so organ donors can save lives. Period.”

For the spot, Y&R teamed up with Laurent Witz, the director behind Oscar-winning animated short Mr. Hublot. Witz and company employed lifelike 3D animation to deliver the message in a way that can grab people’s attention. While it’s not immediately apparent why the city is falling apart, the message is clear by the end of the 90 seconds, and the initial mystery serves to draw in the viewer.

Still, Jacobs says that Y&R’s work for the cause is far from over. “If this campaign helps raise awareness for the cause, that’s great,” he told Adweek. “But we have a long way to go. So, our aim is to keep finding bigger and better ways to get the message out.” (more…)

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Even fine artists need corporate sponsors.

In a campaign to promote client TD Bank, Philadelphia’s Tierney commissioned a series of works from nationally exhibited, New York-based artists with the collaboration of Bridgette Mayer Gallery. The artists, who work across mediums, were each produced original tree-themed pieces.

Here’s one from Federico Herrero, who has three works in the Guggenheim:

The purpose of the campaign is to promote MillionTreesNYC, an eco-initiative describing itself as “a public-private partnership between NYRP & NYC Parks” that aims to plant one million new trees in the city by the end of 2015 — with the blessings of one Bette Midler.

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Tribal Worldwide has a new campaign discouraging teen cough syrup abuse on behalf of the Consumer Healthcare Products Association and the Partnership for Drug-Free Kids.

Rather than take a typical scare-tactic approach, Tribal Worldwide instead decided to make a fun game. The game, entitled “DXM Labworks” lets players get a robot all messed up on DXM (the psychoactive ingredient, dextromethorphan, in some cough syrups) and see what the effects are like (spoiler alert: the robot pukes a lot). Billing the app as “your chance to see the effects of abusing DXM without trying it yourself,” the idea is that teens will try out the game and see an unglamorous portrayal of the effects of the drug.

“It’s not a sexy drug –- there’s loss of motor control, slurred speech and, of course, the uncontrollable puking,” Kinney Edwards, executive creative director at Tribal, explained to Mashable. “Social disapproval really matters to teens, and they can see first-hand how embarrassing and not cool this is.”

The campaign is mostly aimed at “on the fence” teens, those who are considering experimenting with the drug and perhaps researching its effects online. By presenting them with a game that simulates the effects of the drug, Tribal hopes the teens will make the judgement that DXM’s negative effects are not something they want to experience. The agency decided that teens easily dismiss PSAs but that they might be more receptive to a fun, mobile game. And what’s not fun about a robot puking?

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Here’s the second high-minded short film promoting a camera company that we’ve received today.

This one, created by Saatchi & Saatchi’s Brazilian wing F/Nazca, hypes camera maker Leica on its 100th anniversary by recasting some of the past century’s most memorable images and suggesting that they wouldn’t have come to be if not for the innovations sparked by that company.

Key line: “We didn’t invent photography…but we invented PHOTOGRAPHY” (emphasis ours).

It’s a bold claim backed up by an elaborate restaging of 35 “iconic” photos. We didn’t recognize all of them (which is shameful because we majored in studio art), but Eddie Adams’ “Saigon Execution” and a few more obvious entries like the John/Yoko portrait do stand out. Something tells us our readers will score better on the unofficial quiz.

The specific purpose of the film is to promote the brand’s store/gallery in Sao Paulo, but not its new “brilliant, crazy camera you cannot afford.”

Credits below.

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