Finally someone has found a good use for drones: Making a cake.
A team of little flying robots assembles a three-tier confection by airlifting genoise, splashing icing, firing candies out of a makeshift cannon and even lighting a sparkler with a blow torch—all in a new ad for Norwegian telecoms company Telia.
If you want the best pizza, you’re not going to order Domino’s. But if you want your pizza delivered in the most innovative way, well, Domino’s may have that market cornered.
The chain took four years to modify a car to become the perfect delivery vehicle. And now it is testing drone delivery in New Zealand. And by all accounts, its first drone test went well, with the pizza landing gently and without major damage—save for a little cheese stuck to the top of the box.
To celebrate the FAA’s loosening of restrictions on who can pilot commercial drones, Intel has put on a flying robot light show—and the results are pretty.
What’s an appropriate visual metaphor for an app that lets you scan handwritten notes to your smartphone? If you’re U.K. stationery brand Oxford, it’s a drone that follows you everywhere, lugging your paper notebooks.
In this new video from gyro Paris, flying reams of study materials distract. haunt, and taunt a bunch of stylish teens. All that to promote Oxford’s SOS Notes app, which lets users scan Oxford notebooks and save them to various devices as .pdf files.
Setting aside whether that’s a task that really needs its own app, it’s hard not to wonder if Oxford should really sell it as an oppressive, inescapable nuisance. Then again, that’s probably how most students feel about their homework already. And theoretically, the product is actually making their lives easier—mostly by reducing work to share notes with friends, but also by lightening their physical load, while they, say, skateboard.
That makes the playful, unencumbered tone of the clip, fit pretty nicely—even if it does seem weird for Oxford to introduce this new element of its brand as an extension of the surveillance state. The kids would probably roll their eyes at that kind of handwringing, though, then hop on a hoverboard and high five a robot.
And in fairness, it looks like it must have been a lot fun to shoot, given the fleet of drones. Interrupting a make-out session is just rude, though.
CREDITS
Brand: Oxford?
Agency: gyro Paris
?Executive Creative Director: Sebastien Zanini, Pierre-Marie Faussurier?
Art Director: Aurelie Casimiri?
Copywriter: Margaux Castanier
?Business Director: Rebecca Cremonini?
Account Executive: Marion Lasselin?
Head of Strategy: Evelyne Bourdonne, Zoe Sabourdy
?Media Strategist: Pascal Deneuter?
TV Production: Yelena Nikolic?
Director: Romain Quirot?
Production Company: Fat Cat
Sure, drones are almost taking people’s heads off at TGI Friday’s. But they can be loyal and useful airborne employees for brave ad agencies willing to embrace the future.
Or maybe they’ll just wreak havoc.
Check out the video below, from creative and technology agency MRY, to see what might happen if a creative agency actually hired drones. And check out the New York City Drone Film Festival on March 7, of which MRY is a sponsor.
Non-combat drones are good for lots of stuff: carrying advertising banners, delivering beer and generally just freaking people out about privacy. And they make great dance partners, too.
That is, at least, if you’re Cirque du Soleil. The performance troupe teamed up with the drone experts at engineering school ETH Zurich to create a short film about a tinker who accidentally trips the breaker in his building, then proceeds to have a whirl in the dark with a group of flying lampshades.
The clip is drawing apt comparisons to The Sorcerer’s Apprentice. It’s beautifully shot and delightful to watch (especially in full-screen). Fast Company has more details on how ETH Zurich choreographed the drones, but suffice it to say—as the video notes at its end—there’s no CGI involved.
Someone should really tell Johnny Dronehunter about these benevolent machines, although he doesn’t really seem like the type of person who’s open to debate on the subject.
Sometimes when you watch an ad, you can’t quite believe it’s real. Then you learn about the backstory, and you watch it again, and you still can’t wrap your head around it.
Take Johnny Dronehunter, the hero in a real new commercial for a real new shotgun silencer, from a real company called SilencerCo.
If you are, like Johnny, a man who drives through the desert in aviators and a beat-up ’80s-era Cadillac, then finds himself in combat with a fleet of flying surveillance robots, then this is the shotgun silencer for you.
If your response to growing privacy concerns around the increasing use of drones by domestic law enforcement doesn’t include overtones of a paranoid dystopian fantasy in which people run around shooting drones out of the sky, then it’s still pretty amusing to watch the clever melodrama of a well-produced drone-hunting video. It even feels a bit like a Tarantino-esque take on grindhouse cinema (even though the Cohn brothers’ No Country For Old Men is more famous for its silenced shotgun, it was also quite a bit more serious).
If you were worried that Johnny Dronehunter might not be coming soon to a town near you, SilencerCo’s CEO tells Vice’s Motherboard that the brand plans to film future Johnny Dronehunter ads in cities and suburban settings, but he admits it’s harder to shoot and blow up robots in less desolate locales, because, you know, laws.
If you’re still wondering why anyone would need a shotgun silencer in the first place (especially in the desert), it’s because shotguns are loud, which means it could give away your position to the government. Just kidding. Shotguns are incredibly loud, and a suppressor can help keep it from damaging your ears while shooting clay pigeons or hunting live animals. Though it’s generally worse for the duck.
Lembra do projeto Connectivity Lab do Facebook, que propunha o uso de drones para distribuir internet para todo o planeta? A principal fabricante do modelo de drone que Mark Zuckerberg estava de olho, a Titan Aerospace, acaba de ser adquirida pelo Google.
Os termos da negociação ou o valor da compra ainda não foram divulgados, mas o Wall Street Journal informa que os drones seriam usados para complementar os balões do Projeto Loon, do Google, que tem uma premissa bem semelhante ao Connectivity Lab do Facebook.
Especula-se que a aquisição da Titan tenha ocorrido para evitar que o Facebook a comprasse
Especula-se que a aquisição da Titan tenha acontecido com o principal propósito de evitar que a empresa fosse incorporada ao Facebook. Ao invés de integrar o império de Zuck, agora a Titan é parte do conglomerado de Larry Page e Sergey Brin.
O BusinessInsider também sugere que os drones poderiam ser utilizados para coletar fotos de todo o planeta e ajudar na melhoria de serviços como o Google Earth e o Google Maps.
Se eu fosse o Zuck, ia retaliar comprando uma empresa de balões.
Post originalmente publicado no Brainstorm #9
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Seja usado como arma de combate, entregando pacotes da Amazon ou em projetos de foto e filme, os drones são assuntos que levantam muitas questões.
Embora o uso comercial de drone esteja aguardando a regulamentação da Administração Federal de Aviação, não é difícil imaginar um mundo repleto de diferentes tipos de drones, cada um com suas tarefas e controlador.
As filmagens foram criadas usando o DJI Phantom Drone, uma câmera Go Pro e alguns efeitos especiais no After Effects.
O vídeo One Drone Future, do designer Alex Cornell, explora um futuro com drones semi-automáticos circulando livremente e dentro da lei por São Francisco, sendo usados como ativos em vigilância de segurança, vasculhando a cidade por situações de risco e chamadas de socorro.
Os drones de segurança podem detectar veículos e rastreá-los, fazendo o mesmo com pedestres. A interpretação de Cornell sugere que a polícia da cidade teria acesso a um sistema de monitoramento remoto, observando todos os vídeos e dados do drone e sugerindo uma missão alternativa se necessário.
O vídeo começa otimista porém até o seu desfecho busca mostrar os dois lados da faca.
Enquanto os benefícios dos drones de segurança podem estar em reportar emergências, acidentes e crimes sem a necessidade da presença física da polícia, por outro lado, a privacidade dos cidadãos pode ser invadida e os drones, quem sabe, podem até nos desobedecer.
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Muitos dos projetos focados em drones parecem usar a tecnologia como forma de protesto contra os ataques militares, causa real do seu nascimento.
Mas o Dronestagram está estimulando a criatividade dos entusiastas dessa tecnologia, oferecendo um lugar para compartilhar fotos áereas de tirar o fôlego capturadas com drones.
O site espera construir uma vista inteira da Terra através de fotografias enviadas por qualquer usuário que tenha câmeras em drones. Mesmo no começo, já vemos desde imagens artísticas às mais variadas e incríveis paisagens.
Em uma referência ao Instagram, Dronestagram também funciona como uma rede social aonde as pessoas podem compartilhar, buscar, visualizar, curtir e comentar em imagens.
Abaixo, algumas das fotos que vemos na rede.
Não é por acaso que somos fascinados pelas vistas mais altas e infinitas.
A visão de um drone faz encolher até o mais alto prédio, transformando toda a cidade em um grande mosaico. Embora essas imagens costumavam ser limitadas aos filmes de Hollywood e suas caríssimas tomadas de helicópteros, a comunidade entusiasta dos drones hoje ganha cada vez mais fama pela arte capturada em cima de suas máquinas voadoras.
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Considering how much you hear about drones these days, it's surprising we haven't seen more marketing stunts using remote-controlled hoverbots. But Paramount Pictures pulled off an interesting trick this weekend by using glowing quadrotors to create a Star Trek logo over London. The promotion, for the franchise's latest film, Star Trek Into Darkness, was timed to mark the end of the World Wildlife Fund's annual Earth Hour, which encourages cities to turn off nonessential lights for environmental awareness. As the hour of darkness ended, the 30 drones' LED lights (charged through renewable energy sources) turned on to form the insignia of Star Trek's Starfleet. Created by Ars Electonica Futurelab and Ascending Technologies, the result is pretty impressive—when viewed from the right angle, at least. Check out a video below, and enjoy the moment at 1:20 when two of the drones at the bottom of the frame seem to collide, sending one plummeting out of the sky.
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