In an infinitely classy and gracious move, Lucasfilm took out an ad in the Irish Examiner to thank the communities of Crookhaven, Goleen and the Brow Head peninsula, where parts of the upcoming Star Wars movie (Episode VIII) were shot, for putting up with them.
The ad references the “tireless commitment of our Irish crew” in glowing terms, and states that “the enthusiasm and support of all the people of West Cork have made our Irish adventure one we will always treasure.”
Dublin-based international creative agency ROTHCO, has developed ‘It’s your call’, a global campaign which will give rugby fans the opportunity to actually take part in the start of every game in the tournament. In an exciting first, fans will be responsible for the coin toss that will determine which nation kicks off the game. Everyone across the world will have the chance to enter a competition to flip the coin at their country’s game and one very lucky fan will flip the coin at the Rugby World Cup final on October 31st 2015. They are literally minting thousands of coins to give rugby fans in each participating country the chance of flipping the coin at their nations game.
This spot shows just what a lucky coin can do.
Irish International BBDO did it with a chilling script, Cannes Lion winning director, Martin Stirling, and a haunting, original, score from Gareth Averill.
The Road Safety Authority’s latest ad is an exploration of how a single moment turning to look at a child in the back seat could lead to a lifetime of looking back in regret.
In the ad we see a woman in her seventies wistfully glancing at a photograph of a child who’s no longer with us. We see her at different points in her life, always looking around, in sadness, loss, heartache, all the way back to a crucial moment. The moment when she turned to look at her daughter in the back seat of the car, killing her, by driving headlong into an oncoming vehicle.
The audience is told: Don’t lose a lifetime looking back.
It’s a poignant reminder that one of the most dangerous and distracting things you can carry in your car is also the single most vulnerable – your child. Driving with a child in your car can be 12 times more distracting than when driving with a mobile phone. The most vulnerable person in your car can also present the biggest danger.
It’s a film that will make parents think twice about the stakes at play when they’re distracted by kids in the back. Most importantly it’s an ad that will save precious lives on the road.
Fun fact – although portraying the same person at different ages, the older- and middle-aged women are actually mother and daughter in real life.
“Dublin’s cabbies have lots of opinions and are well known for sharing them” comments, Kevin Keenan, Creative Director at Guns or Knives. “So we flipped a traditional prejudice, to give a satirical take on discrimination. Then we found a proper Dublin taxi driver who we reckoned could pull it off.”
It was essential for the project to air just before the two day media moratorium, to fill the void in the discussion about the referendum.
“The timing of the piece was crucial. We didn’t have a lot of time and from idea to airing, the project was completed in just under a week.”
Audi Ireland has decided to directly address the stereotype that women are bad drivers in a Twitter campaign that aims to undermine that perception.
The automaker last week posted a series of images that appeared to make fun of women drivers—including scenes of poorly parked cars and men in passenger seats looking terrified. The tweets were tagged #womendrivers.
But the tweets also contained links, and it turned out they pointed to stories of women being real drivers in fields like technology, science and sports.
If a woman wants to drive… don’t stand in her way! #womendrivers #fail #audi http://t.co/NmIe4yd8i9 pic.twitter.com/3Aouhz6ekU
— Audi Ireland (@audiireland) April 27, 2015
Nice job, lady! Check out these #womendrivers #audi #funny http://t.co/EqS8q8Nj4a pic.twitter.com/WxjZs3On14
— Audi Ireland (@audiireland) April 27, 2015
It’s an interesting idea, and a bit surprising that an automaker would even tackle an issue with such obvious pitfalls. The problem, as some have pointed out, is that you have to actually click on the links to realize Audi isn’t just being negative and weird. (The automaker has been posting an explanatory video on Twitter, too, though of course it’s easy to miss individual tweets.)
So, is a campaign like this clever, or maybe not such a good idea after all?
Agency: Atomic, Dublin. Via Design Taxi.
Driving Miss Ditsy. Check out these #crazy #womendrivers #audi http://t.co/Od9BwnTY1e pic.twitter.com/EDFOwueSaW
— Audi Ireland (@audiireland) April 29, 2015
Crazy women drivers! You’ll never guess what happened next!!! #funny #audi #womendrivers http://t.co/Ac2NI3v0xs pic.twitter.com/Yuomy5LeQa
— Audi Ireland (@audiireland) April 29, 2015
Watch out! Women driving! #womendrivers #audi #toofunny http://t.co/XTaYXGcU2v pic.twitter.com/GwpGgIIlsd
— Audi Ireland (@audiireland) April 28, 2015
Caution women behind the wheel!! #funnystuff #audi #womendrivers http://t.co/rGb07YF6MS pic.twitter.com/fEXODIBUdC
— Audi Ireland (@audiireland) April 28, 2015
But before we get too happy-clappy, let’s switch our analytical brains on. This advertising is much too good to be an in-house piece from a little paper shop you’ve never heard of – in both the concept and execution. They’ve put everything behind it; we are talking a full integrated campaign including social media, a microsite, and a physical product – and that doesn’t come cheap. Someone is hoping for a viral hit. And those someones are new owners Ger and Lar Barron, paper merchants (of parent company Realt Paper Ltd), and agency responsible for the work, Rothco.
Daintree Paper are apparently better known in Ireland for a gay cake-topper row, where previous owner Paul Barnes is on record as saying his store “would not stock any merchandise that promotes same-sex marriage”. New owners clearly looking for a rebrand, both of their business, their ethics, but also putting marketing efforts behind an admirable cause.
I wish them every success. Since I started writing this piece, their video has doubled in views, so I think we might have a nice little viral hit on our hands, especially in the run up to the referendum.
Feedback over the social webs is unanimously positive:
I love @ShredofDecency_ by @DaintreePaper turning inequality into love that can be scattered #yestoequality— Edel Becton (@dellbells13) April 7, 2015
Best idea ever (after equal rights 😉 )
Fair play to @ShredofDecency_ @DaintreePaper you win the internet!
@YesEquality2015 #MarRef— Helen (@HellyH) April 7, 2015
Website: http://shredofdecency.ie/
Sure, the old “they’re not really talking about sex” gag is an ancient red herring, but we still enjoyed this bit of low-budget advertising from Cork, Ireland.
Obviously we won’t spoil it by telling you what they’re really discussing. My first hunch was a restaurant, and after hearing it all out, part of me wishes I’d been right. Because that would be one interesting restaurant.
What will happen when gay marriage is legal? Will the resulting Armagayddon destroy civilization as we know it? Luckily, an Irish gay rights advocacy group is here to help you visualize the consequences.
Ireland is set to consider a referendum on marriage equality in Spring 2015. To get people fired up for the vote, LGBT Noise is holding a march in Dublin, and they’ve partnered with Like:Minded productions to create this humorous short that laughs at our collective fear of the unknown.
Social change can be hard, particularly in a conservative nation, but what this spot is trying to suggest is that there really won’t be any change—unless opponents ruin their own lives with self-enforced isolation and a creepy prison box for their children.
With more than 200,000 views since being posted two weeks ago, it’s sparking interest for the cause around the world. After all, sometimes the only thing you can do in the face of uninformed fear is laugh.
CREDITS
Client: LGBT Noise
Production House: Like:Minded Production
Writters: Tara Flynn and Kevin McGahern
Director: Martin Gaughan
Producer: Lisa Gallagher
Director of Photography: Andrew Cummins
Sound: Stephen McDowell
Assistant Director: Diarmuid O’Brien
Assistant Camera: Anna O’Carroll
Make Up Artist: Olivia Fitzsimons
Sound Mixer: Bounce Sound
Graphics: Richard Merrigan & Eric Dolan
Postproduction Producer: Carly Butler
Online Editor: Robbie O’Farrel
Editor: Tom O’Neill & Ultan Murphy
Cast:
Adam: Shane O’Reilly
John: Kevin McGahern
Mary: Tara Flynn
This literally out-of-control 60-second road-safety ad from Northern Ireland is causing an international stir for some intense imagery that begins around the 40-second mark.
As these types of ads go, it’s not particularly graphic. There’s no blood and guts. No flying body parts. No mutilation. Even so, some observers have criticized the country’s Department of the Environment, which produced the spot, for going too far, and some news outlets have posted “trigger warnings” about the strong content. It airs on TV only after 9 p.m., when kids, in theory, aren’t watching. And that’s a bit ironic, because the controversy centers around the horrifying fate of a group of children.
The PSA, by Belfast agency LyleBailie International, opens ominously, with a slowed-down, dirge-y version of Guns ‘n Roses “Sweet Child ‘O Mine”—more or less tipping us off that the primary-schoolers seen laughing, playing and preparing for a class outing are in for trouble. Even so, it’s hard not to jump when the moment of tragedy arrives.
“Since 2000, speeding has killed a classroom of our children,” a voiceover says. “You can never control the consequences if you speed.”
Criticism has run the gamut. On UTV’s coverage of the ad flap, “Unsure in Belfast” questions the strategy: “I’m surprised if these adverts work. People I know won’t watch … Those boy racers who drive fast are never going to be impacted.” Over at Philly Barstool Sports, “Smitty” suggests the approach trivializes the issue: “It’s not even something out of a Michael Bay film but rather a Michael Bay spoof.” Meanwhile, Twitter user @Curljets sums up the anti-PSA sentiment thusly: “I’m thinking of starting a support group for Irish people called ‘DOE Road Safety Advert induced trauma.’ “
The DOE says it used such brutal imagery because it believes the fear of killing kids will influence at least some folks to stop speeding. “The aim of this campaign is to challenge and dispel, once and for all, through this emotional and uncomfortable message, the false perceptions that many road users have as to the truly horrifying consequences of speeding,” says road safety minister Mark Durkan. “People are losing their lives long before they have the chance to fulfill their potential. Families are being destroyed forever.”
While I wasn’t exactly horrified by this spot, I would rate it among the most audacious, unsettling and memorable PSAs I’ve seen. And I’m not the only one taking notice. The YouTube posting is approaching 1.7 million views in a week, and the controversy is driving the anti-speeding message into the public conversation far beyond Ireland.
Once a rising star in the industrialized world, Ireland now has the highest per capita national debt in the world – a debt to be paid by the people, not the 1% behind the crash.
Read more at Al Jazeera: http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/peopleandpower/2012/01/2012119847466…
London’s Murder.
Advertising Agency: Cawley Nea TBWA, Dublin, Ireland
Creative Director / Copywriter: Alan Kelly
Art Director: Mark Black
Photographer: Jonathan Minster
Retoucher: Dermot Heaslip
To be published: July 2008
Advertising Agency: Publicis QMP, Dublin, Ireland
Executive Creative Director: Carol Lambert
Art Director: Nicholas Pereira
Copywriter: Priscilla Groves
Retoucher: Taylor James
Photographer: Simon Burch
Advertising Agency: Publicis QMP, Dublin, Ireland
Executive Creative Director: Carol Lambert
Art Director: Nicholas Pereira
Copywriter: Priscilla Groves
Retoucher: Taylor James
Photographer: Simon Burch
Filtered through volcanic rock with a touch of fruit.
Advertising Agency: Chemistry, Ireland
Creative Director: Mike Garner
Art Director: Nicole Sykes
Copywriter: Anne Fleming
Photographer: Michael Collier
Retouching: Ray Fadden
Published: May 2008
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