In a world where love is patient and love is kind, one couple refused to play by the rules. This summer, they're going to the chapel and someone's going to get … buried!
OK, so it was actually last fall, and no one died in a fiery blast. But these parodies of Hollywood blockbuster posters for the marriage of David DiCicco and Rachael Batts are still epic enough to make Michael Bay consider a second career as a wedding planner.
The posters were the work of the Virginia couple's close friend, Nashville-based photographer and designer Andres Martinez. After helping them create a Casablanca-themed save-the-date card, Martinez spent about a month creating a series of posters starring DiCicco and Batts, who displayed them at their wedding reception.
"It was definitely a labor of love, for sure," Martinez tells AdFreak. "It was a fun project. There are few people I'd rather do that kind of thing for."
What makes the posters truly impressive is the attention to detail, from recreating the lighting effects of the originals to matching the body positioning as closely as possible. Martinez said it was the perfect outlet for his passion for learning how iconic images are created: "As I've been shooting more and more, I find myself going to magazines and posters and just looking at them, trying to reverse engineer what's going on in the photo."
Late last week, Martinez and the now-married couple decided to share the posters on Reddit, where they rapidly shot to the front page. But their glory was short-lived, as Reddit moderators removed the post from the front page after about an hour because they were concerned about including the full real names of the couple and their friends.
Check out all the posters and their inspirations below:
If you love nerding out about social media almost as much as you love nerding out about Game of Thrones, then have I got the video for you.
Social media management service HootSuite created the astoundingly well-produced promotional clip below, called "A Game of Social Thrones" and crafted in the style of HBO's opening sequence for the fantasy epic, returning to TV this Sunday for its blood-drenched fourth season.
In HootSuite's version, the Seven Kingdoms are reimagined as the major social networks, with Facebook's high walls and Twitter's tower encircled by chirping fauna. Digital wonks will especially enjoy how each company's related services (YouTube for Google, Instagram for Facebook, etc.) are arranged like nearby bannermen.
Most self-promotions are works of attention-seeking desperation. This one's practically a work of art.
UPDATE: HootSuite tells us the video was largely an in-house production, with the help of an outside motion designer and composer.
Also worth checking out again: HootSuite's "Social Media Winter Is Coming" infographic from last year—"a visual representation of the quiet battles being fought between many social networks, who were building walls and blocking access between their respective sites and apps." That's posted below.
In today's installment of making new things look old, Game of Thrones gets retrofitted into a 1970s sitcom, complete with overly long exposition and freeze-frame introductions for each actor.
The idea isn't exactly revolutionary, as you can see from the previous mashups we've collected below, but there's still something entertainingly jarring about the contrast of murderous, Machiavellian schemers and an aw-shucks title treatment reminiscent of Little House on the Prairie.
Below, some of our previous favorites from the show's rapidly growing pool of parodies.
This year, all the usual brand suspects are joined by a host of tech companies and startups in trying to throw you for a loop—a near impossibility these days. And in an odd move, American Eagle Outfitters pranked us an entire week early.
Stay tuned. We'll be updating this list throughout the day.
UPDATE (4:37 p.m. ET): Here are still more. Scroll down to see the earlier ones.
• Lego The toy brand is delivering its new Ninja Turtles set via live turtles.
• Honda The automaker creates the world's first DIY car.
• Sam Adams The brewer releases HeliYum, the world's first helium-carbonated beer.
• Lil BUB The celebrity cat introduces her twin.
• Moshi The computer accessory maker has invented MouseBolt, the first live-mouse-based charger.
• House of Cards The Netflix show gave everyone a sneak peak of Season 3 with a script page on Facebook.
• Netflix Watch Bacon sizzle with Netflix's new original series, Sizzling Bacon. If it's half as popular as Fireplace for Your Home, they've got a winner:
UPDATE (2:59 p.m. ET): Here are a bunch more. Scroll down to see the earlier ones.
• Bonobos The apparel company created TechStyle—wearable tech-clothing that connects you socially to a psychopathic artificial intelligence.
• Denny's In a surprising, press-getting twist, the restaurant opted out of April Fools' Day altogether.
• WestJet The airline is converting to "metric time" to be even more Canadian.
• RedBox The DVD rental company created Mood Match, which lets you auto-match your movie selection to your mood. Dissapointed that it's fake? Get 50 cents off today with the code Aprilfools.
• Saatchi & Saatchi Thailand Ad agency creates an app to help clients fire their agency.
• Samsung and HTC Bothbrands have made fake wearable tech gloves. HTC won this battle.
• American Well The telehealth firm has introduced Puppy Connect, which lets you connect to puppies to improve your health. Aww, puppies.
• Captain Morgan Hopefully this Taco Rum is fake, although Chrissy Teigen says she's not opposed.
The original list is below: • Google Linked off the Google homepage this morning is the Auto Awesome Photobombs app for Google+, which lets you insert David Hasselhoff into any photo.
• American Eagle Outfitters Charging out of the gates last week, American Eagle announced American Beagle Outfitters, a new clothing line for dogs, complete with a dogumentary.
• Cheetos Spokescheetah Chester released his new fragrance, Cheeteau. They took it a step further by actually making a few bottles of the stuff, and sent one to AdFreak. It reeks, and not in a good way. In New York City today? Try it yourself on Madison Avenue between 59th and 61st Streets.
• YouTube The video site announces the absurd viral trends for the rest of the year.
• Reddit "Headdit" lets you navigate Reddit with your head. Includes special cat mode.
• Publicis Seattle The agency has created Brand Drops, the world's first branded aromatic rain. They turn a rainy day into the ultimate out-of-home, multisensory brand experience.
• Qless This startup has created Line Ringer, an app that scans for the cellphone numbers of the people ahead of you in line and calls them with fake emergencies that force them to sacrifice their place. I wish it was real.
• Fresh Direct The food-delivery company is offering eagle-caught salmon sustainably harvested in the wilds of upstate New York.
• Google Maps Compete to become the world's best Pokémon master and win a job at Google Maps. OK, the job doesn't exist, but you can download the app and find the missing Pokémon.
• Gmail Google's mail app has created "sharable selfie" themes for your Gmail inbox—or as they're calling them, Shelfies. And … they're claiming they invented the term "selfie." Again, it's not fully a joke, as you can now set your Gmail box to show other people's Shelfies.
• Orbotix Speaking of selfies, Orbotix, maker of the Sphero ball toy, has invented a tiny hovering drone called the selfie bot, so you can take selfies every second of the day.
• Google Japan Check out the Magic Hand, a joystick that replaces your hand with a robotic hand. Just another example of Chindogu.
• Nest The home automation company teams with Virgin America to create Total Temperature Control for every seat on Virgin, introduced by Tony Fadell and Sir Richard Branson.
• Virgin Active The Smarty Pants are underwear with a built-in meter to count your every glute flex and ensure your rump is in tip-top twerking shape.
• Waze How do I love thee? Count the ways with new WazeDates. Because honking only takes you so far.
• National Geographic Channel The channel will be running some of its classic programs with new audio courtesy of RiffTrax. This will probably seem more prank-like if you're flipping through and have no clue why the honeybadger is mouthing off again.
• The Pirate Bay A special device will embrace your entire mind and upload Pirate Bay's content directly into your brain.
• Ely, Minnesota The April Fools'-loving city is launching The Ely Channel, featuring great TLC-inspired shows like Sauna Wars, The Real Housewives of St. Louis County and Iron Range Chef.
• BMW Introducing the Ultimate Sleeping Machine. BMW is old hat at this, so hats off for another super cute prank.
• JetBlue In an anti-prank, JetBlue is again giving free fares to people whose birthdays are April 1.
• CafePress The site has launched CafePredict. In conjunction with the NSA, it'll ship you items before you order them.
• Reyka Vodka A lava rock drinking-water filter.
• Chili's The restaurant chain has put everything you love about Chili's in an ice cream. Try Nacho Queso Crunch, Baby Back Chunk and Buffalo Brownie Sundae. Because there's a pregnant lady somewhere.
• Life at Google Try out Google Resume Auto-Awesome (actually not that awesome).
• Rosetta Stone The language software company now lets you Learn to Speak Klingon. It's another product some people would actually buy. Plus, they got Worf himself, Michael Dorn, to star in the video.
The buzz is heating up for Quiznos, who has scored a hit with its House of Cards/Game of Thrones mashup called House of Thrones.
Machiavellian Congressman Frank Underwood is transported to the Seven Kingdoms, where he eliminates characters as mercilessly as George R. R. Martin himself—though he avoids killing fan favorites like Tyrion Lannister, settling instead for a merciless teasing.
Hindered by a script that is only mildly funny, the spot is held aloft by an exceptional Kevin Spacey impersonator and a spot-on concept: crossing two of today's hottest properties for maximum viral effect. They even give a few spoiler-ish nods to the fans who've read all the way up through A Dance of Dragons.
Windowseat in Los Angeles created the video, which is part of Quiznos' new content strategy for its recently launched Toasty.tv site—an interesting ploy, considering that Quiznos has just filed for bankruptcy and people are questioning whether this kind of buzz will actually sell sandwiches.
Given the target market, this kind of advertising is great for the brand. But before they invest in entertainment, they should probably focus on making subs that aren't substandard.
It took a while, but someone has finally lampooned Cadillac's much-derided "Poolside" commercial starring Neal McDonough. And not just any old someone—Ford Motor Co.
Ford's agency, Team Detroit, shot the parody below, which stars the polar opposite of the McDonough character—Pashon Murray, the founder of Detroit Dirt, a sustainability consultancy and advocacy group. The Cadillac spot showcased the CLR luxury plug-in hybrid. The Ford video shows off the Ford C-MAX hybrid. But Murray's message about today's America is light years away from Cadillac's.
The spoof is posted on its own YouTube channel, not Ford's. But it has Ford's tacit approval. Speaking to the Deroit Free Press, Ford spokeswoman Sara Tatchio described the video as "lighthearted," and added: "I don't think we're mocking a competitor. We're trying to showcase positive work being done in our community."
Yeah, no mockery going on here. GM has not commented.
As we saw in our December roundup, there's no shortage of sexist ads—the vast majority of which are degrading to women rather than men. But what if the tables were turned?
BuzzFeed's new video, "If Women's Roles in Ads Were Played by Men," swaps the genders in three commercials—for GoDaddy, Hardee's/Carl's Jr. and Doritos. (Only the first two were approvedads, however. The Doritos ad was a fan-made entry into the 2011 Crash the Super Bowl contest, and didn't advance to the finals—though it has gotten more than 2 million views on the director's YouTube channel.)
BuzzFeed recreates each ad and plays them side by side with the originals. The GoDaddy spot reverses the Bar Rafaeli/Jesse Heiman setup and features a good-looking guy having to make out with a nerdy girl. Instead of Nina Agdal oiling up her cleavage for Hardee's/Carl's Jr., we see an average-looking guy … oiling up his cleavage for Hardee's/Carl's Jr. And in the Doritos ad, it's the guy, not his girlfriend, who's naked in bed and covered in Doritos. (Maybe this version would have been a finalist after all.)
"Seeing men like this is ridiculous, so why isn't it with women?" the video says at the end. They picked three cringeworthy ads to replicate, but the question certainly holds merit. Sex and humor are effective for a lot of campaigns, but it'd be nice if that could be achieved without, you know, gratuitous crotch shots.
It's a wonder that cat-related brands don't already rule the Internet.
Cat-food brand and renowned jingle lover Meow Mix makes a move in that direction with an amusing and even potentially useful parody of Kickstarter—called Catstarter—envisioned as a way to crowdsource cool new cat-related inventions. Ad agency EVB conceived the site as a playful, feline-focused version of the well-known crowdfunding platform. But instead of actually backing Catstarter projects financially, you can just click on the ones you like, and Meow Mix will produce the most popular ones.
The site launches with three products; the top vote getter will go into production this spring. (The heated companion keyboard is an inspired one that I'll back right now.) It's also an R&D lab of sorts, as the brand also wants people to suggest ideas for making kitty lives better—something we can all get behind, yes?
Full credits below.
CREDITS Client: Meow Mix Campaign: Meow Mix Catstarter Agency: EVB Executive Creative Director: Steve Babcock Creative Directors: Patrick Maravilla (Copy), David Byrd (Art) Art Director: Tom Zukoski Copywriter: Nate Gagnon Designer: Markandeya Sendan Illustrator: Natalia Martinez Motion Graphics Designer: Kevin Brown Sound Designer: J. Michael Neal Director of Technology: Ken Goldfarb Lead Interactive Developer: Josh Kanner Interactive Developer: Ken Crosby Senior Producer: Kevin Turner Vice President, Director of Account Management: Kathleen Foutz Strategist: Neeti Newaskar Producer: Kevin Turner
Stranger dogs tend to get pretty intimate pretty quickly, and so all the hesitancy in the first half the video, I suppose, is the joke here. Before long, though, there are plenty of noses in butts and all is right with the world again.
The original "First Kiss" video, by the way, has topped 40 million views since Monday.
Like many parents, I've been seeing (or at least hearing) a lot of Frozen lately. And while I enjoyed it enough the first time around, the film's odd logic doesn't always hold up under multiple viewings.
If you've faced similar skepticism, you'll definitely enjoy Screen Junkies' "honest trailer" for Disney's megahit, which the video creators accurately describe as "the feature-length music video for 'Let It Go.'"
Impressively, Screen Junkies even dubbed in its own versions of the movie's songs, recast as meta parodies of themselves, like "Do You Want to Build a Snowman?" becoming "Do You Want Some Exposition?"
The surest sign that you've created a viral juggernaut is that the parodies quickly come flowing in. This will be especially true of Wren's "First Kiss" ad, which is so stripped down visually that it will be easy to spoof. First out of the gate is a British brand with a reason to jump all over this—Snog frozen yogurt. (A "snog," of course, is British slang for a makeout session.) Check out the parody below, and wait for the onslaught of about 5,000 more by tomorrow. Agency: Krowd.
Created to mimic the look and feel of current posters with the new tagline "You're On," these parodies mock the campaign's brief aspirational vignettes, which include lines like: "You moved to New York with the clothes on your back, the cash in your pocket and your eyes on the prize. You're On. (Diet Coke)"
In Animal New York's version, we get coked-out internal monologues, like: "You haven't been able to sleep, eat or orgasm in three days, but good luck on that client meeting." You can check out the rest of the parody ads below.
With so many snorting at the soda's new campaign, I wonder how much longer the brand will decide to ride this long strange trip before it fizzles out.
YouTube star Ryan Higa takes some well-aimed shots at the college experience with this Honest College Ad video.
He's a little confused about which college experience he's targeting, though. The name of the fake college (EveRy) and the video's tone and aesthetics are a send-up of diploma mills like ITT Tech and DeVry, where annual costs are closer to $25,000 than $56,000. Higa's description more closely matches the pitfalls of a state university.
And while it takes him a little too much time to parody an ad genre that's typically shorter than a minute, he covers an admirable amount of ground and calls out many of the most frustrating aspects of the debt-accumulating process required to graduate. And it's clearly resonating with young viewers. "It would be funny," notes one YouTube viewer, "if it weren't so true and depressing.?"
When you're an alt-weekly known for skewering the establishment, how do you tackle the fact that you've been bought out by the establishment?
Baltimore City Paper takes a commendably self-effacing approach with today's issue, the cover of which was designed in the staid style of the paper's new owner, The Baltimore Sun.
The Sun's lofty motto, "Light for all," has been replaced with "Jobs for some," a reference to the pending raft of City Paper layoffs. The lead story, speckled with obscenity and drug references, ends with the jump tease "MORE CURSE WORDS, Page 14." Each reporter's byline is a cobbled medley of media ownership, like "Baltimore City Paper, no wait, The Sun—no wait—The Hartford Advocate, no, The Sun, maybe? Taco Bell?"
While this spot-on cover surely won't be enough to placate readers and observers who are concerned about City Paper becoming a gutless annex of The Sun, the move definitely shows it might be possible to sell out without giving up.
Hey, it's filmmaker Jason Headley! You might remember him from such short films as "It's Not About the Nail," and now he's lampooning the "It Gets Better" project with this mock PSA from people who peaked in high school.
"It Doesn't Get Better" has its moments—the IROC-Z guy and the brunette have great delivery—but it showed up kinda late to the party and isn't quite clever enough to compensate for that. Also, the whole nerdy teen/yacht owner thing almost never happens in reality.
If life in the workforce has taught me anything, it's that most high school nerds end up working for rich, thick-headed dudebros with MBAs.
Meet Domestic Abuse Barbie, a doll that will not be modeling for Sports Illustrated or appearing in toy stores anytime soon.
Sam Humphreys, an artist out of the U.K., has transformed the iconic doll for her photo series called "What If?" The images, some of which could be seen as raising awareness of domestic violence (though the artist says they're "by no means intended to be used as an educational tool"), are based on a theoretical question: “What if we were to teach our children at an early age about the harsh realities that face some?”
On her website, Humphreys says the series is not for children, but she is demonstrating that life for some isn't as perfect as Barbie's life suggests. While some images depict Barbie with black eyes and a bloodied mouth, the series also "explores insecurity, loneliness, illness and addiction."
Brands with real-world appeal have been faux-criticizing social media for years—often in social media—by suggesting that you get off the damn phone already and take stock of your actual surroundings and the actual people in it.
Coca-Cola is the latest to do so with the amusing video below, advertising a (presumably fake) product called the Social Media Guard, which is basically a giant, human-sized, Coke-red dog collar. This gizmo will possibly stop you from checking your phone every eight seconds, though actually it seems like you could still take a selfie if you wanted to. (You can also, not coincidentally, still drink a Coke.)
"Did you know that the world spends 4 million years online every month?" the soda giant asks. "If you're watching this video on your mobile phone, it's time to put it down. Look around you, there is probably someone special you can share a real moment with. Enjoy it with an ice-cold Coke :)"
The Social Media Guard, the brand adds, "takes the 'social' out of media and puts it back into your life."
The video is pretty goofy for Coke, which usually prefers more feel-good stunts that don't liken its target market to animals that can't stop licking their stitches. But there's some honestly there, at least. Just don't share this with your friends. Coke wouldn't want that.
From the peanut gallery at Reddit comes this amusing, fake Audi ad that plays off the four-rings snafu during the Opening Ceremony of the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia. An Audi rep confirms to Mashable: "This is not an official ad … it is most likely from an Audi fan." At least one other brand, though, did make fun of the technical glitch for real.
If Instagram had been invented in the 1980s, your digital photos would have already been pixelated messes stored on cassettes or floppy disks.
To see them, you would have had to snail-mail your camera roll to Instagram, so it could send the files back to you with awful filters applied. You could have taken pictures of your salad, your cat and your thigh gap. In other words, it'd be just like Instagram now. Except your pictures would have been called "pitchers," because apparently people in the 1980s didn't know how to pronounce "pictures."
At least, so says this mock infomercial, which earns the honor of capturing the 1980s even better than Delta's super 1980s flight-safety video. The reimagined Instagram logo might be the best part, except for maybe the fact that the whole video proves real Instagram isn't so bad after all.
Since everyone I know is getting married and having children (and making sure Facebook stays informed about every step of those processes), this ad for a fake drug called Not Having Kids is rather timely.
Put together by Internet funny guy Jason A. Messina, the ad riffs on medication advertising's tone and imagery (lots of hikers in those ads) alongside the pervasive social pressure to settle down and procreate by the time one hits 30.
The temptation to be a smug, overbearing asshole about major life decisions cuts both ways, though, which Messina doesn't ignore. The side effects of Not Having Kids are pretty heavy on regret, and when it comes time to list them all in true pharma fashion, the video definitely takes a turn from reinforced selfishness to a downright dark level of self-reflection.
This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
