Hasta La Creative!

A keen observer, a doer, and a humble guy at heart. His work reflects his ingenious ideas and lateral thinking. Even the smallest of jobs rolled out from his desk have a sense of sincerity and a sense of design. Apart from being his creative self he is also a team player and a leader, who supports his subordinates and teaches them every little bit he has learned over the years. There are very few people who have the gift and so willingly share it with others and Prasad is one of them.Working with him in a team is not only fun but also very gratifying. (I made my copy partner write this last part, haha!!)
Why are you into advertising?
I’ve always loved to think, read and ask questions in school. I used to discuss any subject, loved to argue and debate, loved to day dream, loved to observe the people around, loved to make stories, loved to draw and paint, so advertising was the closest where I could do all of this. So here I am today, doing what I wanted to and I am lucky to be also getting paid for it. So it’s been a great journey so far.
Although very few know that I wanted to be a lawyer when in school.

Did you attend school for fine art or design or communications?
Yes I did my Applied Arts from L.S.Raheja School of Arts, Bandra. But my real school were the teachers at Raheja, from whom I learnt the basics sans the syllabus. They were willing to answer my questions and I had a lot of questions then (even now I do). Those answers have built me brick by brick and they were the ones to shape my mind to get into business.

Tell us about your recent campaign?
1: My recent campaign is a footwear series for Mochi shoes, it’s a series in print which speaks about the awesomeness of the wearer and his or her actions. Awesome people are fun loving, whacky and crazy bunch of people who love to look beautiful in whatever they wear. They do things differently. Be it having a hairdo or reading a newspaper, they have their own way without being stupid.

2: My recent campaign is a print series for Swiss made watches, Swiss Eagle. The brief was to present the range of watches in India, so we thought of speaking about Swiss Precision that’s legendary. Swiss engineering, the swiss eagle eye and the bell were used as visual metaphors to compose these visuals. Loved working on this 3 ad series with my copy partner.

Were there any particular role models for you when you grew up?
My parents, my friends, my teachers have been my role models in life. In fact I have picked up something from everyone I have met. Goran Ivanisevic, the guy who used to serve only aces in tennis was my hero then, but this guy used to lose in the finals to either Andre Agassi or Pete Sampras. In cricket, I used to admire Rahul Dravid, he was a guy who worked like a wall but Sachin or Saurav used to score better and they took away the man of the match. One day Goran won Wimbledon, one day Dravid won the man of the match. That day I realised patience is very important in life. Skill and hard work will never go unnoticed.

Who was the most influential personality on your career in advertising?
I have grown up (in advertising) observing the works of Agnello Dias, Santosh Padhi, Manish Bhatt, Raghu Bhatt, Kapil Tammal, Akshay Kapnadak, PK Anil, Mahesh Parab, Denzil Machado, Preeti Nair, Niteesh Tiwari, (from India) and Dan Wieden, Alex Bogusky, Marcelo Serpa, David Droga, Eric Vervroegen, etc. ( can go on and on) So it’s hard to pick someone who has been most influential. I was fortunate to have had the opportunity to work amidst Kapil and Akshay, although I didn’t work much with them, but still they were great guys to be around in my growing days. Rajneesh Ramakrishnan (Osho) was like a teacher more than my copy head, in fact I can say he was my teacher after school days. He had opinions and answers to everything in the world. Still miss his guidance. He was our Google

Where do you get your inspiration from?
From the people around. For me observation, is the key. You’ll see many TV commercials and campaigns coming from the finer nuances of life, from our experiences, from family bonding, from friends, from our work styles, from our lifestyles, from our reading, our learnings, etc. Inspiration is everywhere, (I know it sounds clichéd, but somewhere it’s true). Coming from India, we’ll never fall short of inspirations. Sometimes the biggest ideas can be the simplest, the smallest and most obvious, inspired from life.

Tell us something about Makani Creatives’ environment.
Makani is a place I have grown up with. I started with makanis, moved on to McCann and after my brief stint with McCann Erickson, I joined Makani again. It’s a place with great talent and the craze to do well in advertising. A place that doesn’t believe in Hierarchies and cubicles and cabins. We have a beautifully laid workplace, where we come to have fun and to do good work. (Preferably in the same order). At work we are a bunch of people almost in the same age bracket, so we love to compete for good work, we are all here to do well for us, for Makani Creatives. I hope this place does well in the years to come cos it’s a great place to be and work. Tell us about your first brief as an art director in the field of advertising. It was a Monday, and I was asked to sit with the brand head of a garment brand (since she had come to our office) for a new brief for their summer collection. Her brief was “summer collection hai, bright colours hai, we need to do a rocking campaign, need to make tags, labels, etc.” and in the next five seconds she was gone. That was when I said to myself “welcome to the real world Prasad”. That was when I realised why a brief is called a ‘brief’. A brief doesn’t last long

Do you think brands whose advertising wins awards do well in the market?
Definitely. Yes! I respect the business of communication that we are in. I respect awards too and they win it only because they are worth it. Nike, Cadbury, Perfetti, as clients have been doing wonders in the market, and agencies like Ogilvy,
JWT, McCann have been creating magic with these brands. Their work is real, it’s aspiring and brilliant too.

What advice do you have for aspiring creative professionals?
Work hard, put in your best every day. Don’t wait for ideas, work towards it. Learn to take rejections and denials in your stride, cos not all ideas are lucky to see the light of day. Opportunities are there, ideas are there, you never know when you bump into one. So, keep your eyes open, brains wide open and be ready to kill your own ideas.

Who would you like to take out for dinner?
No one from the advertising field. Because they’ll never land on time for it.

What’s on your ipod?
Sorry! I don’t have one. But I love listening to old tunes whenever I get that little time for myself. Right from Kishore Kumar, Manna Dey to KK and Sonu Nigam, Shreya Ghoshal, I can spend hours listening to then if time permits.

Mac or PC?
I am happy with either one. Unless and until it functions properly.

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