The comedy show has always kept up with the times, switching from their original cel animation style to digital ink and paint animation in 2004, and now using early access to the latest Adobe technology to animate their characters live on air.

Nearly twenty years ago, the Simpsons joked about live animation in “The Itchy & Scratchy & Poochie Show”, when Homer became a character in the Itchy & Scratchy Show. Homer asks about acting live for a cartoon, to which the reply is “Very few cartoons are broadcast live. It’s a terrible strain on the animators’ wrists”. Yet here they are, animating live on air.

The live segment showed Homer Simpson, voiced by Dan Castellaneta, sitting in a sparse office as he took questions live from the audience. Other fan favourites also made an appearance, such as Lisa Simpson, Mr. Burns and even Bender from  Futurama, another show by the Simpsons’ creator Matt Groening.

After watching the segment, audiences were left wondering how the show’s producers pulled it off, and the answer was relatively simple. The team used Adobe Character Animator, which is a part of Adobe After Effects, to create the three-minute long segment. Homer’s mouth movements were done through realistic lip-synch and keyboard-triggered animations, and the other characters featuring in the segment were all pre-animated.

Adobe Character Animator, which will be installed in the next version of After Effects, will allow animators to bring still images from programmes like Illustrator or Photoshop to life. The software will capture an actor’s performance through a camera, synchronizing the mouth movements to the actor’s speech, and then the animators can control all of the aspects of the character’s movement with the mouse and keyboard.

Cinema Blend believes that this software could represent the future of animation, and that the technology that lies at the core of Adobe’s Character Animator software could change the way in which animation is brought to audiences. Audiences were amazed by the segment, so it’s not difficult to imagine other shows trying the programme out in the future.

The technology is, however, limited- there were only a certain number of lip movements and motions that Homer could make, said executive producer, Al Jean, and if the segment ran for more than three minutes, it would begin to feel repetitive. This technology will certainly advance over the coming years, and animators will likely soon be able to animate whole episodes using features like Adobe’s Character Animator.

Only time will tell whether live animation will become the norm,  or if it is simply a passing fad, but a great response to the Simpsons’ segment certainly indicates good things for the future of Adobe’s technology, and for live animation itself.

Sources: 

Watch the Simpsons Live Segment here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jM9o6dKpWB0

http://www.cinemablend.com/television/How-Simpsons-Pulled-Off-Homer-Live-Episode-139547.html

http://www.radiotimes.com/news/2016-05-16/the-simpsons-make-animation-history-with-live-episode–and-homer-promises-the-series-will-never-end

http://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2016/may/16/the-simpsons-live-a-remarkable-stunt-that-proves-homer-will-outlive-us-all

http://blogs.adobe.com/creativecloud/the-simpsons-tv-show-and-adobe-make-live-animation-television-history/

http://blogs.adobe.com/creativecloud/adobe-character-animator-revealed/

The post How the Simpsons Made an Animation Go Live appeared first on LoveLove Films.

The Rapid Rise

Users of the service could only speculate where it would go next. Now the platform has expanded to iOS and have just premiered their latest short, Pearl, at the Tribeca Film Festival.

The use of 360 degree videos and VR has skyrocketed in recent years, and the progression of the medium even in the last year has been noticeable- Tribeca Film Festival now includes a Virtual Arcade, and Duet, a Spotlight Stories short, was shortlisted for the Animated Short Film Oscar.

Spotlight’s first short, Windy Day, felt more like an experiment in VR and 360 video, gently guiding the audience into the world of VR using the story of a mouse in pursuit of a hat, and using the movement on screen to entice the audience into moving their phones about. Very little happened in Windy Day story-wise, but Spotlight’s shorts have moved forwards leaps and bounds since then, and their latest short, Pearl, definitely showcases this.

What Sets “Pearl” Apart

Set entirely inside a hatchback, Pearl is a coming of age story based around a young girl and her father as she grows into an adult and inherits the car. The story is set to an original song, “No Wrong Way Home”, written by Alexis Harte and JJ Weisler, and is performed by Nicki Bluhm and Kelley Stoltz, who play the young girl and her father.

Pearl is absolutely heart-warming, and as the audience watch the video, they cannot help but be truly amazed by what VR can achieve for storytelling. Pearl makes the audience feel like they share the adventure that Sarah and her father go on, and has a real hallmark feeling at the end, making the audience themselves feel proud of the girl when she’s all grown up.

Shorts like Pearl show just how fluid storytelling can be with VR animation. Duet, which Disney animator Glen Keane directed, actually makes the audience choose which character they want to follow when the characters both go separate ways off screen, with a different story being told depending on which character you follow- one from the perspective of a young boy, and one from a young girl. Keane himself said that he “had a hard time giving up control […] of the camera”, but the audience controlling the adventure is part of what makes VR so great.

Spotlight’s progression has been helped greatly by its’ collaboration with major Hollywood stars, from Fast and Furious director Justin Lin, who created the first live action short for the platform, to Disney animator Glen Keane, who created legendary characters for films like the Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast.

Outside of Short Films

VR and 360 degree footage has many potential applications, and brands and companies are also beginning to realise the potential that VR has- The North Face has created a VR experience to draw in their audience- those that seek outdoor thrills- and making them feel as though they’re climbing in Yosemite National Park.

GoPro Extreme has also made the leap into using 360 degree footage in their branding. Their video of a surfer was posted to Facebook by Mark Zuckerberg himself, and really draws on the “extreme” nature of the GoPro to display what both their cameras and 360 degree footage are capable of.

The Future

Particularly for media companies, VR and 360 degree footage can brilliantly display what your company is capable of in a visually stunning and exciting way. The ability to truly draw an audience in is perhaps the most amazing aspect of VR and 360 degree footage, and is a tool that companies can use to not only sell to an audience, but to amaze them too.

VR has already come so far since its inception, and its potential is limitless, Tech Crunch predicted that people will be able to experience everything through VR, and that it will be incorporated into your existing reality. VR seems primed to revolutionise the film industry, with major studios already experimenting with the technology.

Spotlight seems to be at the forefront of VR technology as it relates to short film, and to see what they will create next is definitely exciting.

Sources:

Watch Pearl here : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WqCH4DNQBUA

Pearl Behind the Scenes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7fN0bZhks5Y

Read the original LoveLove blog about Google Spotlight Stories here: https://lovelovefilms.com/blog/google-spotlight-stories-peeking-at-a-new-world/

http://www.adweek.com/adfreak/north-face-gave-these-shoppers-vr-experience-suddenly-got-awesomely-real-167900

http://digiday.com/brands/5-ways-brands-using-360-degree-video-including-faraday-friday-electric-car/

https://backchannel.com/google-taps-hollywood-a-list-for-360-interactive-short-b36e7fb35b5f#.bap59gz1h

http://techcrunch.com/2015/11/15/what-technology-will-look-like-in-five-years/

http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2016-01/27/virtual-reality-breaks-fourth-wall

http://techcrunch.com/2013/10/29/google-motorola-spotlight-stories/

The post Google Spotlight Stories: A Rapid Growth appeared first on LoveLove Films.

In March 2016 Nokia released its OZO camera in Europe. The OZO is a spherical camera with eight synchronised cameras and microphones that can record 360° audio and video. Vesa Rantanen, head of Research and Development at Nokia tells Wired  “We’re working with movie studios and live performance artists – musicians and sportspeople – and also a lot of short form content; filmmakers, video makers and documentaries.”

Here’s why we think the OZO might be revolutionary:

The Technological Advantages

The OZO camera may not be the first 360° camera, but it is making big strides in making 360° and virtual reality production more accessible to filmmakers. The futuristic, stylish looking OZO allows content creators to view footage whilst the camera is recording, and their optional wireless remote means that the camera can be adjusted on the go. The OZO is perfect for use with drones, as it is wireless and the combined battery and memory back allows filming for up to 45 minutes.

Nokia set out to create the OZO camera to fill the video content gap following the recent technological push towards making Virtual Reality headsets.. This will make producing 360° and virtual reality content easier and more accessible, especially since content filmed on the OZO can be viewed with any headset.

Virtual reality has in the past been better known for its relationship with games, and the two are very closely interlinked, both seeking to give users a truly immersive experience. We’ve come far from the Virtual Boy, which was the first commercial attempt at introducing virtual reality to an audience (the Virtual Boy was discontinued less than a year after its’ commercial release), and VR headsets can now be bought for as little as £11.99 (Google Cardboard).

Adoption by Cinema

Given cinema’s attempts to draw the audience into a story more and more with the advent of 3D and 4DX, 360° footage and virtual reality seems like the best step forwards for cinema, and it’s one that large studios like Disney are more than willing to take. Many of Disney’s more recent films are a visual spectacle, even in 2D, and the thought of being completely immersed in films like Captain America: Civil War or Star Wars: The Force Awakens is truly something to behold.

Disney has partnered with the Nokia OZO to produce behind the scenes content, the first of which being a 360° cast interview and a 360° view of the red carpet premiere for Disney’s recent live action adaptation, The Jungle Book. They have also announced that one of Disney’s upcoming films will feature 360° behind the scenes content.

Level of Use

Whilst footage from the OZO can draw the audience into the story entirely, and effectively provoke an emotional response from the audience (particularly, I think, in horror films. Imagine the monster in a horror movie seeming like it’s literally behind you!), is that viewing experience going to be better than viewing multi, or single camera footage? When focusing the camera on one thing, a filmmaker can get across emotions on an actor’s face, which may be missed in 360° footage. A director will also have difficulty in directing an audience’s attention in a 360° film, as there are a great many things for the audience to look at.

Foolproof have also discussed directing the audience’s attention as an issue of 360° filming, as they point out that it is impossible for filmmakers to frame their shots. The Chuck 360° is referenced by Foolproof as a good way to avoid this limitation, as the viewer’s gaze is directed by changes in the volume of the narration, which is lowered if you look away from where the filmmakers want you to look.

There are some, such as The Singularity Hub who think that the development of virtual reality technology will cause the closure of cinemas as it becomes so popular, but others are not convinced. Vice notes that our own internal monitors can cause us to feel ill when using a virtual reality headset- if the camera is sent lurching forwards in a film, but your body knows you have remained seated, you can be left feeling sick and dizzy. Warren Spector, director of the Deus Ex game series, denounces virtual reality as a “fad” that will not take off for entertainment.

Only time will tell whether 360° filming and virtual reality are the future of the media industry or merely a passing fad. Personally, I think this style of filming has more of a home in games, but I think there’s definitely potential to create some interesting results for short films, as we have already seen in this short film about Aleppo, Syria, and I can’t wait to see how filmmakers use 360° filming, as the advent of technologies like the OZO show us we haven’t seen the best of 360° filming yet.

Here’s the 360° interview with the cast of the Jungle Book: https://www.facebook.com/DisneyJungleBook/videos/1520642841295367/

Check out this Star Wars Virtual Reality by pipocaVFX:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6uG9vtckp1U&feature=youtu.be

Or this VR short film shot in Aleppo, Syria: http://petapixel.com/2015/09/22/the-first-ever-vr-film-shot-in-a-war-zone-with-a-360-camera/

The post Will Nokia’s 360° OZO camera change video production? appeared first on LoveLove Films.

That quotation comes from a young George Lucas, the creative visionary behind Star Wars. To make Star Wars so successful George Lucas realised that spaceships, aliens and explosions weren’t the key to success, it was making original stories, characters and settings. Of course, Star Wars’ visuals are iconic and contribute hugely to its mythos, so obviously effects and filming techniques are also important.

What needs to be done to get a stylish video right is work out exactly how your visuals will emphasize a particular story; how will that cool effect allow the audience to see a character’s motivation in a unique way? What is the best visual trick to use to express this person’s feeling at this time? Furthermore, if it is a promotional piece, you additionally have to think, how can I tie my brand into this video in a seamless, effective and non-obtrusive manner?

Answering those questions can be tricky, but when addressed the results are often amazing. Advertising is really taking this message on board, and over the last few years there’s been an explosion of original stories in commercials that use both stylish visuals, interesting characters and on point branding to get their message across.

There’s no one way of achieving this; interesting synchronisation of style and substance can take many different forms. So, to help, here are some different examples of what people have done to meld stories with interesting visual effects.

For Your Next Step – Lloyds Bank

This advert really connects its brand into the story. Not only is Lloyds’ iconic black horse literally in the centre of events; it’s used to push the story forward, being a device to go from one interesting scenario to the next.

Its premise is noncomplex. The Lloyds horse gallops through slow motion scenes, where several characters are at a turning point in their lives. People are becoming parents, people are proposing, people attend a funeral, a man drops his child off at her first day of school, a new couple kiss at a funfair. These are all basically snapshots of some of the most important developmental experiences someone goes through.

So, this video has used these scenarios that relate to everyone and sells banking an incredibly stylish way, by suggesting that Lloyds will be there to help throughout, showing its horse galloping through moments in peoples’ lives.

 Dogs Trust- Special Someone

This advert, which we also discussed in last week’s blog, uses a stylish storytelling element called a repeated visual motif to bridge its story to its audience. The repeated visual motif in this instance is the little puppet friend of the dog. As well as being cute, this little puppet character acts as a symbol of what the dog wants and that s/he is missing something  in his/her life. The puppet accompanies the dog to all its activities, being company, but it is not the same as human companionship. The visual motif is carried on when the dog finds an owner; low and behold, he looks just like the puppet!

It’s interesting to consider how important the puppet’s role is in getting emotion across, as the video is accomplished and uses strong camerawork throughout; however, the producers of this video knew that that alone was not enough. Something needs to be present as a symbol of the dog’s emotion.

It’s also fun to see the female puppet at the end of the video. An interpretation of this is that the dog’s new owner needs to get a girlfriend. This is a blink and you’ll miss it visual, but they included it for a reason.

Nike- The Jogger

This next commercial will not be too familiar to UK audiences; however, its impact around other parts of the world was huge.

This advert is good to consider, because it shows that to create a stylish advert, and to make an interesting story doesn’t require a huge budget, lots of special effects and a complete branding overhaul. It just needs to make something look distinctive, and do something different than the norm.

This advert is one continuous backwards tracking shot. It begins with someone jogging in the distance. A voiceover talks about how greatness is not just for athletes, prodigies or superstars, but something we’re all capable of. It becomes obvious, as the jogger comes into focus, that the person that has been getting closer is in actual fact an overweight child. This is completely atypical in terms of advertising casting; but it really works in this instance.

Thanks to the way the advert was presented and its timing (it was released during the 2012 Olympics) the video has seen massive impact and as the last link demonstrated, garnered a huge reaction. It managed this through its stylish presentation and its feel good story of optimistically making non athletes the focus of attention.

So, in conclusion, the key to making successful adverts isn’t just in showing off a product and how great it is; it’s through using style and substance, creating something that stands out for its story as much as its visuals. There are many ways to do this and each brand will need to do this slightly differently; just always remember, absolutely go for the most impressive visuals you can think of, but the real trick is using the visuals to showcase the story it’s telling!

Please note, we didn’t make any of the above videos, we do think they’re great however!

The post Style and Substance: Getting Good Stories from Visuals appeared first on LoveLove Films.

We’re not just talking about the programming. Even advertising is now trying to prey on viewers’ heartstrings by crafting mini narratives that, instead of showing the direct application of the product or service they’re pushing, focus on getting the audience to connect to a character and experience their story.

In the past it was all about the hard sell and getting the audience to buy, buy, buy!  There were exceptions, such as the famous Ridley Scott Hovis advert, which showed restraint on pushing the product in favour of creating something atmospheric, but on the whole it was straightforward product, price, buy, style stories.

Not so long ago…

The advertising landscape of 2016 is very different from even that of just six years ago. If we look at a list of the top adverts of 2010 the changes are obvious. The linked list rightly puts the Meerkats advert on the top spot, but below this are a group of largely forgettable promotions. A Magners advert that shows a cricket team catching apples, two girls prop their sleeping boyfriends together so that they can eat Maltesers and Santander makes a giant Lego road in the countryside.

There’s nothing wrong with these adverts, but there is a distinct sense of something missing from the list, a particular genre that has since emerged. All the adverts are hard selling their product (even the Meerkats ad, which mentions or shows Compare the Market and car insurance 7 times in 30 seconds), they are using very obvious visual gimmicks, or hilarious concepts to push their product to as many punters as possible.

The present day is a very different story.

Now

2015’s top advertising list stands in stark contrast. Most of the videos chosen focus on one or a series of characters, and make interesting attempts at connecting with them, showing who they are and what they care about.

The top video on the list, John Lewis’ insurance advert that features a child dancing enthusiastically to Tiny Dancer, perfectly shows this. It’s about home insurance, but doesn’t reveal this until the last seven seconds of a 1:30 minute advert. Instead it goads the audience into appreciating the girl’s enthusiastic attempts at dancing. At the end the audience appreciates that really, the point of the advert is also to focus on the calamity that the girl could have caused. It’s relatable to anyone in the advert’s market, as most homeowners have children and will have seen them recklessly run around their home, and achieved with such emotional gusto that it can’t fail to deliver.

Other adverts in the list clearly show a preference for emotion over hard selling. From the Thai advert that paints a child as a hero by helping his mother, to the Dove campaign that asks women to walk through a door that represents how they describe themselves, emotion is given preferential treatment like never before!

Dog’s Trust Now and Then

A particularly good example of how a company has rejigged its approach to TV advertising through a touching story is Dog’s Trust. It’s interesting, as charity advertising has always attempted to have emotion in their adverts, but they are usually still geared towards the hard sell.

As recently as December 2015 a Dog’s trust advert looked like this:

It’s a well-worn, and predictable approach to pushing donations. Here’s a shocking image, here’s what Dog’s Trust can do to help, here’s the recovery, donate for as little as this much a month. Also, the logo is ever present making sure that people never forget what it is they’re donating to.

However, Dog’s Trust has hugely rethought their approach with their latest advert.

This advert, on paper, isn’t very different to their December advert, but its execution delivers much more of an impact.

Instead of making something that is explaining to the viewer right away who they are, they leave it, and focus more on making the dog character a figure to identify with. Dog’s Trust logos and brand colours are hidden throughout the advert, if you look closely, but on TV most viewers wouldn’t immediately recognise which organisation the advert was about. Like the John Lewis ballerina advert, the audience is given time to connect to the dog character and his mascot. It is only in the last 7 seconds of the advert, after the story of the dog is resolved with finding an owner, is it made explicitly clear that it is for Dog’s Trust.

That’s a wrap!

So really, that’s how you do it! Spend less time on hard selling, more on creating a unique character and story that represents your brand in a subtle way and you’re halfway towards making an advert that not only sells you, but engages with people on a deeper level.

Of course, one thing that’s also evident in almost all the adverts is that they are stylish. Thinking up the best style for your advert is important, so how do we achieve this? How to make style work with substance is answered in another blog post coming soon…

Please note, we didn’t make any of the videos mentioned. We do think they’re great examples however.

Sources:

The golden age of TV: How we got here and why there’s no bubble to burst

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lrMD_z_FnNk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Mq59ykPnAE

http://www.theguardian.com/media/organgrinder/2010/dec/17/adverts-top-ten-2010

http://www.theguardian.com/media-network/2015/dec/04/best-ads-advertising-2015-favourite

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gqPM_GT8Qw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4QHeXTQxo_Y

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrJhlVODG3w

The post How Advertising uses Touching Storytelling appeared first on LoveLove Films.

All stories, no matter how much we laud them for their uniqueness and originality boil down to several key universal factors. This is true for feature films, novels, music videos, adverts, promotional videos, urban legends, fairy tales, documentaries, or anything that tells a story. However, there are also rules for using these universals in an advanced way, and using them to make more interesting stories.

We’ve blogged about storytelling for business in the past, so what we’re trying to do here is create something that will still be helpful to businesses, but which has a much broader appeal, and which will also be helpful to students, artists, or anyone who is interested in stories. We think there are some very interesting lessons that can be learnt from seeing how these universals can be used to improve individual stories, but also apply to all sorts of platforms of storytelling.

Let’s begin:

Character and Advanced Situations

Characterisation and plot are the two most key aspects of storytelling. Once you have a person with motivation who goes on a journey, you have a story, no matter how rudimentary it may be.

Zaid grumpily went to his shed to fix a wheel and then cycled home. That’s a story. Arguably not a very gripping story, but technically a story nonetheless. It meets the barest requirements to constitute a fictional narrative that ties in a character, his feelings, and a situation with a resolution.

With that dull story in mind, how can we create something that is more interesting to an audience? You may say more length, and more things happening, but that is wrong. If you think of a TV advert, which is often 30 seconds in length, Zaid’s actions are if anything more than enough to fill this time. Conversely, you can tell the story of the entire world’s evolution in the space of an advert. So with the ability to create something that can span as long or as short a timeframe as necessary, how do you make the story interesting and stand out? The answer is to give your character an advanced situation.

An advanced situation is a plot that puts an interesting spin on typical dull storylines or takes them in new and unexpected directions. It is the thing that makes a story unique. Too many adverts go no further than running with a plot that goes “character has a problem, character’s life is bad, character gets new product, and now character’s life is good forever.” It does the task of promoting the product in the most typical fashion possible, however, this is too simplistic to work as a good story, or make any long lasting impact.  Advanced situations look at these dull typical situations, and make them interesting.

An advanced situation can take many different forms; it can create an original meerkat character whose situation is that people keep on mistaking his website for something similar sounding but completely different, it can show a person so desperate for good salmon that he resolves to fight a bear in a faux documentary presentation, it can make a story of an old man on the moon who is lonely at Christmas so connects to a young person through a telescope, and so on. I have used advertising examples above; as advertising is the platform where you can most easily observe these spins on the norm, however creating an advanced situation applies to so many different forms of storytelling.

Source: http://www.precedent.com/images/articles/june-14/compare_the_meerkat_site

The world is jam packed with stories. When was the last time you met someone who has read all novels, seen all TV series, seen all films? No one can hope to experience them all. Therefore to give your story the most chance of being recognized it needs to give the most unique spins on recognizable situations as possible. Before Harry Potter people had created coming of age boarding school stories, and stories with witches and wizards, but Harry Potter was the first one to advance the situation by showing an outsider come of age in a wizard and witching boarding school, making something original out of two familiar stories. Before Star Wars there had been science fiction stories, but none advanced the situation by creating as realistic, exciting, and believable a world for Luke Skywalker to come of age in as the one that the series is set in.

Once it is understood that giving characters advanced situations are the key to both successful and original storytelling it becomes easier to make something stand out. It still needs original creative thought and time to perfect, but understanding how makes it easier to do.

Coming up with advanced situations for characters may sound like the tired old metaphor “thinking outside the box”, but really it is a different process. It is taking the box, modifying it and putting it to a different use.

Original Metaphors

The previous paragraph used both an established metaphor, and then created a new metaphor out of the old metaphor. That wasn’t an accident.

Metaphor is hugely important. Some people think it is just a flourish of language, however many linguists, psychologists and cognitive scientists (such as George Lakeoff, Mark Johnson and Steven Pinker) have provided evidence that suggests that metaphor has a much deeper connection to making humans human. It is a complex theory, but boils down to the idea that the human brain first developed through its ability to associate one thing to another thing, birthing all abstract thought. For example cavemen would have thought “Rubbing hands makes my hands warm, but hurts eventually. What if I rubbed these sticks together, which get warm but don’t hurt? Would they get so warm they stayed warm?” which created fire. The caveman is so happy he experiments with seeing what other things are like other things, using mental metaphors to do this.

With metaphor being such a key part of how the mind works it isn’t surprising that metaphor is used so thoroughly in stories, and in fact many stories are often cited as being a device to convey one large metaphor, or as we more commonly associate it a moral or message.

The storytelling platform that uses metaphor most blatantly is probably song. Song lyrics are filled with metaphors to tell personal stories. For example, Johnny Cash’s most famous song of all time opens with the line “love is a burning thing, and it makes a fiery ring.” It then proceeds to tell the story of how the protagonist of the song fell into that fiery ring. Not only is it a catchy song, it creates an image in the listener’s mind of going into a passionate, but ultimately tumultuous and damaging relationship that is in many ways inescapable. However, the song never states this; it uses language that is much more creative to tell this story as an appealing and original metaphor. Songs do this all the time.

Other forms of storytelling are no different. Going back to advertising, a famous Barclaycard advert once focused entirely around a man using a waterslide for his end of work commute. That he could go about all of his tasks so seamlessly and conveniently was the perfect metaphor to show how using a contactless credit card could save someone time and hassle. Metaphors also explain some of the most abstract adverts that hold huge levels of appeal, which can otherwise be hard to understand. The Cadburys Gorilla Advert, which was recently voted the best advert of all time by the Independent, is the perfect example. It is a gorilla playing the drums. How does that relate to Cadburys Dairy Milk? The joy and elation that the gorilla feels when playing the drums is comparable to the audience eating Dairy Milk of course. Due to the song choice it also mixes in anticipation, just like how many people anticipate the taste of chocolate just before eating it. The whole thing is a metaphor for the chocolate eating experience.

Making an original metaphor for a story can really be considered a way of executing an advanced situation; however they are handy as coming up with an original metaphor is not that difficult (human brains, by being reminded of things after seeing other things do it all of the time) and are almost guaranteed to be putting a unique spin on a character’s situation.

Character Archetypes and Subversion

Character archetypes (and their shameful cousins, stereotypes) are something that we all know. The wise father, the moustache twirling villain, the mad scientist, the moody teenager, the damsel in distress, the knight in shining armour, the funny sidekick. We also have a terrible tendency of falling into the habit of relying on them too much.

If a storyteller claims to not have relied too heavily on archetypes and stereotypes at some point, they are a liar. With the almost inescapability of relying on archetypes how can we tackle this? By subverting them of course!

Subverting archetypes is really not difficult. Think of what the character’s archetype is like, and then give the character some traits not usually associated with him or her. It can be that easy. This could be making the moustache twirling villain an animal lover, making the mad scientist a dedicated follower of fashion, making your Russian oligarch a meerkat, making your incredibly wise old master a tiny green frog creature and so on.

The extent of this subversion is for the storyteller to decide; it can be as largescale or small-scale as needed. You could go as far as Shrek and make a film where the knight in shining armour is an ugly monster, the damsel in distress is gutsy, brave and also an ugly monster, the main villain is three feet high, and the lovable sidekick is an irritating donkey. However, subversion can be as brief as in the Aldi advert where the old lady doesn’t like tea, but gin.

These examples show that Storytelling, while not a science, or something that you can turn into an equation, definitely works to several universal themes, which storytellers can apply in an almost formulaic way to help them with their creativity and original output.

Please note we didn’t make any of the above videos, but they do make great references.

Links:

https://lovelovefilms.com/adverts/storytelling-powerful-business-tool/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1t4sdgvy-pk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M0mXUC0cUPg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CVS1UfCfxlU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wuz2ILq4UeA

http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/M/bo3637992.html

http://tonoticeandtolearn.com/2013/06/24/pinker-on-language-and-thought-part-ii/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1WlRcXIO5ik

http://i100.independent.co.uk/article/these-are-the-10-most-popular-adverts-of-all-time–Z1ahMV7O8l

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCKgCkubGc0

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One of the key ways it has managed this is through telling pitch perfect stories, and using well thought out and executed storytelling techniques in its videos. Time and time again it has been able to grip its audience through personal accounts, metaphors, interesting reveals, and a plethora of other poignant practices.

In the end the effectiveness of Cancer Research’s storytelling cannot be put down to one particular aspect, but is the combination of several key things. Very often the things that Cancer Research gets right are exactly what many other charities and brands miss out on in including in their own media. These are things that are not expensive, are not missed out on due to a lack of budget, but are more missing due to rushed campaigns that put too much emphasis on straightforward promotion, and not enough in making the media effective and unique, things that must be thought of in the conceptual stage, and cherished throughout the production and campaign execution.

Here are some of the ways Cancer Research makes it work:

Balanced Optimism

Using emotion is now ubiquitous with advertising and promotion. However, Cancer Research has a potentially difficult hurdle to surpass to do this.

Cancer is an incredibly serious subject. It is something that people generally don’t want to think about during their day to day activities. Furthermore, it can be incredibly grim. However, none of Cancer Research’s stories are wholly grim.

The subject matter in their videos varies in tone; but they are never unremittingly bleak, and even in the saddest of stories a silver lining is sought.

Balancing optimism happens in different ways depending on the story being told. In an overall optimistic testimonial video the difficulties are always discussed. For example in Amy’s Story, an account of surviving cancer and being able to get back to living life, a point is made of showing the struggle of this process; talking about the anxiety after the all clear at 30 seconds into the video and upset at taking hormone replacements at 1:17 are two clear examples of this. Conversely, a bleaker video, such as Roger’s Story ends with the contributor expressing hope for others.

However, Cancer Research’s most effective use of optimism balance to date has been their recent Right Now campaign. This campaign was spearheaded by a TV advert that was released on Christmas Eve 2015. This advert is essentially a montage of footage of real life people with cancer, showing medical professionals interacting with them, and doing their best to help them. Some of the shots in the advert are harrowing; however a life affirming message prevails, with good news being delivered to patients, and with people getting through their illnesses.

The Right Now campaign is expanded online, with Cancer Research’s YouTube channel hosting an expanded playlist of cancer patients’ experiences being shown in different ways. These videos all fit in with the theme of showing optimism to greater and lesser extents in their subject matter. That this balanced optimism is integral to Cancer Research is backed up by statements made by Cancer Research’s Marketing and Communication’s Director Anthony Newman to Marketing Week. “What we want is people feeling hopeful and optimistic about the future and we expect to see people feeling sad as well. We are judging the work by whether it elicits a powerful emotional response that touches the heart first, then the head, then the hand.”

Active Questions

Active questions are a key tool that is used by novelists and screenwriters to keep a viewer hooked, and to build tension. They work by keeping the viewer asking questions about what they see and hear on screen. For example “Will they get away with it?”, “What is it that this character is so scared of?”, “How did they get into this situation?” are oft used active questions. The book or film’s following plot will spend its duration answering these questions. Cancer Research also uses active questions to great effect.

In this Cancer Research video the active question is “what are these children talking about?” Wide arrays of children discuss an unseen thing. All their comments make this thing seem really appealing to them. Viewers will try to guess what they are referring to; the obvious answer would be a new toy or children’s product. Exactly halfway through the video the tables are turned and the active question is answered. The children are talking about cigarette packaging.  It is a shocking answer, and one that is delivered with a huge impact, all because of the way that the active question was set up and then answered. The result is so impactful that only a tobacco company would seek to criticize the way it was presented.

Furthermore, that campaign achieved results. In May 2016 standardised packaging shall be implemented onto tobacco products in the UK; in no small part due to that remarkably effective video.

Cancer Research also masterfully mixes active questions with metaphor. An example of this is their Advertising Campaign called The Lump. At first the video appears to be completely unrelated to cancer. It is real life footage of pedestrians walking down a street. A small bump in the pavement appears. As days pass it gets larger. Pedestrians continue to ignore its presence as it grows larger. By the end of the video the lump has grown into an incredibly large bulge, yet people still ignore it and avoid it. Throughout this time the active question “What is this bulge?” is raised. The end screen states “It’s easy to ignore something, especially when we’re busy. But spotting cancer sooner could save your life.” It becomes obvious to the viewer that the answer to the question is that the lump in the ground is a metaphor for a cancerous growth that could easily be ignored until it has blown out of proportion.

Brevity

The vast majority of Cancer Research’s online videos are shorter than three minutes in length. In fact, the top twenty most viewed videos on their YouTube channel are all shorter than two minutes in length, with the most viewed video of all time only being 30 seconds long.

The reason why Cancer Research tends to produce shorter videos is because they know a universal truth with online video promotion; that attention spans are short. This means that Cancer Research must tell stories in the quickest timeframe possible.

Take their most successful video, Alfie’s Bath as an example. It is part of their new Right Now campaign, which aims to show how Cancer Research is tackling cases of cancer right now. There is no expository dialogue, the story is told visually.

At first it seems that Alfie’s Bath is a simple video, but on a closer inspection it is anything but. It uses both balanced optimism and active questions. The opening shot looks out of a window, with a drip being visible. A female voice sings “row row row your boat”. The audience is left wondering what is happening in this scene. The camera pans down to reveal a very young child that is being bathed by a medical worker, which answers the active question. Subsequent shots focus on the equipment being used on the child during the bath. The subject of the video could be depressing, but by establishing that the child is being cared for, is happy, and is receiving treatment; it is positive and motivating as well.

This video, in terms of views, has had the largest impact for Cancer Research.

Not all stories can be told this quickly, but all are told in as succinct a manner as possible.

Relatability

Cancer Research’s videos are filled with relatable touches that make the stories more real for their viewers. Like optimism balance, relatability manifests itself in different ways depending on the tone and implementation of the video.

The most obvious example of this is in the testimonial videos. Going back to Amy’s Story, there are many things that are done to make the viewer connect to the person on screen. Footage is shown of Amy in Scarborough where she lives, enjoying time on the beach with her father; and in the final third of the video much of the footage is made up of showing the viewer pictures of Amy’s wedding day, showing the positive result of the cancer survival in an event that most people can relate to, as most people aspire to marry, or have at least attended weddings.

Relatability is also present in all other videos discussed. In Alfie’s Story everyone can relate to entertaining a young infant, and singing to cheer them up; in The Lump everyone can relate to seeing but ignoring strange occurrences in public settings; in the standardised packaging campaign everyone can relate to kids enthusiastically talking about things they are presented with; and the Right Now advert is filled with relatable scenes, such as children sitting and drawing at desks, people reading magazines in waiting rooms, people being happy when they hear good news.

These techniques are very clever, and take lots of thought and attention to detail to get right, but on the whole they are not outlandishly expensive or difficult to organize. They are a great example of how well thought out promotion can lead to huge successes.

Sources:

http://logok.org/cancer-research-uk-logo/cancer-research-uk-logo-logotype/

https://www.youtube.com/user/cancerresearchuk/videos

http://www.shots.net/news/article/89086/new-approach-for-cancer-research-uk-campaign

Please Note: We had no involvement in the Cancer Research UK campaigns or videos in this blog post, we just LoveLove love them!

The post How Cancer Research UK uses Impactful Storytelling appeared first on LoveLove Films.

Famed bread-maker Warburtons has joined forces with everyone’s favourite cast of puppets to create an advert that not only evokes some happy childhood memories for some members of the LoveLove team, but that also stands out from the crowd this festive season.

To coincide with the launch of Warburtons’ new Giant Crumpet range, Kermit and co have turned up and taken over with their very own Muppet extravaganza, “The Giant Crumpet Show”. With the likes of Fozzie, Pepe the Prawn, Sweetums, The Swedish Chef and a rather seductive Miss Piggy all making an appearance, this ad could turn out to be something of a marketing masterstroke for Chairman, Jonathan Warburton.

The 120-second commercial, which was created by advertising agency WCRS London, premiered during ITV’s The X-Factor and is part of a £25 million campaign to help cement the company’s place as the second biggest grocery brand in the UK based on sales.

Unlike most advertisers this Christmas, Warburtons has opted to not go down the heart-tugging, emotional route, but instead lets The Muppets unleash some of the joyful chaos that they are so famous for. Watching these lovable characters, (which have been somewhat of a mainstay on our TV screens since their creation over 60 years ago), sing and dance their way through a crumpet-themed version of their own theme tune will bring a smile to even the most stern of faces.

With cultural nods to the likes of Coronation Street and the British love of tea, and over a million views on YouTube, this witty commercial has Metro’s Olivia Waring declaring that the advert “is everything you could hope for…and blows all other Christmas ads out of the water.” Check out our post on some more of this years Christmas commercials here and decide for yourself, by clicking here

When the cantankerous Statler and Waldorf emphatically declare that they miss Stallone, we can’t discuss Warburtons’ brave advertising strategy without mentioning their successful Rocky-inspired commercial, “The Deliverers” that proved such a big hit back in April. Again the brainchild of the creative team at WCRS, this commercial represented a significant investment in video content for the company, with the total cost of the campaign hitting the £18 million mark.

But with Sylvester Stallone delivering the goods in terms of performance, as well as a truck-load of bread, the commercial proved to be a knockout with consumers and even lead to marketing magazine The Drum showcasing it as their Ad of the Day.

Here at LoveLove Films, we always like to see companies producing interesting and engaging video content that has the ability to make people stand up and take notice; Warburtons have done a great job so far of utilizing the power of video to increase their brand awareness and reputation and we for one can’t wait to see what they do next.

Sources:

http://www.campaignlive.co.uk/article/muppets-unveiled-celebs-warburtons-crumpets-ad/1372650

http://metro.co.uk/2015/11/14/forget-the-john-lewis-ad-the-all-singing-all-dancing-muppets-have-brou…

http://www.campaignlive.co.uk/article/brawn-bread-sly-stallone-stars-warburtons-campaign/1342273

Please Note: We had no involvement in the Warburton campaigns or videos in this blog post, we just LoveLove love them!

The post Warburtons deliver much kneaded laugh advert appeared first on LoveLove Films.

With some of the largest retailers vying for their ad to be the one that we are all discussing over our gingerbread lattes this festive season, this years crop is possibly the best yet. There are certainly some original and interesting narratives for us to indulge ourselves on as we gear up for a Christmas to remember.

Of course, you cannot mention the words Christmas advert without discussing the latest showing from the proverbial kings of Christmas advertising, John Lewis. Their Man on the Moon video, which premiered during last weeks episode of Gogglebox, has staggeringly been viewed over 12 million times on YouTube in its first week of release. Opting to take a much different approach to last years heart-warming Monty the Penguin campaign (which according to the Financial Times cost £6.9 million and saw a 4.8% rise in year-on-year sales), they have now teamed up with Age UK to bring us a timely reminder that nobody should be lonely at Christmas.

However, hot off the press and with over one million online views in 15 hours, Sainsburys’ “Mog’s Christmas Calamity” is a great example of how to effectively combine live-action, high-quality animation and bundles of emotion to make an advert with the potential to dethrone their high street rivals. Written by author Judith Kerr and produced by Abott Mead Vickers, the ad has certainly got those on social media purring!

Whilst there are those who question what a fluffy cat or even a man living on the moon have to do with selling groceries and fashion accessories, here at LoveLove we are just glad to see growing numbers of companies utilising the power of digital storytelling to create powerful and unique video content. More and more, we are now seeing the importance placed on narrative in advertising; without a good story an advert just gets lost in amongst the over-saturated pool of promotion that consumers simply ignore.

Storytelling is an innate part of the human psyche and the most successful advertisers are the ones who have embraced this fact; as Adweek Magazine’s Jon Hamm highlights, “the most powerful stories happen in the mind of the audience… and this presents marketers with an amazing opportunity, as the most powerful way to persuade someone of your idea is by uniting the idea with an emotion. It’s indisputable that the best way to do that is by telling a compelling story.”

Because of this, audiences want adverts to engage them, to invoke emotion and to take them on a journey; and as this years ads have shown, there is more than one way to do that.

Lidl’s “School of Christmas” puts a uniquely comical twist on the preparation we all go through for the big day, whilst watching Jeff Goldblum take his role of housewife to the extreme in Curry’s “Acting Grateful” had us snorting out our mid-morning coffee. The latest offerings from TKMaxx and Coca-Cola have that classical feel-good factor that we all love this time of year; and as nothing quite says Christmas like lorry loads of chocolate, Cadbury’s “Lorry Advent Calendar” has got us stocking up on selection boxes and its not even December yet!

Even though we now live in a digital age, television advertising has been, and remains, one of the most effective means of getting your brand message out there; and now with the invention of Sky AdSmart it is easier (and cheaper) than ever before for local and regional businesses to use TV as a means to showcase their own great video content.

And it’s easier than you might think! You don’t need the six-figure budget of John Lewis to create a powerful advert that will resonate with your audience.

So if you want to create your own original and memorable video, then the team here at LoveLove are well equipped and ready to help you take the next step on your journey.

Sources:
Why Agencies and Brands Need to Embrace True Storytelling
http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/why-agencies-and-brands-need-embrace-true-storytelling-152534

Please Note: We did not make any of the Christmas campaigns or videos in this blog post, we just LoveLove love them!

The post T’is the season to be Moggy – Brands launch Christmas adverts appeared first on LoveLove Films.

Why an Online Safety Video?
With the web allowing consumers to access media from all over the world, an online safety film makes it easy to share and promote these short videos – enabling thousands, if not millions, of online hits. Video’s can often be easier to absorb and can generally draw us in quicker than writing, explaining perhaps why this is such a popular choice when trying to influence an audience’s actions. The Guardian summarizes this idea well – “With online video quickly becoming a key means for people to satisfy their information and entertainment needs, small businesses that fail to include it in their internet marketing strategies will do so at their peril”.

Embrace Life – Always wear your seatbelt

Embrace Life is a powerful example of how videos are use to convey safety messages through the use of film – with this example illustrating the importance of seatbelts. It uses a situation many can relate to – family – and creates a film that is both emotive and informative to the us. This is sure to get people to think twice before driving without a seatbelt.

Since the airing their new safety video in 2009, Thomson announced that “three times more people are watching it”. Thomson created a clever way to entice flyers into watching their safety video – in order to prevent their customers from ignoring their safety messages. Also, in contrast from the old mundane plane safety videos, Thomson’s new film not only engaged adults, but also engaged children with a “ 91% increase in the number of children under 12” who watched the entirety of the video (Thomson).

The Impossible Texting and Driving Test

Being watched over 4 million times on Youtube, The Impossible Texting and Driving Test by RYD (Responsible Young Drivers) became a hit with its driving and texting safety video. Rather than trying to convey to young people not to drive and text, it forced them (in a set up environment) to text and drive – with the theory if you ban something, young people will want to do it even more. Its message was simple “ to teach young drivers about the dangers of sending text messages whilst driving” (BBC).

Whodunnit?

“It’s easy to miss something you are not looking for. On a busy road this could be fatal. Look out for cyclists” (Telegraph). Whodunnit, is a follow on from a series of road awareness campaigns from TFL showing how easily you can miss something. Many people perhaps saw one or two changes in scenery, but no one imagined that their were in fact 21 errors – similar to the moonwalking bear, it made us feel stupid and stunned by our mistakes – which hopefully will make us more aware of our surroundings in the future.

Dumb Ways To Die

With over 110 million hits, this animated train safety video for Melbourne Metro Trains is definitely one of the more popular awareness short films. It uses dark humour and a catchy song (Dumb ways to Die, Dumb ways to Die, Dumb ways to Die) in order to urge people to behave more carefully around trains. The video has been so insanely popular that Melbourne Metro even followed it up with an animated app for both iPhones and Android phones and a second video: Dumb ways to Die – Let the training begin (get it? TRAINing).

Whilst on the topic of safety videos, a good friend of ours, Martin Sterling, directed a short on texting and driving that was released earlier this week. Anatomy of a Split Second is shot and edited together excellently and is a “powerful reminder to keep your eyes on the road” (adland). We LoveLove love it! (Go Martin!)

Are safety awareness videos effective?
YES. Our brains favour visual material, so we respond so much better to video and animation – especially if they are as captivating as the ones above. We can also receive the information much quicker than just words alone, saving both time and energy. According to THINK! after 50 years of campaigning drink driving deaths have significantly fallen – proving that these campaigns do make a difference! Hats off to the filmmakers and animators which work hard to make safety awareness interesting and engaging – saving lives and loved ones.

Sources:
http://www.theguardian.com/small-business-network/2014/jan/14/video-content-marketing-media-online
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20120516-the-impossible-driving-test
http://www.faithtap.com/3851/driving-test-allows-texting-to-prove-its-danger-to-drivers/
http://www.fastcocreate.com/3027603/coke-puts-cinema-goers-onscreen-to-remind-them-to-be-quiet-during-the-movie
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/article-1212266/Thomson-Airways-safety-video-children-cabin-crew-shows-buckling-plane-simple.html
http://osocio.org/message/campaign-of-the-year-2010-embrace-life-always-wear-your-seatbelt/
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/3478961/Whodunnit-awareness-test-How-many-changes-can-you-spot.html
http://www.thomson.co.uk/editorial/press-centre/2009/thomsons-visionary-approach-to-in-flight-safety-is-childs-play.html
http://think.direct.gov.uk/drink-driving.html
http://adland.tv/commercials/road-safety-authority-anatomy-split-second-2015-45-ireland

Please Note: We did not make any of the viral campaigns or videos in this blog post, we just LoveLove love them!

The post Safety Awareness Viral Videos: Saving Lives Through Film & Animation appeared first on LoveLove Films.