Media and Mediums

Time To Bend Your Noodle and Fight Hunger in America.

CP+B have created a desktop and iPad experience for KRAFT Macaroni & Cheese designed to stop food waste, promote creativity, and help stop hunger in America. The application was built using flash and cross compiled to work on iOS. (I’m kind of surprised hey don’t have an Android version of this available as well since the desktop app was developed using Adobe Flash.)

KRAFT’s ‘Dinner Not Art‘ application donates 10 noodles to Feeding America for every virtual noodle saved in the macaroni art that you create. While this number seems small, think about the number of pieces used on average by a kid when making a macaroni masterpiece. It ads up fast. The application is easy to use and a little addictive. So long term, this could create a large payout for Feeding America if the application takes off.

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The application features a fun easy to use interface that is intuitive for younger children, and actually rather fun for adults. The bright colorful UI reflects the KRAFT Mac and Cheese box and branding colors, but does it in a way that never feels like Kraft is promoting their product. It’s this subtle balance that really wins here. Throughout the experience the participant is shown a counter that increases with each noodle added. (The feel good factor). At the same time the KRAFT brand is represented in an unobtrusive way, and subtly promotes the product. At the end of the experience you have the option of saving and sharing your creations. (another feel good factor).

Appshaker’s Frozen Planet Invades American Shopping Malls.

I seem to be on a bit of an Augmented Reality kick today. The video below is a really nice execution of the technology from the folks at Appshaker.

Produced for BBC Home Entertainment “BBC Frozen Planet Augmented Reality” was hosted in three key markets in the United States to introduce the TV program that was produced in conjunction with the Discovery Channel. The three market tour ran from April 19 – April 22 in New Jersey, Illinois and California after the television series Frozen Planet first aired to more than 20 million viewers on March 19th.

Appshaker is getting a solid reputation for this kind of augmented installation in both Europe and the United States. With work like this it’s no wonder.

Creative Direction: Alex Poulson / Kevin Jackson
Art Direction: Barnabas Nanay
Production Direction: Szabolcs Turanyi-Vadnay
Technical Direction: Adam Trost
3D Design: Vertigo Digital

Sound of Vision.

In the last 5 years film making has undergone a revolution. Camera technologies have improved. Editing and compositing software has gotten so good and so easy to use that anyone with a good eye and design sensibility can produce a pretty solid film with a digital camera, and a laptop. This is something that would have been really hard to do a few years back. I’m not saying that everyone can do this. There is plenty of junk on the internet, but when the right tools are in the right hands, magic happens.

A great example of this is from Konstantin Syomin and “20Coop”. Their documentary film, “Sound of Vision” was shot entirely on a Panasonic GH2 micro four-thirds camera. The film won the International Documentary Challenge in Toronto. I tried to embed the video below but couldn’t instead click on the image below to be taken to the film page. Here you can see this wonderful film, plus the rest of the finalist.

The film won

— Best Film
— PBS’ POV award
— Best cinematography
— Best editing
— Best use of Genre

The Art of Film & TV Title Design. Off Book & PBS.

If you produce any form of video or animation based content for TV, Film, The Internet, Mobile and Tablet based devices, you need to watch this film. “The Art of TV Title Design” by PBS Off Book, is a great short film that features some of the heavy hitters of Title Design talking about their craft.

Opening credits are quite often the first thing an audience sees when they watch a great film or TV show. While they are very memorable, more often than not they are not talked about in great detail. Even though they help set up the story, and close it out.Good Title Design is an art form, as much as any other aspect of the broadcast and film industry. The designers that create title sequences are asked to invent concepts that bring the core story out, and enhance the overall production themes, to create a visual experience that pulls the viewer into the film’s world.

In the video below some of the most inventive people working in the field of title design today, including the creators of the iconic Mad Men sequence, the hilarious Zombieland opening and the stirring end credits from Blue Valentine, discuss what goes into making a great title sequence. Featured in the short film are Peter Frankfurt and Karin Fong, Jim Helton, and Ben Conrad.