By The Book

Via Wooster Collective.

Merry Christmas!

This is the Theater District Business Center building in Chicago. The front of the building facing Randolph Street contains a number of colored lights running on a pattern loop behind semi-opaque glass. For Christmas, the pattern was modified to include a number of traditional Christmas themes.

288,000 Candles

I'm sorry AKQA but I have a new favorite holiday video. Famous from Brussels delivers an amazing year end video with the help of 288,000 tea candles.

Agency: Famous, Brussels
Creative Director: Christophe Ghewy
Art Director: Nicolas France
Copywriter: Olivier Roland

And of course there is a making of...

Money

N.A.S.A.'s "Money" featuring David Byrne, Chuck D, Ras Congo, Seu Jorge, Z-Trip and the iconic artwork of Shepard Fairey.

Youtube Hillifier

We're digging the The Benny Hillifier. Add the Benny Hill Yakety Sax to any youtube video. Just enter the youtube video ID (the code after the "=" in the URL) into the box and blamo! hilarity ensues. Check out the one we made this morning.

You're Not Alone and It's Not So Bad

A fantastic video from Anthony Ferraro about getting laid off. Finally, a bit of optimism from the land of unemployment. If you haven't been to the land of unemployment recently you may wind up taking an unexpected trip there soon so, watch the video and realize you're not alone and it's not so bad.

Travel Deals for the Living Dead

We're digging Vice.tv's Guide to Travel Series. We're not exactly sure why Shane Smith and Pella Kagerman have to get drunk for their urban safari in Chernobyl but the series certainly explores topics and areas of the world left off of the map by the Travel Channel.

via Vice.tv

AKQA Nukes Christmas

Perhaps my new favorite agency holiday video of all time.

Expedia's Coffee-tising

In cooperation with coffee shops (Deli Star), stencils are distributed which are used to create the offer in cocoa on top of the milk foam. Underneath the cup is a paper coaster printed with expedia.de and further explanation of the offer.

Advertising Agency: Serviceplan Munich / Hamburg, Germany
Creative director: Ekki Frenkler
Art Directors: Patrizia Marroni, Pei Mueller-Lierheim
Copywriter: Petra Nachtigall

via Ads of the World.

Lost in a Moment

A one take impromptu film made in Tokyo by Dennis Wheatley and Stefan McClean for the song Lost in a Moment from Shrift. "What we loved about watching this film back was the space that the camera was able to enter.. extremely personal and scrutinising but not too lingering."

The Mysterious Dinner Napkin (Solved!)

Last Tuesday we posted this fantastic napkin design after checking out the online fashion magazine, The Dinner Jacket which featured a photograph of it on their contents page. Ashley & Justyna from The Dinner Jacket just got back to us with some background info and it turns out you can get a set of your very own over at The Spoon Sisters. Thanks Ashley & Justyna!

Via The Dinner Jacket.

Business Cogs

The incredible geared business card designs of Adam Mayer. Still in prototype development, Mayer's designs allow us to catch a glimpse into the future of business card design. Digital cards perhaps?

via Unique Business Cards.

24 Hours in K-town

Critical Intent was recently invited to New York to explore the secrets of lower Manhattan's Korean Town and though, most of what we uncovered there wasn't appropriate to print or photograph for that matter, we were treated to a killer meal by our host and NYC food blogger Alan Kwon. Thanks again Alan!

Trick 17 Best Picture

Intervelometer from Team DAK just won 'Best Picture' at the 2nd Annual Trick 17 Stop Motion Animation contest. Teams were given 52 hours to create a 1-3 minute film. Team DAK is made up of Deniz Merdanogullari, Aparna Kapur and Kunal Sen.

Mad Skate

Tim Nolan of Poke and Marco Cigini of McCann Erickson have created a skate club for the Ad industry set and have dubbed it MAD SKATE, naturally. How's it work? Join the group on Facebook here. Each member will be asked to fork over a bit of cash to help rent a park such as the The Autumn Bowl in Greenpoint, Brooklyn or the Shield Skate Park in New Jersey. Any left over money will be donated to charity.

via Agency Spy

Addidas Originals: Break Up Service

Agency: TBWA\London
Production Company (Japan): Taiyokikau
Creatives: Mat Fox/Mark Nicholson
Producer: Satoshi Takahashi
Production Company: Blink, London

via Scary Ideas

Graffiti 2.0

For the last couple of years, Italian graffiti artist, Flippo Minelli has made people acutely aware of the technology gap between 2.0 nations and the third world. Though the Internet has provided an extraordinary platform for the exchange of ideas, information and social exchange, it has broadened the gap between technological societies and those that remain "offline".

"The idealization connected with these experiences provokes a small-but-important detach of the perception of reality and what i want to do by writing the names of anything connected with the 2.0 life we are living in the slums of the third world is to point out the gap between the reality we still live in and the ephemeral world of technologies."

via Wooster Collective

The Elephant in the Chatroom

Wired has published an article on their website that finally, FINALLY, confronts the 500lbs. elephant in the room when it comes to advertising on social networking sites. To paraphrase, it's invasive and it doesn't work. For the last five years, "Social Networking" has taken the place of "Viral" as the most overused buzzword in your company's marketing department and today, Wired reported on what any network user could have told you all along, that just because users are willing to volunteer information about themselves does not mean that they welcome that information to be used to bombard them with marketing messages. Speaking at a digital marketing conference in Cincinnati recently, Procter & Gamble's head of interactive marketing and innovation, Ted McConnell stated...

“Consumers weren’t trying to generate media. They were trying to talk to somebody…. We hijack their own conversations, their own thoughts and feelings, and try to monetize it...What in heaven's name made you think you could monetize the real estate in which somebody is breaking up with their girlfriend?”

Cheers Ted!

Read the entire article here.

The Mysterious Dinner Napkin

I found a photograph of this brilliant little napkin on the contents page of The Dinner Jacket Magazine. A request to The Dinner Jacket for Art/Writer credits for the piece have not yet been returned but I will post them here as soon as I find out. If you know anything about the piece please email me!

Smart (Business) Cards

Advertising Agency: Duval Guillaume
Creative Directors: Katrien Bottez, Peter Ampe
Creation: Tom Theys
Copywriter: Hans/Raoul
Typography: Stoffel Van den Bergh

via Ads of the World