Hey I've Seen That Before! Scribble Drawing Ads

Great package design - CRISP

Not only are the falafel sandwiches at CRISP delicious, the packages are a great user experience as well. Falafel sandwiches can get a little messy, but these come in a neatly packaged and sealed box, where you pull open the tab to take off the top half of your box so that you have a nice neat place to put your sandwich back into between bites.

Random fact - Flounders can change to match patterns

Did you know that some tropical flounders can change color to match their surroundings — and even match a pattern. A study in the 90s done by Vilayanur Ramachandran found that "when he moved the fish from sandy sea floors to black-and-white checkerboard and polka-dot patterns, the flounder quickly sported squares and dots."

Simply Orange Branding

Today Simply Orange setup a tasting bar outside of Grand Central. Not only was it a nice morning treat, but it was a very unique giveaway stand. The stand was complete with banners, logos and a very simple untreated wood counter, designed to look like the crates holding the many fresh oranges surrounding the stand. I thought it was a great touch for the brand promise of natural, simple and fresh.

Then I began to wonder if Simply Orange had managed to implement this brand feeling on other consumer touchpoints - and they did. When I went to the website it had the same image of fresh oranges and an simple untreated natural wood in the foreground serving as a tabletop for the Simply Orange drinks. What a great user experience to continually see reinforcement of the brand promise through visual and design cues. Only problem with the site - the annoying bird chirping that automatically plays on open. Unless you are in the music industry and users are coming to buy your super sweet music, no brand should have music or sound effects autoplaying in the background of their site.

Trendspotting: Wax Stamp Logos/Icons

What happens when communication breaks down...

Found this on StumbleUpon here.

Hey I've seen that before! Papyrus Font Abuse

The other day I noticed that Edible Arrangements uses Papyrus as their font in their logo and I thought "Oh no, what an overused font." I'm not alone in thinking this, check out papyruswatch.com or ihatepapyrus.info for numerous examples of the abuse of this font.

Why is papyrus so overused and abused? Because it's free and "unique" looking, so many businesses probably think they are being different. For the small businesses, maybe I can give you a pass since your budgets are smaller. But bigger businesses, have some pride and get your logo designed and a complete brand identity established. It's the visual that represents your company and what it stands for. What does papyrus say about your brand? Maybe that you stand for cheap quality or the easy way out?

Papyrus font masquerading as a script?

Air New Zealand - Coach Seats

How has no airline thought of this before? Bringing the foot rest all the way up to make a couch. Amazing. If there are other airlines that have this please tell me so I can fly on them!

Hey I've Seen That Before! Let my hands show you...

Another commercial with just hands showing the product features of a new phone or technology product? Almost. But this first ad is a little different than the others as it's for something that requires no battery or charger — a Moleskine journal.

Moleskine - Let my hands show you how I write in my wine journal


Here's the other advertisers in love with hand models (besides jewelers of course):

iPhone - Let my hands show you how to work an iphone


HP - Let my hands show you the cool stuff I keep on my personal computer


AT&T Hands - By far the most artistic use of hands

Check out the making of the AT&T ads here.

Hey I've Seen That Before! It's all about YOU ads.

Yahoo! You campaign

HTC You campaign

Nintendo "Who are You" campaign

The Original You campaign

Hey I've Seen That Before! Fill in the _____ ads.

As time goes on it always becomes a bit more difficult to have that really great innovative idea. But, sometimes there are certain themes and concepts that are used repeatedly because they are "trendy" or "buzzwords" this series attempts to document some of those I've noticed and have a resource for similar creative concepts that have been published.

Fill in the blank. 
We've all seen them and usually those blanks are filled in with a handwriting font. Here are some of the most recent users and abusers.

North Dakota Tourism - "I am _____" ad campaign

Found online Jan 15, 2010

Wells Fargo - "With you when _____" ad campaign.
Found in New Yorker Mar. 15, 2010

National Peanut Board - "Energy to _____" ad campaign
Found in NYC subway Mar. 9, 2010

Merrill Lynch - "help2 retire _____" ad campaign
Found in NYC near Grand Central, Mar. 19, 2010

Maryland Tourism - "Maryland of _____" ad campaign
Found online on Jun 16, 2010

A Day of Tim Burton

Because Alice in Wonderland is one of my most favorite books and Disney movies, I decided to make today a day of Tim Burton. The dismal weather could not have been more appropriate for a Tim Burton day as much of his work is moody, dark and somewhat twisted. The day started at the MoMA special exhibit and ended with the IMAX 3d Alice in Wonderland.

The MoMa exhibit was really spectacular and when you first walk in it is as if you are being eaten by the large freakish Burton character. You enter a room of complete darkness, only lit by black lights. Then there are sketches and 3D models of Burton's work from high school up through his most recent movies like Sleepy Hollow, A Nightmere Before Christmas and Batman. My favorite pieces included Burton's personal handwritten notes to the animators of the films or readers in general. One piece was called "Little Dead Riding Hood: A story of torment and demon possession."

Poor User Experience #1: Top 10 lists that have next buttons

What annoys me as an internet user are the "top 10 lists" that I have to press NEXT to see each one and wait for the page to reload each time. I hate excessive clicking. I simply want to see what you have to say about the topic and move on and most of the time the lists are garbage anyway.
I know the site publishers think they are very clever and by creating the lists this way to serve me up different ads every time I press next, but now I know better and have stopped going to their sites and have started unsubscribing from their emails. See samples below:

 

 

Tuxedo Strawberry

Goodbye Kindle and epaper

The Kindle is toast. While e-ink and e-paper was a creative idea and interesting development, it is still very cost prohibitive for the masses to adopt and now users can opt for to read their morning paper on the new Apple iPad, which can also check email, watch videos, among other things. Although it is unfortunately named as an Always product, it sure does look sleeker then the other e-book options out there.