Sydney Pollack's "Sketches of Frank Gehry"

With the death of Sydney Pollack, most people will be ruminating over his fine acting career (Michael Clayton, Eyes Wide Shut, Changing Lanes) or the popular films he directed (The Firm, Out of Africa, Tootsie, The Way We Were). Lesser known and publicized was his 2005 documentary "Sketches of Frank Gehry"on the influential architect. Pollack delves into Gehry's creative process, not only interviewing him but accompanying him during his work. I was amazed at the architect's aesthetic audacity when designing buildings, with much of the decisions purely intuitive and difficult to articulate in layman's terms. Regardless, it is a fascinating peek into the mind that designed the Bilbao Museum and into creativity in general.
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Robert Rauschenberg: The Forgotten Visual Communicator

The recent death of Robert Rauschenberg was not just a loss to the fine arts, but to all visual communicators (graphic designers, art directors, illustrators, photographers, etc). While better known for his integrating painting and sculpture (combines, as he called them), his silkscreen paintings of the 1960s had enormous influence as well. Photographs would be assembled, juxtaposed, and layered via the silkscreen process to create beautifully dense compositions. If Andy Warhol's art focused on consumerism, then Rauschenberg's was a commentary on mass media and communications. The aesthetics of his work predates transparent image layering a full two decades before Adobe Photoshop. Of all his accolades, the least known may be his medal from the AIGA (American Institute of Graphic Arts) in 1974, a lifetime achievement award from the most venerated organization for visual communication professionals.
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Using Sex (in the City) to Sell: Turner Entertainment to Offer Contextual Advertising

Turner Entertainment recently announced a new sales strategy regarding placement of tv spots. The company, which owns a multitude of channels including TBS, TNT and Cartoon Network, plans on offering contextual airtimes to advertisers. Here's an example: TBS runs an episode of Sex in the City, which primarily attracts a young adult female audience. The current approach targets that demographic with a product that could generally appeal to them: a deodorant, for example. The new contextual approach would seek out shows in which body odor was either the episode's theme, or mentioned within a segment of that episode. Carrie, the main character, rejects a suitor due to his b.o. and recoils in horror with the thought that she might be the perpetrator... then cut to a commercial on a new extra-strength Ban roll-on.

If you combine Turner's original productions, their syndicated properties, and their Turner Classic Movies archives, the opportunities are vast. With the rapidly expanding use of Tivo and other television recording devices, tv advertising spots may have to further evolve to escape obsolescence. The next move could well be product placement at the bottom of the screen during the episode, or incorporated into the storyline itself, already practiced in varying degrees on television and films.

More likely, a combination of the above will be used, and much more frequently. Whether these strategies will negatively affect the original content of the shows is another debate.

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The Bombay Company: The Bankruptcy of a Distinctive Furniture Brand

I had always admired The Bombay Company's newly revitalized brand identity, distilling the store name to one word and accompanying it with a circularly enclosed palm tree. Not only did it make the company look more contemporary and slightly more upscale, but it did evoke the more romantic aspects of British India (ironic given its beginnings in New Orleans and corporate ownership in Texas). So I was saddened to hear of their bankruptcy a few months ago. There are by no means the only furniture retailer to suffer from the housing market, but I have to wonder about two strategic moves that may have contributed to their demise: their expansion into higher end furniture and their extension into Bombay Kids.

While the new identity is more upscale, their existing audiences may have rejected the perceptively higher priced items. Moving into higher price points in this case may have required a transition: introduce fewer items, see how the market reacts to them, then plan accordingly. Any eventual loss in customers would be offset by newer affluent customers, and the higher-end products presumably would have higher margins as well.

The brand extension into the Bombay Kids store may be more complex. The name, without much equity or advertising support, may suggest the third world too inadvertantly. It also seems such a flagrant move to duplicate other "kid store" extensions such as Pottery Barn Kids.

With the new brand equity built up over the past year, it's hard to imagine a corporation couldn't somehow re-assess their products and reposition their offering. As far as shopping mall retailers go, The Bombay Company was one of the few distinctive identities.

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Flogos: The Viability of a Soapy, Floating, Temporal Logo

An Alabama company has apparently invented a device that can create floating logos, or "Flogos". They're made out of a proprietary environmentally-safe formula, but the basic ingredients are soap and helium. They can currently be created in 24- and 36-inch sizes, and the machine generates around one every fifteen seconds. The more machines you rent, the more flogos in the air.

Yes, it's a novelty, but I'm reticent to dismiss it as a fad. It does seem viable as a branding method, but only in certain environments. Obviously, indoors wouldn't work unless it was a large venue, like a covered stadium. Their ability to waft around would probably be affected by ventilation. Secondly, this technology seems well suited for celebratory events: corporate sponsored events such as marathons, outdoor concerts, parades, and employee picnics, for example. From the video I've seen, they move slowly and retain their shape for some time, increasing their visibility on the ground. There are limits, however, from both a strategic and design standpoint.

No Thinly Constructed Logos
Flogos are still some sort of solidified soap bubbles, which means in order for it to create and maintain its shape, the logo has to have some bulk to it. The Apple symbol will work, McDonald's won't.

No Disconnected Logos
As simple as the Target symbol is, the fact that it is two separate parts (a small circle within a large outline) disqualifies its use as a Flogo. The two elements will simply float apart.

No Typographic Logos
Logos that are words, monograms, or initials will be less legibile than their iconic counterparts. Flogos will twist, turn, and change orientation as the air currents see fit. Typography, for the most part, depends on fixed orientation and cannot be read from all angles. Sorry C0ca-Cola, GE, and IBM.

No Dimensional Logos
Due to the web, there is a trend in logos to become more dimensional, which works well on some applications and not in others. There is an added thickness to Flogos, perhaps several inches, but it cannot replicate the nuances of the AT&T and Xerox symbols. These logos in particular look terrible in their rarely used two dimensional versions.

No Multicolor or Multivalue Logos
The logo also has to be translatable into a single color (white). That means multicolored or multivalued logos without a (comparably recognizable) one color equivalent will be unusable as well. This includes the BP burst, the MSN butterfly, and the UPS shield.

Aesthetically, Flogos only communicate with one design component: shape. In the near future, the company promises to develop more colors, which would greatly enhance the brand proposition. Strategically, this service will apply primarily to established brands where the logo has significant equity. New brands would have to supplement Flogos with other onsite materials: signage, posters, t-shirts, volunteers, etc. to clarify which company the floating logos represented.

It's a unique and fully viable new method of brand promotion, if used by the right company and under the right circumstances.

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The look of the Torino Olympic Games: Pushing the Limits

Nearly two years have gone by since the Winter Olympic Games in Torino, and when I peruse through the photo and video footage, certain visuals stand out more than others. Although I can appreciate the conceptual underpinnings of the Torino Olympics logo, overall it feels imbalanced and tries a little too hard to look contemporary. The Olympic mascots, Neve and Gliz, appear as mentally challenged marshmallow-heads.

The most successful visuals of Torino by far were the pictograms and environmental graphics. Not only did they convey the excitement, speed, and athleticism of the competitions, but the celebratory feel of Italian Carnivale. The graphics were especially vibrant and imposing in large scale, across multiple venues. It is strategically sound as it is aesthetically pleasing, and the last time I recall the Olympics looking this good was Los Angeles in 1984.

Every two years, the Olympics have an opportunity to create the ultimate experience in sports, whether a participant, an attendant, or foreign television viewer. And every so often, a city like Torino exceeds expectations and makes a memorable visual impression.

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