This poster has a cold

The promotion for the new movie Contagion has truly gone viral. Ahead of the release of the film, Warner Bros Pictures hired microbiologists and immunologists to create an unconventional billboard.
Teaming up with CURB Media and ad agency Lowe Roche, they installed 2 huge petri dishes full of live bacteria in an abandoned storefront in downtown Toronto. Over a period of a few days, the bacteria multiplied and grew to spell out the name of the film, Contagion. Love this and the art direction and type reveal looks amazing, this also reminded of a campaign my old copywriter Jo Arscott did while at Saatchis where they produced a 48 sheet poster and sprayed the headline in glue - over the coming days the fumes and dirt from London streets revealed the message; 'This is what your kid breathes in everyday' it was for kids with asthma, love how both pieces play with the type and dramatised the key message.

Steve Jobs the best quotes for all creative people

Below are some of the best Steve Jobs’s quotes to inspire us to think differently and up our game through innovation and collaboration, wonderful but today a tad sad reading.

1. “The cure for Apple is not cost-cutting. The cure for Apple is to innovate its way out of its current predicament.” Apple Confidential: The Real Story of Apple Computer

2. “For something this complicated, it’s really hard to design products by focus groups. A lot of times, people don’t know what they want until you show it to them.”

3. Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn’t really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while. That’s because they were able to connect experiences they’ve had and synthesize new things. And the reason they were able to do that was that they’ve had more experiences or they have thought more about their experiences than other people.

4. “That’s been one of my mantras — focus and simplicity. Simple can be harder than complex: You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple. But it’s worth it in the end because once you get there, you can move mountains.”

5. “Innovation has nothing to do with how many R&D dollars you have. When Apple came up with the Mac, IBM was spending at least 100 times more on R&D. It’s not about money. It’s about the people you have, how you’re led, and how much you get it.”

6. “When you first start off trying to solve a problem, the first solutions you come up with are very complex, and most people stop there. But if you keep going, and live with the problem and peel more layers of the onion off, you can often times arrive at some very elegant and simple solutions.”

7. “We made the buttons on the screen look so good you’ll want to lick them.”

8. “Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn’t matter to me … Going to bed at night saying we’ve done something wonderful… that’s what matters to me.”

9. “You’re missing it. This is not a one-man show. What’s reinvigorating this company is two things: One, there’s a lot of really talented people in this company who listened to the world tell them they were losers for a couple of years, and some of them were on the verge of starting to believe it themselves. But they’re not losers. What they didn’t have was a good set of coaches, a good plan. A good senior management team. But they have that now.”

10. The system is that there is no system. That doesn’t mean we don’t have process. Apple is a very disciplined company, and we have great processes. But that’s not what it’s about. Process makes you more efficient … But innovation comes from people meeting up in the hallways or calling each other at 10:30 at night with a new idea, or because they realized something that shoots holes in how we’ve been thinking about a problem. It’s ad hoc meetings of six people called by someone who thinks he has figured out the coolest new thing ever and who wants to know what other people think of his idea.”

Thank you for inspiring me

Zombie Running App - genius

Yes you have Nike+, Runkeeper and MapMyRun and I've used them all great functional apps but I came across this last night that literally changes the game and more importantly puts the fun back into functionality.

Zombies, Run!, to be released early next year for iPhone and Android, is an app in the style of Runkeeper, with an exciting undead twist.

You start up the app, plug in your headphones and go for a run. As you begin to sprint, jog or walk to your destination of choice, you’ll hear the narrated story of a zombie-infested, dystopian future. You’re a “runner” in this world, which means that your job is to go out and collect supplies like ammo, medicine and batteries for your ragtag base of human survivors. The more you run, the more stuff you’ll acquire.

“We want to tap into a fantasy that we think a lot of people have when they’re running or deciding to get fit — that you can be the hero of your own action movie,” said the game’s designer, Adrian Hon, in an e-mail.

“After all, why does anyone want to run? Probably so we know that if things get bad, we can rely on our bodies to get us out of trouble.”


The idea first came from a class for amateur runners, which Zombies, Run! writer Naomi Alderman had joined. During an introductory session, one of the organizers asked the group why they wanted to run.

“To outrun the zombie horde,” said one of the participants. Everybody laughed — except for Alderman. Her mind was busy running races of its own.

Hon says you’ll be able to make meaningful decisions as you progress through Zombies, Run. For example, once you’ve finished a running session, you’ll be able to allocate resources to different areas of your city, choosing which people to help out. He hints that your decisions could result in life-or-death consequences for some of the game’s survivors. Bloody genius and as always an idea sprung from someones passion, in this case running.

Fans have flocked to Zombies, Run!, which has garnered over $53,000 on crowd-funding site Kickstarter in the past month. Hon and Alderman say they’re psyched about the positive reaction, noting that the game already has a “guaranteed audience.”

Combined with fun and functionality that's intune with your target audience, wonderful work is created.

Linkedin profile as an infographic

vizualize.me - Kevin's profile I came across this last night, such fun and pretty impressive, simple but functional. Interesting Linkedin over the last couple of months have really enhanced their platform. This by Vizualize.me is just another cool add on.

Someone asked the Dalai Lama what suprises him most. He responded, "Man. Because he sacrifices his health in order to make money. Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health. And then he is so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present; the result being that he does not live in the present or the future; he lives as if he is never going to die, and then he dies having never really lived."

Super Fly better than looting and burning

Win a car that made your dad look cool - shot and art directed this for Ribena in the UK- based on the campaign idea - Ribena 'Grow Up One Day' - all based around pranks, this promo was part of the campaign. I wanted something a bit more different and fun than giving away a cool Vespa - so we went for a second hand Capri - Ribena gave away 5 in total, the retro guy - seriously dressed liked that all the time- easy casting.

Twitter promo that's a little cracker

If you haven't picked this up on Twitter then in the next day or so you will - this appeared about 4 hours ago it caught my eye as it has been streaming through my tweetdeck under the hashtag #tweetcracker and it takes you to a site where all is relieved- it's a cross promotion with Samsung and Intel the idea is beautifully simple just log on using your Twitter handle tweet the correct code to disarm the lasers, bust the safe and win what's inside: 10K worth of gold and a Series 9 notebook, and as they say: the only thing that is stopping you are evil lasers and a lucky tweet, lovely work, I also love the video where we see a fit looking looking James Bond leather clad women place the prize in the safe, and arm the lasers, great promo and great fun, a great way to use Twitter as a promo platform site here