The client has spoken and as much as I would love to argue the gray lines between sinister and devilish and your average MMO gamer. I have changed the Intermax graphic. I have moved him to a human form although I loved the green impish avatar-esk projection of his inner id. This new refection of the gamer guy has no ears that could be mistaken as horns but retains the 3 day without sleep, focused intent that is the calling card of pixel driven excess. I added bed head and a slightly befuddled expression to further drive us away from “devilish.” They are still in love with the graphics and are talking viral sticker and posters giveaways at the local county fair they are attending. I am making a very large 3 foot by 8 foot banner show banner for them also featuring the graphics.

While this ad is not the best example of this, I thought it relatively effective. It is a newspaper ad for Intermax Networks. Rather than using a half-toned picture or a figurative illustration (both of which when published on newsprint can be iffy) I used a graphic that is typographically based to convey the idea and frustration of waiting. A very simple and direct method for reflecting the differences in broadband speeds.

(Gill Sans Light and Gills Sans bold were used for the typeface.)

Advertising is great. I make a pretty good living at providing new suits for fledgling products. It is a world that is constantly changing and evolving. There are new technologies, new tools and new media to exploit for the greater evil and nefarious advertising plan of global consumerism. (Stumbling into an abrupt segue) So it should not be a surprise that I would post a link here on my blog of a great example of new media greatness.

It is called Dr. Horribles Sing Along Blog.

As geeky and strange as I freely admit that I am within my closeted circle of friends, This show is just weird times ten. Therefore I love it and have bookmarked, RSS feeded, digged, and now outbound-linked it to geeky stardom. It ranks up their with my other web serial passion The Guild.

Could it be that I have a middle-age crush on Felicia Day? Pass out the pocket protectors and over clock my motherboard, I am hopeless.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming (sigh).

I am a big believer in testing ad response where ever possible. This is harder to do with branding type ads, but for your average display ad it does not take much to drop some sort of call to action into an offer. Testing not only reveals an ad’s effectiveness, but it can also be a great test for the publication you are advertising in. Case in Point; Our local newspaper. I have repeatedly tested ads of varying sizes, times, and placements in our local newspaper against the local “freebie” Nickels Worth” classified directory, (which also accepts display ads). Because the classified directory covers a broad geographical area, it claims (it’s free?) a large circulation. The newspaper numbers are a matter of record and they are comparable. The main difference is the cost. The local newspaper is 4 to 5 times the cost. What is interesting is the test results always favor the classified directory. It is a repeat winer.

Better rates, better response, more flexible contracts, and a large and apparently loyal readership. It makes a guy wonder what kind of boondoggle are the newspaper guys running.

The last sale time I was contacted by the newspaper sales rep I laid the numbers out for him and said. “tell you what. I will place the same ad on the same day and in the same proportional size per page (newspaper pages are bigger.) in both papers. If your paper gets a better response I will pay for both ads, If however the classified directory pulls better, your paper pays for both ads.”

He said “The newspaper business doesn’t work that way.”

Anyway … here is an ad for Gary Bills, DDS. He apparently does a fair amount of worker’s comp claims and knows the system well enough to seek out such business. I love the tooth ache guy. Slicing his face in half adds a little tension and the copy is straight forward and clean.

We are of course testing the ad for response rates.

I teach part time (2 sections of Illustration I & II) at the local community college. It is not exactly a philanthropic venture, and yet not really a money making deal either. I like teaching. I like the energy the students bring to class and the gig forces me to leave my cave at least once a day and interact with other humans. It is something that I do because I like it and because I can.

Most of my Fall semester students are fresh from high school and under the romantic delusion that illustration means; “Paint me a dog.” “OK. I painted you a dog” “Wonderful! here is money for painting me a dog.” Of course it rarely goes like this and having recently chronicled the creation of a simple cartoon for a web site, I thought of using this eloquent blow by blow serial as a real world teaching example. The thumbnail to the left has a large jpg you can view and if you feel so inclined, here is a pdf (the-process) for your off-line enjoyment.

My sketches are always a step between what exists inside my head and where reality lies. I sometimes have a very clear mental image that I am working from; images that include color and even expression. Sometimes it feels like the image is located in my fingertips and my mind is completely unaware of what is happening. It plays a passive role at best in these circumstances.

Then there are those times where I think I know where I am going, but am surprised by the end result. I am talking in particular about the power shopping lady. I knew where we were going, I saw the sketch, but it really didn’t “click” until I colored it and took a step back. I had imagined her in a little black dress. It came out looking like a slip or corset. My teenage son called it Madonna gear. I don’t think it is offensive, but I somewhat agree with the description.

Now the question is; is it appropriate for prime time? I think it is fun. I think it is a bit edgy. I think it will make people stop and look. All of which is good. But I definitely feel like I am walking a line in our conservative based North Idaho mores.

We will see what the client says

Yeah! The Intermax “Yes you can” campaign was approved. There was some discussion concerning the “devilish” look of the online gaming graphic. I did my best to describe the average MMORPGer and avatars and the creation/adoption of a persona outside of your RL (real life) self, and received blank stares in return. I’m afraid my geek flag was completely unfurled and snapping loudly in the wind. Oh well. They decided to trust me on this point and gave the OK for postcard test mailers.

We are printing them in gangs of four, SO I am quickly working on the first four graphics today. The cyber dating is already done. I sketched out the remainder (Media streaming, super shopping, power selling) this morning and hope to get them vectorized by this afternoon.

We opted out of doing the Dateline Diving (To catch a predator) and Pervy Porning

A new project commissioned by Stuart Advertising in Spokane, Washington features a pharmacist with a pill bottle in one hand and a gas-pump handle in the other. This was a fun gig (started Monday, finished Wednesday.) It was fun, first, because I was allowed to do the illustration and layout — which is always cool — but also because they sent me the ad copy and said “do whatever, be creative!”

So with an emphasis on simplicity, and directness I came up with the female pharmacist pump-jockey. You really can’t see it here but the background pattern is a series of pill bottles. Used on a variety of display cards and sizes From 11 x 17 to 4.5 x 7 and a 2″ x 6″ banner. Gotta love vector versatility!

Because we wanted to skew this cartoon more towards real than towards wacky, I used a piece of scrap from istockphoto. I made her younger and changed her hair. Of course there is not a lot of pictures of pharmacists with gas pump handles in their hand, so I scrubbed for a piece of scrap for that as well. I then reversed it (and altered the sketch for a left hand grip). Filled in the blanks, mapped the logo onto the bottle and name tag using Illustrator’s envelope tool and voila; Pharmacy gas gal.