DigitalCuppa

In the latest in their series of Future Vision videos (see the one from 2009 here and the whole channel here) Microsoft again provide their take on how technology will progress and help us in day-to-day tasks in the coming years.

If one thing is clear in these videos, it’s that there will be a screen on every… single… thing… you interact with in the future – better start investing in some touch screen tech companies now! But as someone that remembers rotary phones and re-tuning a TV with a little plastic stick (kids have it so easy these days) there is no doubt that before I’m old enough to get left behind, these sort of devices will exist.

The interesting thing about this though, is that while I don’t doubt there is a problem with this from a technology point of view, the major stumbling block will be data. The gadgets in this video can only be applied and personalised if data is shared freely. Data sharing online has gone from non-existent to common place in the space of just a few years so I don’t doubt that it can progress too, but don’t forget that all nations are not as accepting as the British and Americans. Germany is one of the strictest nations, with EA coming under fire just this week for the T&Cs on their Origin service, needed to play Battlefield 3 (brief summary here). While there are indications younger Germans are more accepting of data sharing, something that we’ll see worldwide in the new generation, there are still hurdles to overcome. I mean, if the EU is handing down muddled, confusing and unrealistic on cookies in advertising and site analytics then my hopes are not actually that high for a life like in this video.

Via DigitalBuzzBlog

I highly recommend following the W+K blog, Welcome to Optimism, to anyone that doesn’t already because they include some treats on there. Like this incredible video.

Projecting mapping, only owning to the sheer volume of projects I’ve seen over the last 18 months, has become a little stale. However, innovation like this, where images are projected onto a mist of water inject new energy into the stunt. Skip to about a minute in to get to the action.

Only criticism – would have liked it to be longer.

Two things that are being increasingly exploited on YouTube for entertainment and advertising purposes are annotations and using the number keys to jump to certain points in the video. The former has possibly been best showcased in the Time To Spy videos from McDonald’s, but also to a less impressive degree (but still very innovative at the time) by Samsung and the COI in an anti knife crime campaign.

However, campaigns using the numbers on your keyboard to control videos are far less impressive, as in the example from Audi above. In this, you control the driver using keys 1-9, which gets the driver to perform an action. Those thrilling actions include, turning left, turning right and even going through a chicane!!! From the top comments, looks like other users are about as amazed at this as I am.

Other examples have cropped up from Sprite and Lynx (the latter supposedly being NSFW), below:

Sprite Zero Skate ‘n’ Splash

Lynx – Hot news girl gets job done… (you need to hit 5 7 3 8 to get the “Lynx Effect” on this one)

Let me know if you think otherwise, but these just don’t work. The Lynx (or AXE for our non-UK friends) video is obviously intended to make it look like the girl is giving the guy  a blowjob and that you can control this (sure teenage boys will be throwing away their porn for this right now). But instead you just get an earful of messed up audio and a few jerky motions. And the Sprite example, well, I challenge you to even crack a smile and try more than 3 tricks before you punch your monitor out of boredom.

This mechanic works will as a 1 minute time killer and has been used for a while on things like interactive YouTube keyboards and drums, and those have a ton of hits and a load of likes. But these aren’t representing a brand and trying to convey a message.  They are made cheaply and quickly to show off a use of a YouTube feature that probably wasn’t planned. Trying to crowbar a brand into them simply doesn’t work, at least in these examples.

Sadly, this is a result of a problem far too common within the industry, which is “innovation” for innovation’s sake. Innovative campaigns only works if they still addresses a brand’s key aims and challenges. And even if you’re going to ignore that, which gives you a much wider scope for creativity, you had better at least produce something that people are going to like, engage with for more than 5 seconds and want to share.

Face Substitution from Kyle McDonald on Vimeo.

Well, I’m officially freaked out!

Using programs and plug-ins on opensource platform Openframeworks, Kyle McDonald (in the above video), Arturo Castro and Kevin Atkinson (source) have developed a way of layering faces from images, onto your face on the feed of a webcam.

This delivers some surprisingly well meshed “masks” and while some are just downright creepy (Michael Jackson!) the ability to alter the face so well, with the tracking of facial expressions and a mouth opening, is extremely impressive. It seems like only yesterday that I was amazed by the Transformers AR face tracking but it goes to show how quickly this technology is developing.

Applications for this are really not difficult to think of, the first that springs to my mind being gaming. Developments like the Kinect Avatar, have been designed to make you feel like you are in the game, although this would be perfect for making you more like the hero in the game, something that would be much more applicable in FPS games (don’t think shooting the faces of real people is that acceptable right now!).

Thanks to Duncan Child for the share

This is pretty awful by anyone’s standards. I’m almost loathed to share it. However, I suffered through all 18 seconds so I think it’s only right you do too.

If you can’t bear to watch it, it’s an advert for Wonderful Pistachios nuts featuring Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss. Clearly their money grabbing antics will never cease.

The RNBI (Royal National Institute of Blind People) released this video back in March to mark World Book Day.

There’s not a whole lot to say about it, apart from it’s hard hitting, conveys its message both beautifully and tragically, and will probably make you feel pretty down for a while.

Great work, for an extremely worthy cause.

Stan James may have adopted a slightly different advertising approach to most of their competitors, if this poster is anything to go by.

Instead of trying to convey why Stan James is the place you want to be spending your pennies (you know, by promoting a USP or offer!?) they instead are going after the classic market of gamblers that don’t know how gambling work.

Throw into the mix an image of bloody great big phone, a QR code (ticking off those mandatory boxes on the brief!), some copy about mobile that doesn’t relate to the main focus of the ad and you’re done!

I’d argue that if the person reading the ad doesn’t quite grasp the basic concept of gambling/fractions, they sure aren’t going to know what a QR code is.

Similarly bad poster from the same pub

Reddit is a wonderful community. It can make you laugh, cry or both. And with its huge range of interest communities and a open platform, collaboration and inspiration can combine so that little projects like this emerge too.

With some website development and chopping up of audio, you can now have Old Spice Guy (Isaiah Mustafa, not “Fabio” of course) as your voicemail message. All it takes is the ticking of a couple of boxes and boom. Check out mine (with fake phone number of course) here or produce your own.

Nokia continue to show off the camera on their phones with this, the world’s largest stop animation video, from W+K (I know, them AGAIN!).

This follows on from the winner of the Nokia Shots competition, Splitscreen: A Love Story, which is also just wonderful.

Splitscreen: A Love Story from JW Griffiths on Vimeo.

See the behind the scenes of Gulp here.

Gulp. The making of. from Nokia HD on Vimeo.

Sometimes I feel I should just call this blog “Here’s some more stuff that W+K have done” at the rate that I want to include their work.

This time they introduced Human Twitter, where tweets to the hashtag #humantwitter could be spelled out by some willing participants, at this year’s X-Games.

And who did they do this for? No one. Just because they wanted to/can.

Lucky bastards.

Via mashable