A print for the creative industry.

i10 has released this limited edition 420 x 594 canvass print of a parody from the iconic 'Keep Calm and Carry On' wartime poster. The print is backed on sturdy hardboard and is ready to hang on any anxious adman's wall or office. The prints are available online at £29.99 each.

Essentially the print is a reflection of creative agencies in this economic 'creative crunch', where agencies are beginning to panic at the loss of blue-chip clients, or parent companies begin to implement recruitment 'freezes'. If an agency does not hire during this recession...its competitors will snap up the latest talent instead.

Vintage Cool

As history always repeats itself, so too does fashion and the trends that accompany it. ’Retro cool’ is highly appealing as consumers become weary of the current generic choice of consumer goods, and nostalgia can hit a culture for a certain period of time before becoming saturated and eventually superseded by the next trend. One element of retro cool I am currently interested in is the collection of vintage radios…but I don’t know why (but I’m sure playing Fallout 3 has something to do with it). There is also a subculture of people who buy and restore these relics of a bygone age.

To me, these radios represent a lost era in mass communication, a time when radio was THE most popular media for mass communication, and all completely analogue. Today nearly every method of communication is digitised and solid state devices are shrinking in size (and doubling in power according to Moore’s Law). These vintage radios are huge in comparison, filled with glass tubes, transistors and large obsolete batteries (even the ‘portable’ ones). There’s something humbling about this though, they feel weighty, valuable, solid and dependable. They have stood the test of time, and still have an element of ‘cool’ about them. I can already imagine the Miles Davis tracks flowing from the speakers...

Fallout 3 in the real world.

I am a huge fan of the Fallout franchise and think that Bethesda have done a wonderful job in breathing new life into this once cherished game. There is a huge fan-following of the game quite simply because not only is the game stylistically beautiful (envisioning a post-apocalyptic 1950's dystopia of the future), but the in-depth storyline and massive level sizes (on par with that of GTA4) make this game an explorers paradise.

Getting hold of 'swag' and other related items is EXTREMELY difficult as most of the games launch was concentrated in the US (some promotional items have sold for over £490 on eBay). In light of this, I wanted to create my own swag, namely the infamous 'Mentats' and 'Buffout' health items. Below is what I came up with...

The in-game items

The real world versions!

Vaultboy approves
Buffout!
Mentats!
In the stores now!
The advertising
More advertising
Mentats on TV

There are other such real-world items on the web including this guys Nuka Cola label, and a Pipboy. As nerdy as this all appears, it shows a passion for something that transcends the realm of an idea's original media, from digital into sold state and demonstrates a truly effective piece of branding where demand exceeds supply (and the brand survives longer through the continuous UGC created). Well done Bethesda and Interplay!

i10 is now on YouTube.

i10 will now be postig some of its motion graphic work on Youtube. Stay tuned!

Already posted....MAN....GTA4 Spoof....The Gingerbread Man

Work tweaks: Man + Epic

I've tweaked the MAN film a little in the audio, something I've been meaning to do for a while now. Leave a comment if you like the film, I know I do. The original post is here. For those who haven't seen the earlier post, MAN was a micro-project last year to create a short picture show that taps into emotion using very powerful imagery in a bid to get people to broaden their thinking scope about humankind and all the terrible power we wield as a species, and have subsequently demonstrated throughout the ages of man.