In Montreal

Like Father - Like Daughter
Originally uploaded by glazerout99

We're in Montreal - where the sun is shining, The Plateau is buzzing and we have 17 apartments to see today.

We won't be seeing Hell's Angels - as 150 were arrested yesterday

We won't be as worried about cash - as I got the promise of a contract through this morning. Some things to do - but it means that I have the promise of work... and an income.

Throw in a cool apartment last night, great food, too much beer, some nice people and an upgrade on the plane and things are looking brighter

Montreal

So we're off to Montreal today, looking for houses.
I still haven't heard on my contract thing
And can't get started on my new company thing

So we're looking at houses that cost a lot less than we've been used to paying.
We shall see how that goes.

However there are some lovely looking things on our list
Plus the city seems cheaper even than Ann Arbor
We've been upgraded to first by NorthWest
The weather will be 10c and sunny
And the university is picking up the tab

We shall see just how this thing goes....

Back to life, back to reality

So yesterday I drive up to Southfield to shoot a very pregnant woman. With my camera. Obviously. Even I haven't taken to the slaughter of innocents, heaven forfend.

She was very sweet, very Russian and very determined to get exactly what she wanted.
Alas she also had very limited room to shoot in and so everything had to be shot at 19mm, just to squeeze her in.
Fun, but long

Tomorrow I'm off to Novi to interview and shoot a guy who trains Mac Genius Bar Geniuses. Again should be fun.

And then it's off to Montreal to find us a house.

Well a cheap apartment
That takes animals
Is close to a subway (metro)
And doesn't smell (hopefully)

Lots of places matched 3/4 of that... cheap may be the issue, we shall see.

DIA Again

DIA Shoot
Originally uploaded by stevenjude

Back to the DIA for the third time in 8 days

Last Sunday is was Norman Rockwell
Then Monday we shot Rodriguez there

And today it's back to check out what it has to offer; on free tickets they just sent me.

Friend arrives today.
Then maternity shoot tomorrow
And a burlesque musical take on Alice in Wonderland to close

Steve

Nothing to add

Opera House Shoot
Originally uploaded by stevenjude

Sorry that this has been so dull of late. The truth is that I don't trust myself at the moment to keep it together if I write what I feel, but know that not keeping it together isn't an option.

I'm waiting on other people to deliver on promises at the moment.
And fearing that they won't.

Which would make them 'bad people'
And leave me 'screwed'

So I'll take as deep a breath as the pain in my chest allows and try to chill.

This shot, btw, was just a 'spot' during the Opera House shoot we did a few days ago

Cross Pollination

I started a new Blog yesterday... one where I start to put the ad thoughts that I have in my head out into the ether.
This is the only time the two blogs will touch - but looking for early numbers boost




*****X**************************************X*************************************X**********************************X

More pre-amble today I’m afraid. Think of it as that little salad thing that they bring out before your main course, you didn’t ask for it but you welcome it as a sign that the steak is on its way and find yourself really rather enjoying it despite yourself.

For those of you of an impatient nature may I remind you of the mantra at many a Playboy party – “We’ll get to the models in a moment, but first Heff wants to make a little speech.”

The biggest change in planning in the time that I’ve been doing it has been the question that we ask on the brief. That’s pretty fundamental. The words haven’t changed much, but the question these days is entirely different. Back in the early 90s the toughest box on the brief to fill out was the one that ask a version of this question

“What do we expect this advertising to do to people?”

It was a tough question mainly because the answers were very limited and so you were always looking for a nuance.

The thinking was pretty simple.

If your advertising was an argument then it would Persuade them to change their behavior by delivering a killer fact. That could have been a USP ‘this is the only one that doesn’t cause anal leakage.’

This was pretty much the standard one. Our job was to argue people into submission. To come into their homes and say ‘You think that your whites are white now. You’re wrong, we’re right. Now switch.”

When writing what was called a ‘Persuasion” brief (a euphemism that I’m sure could be applied to water boarding in Gitmo today – ‘persuasion sessions’ perhaps?) the TONE box used to be very important indeed. How you argued became how you differentiated. Were you going to whip out the evidence with a flourish, or were you going to try to hide it behind some entertainment. Were you “Now with Super-Stain-Bleacher” or were you ‘You can’t get better than a Kwik Fit Fitter?” replete with jingles and funny dances.

Lots of pharmaceutical advertising is still Persuasion and USP based. Claratin makes you less sleepy than Baratin that works in two ways instead of the one way that Daratin, the fastest one works.

There were of course certain strategies that grew up around this. Jim Carroll of BBH put it very well when he talked of Cowboys and Crusaders. The big brands, he claimed, try to define all of the rational points that are relevant in the market. They tell you what you should be looking for, then claim them all as their own.

So Scottex tells us that Bathroom Tissue should be ‘Soft, Strong and Long.” – we buy their argument and their demos and they become huge.

That leaves only two strategies for smaller players.

They can abide by the rules and start to argue against one of the points – “we’re softer or stronger or longer”

Or they can try to introduce a new point of argument, convincing people that this is what’s really important. So you suddenly find brands that are “recycled” or even brands that are “prettier”

The trick here was always to try to bring the category identifiers down by claiming parity there… they’re ALL soft, strong and long – this one does all of that AND…

I still play the game of trying to spot these ads during the rare moments that I’ve not delayed my viewing of American Idol by enough to whiz past everything paid for. They tend to have a sentence that starts with “Sure….”
The second strategy that we used to try during the days of “What will this advertising do to people?” was to move beyond the rational and into the emotional. We were going to SEDUCE them. The ESP (emotional selling proposition) was a defining to 80s advertising as Thatcherism was to society (though she’d have denied its existence) – and its legacy was about as long.

The ESP led agencies to say things like “We’re not here to sell things to people, we’re here to make them want to buy”

This strategy was about FOSTERING DESIRE and everyone wanted to do it, because it meant bigger budgets, glamorous work and awards galore.

The word that acted as lube to this strategy tended to be ‘aspiration’ – we suddenly realized that we didn’t have to show our brands in relation to people’s actual lives. They didn’t have to argue that they could solve a real life problem and leave hands that did dishes as soft as your face – no, they could promise to be a gateway to a more fabulous, imagined life. One full of yachts and beaches and Yasmin Le Bon. Yes, you too could be Duran Duran.

Ask any British person between the ages of 35 and 45 to give you an example of this style of advertising and they’re very likely to show you a Bacardi cinema ad. In this a yacht serves as ‘the last bus home’ and beachside bar as ‘your local pub’ etc. and the line “If…. You’re drinking Bacardi”

There were other ways in of course – but the shift here was from winning the argument rationally to winning it by proving that you were a better gateway to a better life. It made for some great work. Instant Coffee became fodder for glossy soap-opera affairs, small cars migrated to Château in the South of France and phallic chocolate bars were consumed only by gorgeous people in bathrooms bigger than the average British house.

The really clever people managed to mix both messages. Levis advertising always took a rational point (shrink to fit, button flies, double stitched) and wrapped it in a heady mix of sex, rebellion, hormones and glamour.

‘Aspiration’ is a word still bandied about by clients but the days of the Imperial Leather family on their private jet now seem as naïve and dated as the Two Tarts in A Kitchen (there’s a cleaned up phrase) advertising of the 50s.

So the question when I started was

“What will this advertising do to people?”

These days that question has changed. We’re asking something else entirely. These days the brief asks the question

“What will people do with this communication?”

It’s a fundamental shift. And one that I think one of the big agencies summed up very nicely when a terribly bright young planner there wrote this

“For too many years we’ve been in the business of Interruption. We found content that people were interested in and we got in the way of their enjoyment. Found an article that you love, we’ll put an ad in the middle of it. Want to know what happens next on your favorite TV show, find out… after the break. Want to get information online, click to close our banner.

Well technology has changed and the age of interruption is dead.

We need to stop interrupting what people are interested in, and be what people are interested in.”

The agency loved this, put it on their website, told clients about it, wrote it on their walls, put the young planner in their ‘high potentials group’ and then laid him off during a round of cutbacks – proving that in advertising you’re only as big as your byline.

But it does sum up the change and it does explain the sudden panic around agencies regarding ‘What to do?” in this brave new world,

I’m hoping that this book can provide a clear framework for thinking about what we do when the question changes and we’re all asked

“What will people do with this communication”

Or as I like to think about it – what do we do when the soundtrack is no longer Duran Duran singing “Rio” but Lily Allen singing her diary?

Tomorrow we’ll get to the meat of that one…

Not a bad day

isight
Originally uploaded by axb500

Got up this morning and was introduced to a very cool charity for whom I want to do some work

Saw a great looking Montreal apartment and got chatting to the owner, who works for an ad agency there and seems really sweet.

Got a call from Visa people saying that my correction was complete, pick it up tomorrow.

Good workout at the gym

Then on to two photoshoots. The first at the Detroit Opera House where they opened up for us to shoot video with a woman whose dress seemed to be made of noise.

The second with a cool blind blues singer, at the D.I.A - again opened up specially for us.

Came home to find an apology from the realtor who had confused our apartment with another and described us as 'pigs' to the landlord

Then Jude came home with a gift for me - a MacBook Pro that is sexier than my ass (and I have a GREAT ass) and means that I'm no longer chained to the wall upstairs.

Good day indeed.

For those with 3mins and 48 secs to burn

This is where we live - spot the animals

Photo day today

First a few dozen of Jude snapped after watching America's Next Top Model and noticing the light coming in through a gap in the blinds...

... then to Detroit to snap some Big 4 college basketball revelry and a slice of the Pussy Cat Dolls

before coming back and putting together a sexy, at home, maternity shoot for a woman and her husband, loving some of the ideas, hoping they hire me.

Not a lot you may think - but enough to take my mind off the fact that we'd planned to be in Japan where the cherry blossom is out. Waaaaaaaahhhhhhhhh.

Fishmonger

Fishmonger of Tsukiji III
Originally uploaded by exhibitj

The guy who runs my gym is a big fan f tropical fish
He says that they're very calming

Next door to the gym is a great fishmonger

I want to put 2&2 together and have my guy at the gym pose in a yoga position in the middle of a mound of fish

I'll add the words "I find fish very calming"

I think that it's funny - now to make it happen

More Idol Ramblings

So this week American Idol did "Oh, just sing anything you want to" week. Except that they pimp'd the episode by saying "as long as it's on i-tunes" and forcing everyone to wear apple headphones during a segment where they visited Ryan 'at work." I've not had a taste this bad in my mouth since Manilla.

Anyway here's how it went...


Anoop -- "Caught Up"

Anoop really isn't the best performer. And this was just horrible. He bounced. He repeatedly flicked dandruff from his 80s jacket. He killed the beat. He killed the mood. He ought to be bottom three.

Megan -- "Turn Your Lights Down"

Megan is like a third rate, lobotomized Amy Winehouse. No shame in that, it's making money for Adele and Duffy. Trouble is that strange bird just doesn't realize it and instead grates out ice in blender vocal after ice in a blender vocal. Just nasty.


Danny Gokey -- "What Hurts The Most"

He of 'my wife is still dead' infamy resists the urge to sing 'She's Gone' and instead stomps his way over some Rascal Flatts nonsense in a way that has Paula peeling herself from her stool and the rest of world wistfully thinking 'second glass of wine time?'. Awful, shouty and he has moobs.

Allison Irehata -- "Don't Speak"

The fetal Suzi Quattro plays it safe with the song, loose with the outfit and should just scrape by.

Blind Scott -- "Just The Way You Are"

Blind Scott proves that he's contemporary by playing an old Billy Joel song, at the piano. He seems to have retired the adenoids this week, which is a good thing but really "Just the way you are"?


Matt Giraud -- "You Found Me"

Warty would be Chris Martin dry humps his Casio keyboard while belting out bad but anodyne notes to the horror of all concerned. "We keep seeing a different Matt every week" complained numerically dyslexic Kara. "And they all have warts" shouted back America


Lil Rounds -- "I Surrender"

Lil did everything the judges told her. She picked a big ballad, got all gussied up and belted it out. She looked 90, sounded bored and lost everything that anyone ever liked about her. Grow a pair girl.


Adame Lambert -- "Play That Funky Music"

Big gay tranny Meatloaf took a novelty song and added - More Novelty, throw in wobbly knees and bad skin and you have Paula warbling about Mick Jagger


Kris Allen -- "Ain't No Sunshine"
Stripped down, side mouthed singing from the man with the safety spot on Idol (last performer)....

Could it be????

Jude has been after a pink wig forever, promising me all kinds of photoshoots when one is delivered.
Alas the wig store in Montreal was permanently closed
And Ann Arbor is too worthy for fun
So I wonder where she found it?

Looking at apartments in Montreal now - it looks cheap, which is good.
Also turning down more work based partly on work permit and partly on pride.
Writing more and more and determined to get a book churned out before July.


Sold a couple of lenses today and bought a wide angle with the money. Cool.
Other than that all is quiet, all is well

Taking Its Toll....

Taken Its Toll....
Originally uploaded by Monster Academy

So while I try to tell myself that being without an income is good and remind myself how good my last summer in the park felt it seems that my body isn't getting the message...

I panic whenever I feel as though I'm having fun.. should that be allowed

My joints are all covered in eczema

My face is peeling and my eyes are raw

My back feels as though I was mistaken for Monica Seles by a Seffi Graf fan

My beard has bypassed gray and gone straight to white (a portion anyway)


I need to chill
But that would make me feel guilty

Oh for a heroin habit

More shoots

I have a couple of really cool shoots coming up and I have to say I'm getting really rather excited by the photo lark. Obviously I need to sharpen (okay get some) photoshop skills... but first I have to get photoshop.

I know that's a terrible admission... being a DSLR user without photoshop is like being a chinese chef without a wok. But hey I'm all unemployed and stuff...

Not much to say here. Still a no to London. Still not allowed to leave US and re-enter without an appointment at an embassy overseas to turn my visa letter into an actual visa. That still takes about 6 - 8 wks in total. Ciao Caribbean. Hello DeMoines.

Well ho-hum as they say in Doris Day movies

More Idol news

So it seems like Clearasil before picture and part time drag king Adam Lambert is a BIG GAY TRANNY.
Hurrah!

I've been calling him Tranny Meatloaf forever and now it seems that the boy likes his meat... hurrah and huzzah!
Of course it would have been hard for him to be any more out.
Closets lose their doors as he walks by.
But now thanks to the miracle of the interweb housewives everyone can stop voting for him - just like Jesus would have done.

This week's Idol was Motown.
Or in Adam's case "Homo-town" (geddit?)

Here's what the reprobates did...

First they went to Detroit, It was grim.
They visited "Hitsville" it was grimmer.
Smokey Robinson appeared - we checked for the Grim Reaper.

Then they sang.....

Matt Giraud did "Let's get it on" in a warty if Justin Timberlake was uglier and slightly dumpy way that had Paula panting (maybe its the girdles?) and the rest of us slightly perplexed.

Kris Allen ”How Sweet It Is” - went for the Johnny Matthis side mouth croon, lesbian shirt and equally lesbian sincerity. I've been less bored at 'let's see how long it takes granny to die" weekend parties. INexplicably the judges loved him.

Scott MacIntyre (”You Can’t Hurry Love”) sang as though somebody had dared him to 'sing nerd' - his nasal whine was almost drowned out by his attempt at Honky Tonk piano - but alas not quite. Randy thought that he was "better than that man" --- I'm beginning to think that blindness and tone deafness may be somehow linked.

Megan Joy (”For Once In My Life”) she should sing Amy Winehouse, then go home basically. Here she raced through the song, threw in a signature spasm or two, missed easy notes and tried to look 'quirky'

Anoop Desai (”Ooh, Baby, Baby.”) - the most boring version of the most boring song ever to be transmitted. Another two minutes and his mom would have killed his dad just so that she could throw herself on the pyre. Racist? No - observant.

Michael Sarver (”Ain’t Too Proud to Beg”) - Jesus may have built his oilrig and blessed his bootiful bebby durrrterrr... but if I wanted to see a fat eunuch version of Tom Jones I'd buy Englebert Humperdinkn tickets, thank you.

Lil Rounds (”Heat Wave”) - They dressed her like Tina Turner, she performed like Tina Micheals, the checkout lady at our local Costco. Smokey says she could sing the phone book, I kind wish she had. C'mon big ass, show us what you're made of.

Adam Lambert (”Tracks Of My Tears”) - Looking like a drag king, sounding like a drag mime, A-dame (tee-hee) Lambert did a 'straight' version of the song that would have made him a contender were it not for the taste his taste for cock left in the mouth of American housewives who know that BJs is a store - and a birthday one perversion and sin against Jezuz.

Danny Gokey (”Get Ready”) - His wife is still dead. That should keep him safe another couple of weeks.

Allison Iraheta (”Papa Was a Rolling Stone”) - the soon to be trailer park, drug addict lesbian showed Josh Stone what it was all about on this "never mind the verse I have a lick in the chorus" version of the old classic. Good but I have more chance of winning,

So that's it.... what next week I wonder

A no to London

So we decided against London. A few things weighing in. Visa stuff that would take a while, money stuff that would mean living frugally to really make enough for savings given the time lost to visas, and my need to be here for movers, finding a Montreal house, incorporating etc.

It seems odd being unemployed and turning down offers of interesting work with good people and six figure salaries attached... but the truth is that in the 9 weeks that I'd have been able to be there I'd not have the time to do a good job, not have the ability to fly home when I needed to and not made enough to overlook those facts.

Concentrating on getting things signed and getting back into the business of working all day now. A real shame as I'd have liked a London stint - if only to remind myself why it's not the place for me... but these things happen and you deal

Am I fat and lazy?

So I finally got the offer that I've been waiting for in from London today. And if the dollar was still only worth half a pound it would be the kind of offer that I'd be all over. But the dollar isn't worth half a pound and now I'm in a quandary.

You see the money is really good for someone living in the UK. But I wouldn't be living just in the UK. I'd still have a house and expenses (extra expenses actually) in the US. And I'd have flights. And the extra money would trigger tax on the income we get from our house.

The only way to really make it work would be for me to share a place. In Essex. Which might be an adventure. But an adventure that I thought that I'd left way behind. Long ago.

So it comes down to this. Am I prepared to abandon family for three months, to share a house, to spend time on planes in return for something to do and (if I live frugally) about an extra $10 - $15k in the bank account?

I know that most people would scream "Yes" to this. But then the situation here is complicated. And maybe I'm just too fat and lazy to actually do this. Or maybe the time could be better spent elsewhere.

Oh - and the visa people have me down as German. Pushing things back by 2 weeks. And generally buggering things up. Great.

Inching toward an agreement

I'm slowly inching my way towards an agreement that might see me in the UK for the next three months or so. What's standing in the way are the usual things agreement on money, start date and end date - but also the need for the paperwork on my new visa to arrive before I head off elsewhere. Which, from a distance, makes me seem complicated and a bit of a risk. We'll see what happens. I'm interested, but only at the right price.

Pictured is my very scruffy dog (the groomer is chock-a-block) and her less scruffy daycare fave. Velcro won't let the woman out of her sight and circles her as though she were a stray goat from the flock. No idea why they bonded - but they have so when the door opens and it's daycare days I have one very happy animal on my hands.

Looking for a quick trip within the US too. I'm thinking Miami. Jude is thinking further afield (like not in the US, not a long weekend and not somewhere that speaks English)... that will depend on the When with the UK job. And on the If I guess.

Other stuff happening too... but I can't really lay it out here yet - esp as I signed an NDA on it.

Legal

Caution
Originally uploaded by Penny Green

Well we got confirmation of our change of status... which is good and means that Jude can now work again and I can stay here as long as she does.

Well that will be the case when the paperwork lands in our mailbox. What we have right now is an e-mail saying 'approved' and instructions to wait for the paperwork.

Good news as it means that we'll be able to travel again. Again once the paperwork arrives.

Still no news on Springtime in London for me.... grrrrrr. Will give it until Thursday and then write it off as an opportunity that wasn't to be. I've uncrossed my fingers but still have an eager eye on my inbox... if that makes sense.

Anyway just a quickie today as I have calls to make and internet sites to search - as well as ex-clients to thinly disguise as members of the underworld in my new 'who knew it was a comedy?' book

My next two shoots

I have some amazing people lined up for my next two shoots...

Here's how I described the ideas at casting...


**********SHOEBOX FULL OF SECRETS*************

I'm looking to mix the look of Found Magazine with the intensity of Post Secret... and I'm looking for people willing to go there with me...

What do I mean?

Here are a couple of examples....

The model acts out a scene that's close to their own heart... one story so far is of a girl had a topless pic that her boyfriend had taken of her when they were still at boarding school. She carried it everywhere as she was terrified that it would 'get found' even if she threw it away... We're going to re-enact that image (10 years later) with her holding the pic... she then signs the image "I used to be terrified that someone would see me like this"

Have another guy who had a stash of pretty tame gay porn when he was younger... he kept it in the attic. Going to shoot him upstairs, in late 80s clothing surrounded by similar mags - he signs it"My parents will never know about this either."

It doesn't have to be sexual, it just needs to be personal.

The second is the idea that I'm really interested in

*** PUBLIC VS PERSONAL SPACE****

I have an idea for a series of images that try to capture the difference between how we all want to be perceived (especially as people who work with images) and what the rest of our lives look like.

What I'm looking to do is shoot in two parts.

The first shoot is all about capturing images of everyday life. It will be black and white and grainy and photo journalistic. We're looking for around 120 images of you going about your everyday business in the house as though there are no cameras there. Waking up, brushing your teeth, showering, throwing things in the microwave, throwing things at the TV. We capture 'real life'

We then print those images and use them to create a giant mural / montage that will act as the backdrop for the second shoot (and final image)

This mural will be around 7 feet high and 12 feet across and we'll shoot you in color, in front of it in whatever costume, make-up etc. you'd most like to be seen in.

The idea is to use our life as a backdrop for your larger than life images.

This is an idea that I'm really, really excited by. The first part is going to take some time, and some patience but the final images should be revelatory... and how often can we say that?


THE RESPONSE so far has been terrific, I love the people that are coming back to me and the stories that they want to tell.


In addition went out into the Ann Arbor sunshine today and managed to turn this innocent scene into something that has a bit of a story... fantastic. Loving life