so who needs an ad agency anyway?

street habit

i have this weird habit of paying attention to practically everything on the street. which sometimes translates into the more weird habit of observing all sorts of stains, asphalt deviations, shadows and so on in order to make something out of them. i somehow consider this to be a good exercise for my imagination, even though i sometimes get carried away and reach quite outrageous associations. but, after all, this can be regarded as a form of street art itself, can't it? or maybe, better said, street's art?

oldies, but goodies

Internet at my office works awfully, if at all, blogger works awfully, so i've been using the traditional pencil/notebook method a lot lately. Anyway, three bits of news that i was willing to post for a while.

first: some time ago, i learnt from Stefan Liute that Grapefruit finally came to Bucharest as well, about two streets away from where i work. I'm really glad and i wish the guys there good luck.

second, Biz brought daily Dilbert comics in Romania(n), which seemed like a cute initiative to me, since i've been a fan of these comics for a while now. However, only recently have i started to read the Dilbert.blog by Scott Adams, which i find entertaining in the sense in which words and pictures is entertaining.

and finally, third goody, Audiovisual #03 at the Czech center: Famu animations to be presented on the 30th of March. must-go!

about other sorts of details

again, some posting on details. The thing i adore about "The tipping point" is that it presents all sorts of psychological experiments, habit probably derived from Malcolm Gladwell's admitted obsession for psychology. One of these experiments particularly caught my attention because it immediately made me think about some recent TV commercials. A large group of students were recruited for what they were told to be a market research study by a company developing high-tech headphones. Each of them was given a headset and was required to listen to various tracks, dance and move their heads up and down, presumably in order for the company to see how well they worked when the listener was in motion. But there another flick involved, and that was the actual purpose of the experiment. The students also heard a radio editorial arguing that tuition at their university should increase from the current level of $587 to $750. A third of the participants in the experiment were previously asked to nod their heads up and down vigorously when they would hear the radio editorial, another third were instructed to shake their heads from side to side and, finally, the last third was told to stand still. At the end of the test, the students were required to fill in a questionnaire that slipped the question: ”What do you feel would be an appropriate dollar amount for undergraduate tuition per year?”. The students who kept their heads still were unimpressed by the editorial – they indicated something like $582, which was pretty much the same level with the current level. Those who shook their heads from side to side wanted tuition to fall to a level of $467, thus reacting negatively to the increase proposal in the editorial. On the other hand, those who nodded their heads up and down agreed with the proposal in the editorial and suggested an increase of the tuition, even though it meant giving money out of their own pockets. For further details, consult the book directly.

But among others, one of the conclusions of this experiment, as expressed by Gary Wells of the University of Missouri was that “television advertisements would be most effective if the visual display created repetitive vertical movement of the television viewers’ heads.” If we extrapolate, that might mean that television advertisements are less effective if the visual display creates repetitive horizontal movements equal to nodding from side to side in disagreement.

And that made me think about some recent Ariel (please correct me if I’m wrong about the brand) commercials, which consisted of people moving their heads from side to side in order to follow various objects (like a tennis ball etc). I just wonder if and how the results of the previously quoted experiments apply.

now, i am not a psychology or manipulation freak, who only believes in and spots all sorts of subliminal techniques and all that, although i do not dismiss them either. What i do strongly believe in (in case this blog hasn't already made it obvious), however, is that "Little things can make as much of a difference as big things" and that "the subtle circumstances surrounding how we say things may matter more than what we say". Which might mean, as Gladwell further puts it, that "simple physical movements and observations can have a profound effect on how we feel and think", because "Persuasion often works in ways that we do not appreciate. It’s not that smiles and nods are subliminal messages, it’s just that they are incredibly subtle."

sunday

i finally got round to visit Marcel Chirnoaga's exhibition at the Bucharest History Museum (i'm making the name up, forgive my ignorance). The exhibited works included pieces from The ship of mad, The labyrinth, The apocalypse, The virtues and the vices and not only and was totally worth my Sunday morning. My favourite work was "Mass Media", but unfortunately i couldn't find its picture and i couldn't take its photo in the museum either. Next stop: Galeria noua, to see CĂLIN DAN - Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue.

dailyphobia

this is what i see daily when entering my office. honestly, it freaks me each time i look at it.

fudge factory comics

Fudge Factory Comics style.

border-line surrealism

You lose 1/3 of your life sleeping. time to wake up

These ads were developed by Leo Burnett Lisbon for Heredia coffee. Their message -"You lose 1/3 of your life sleeping. time to wake up."- is transmitted by presenting people long lists of books they've likely never read, although they should have, or places they've likely never been to, although they should have. Which i liked. It reminded me of Jonathan Coe's "House of Sleep". With a special dedication to my sister. via adrants.

"but if u want, touch"

on wireless wizard remote control and other wizards, clearly explained to everybody, and i mean every single body, check out this RCA Colour Television vintage ad from 1961 (on the site until i manage to get fixed some errors which don't allow me to post the video here directly). other vintage commercials here.

a regular day

yesterday we had the presentation for the last pitch of the horrid period we've had lately, so we finally have some days for relaxation. i'm not sure enough relaxation would occur these days anyway, but i am trying. so this post is in accordance with my willingness to relax. ok, i'd better shut up now.

as i was walking with alex, i caught a glimpse of these lines posted on a wall between all sorts of stencils and graffiti. i liked them because they seemed to actually bear a story. i don't know anything about it, i haven't gt the slightest idea how they ended up there, but i simply appreciated their story potential.

then i had a weird lemonde in Green Hours. it was weird cause it contained far more curacao (or something) juice than lemon juice, which made the term "lemonade" the waiter used quite overpromissing.

parks are really sad when there's practically nobody around. children's playgrounds without children giggling seemed lonely in the "loneliness of the long-distance runner" sense. it that makes any sense.

and i noticed this on Eminescu, as i was heading to the office.

the best part of the day however, was that i bought myself some great books, and i found some new interesting comics, and i also found some video tapes featuring Rahan and Tintin. Enough for now, more posting will come as i actually start reading the books.

somewhere over the rainbow

this week's "Masterpiece" discussed the story of the famous "Somewhere over the rainbow", first sung by Judy Garland in "The wizard of Oz", when she was just 16. Apart from the impressive way the song is shown to have been composed, by lyricist Yip Harburg and composer Harold Arlen, the broadcast also analyzes the incredible experience provided by the performance of this number at one of a Judy Garland fighting laryngitis during one of her last concerts. As well as the differences between the song versions sung by Garland when she was in her 16s and in her 40s.

The fact that i liked the most is the explanation of the song. It seems that the movie script included the word "grey" for many times in a few pages, in the description of Dorothy's life at the Auntie Em's farm. Now, for those of you who didn't watch the movie or fail to remember the detail, all images introducing Dorothy in Kansas are sepia-coloured. And this lead the composer t the conclusion that the only colours in Dorothy's life were those of the rainbow, if grey surrounded her so intensely. Therefore, it was only natural for her to imagine this wonderful alternative where "the dreams that you dare to dream really do come true" and "where troubles melt like lemondrops", that is "somewhere over the rainbow".

about details

Russell wrote yet another great post about planning. Nothing new, nothing out of the ordinary, since he keeps on doing that. But i'm going to use his words as a pretext, for some things i was excited to find out. Anyway. He says: "Planning is about the density of ideas, the number of ideas, not the quality of ideas. Or at least my version is. (Kind of. Because I think density gets you quality.) And being open to media, or to people, this is why I like cafes, always half-listening, is a crucial source of idea density." The thing is that i simply love doing this. I am crazy about learning something all the time, no matter where i am or how busy i am. I always seem to grab a piece of information or of inspiration, by keeping my mind alert and open all the time; and then, i don't know how this happens, i must be really lucky, but connections appear, like i always connect pieces of a puzzle.

Example: in order to write a few words about "Taxi Driver" on my movie blog, i was reading yesterday the review on filmsite.org. And i came across the following phrase: "A memorable lamenting saxophone score by Bernard Herrmann (his last) accompanies the film. [He provided some of cinema's best-known musical accompaniments, for such films as Alfred Hitchcock's well-known Vertigo (1958), North by Northwest (1959), and Psycho (1960), and for Orson Welles' Citizen Kane (1941) and The Magnificent Ambersons (1942).] " This appealed to me, since i really appreciated Taxi Driver's soundtrack, not to mention the soundtrack of the other movies listed. I was happy to find out they were the hand of the same person. Especially since i am a great fan of the shower scene, which i consider fantastically achieved from all points of view, especially musically speaking. And then, last night, while i was returning from work, i was listening to a BBC broadcast and they played precisely the shower scene music, saying that the violin sound it involved was a complete inovation from the great Bernard Herrmann. Here's how Wikipedia mentions it: "Herrmann's most recognizable music is from another Hitchcock film, Psycho, specifically the shower scene music. The screeching violin music heard during the scene (a scene which Hitchcock originally suggested have no music at all) is one of the most famous moments from all film scores."

I love details. I always have. And i love planning for allowing me to use all the skills i can.

in case of fire

these instructions were on my door in a Predeal hotel. For some reason, i felt the need to share them.

yet another planner credo

i am currently reading "the tipping point" and i am quite fascinated by the book, but until i finish it and become able to state some personal comments, i wanted to quote Jacques Audiard (yes, i did watch De battre mon coeur s'est arrêté ), when saying: "In essence, my work brings a plus of realism and eliminates the classical story in which you accept the conventions, but don't actually manage to identify yourself with the characters".