Visiting Designer Liad Baniel

Designer Laid Baniel made a great presentation last week on branding and the kind of questions we need to ask ourselves. He presented some of his favorite designer's work— which was quite impressive. As my project was a bit behind schedule I, unfortunately, had nothing of any significance for criticism. I was a bit disappointed that his presentation didn't included and digital branding, as that is the thrust of the class. I went home, logged onto lynda.com and spent the majority of the night going through tutorials — and actually made some headway. Laid did leave us with a great list of inspirational websites. Thanks much, Liad.

marketing video — styleframes

A little behind schedule, but here are my styleframes, still in progress. I've started editing the video, for which i hope to use a stroboscopic effect. the basic concept is using a heads up display, the rider can have real-time feedback as to where he is in the course, where the other riders are; the time and date for recording; a time from when the run started; heart/pulse and whatever else makes sense. the second images is in development. the end will fade into the new name/logo. stay tuned. more to come

A Different take on Augmented Reality

In casting around trying to stimulate some ideas for our marketing brand platform, I ran across a slightly different direction. I thought it fun.

Making Ads that Whisper to the Brain or Brainwashing for the Masses

An article in today’s Times talks about the high art of neuromarketing. This breed believes that traditional market surveys and focus groups are inaccurate because participants can never articulate the unconscious impressions of attraction and repulsion. Volunteers for the think tank NeuroFocus don fabric caps with EEG sensors and eyetracking devices while watching TV commercials that measure neuro stimlation.

“By measuring brain waves, we are able to measure attention, emotion and memory,” says Dr. Pradeep, who holds a Ph.D. in engineering. “We basically compute the deep subconscious response to stimuli.”

Before laughing too hard consider some of the organizations who are taking this all very seriously: Google, CBS, Disney, Frito-Lay and A & E Television, as well as some political campaigns — even Neilson has invested in NeuroFocus, raising their credibility ratings.

Mayhem or a magic bullet, you decide.

Crystalizing theAugmented Reality Brand Platform

To summarize the direction of the Augmented Reality Brand Platform.

Theme.
A distilled explanation of concept is that Augmented Reality is the ability to superimpose meta data and sensory enhancements over a real world environment in real time. More simply, it means having access to the planet's knowledge base wherever you are, and whenever you need it.

The colorboard.
The image and color choices were deliberate and intended to evoke associations of financially stablity, advanced technology, cutting edge, best-of-breed, innovative, global knowledge on a personal level.

Soundscape.
The thoughts were to give the impression of something well orchestrated — maturing and coming of age of a technology — achieving synchronicity, arriving, release (easing), upbeat and positive.

Feedback from AR ning network.
Most guests 'got it' and had some degree of enthusiasm about its possibilities. Almost everyone took the time to think of an application that would enhance their lives. Nobody seemed terribly concerned about AR further diminishing their social interaction — i.e. your iphone taking over your life (though not sure i'm convinced, seems anything can become an addiction). Through the types of applications my guests suggested, I was able determine enabling technologies (existing and emerging) that would/are needed to make the apps functional. By the nature of applications and technologies, one could see the industries (companies) that would profit through industry growth — as well as looking under the hood of the web at infrastructure and thinking about how it's financed.

Improved Reality?

This idea definitely has a lot of merit in my mind....

Augmented — already

Many people equate future thinking with making more stuff. Much of what will be coming down the pike will be playing on platforms already established. Some new technologies will require new devices, but much is already available on smart phones... apps can simply be plug 'n play.