Last week saw Dave Morris, real living Jedi Master of Advertising, run three workshops for the third year, this time all about 'human truth'.
Young Josh Dando (his impatient ways cloud his judgement) has written this for us....
"This week we were blessed once again with a Dave Morris advertising workshop. We've seen Dave twice before, and knew we were in for something special."But in my opinion and many others, this visit was extra special. The topic for this workshop was human truths. Prior to the big day we were asked to come prepared with long copy recruitment ad for one of nine unusual activities, clubs, holidays etc etc and a selection of human truths on different topics."The workshop began with us presenting our recruitment ads. Dave did his best to salvage some positives, but generally it wasn't the best start to the day! However, this all picked up when it came to reading out our truths. "The brilliant thing about human truths is their realness, their true insight into the lives of us odd little creatures. So on numerous occasions the group errupted into laughter, conversation and general banter. Favourites including: "Why do we always insist on getting the petrol bang on the price... £10.01 is a genuine disaster!? Why do we always flick through our inbox or fake a phone call in awkward situations!? Why do parents always call you the name of your brothers, sisters, pets... before getting to your actual name!? "This then lead to us considering how these truths could be placed into an advert to sell a product.A bit of backwards advertising. The outcome proved a success. For most.As well as all this the day consisted of watching TV, worshipping Dave and ad sweepstakes.What more could you ask for?Big thanks to Dave, for once again passing on his wisdom to us minions."
Third year students Pete and Ollie write:
Yesterday Fergal from
D&AD visited the third years to speak about the upcoming
Student Awards a.k.a THE BIG ONE, TICKET TO PARADISE and THE HOLY GRAIL.
The lecture was really useful: he explained how the work was judged, showed us previous winners (and why they won) and gave us a few tips on how to approach a D&AD brief, or any brief for that matter.
We all left with a feeling that it’s now time to step-up a gear and hopefully a few teams from Lincoln will receive the much-coveted pencil!
Creative Advertising students have been flexing their mental muscles over the past two weeks with the first in a series of 'Great Debates' in which CA first and second years mix to tackle the big issues in advertising at the moment.
Things kicked off last week in style with a debate on the role of ETHICS IN ADVERTISING which led very nicely onto this week's topic AIRBRUSHING & RETOUCHING. So far no students have come to actual blows but as well as getting a clearer understanding of the sides of an argument they may not have considered before they have also had a solid workout of their verbal persuasion skills.
In the New Year students will be taking things a step further in a series of competitive debates that will really test their ability to PERSUADE when they put year groups aside and compete for prizes. Which team will SELL their idea in the most effective way?
We'll update you here when we find out...
Last week the Level 2 students took a trip down to London to visit four different but equally interesting advertising agencies.
Group A visited
Karmarama in the morning and
Inferno in the afternoon whilst Group B saw
Saatchi & Saatchi X and
Touch DDB. Each agency had its own unique approach to producing work which demonstrated to us all the great variety of agencies that make up the contemporary advertising industry.
Our hosts made us all very welcome which made the trip fun as well as informative. Special thanks should go out to Ant Melder at Saatchi & Saatchi X, Tim Palmer at Inferno, Dave Buonaguidi & Arjun Singh at Karmarama and Vix Jagger at Touch DDB. Arranging visits like these in working agencies is far from easy and the work that was put into the presentations was much appreciated.
Last week the third years were given one of their toughest briefs to date. I'll let third year students James and Charley explain:
"Our brief this week was do nothing. Absoloutely nothing!"In an attempt to avoid creative burn-out the brief from Gyles and Mike was to stop advertising. Drop the whole subject. Completely. Put any creative problems out of our mind as completely as possible. The idea of this week was to turn to whatever stimulates our imagination and emotions and refuel."As part of this innovative 'detox' week, we were all booked into the local health spa (in the form of the brand new and very impressive Enterprise@Lincoln building next to the Library) for a 'Creative Detox' workshop run by Punch It Up (funded by Enterprise@Lincoln's Innovation Fund). None of us had a clue of what to expect and entered the workshop with open minds."Within minutes we were all walking around the room pointing at different things, calling a chair a dog, the window a cauliflower and the door a whale. Any inhibitions that any of us may have felt were thrown straight out of the window as we were chucked head-on into this liberating and light-hearted half-day session."We completed a range of activities hell-bent on removing, demolishing and completely obliterating any creative blocks that we had. And we did some pretty strange stuff as we sat on the floor, walked around the room, made a lot of noise, closed our eyes and stared deep into the carpet. The whole experience was SO beneficial: effectively demonstrating how each and every one of us unconsciously block and limit creativity. And how that impacts on our ideas – particularly when working collaboratively."Mandy Wheeler, the fantastically inspiring workshop leader, opened our minds and revitalised the often mechanical and methodical ways of working that we found we had inadvertently slipped into. She encouraged new ways of exploring ideas which took the form of techniques such as saying 'Yes, and...' and 'The infinite imaginary box in the floor' to effectively help push forward and develop our thoughts. The workshop made us very aware of the dangers of 'blocking' ideas and the serious limitations that can result."Many thanks for that report, James and Charley. Glad it was so worthwhile.
And THANK YOU VERY, VERY MUCH to the great people at Enterprise@Lincoln for helping us organise this innovative and pioneering event. We're now exploring the possibility of making this an annual fixture.
Now then third years, time to get back to the business of creating great ads...
Vix Jagger was one of the course's first graduates way back in 2006. After she left Lincoln she then did the MA in Creative Advertising at University College Falmouth (run by our External Examiner Chris Waite) which culminated in a D&AD Best in Show award at New Blood '07.
Vix and her copywriter partner Ric Hooley work at
Touch DDB, part of DDB London (The Gunn Report's Most Awarded agency in the World 1999-2008). Here are two very different but equally nice pieces of work they've recently done:
1. For the
Training and Development Agency for Schools (TDA) to encourage teachers to sign up to one-to-one tutoring
(ad of the week on the NMA UK):2. And a beautifully art directed ad for for ESSO OptiPlus.
I'm sure you'll agree, this is lovely, very effective work. Keep in touch Vix (and Ric!) - hope to see you back in Lincoln soon!
As posted a few weeks ago, Level 3 teams Charlotte Gibling & Vicky Daley and Pete Ioulianou & Ollie Agius were selected from hundreds of applicants to take part in the
M&C Saatchi/HYPtv 24-hour ad challenge. They were briefed on Saturday 7th November at 9am and they had to come up with an idea, write a script, film and produce it all in the space of (you guessed it) 24 hours.
Their work was judged by Alan Yentob (Creative Director of the BBC), Graham Fink (Creative Director M&C Saatchi), Peter Saville and Patrick Burgogne (editor of Creative Review).
Unfortunately, neither team were the final selected winners but here's what they thought of the experience...
Charlotte & Vicky (pictured below, mirroring each other and working hard as the other half of their team watch on):
"We spent the weekend in and around London not getting much sleep and meeting some very strange people. However, we definitely learned some interesting lessons...
Lesson 1: Do not lose the creative control eg. our film team seemed to consider 'making things look pretty' was the main priority in an advertising competition.
Lesson 2: People who do not study or work in advertising, do not understand advertising.
Lesson 3: Ask when you need help or advice as no one will volunteer the right answers.
We held our own amongst teams that were A LOT older and more experienced than us. This was an invaluable opportunity that will probably never be repeated and it has definitely toughened us up a bit. If something like this was offered to us again I would advise everyone to apply (as I know a lot of people put it off and forgot about it). In an industry that doesn't seem to have many female creatives, experience is everything."And here's Pete & Ollie (pictured below, nearest the wall):
"Got to M&C Saatchi. Used toilet. Met film team. Got briefed. Got nervous. Got enthusiastic. Met creative mentor. Impressed him with ideas. Got his contact info. Rampaged through London looking for actors. Found out Release Forms are annoying. Filmed idea. Met account director from Leo Burnett. Exchanged numbers. Had a Redbull. Uploaded film. Had a sandwich. Edited film. Panicked. Spent 4 hours getting edited film onto tape. Happy with what we produced. Didn't have time for sleep. Handed final tape in. Had McDonalds breakfast. Watched all films at ICA. Impressed by some. Not so impressed by others. Waited for judges to...judge. Didn't win. Surprised by winner. Learned a lot. Absolutely shattered. Slept. A lot."
Very well done to both teams. A great experience and you did us proud. Bravo!
Level three student Ruby writes:
"Last week level 3 students were once again treated to a workshop run by a visiting guest lecturer, this time from award winning copywriter Mike Waudby (there’s a lot of Mikes around here!). With three very intense briefs set over one very full day, it was a revitalising change of pace, in that oh-my-god-I-think-my-brain-just-melted type way. Each brief was aimed at a very specific target market: a £60,000+ Range Rover; The Dogs Trust; and Poundland – all comparative products with distinct market differences. We all benefited from revisiting the incredibly important areas of tone of voice and target markets, combined with further practice in the all important discipline of copywriting.In the process, we all came up with some pretty neat ideas to develop for our folios.Thanks to Mike for coming all the way from Cardiff. We really appreciate it."Check out his website:
www.mikewaudby.co.uk
Last week Creative Advertising staff and students launched a very exciting new blog. An organic student resource to share all manner of creative influences and stimuli, called Inspiration.
Why? Because the more information we take in, the more options we give ourselves and, ultimately, the better creative options we have to work with!
All it takes is harnessing the perspectives of 130 mildly insane Creative Advertising students... easy!
Have a look at
http://lincolncreativeadvertisinglinks.blogspot.com/Updates on this blog and the new Inspiration blog can be easily followed on Twitter:
CALincolnUniAnd you can also use the link in the Blogs List to the right of this post.
We've done it again!
The National Student Survey (NSS) 2009 results were recently published and - just like last year - BA (Hons) Creative Advertising was the best course in the whole of the University of Lincoln. A league-topping 89% of our third year completed the survey and gave a overall 'satisfaction' result of a record 98.9%. It's official, last year's third year CA students were the most satisfied students in the University! For the second year running.
The NSS is, as the name suggests, an annual national survey of final year university students asking them to score 22 questions from 1-5 about how they feel about their course (eg. 'I have received detailed comments on my work'; 'The course has helped me present myself with confidence'; 'Staff are good at explaining things') and the results are published nationally. The results at a University level are for individual courses and the published national results group courses by subject – in our case the subject area of 'Design Studies'.
'So what?' I hear you ask.
Well, it's very important for the staff team to know that the students are happy with the programme that they're on. And it's good for all of us (staff and students) to further build the programme's profile and reputation within the University.
But arguably more importantly is that it further increases the profile and reputation of the programme on a national level. And the more people that know that Lincoln is one of the the best places to study Creative Advertising the better: 'Hello, young creative. Welcome to our advertising agency. You went to Lincoln, you say? Excellent. I've heard that's a great course. Please show me your folio...'
Good news all round.
Saturday saw our busiest University Open Day yet, with a huge number of people finding out about the BA (Hons) Creative Advertising programme. Mike was based down at the main campus answering as many questions as he could and Gyles, Charley and James were on hand in the TPH studio presenting work, giving tours and helping with enquiries.
We met some very interesting prospective students (and their parents) asking some very intelligent questions about the programme, graduate employment, the curriculum and resources. In case anyone has any further questions
then complete the form here.The next Open Day is on Saturday, 21st of November. See the
Lincoln University website for more details.
Respect is due to Level 3 teams Charlotte Gibling & Vicky Daley and
Pete Ioulianou & Ollie Agius. These two team have been selected to be 2 of only 20 teams to take part in the 24-hour ad challenge for
M&C Saatchi (and HYPtv) where they will have to come up with an idea, write a script, film it and produce it all in the space of (you guessed it) 24 hours. Their work will be judged by Alan Yentob (Creative Director of the BBC), Graham Fink (Creative Director M&C Saatchi), Peter Saville and Patrick Burgogne (editor of Creative Review) to name but a few.
They will be working with a team of film students to help them shoot and produce their ads which should be a great experience for all concerned.
Very well done you guys. This was a VERY competitive selection process and you've done incredibly well in getting chosen. So the best of luck with it all, stock up on the Pro Plus, and we'll all be watching this space to see how you get on.
This morning in Screen 8 at Lincoln's Odeon, 1st and 2nd years were treated to a lecture on 'Sound in Storytelling', delivered by lecturer Justin Tagg.
Justin used the Odeon as a great backdrop to magnify the whole lecture experience whilst students listened to/watched diverse audio and visual examples ranging from Premier League football matches and Alfred Hitchcock's 'The Birds' to the way psychologists build rapport and how sound enforces the illusion of visual storytelling.
It all came together to form an incredibly entertaining picture of how all information informs the story of our world and how sound can work to improve effective communication! Or when ignored... destroy it!
At the end there was also a big round of applause for The Odeon cinema who were heavily heavily involved in the event along with specific thanks to John, the projectionist and Gordon, the manager of the Odeon.
What a brilliant event.
The second years had a lot of innovative fun in the CA studio last week. Here's a post from Adam:
"The best fun to be had with a picture of an old bald man! Beth dug up this gem of an idea from the depths of the web -> fold pictures of hard man supreme, Ross Kemp! It's a brilliant way to creatively spend 5 minutes. Hopefully more mountain-and-valley folded Mr Kemps will make themselves known by being posted on the CA studio noticeboards in due course."
Adam, 2nd Year
All of this week one of last year's Creative Advertising graduates Sarah Whittaker (real name 'Spadge') has been a living piece of art for Damien Hirst. Here's what she says:
"This week me and my twin sister Rosie sat in the Tate Modern as part of Damien Hirst's part in the PopLife exhibition. We had to sit beneath two spot paintings (1992), dressed the same, and doing the same thing for four hours at a time. We had three shifts, which doesn't sound like a lot of hours, but it sure feels longer when people are constantly staring at you!
We were allowed to be ourselves and talk to each other, as well as to the public, which was a good job because everyone had a million questions for us! The most common being 'how long do you have to sit here for?!' and 'how much is he paying you!?' The answer to the latter is £7.50 an hour! So we've made £90 each from this amazing experience!
It was one of the scariest but most interesting things I've ever done! The most interesting thing I overheard from an onlooker was 'it's so strange having the artwork stare back'. The experience has helped my confidence no end, but I wouldn't do it again." Spadge x x
Last night level 3 (and others) had a party. A 'tie' party. It was, by all accounts, a great success. This was confirmed by the rather quiet work-in-progress reviews this morning with Gyles and Mike. We have never seen so many bottles of water accompanying ideas sheets!
A post from Ruby from level 3:
"Our first treat back as 3rd years, was a visit by Advertising legend Dave Morris, and in three groups, over three days we took part in intensive 1-day lecture/seminars. With the help of Sun Tzu’s The Art of War, and bribery (we all put a pound into a prize fund) he enticed us into selling the impossible.
Some of the subjects we had to promote were:
- Get men to wear cosmetics?
- Encourage Parents to smack their kids?
- Promote abstaining from sex until you’re 18?
- Encourage young people not to go to University.
No problem! A one minute presentation from each of us was followed by a discussion and critique of our work.
All this was interspersed with presentations from Dave, including a follow-up to one he gave last year on the ‘Creative Pyramid’, and an exercise in strategy with some great examples from past and present campaigns. At 5 o’clock Dave perked us up with the reminder that a pair of us would soon become £18 richer [the ‘put a pound in’ prize fund].
A vote cast on our reworked ideas, which saw a team from each of the three groups go away with the prize money and their colleagues esteem!"
Ruby, Ruby, Ruby, Ruby - Level 3
It is with great sadness that, during the process of setting this up, we've discovered that
ScampBlog is no more (since June). One of the best creative advertising blogs in the industry, it was particularly useful for students and new creatives. It was written by Simon Veksner at BBH and became essential reading for students and graduates looking for a place to engage with the industry and fellow young creatives. Thank you SO much for the last 3 years Simon (707 posts) - I really hope that we don't have to wait too long for a blog to take its place that is as insightful, useful and energetic.
Even though it is no longer 'live', but still online, I would encourage all of you to have a good trawl of its content. There's a huge amount of very good advice here. It's not all bad news though: according to the last post much of Scamp's content is going to be published in a book next year. This promises to be very useful. Can't wait, Simon...
RIP Scamp - you will be fondly remembered.
Check out this link to catch-up with Mike & Phil who graduated from here in 2008 and are currently on placement at 'agency-of-the-year' Wieden+Kennedy. Well done guys, keep flying the flag... It's also well worth checking out their very entertaining and informative blog >>
http://mikeandphil.blogspot.com/
Yesterday saw the first University of Lincoln Open Day for this academic year. It was great to meet so many people and chat about the CA course. It was pretty busy actually and Mike and I had some good conversations with prospective students (and their parents!) considering doing the Creative Advertising course next year, answering all their questions and showing them around. Nice to meet you all - hope to see you again at interview!
Many thanks must go to students Charley, James and Elliot for all their help giving tours around TPH, answering questions and showing past student work. As usual, very much appreciated.
The next open day is Saturday 31st October. We'll be wearing our costumes for a Halloween special (or not)!! See the
Lincoln University website for more details.
Mike Belton - Programme Leader - mbelton@lincoln.ac.uk
Justin Tagg - Senior Lecturer - jtagg@lincoln.ac.uk
David Thompson - Lecturer - dthompson@lincoln.ac.uk