Advertising: Evaluation

Advertising cutlery:
The outcome for this project was one A4 advertisement. I decided to go with my first idea of having a 'silver service' cutlery layout.  The layout of the cutlery I had imagined wasn't the full set up with all the forks, knives and drinking glasses, I wanted two forks, two knives and two spoons in my photograph and a plate to be placed in the middle.  
As silver service layout includes forks on one side of the plate with knives on the other but I had decided to lay them out differently. I placed the ribbons on the cutlery to make bows and then placed fork with the knife and did the same with the other set so the were symmetrical of each side and then I placed the spoon above the plate and below the plate.
When I was looking back on my photographs I noticed reflections from the light on the spoons and I had burnt out the edges of the cutlery so I had to reshoot my cutlery but I tried it without the spoons so that there was no reflections and moved my lights further back. 
Without the spoons I didn't think my photograph was as good so when I was editing I had made a bow from the ribbon on the spoon from a previous photograph. I then placed the bows above the plate and below and cropped them into square and oblong format.

I had also decided to keep this photograph for an advertisement because when I was in the studio and packing away my cutlery I placed them onto the plate to put them away easier and decided that I wanted to photograph it as the composition was simple but elegant.
When I was preparing my shot by tying the ribbon onto the cutlery I hadn't made sure all the bows were perfect and this affected my photographs as it would have been nicer if they were so they projected the idea of elegance. 
When I was designing my template in Indesign I had planned the text before taking the picture so when I went to insert my image it didn't fit the whole A4 size due to my cropping. I thought this was better for my advertisements because I had chosen a grey background to match the colour of the cutlery as well as the text, at the time it was unintentional but looking back on my advertisements all the colours work together.
Overall I think my advertisements are effective because they portray my idea which was elegant cutlery for fine dining.

Advertising biscuits:

When we had to come up with ideas for a Mcvities biscuit advertisement I had many ideas that I didn't know which one to choose. I had an idea to show how they are the number one choice by having a trophy in the photograph or another idea with maybe an animal with the biscuits showing how not only people like them.  

I decided not to go ahead with these ideas as there would have been a lot of post production work included and it might have looked fake.

I went ahead with my idea of showing how the Mcvities is the best. I wanted to do this by having different branded biscuits laid out and the Mcvities biscuit elevated on top of something to show that it is bigger and better. 

When I was shooting my idea I found that there was so many layouts for the other biscuits. At first I pictured just 4 other biscuits around the digestive but the shot looked awkward in composition, so I tried more biscuits within my shot to see how that worked and it looked better. Then the issue was the layout of those biscuits surrounding the digestive as the bourbon biscuit was prominent in colour and shape (being a rectangle). I had put all the biscuits onto a white card in the studio as this helped to keep the biscuits in place without them moving and so that the background was clean and white. 

When I was editing my image to add the slogan and was unhappy with the other branded biscuits taking the focus away from the Mcvities so with help from a teacher I managed to separate the other biscuits from the digestive and change the opacity of the layer so that the focus was the Mcvities.

I was very pleased with the outcome of this advertisement as it looks professional due to the lighting and the shot as well as the editing technique.

Advertising plastic cups:

When I was given the options of which products to advertise I immediately wanted to choose plastic cups as they seemed like the most fun option. We had to come up with 3 different media outcomes. I had decided to have a magazine page, a billboard and a web banner. 

When it came to brainstorming I wanted to show how versatile plastic cups are. I came up with an idea to have various drinks inside the cups to show that for any drink you can use plastic cups but I felt this idea was too serious and boring so I wanted to come up with a more fun and interesting idea. 

After examining the appearance of the cup from different angles, for fun I put the cup on top of my head and thought of having the plastic cup as a party hat. Following my brainstorm I started thinking of games that could include plastic cups such as ball and cup, 3 cups and one ball and cup phones. 

I decided to go ahead with photographing my ideas and for my first shoot I wasn't focusing on the background or having a white background. I was pleased with how my images had turned out but for the next photo shoot I would have to think more about my lighting and the background. 

We all had to critique our work and from the critique my work was suggested that it would work better if it was aimed at children and relate to take them back to childhood games. 

When I went to reshoot all my idea's the quality of the images wasn't acceptable and I was miserable with what I had photographed so I wanted to get into the studio as quick as I could and reshoot. When I had re shot my photographs I was pleased that they had finally gone as planned but I had so much trouble trying to light my background so it was white with no hotspots that I decided to keep a grey background. 

The next stage was to plan my text and logo. Deciding on a font was very easy as I had picked a test font called 'kiddish'. As I had quite a grey/ black scheme to my work I decided to have my font in white colour but it wasn't well visible to the grey background so I then tried a black text and although it was visible I couldn't decided which colour worked best. I then decided to copy the text and have a layer for white and black and merge them and have the white text as the shadow to the black text. I think this made the text more fun and more childlike because it's similar to children drawing letters such as bubble writing. 

I am very pleased with the advertising outcomes because it was fun to have different media outcomes and choosing an unbranded product of our own to photograph. 

I think my adverts do communicate 'fun' and are aimed at children to relate to the classic childhood games, because now children's games are electrical, but also to mothers because they buy toys for their children. 

Advertising Final

For our final advertising project we have been given 6 unbranded products. We have to choose one and advertise that and produce 3 sets of different media outcomes. 
The products are: 

• Bin liners
• Paper clips
• Plastic cups
• Polystyrene boxes
• Black or white socks
• Dish cloths.

From the six items plastic cups seemed to appeal to me more than the others, so I decided to choose that. 

I wanted to show how the cups are versatile so my first thought was to have different drinks inside them such as tea or coffee. I was thinking of how my layout would look with having the four pictures included in one poster.
I then decided to try a different idea where it would show how boring plastic cups can be fun and interesting. I thought about games or activities that could include cups.
I found that there were many activities that could include plastic cups but these were the ones I chose: Cup phones, ball and cup, 3 cups hiding a ball and having a cup as a party hat. I thought these would be most effective to advertise the plastic cup. 

I did try and come up with idea's for other products but they weren't as strong as my ideas for plastic cups. 

RESEARCH into plastic cups advertisements:

This is an advertisement for plastic nose surgery. They have used plastic cups because its the best resource to use because its an everyday product used by millions of people who buy from coffee places who agree to let companies advertise on their cups.  

Another reason why companies are advertising on plastic cups and not used on mugs or other home appliances is because no one would buy a mug if it was advertising a product on it.

I also found another advertisement that used plastic cups to promote a product. This advert is for Wrigleys extra ice chewing gum. This advert shows the starbucks coffee cup in their advertisement as Wrigleys and starbucks have collaberated to promote each other.  'Extra professional white' is the wrigleys new slogan for their chewing gum and in their new advert for 'eat, drink chew' the person is saying goodbye to lingering food by eating the gum so by joining with starbucks the message is you can still drink coffee and have brilliant white teeth.

This advertisement is for sharpie pens but plastic cups have been used as a canvas to show off the ability of their pens. Cheeming Boey is the artist who combined a sharpie pen with his paper cup. On the website it says  'By combining two very simple things, paper cups and Sharpie Pens, he ceates museum-worthy masterpieces that continue to ignite interest around the globe.  In the same way that Warhol made soup cans famous, Boey is pushing the limits of pop culture with his coffee cups.'

http://blog.sharpie.com/tag/sharpie-squad/

I couldn't find much research about plastic cups but I found that people had made things out of them. 
This lamp was made completely out of plastic cups and a light bulb by stapling around 250 plastic cups together in a sphere.  I think making objects out of plastic cups, especially household items, is clever and is also a useful way of reusing them instead of throwing them away.

http://lifehacker.com/5820515/make-an-awesome-lamp-out-of-plastic-cups


I also found these images of art with plastic cups:
They have all been made from plastic cups and they have been placed into chain link fences to create text or pictures. They are made up of different coloured cups and take lots of time and planning to get each cup in the right place. 
Using plastic cups is effective for this because they fit perfectly into the fence whereas other objects may not. 

http://www.pixeledfence.com/ 
This link is to a website where a man and a group of friends set up these art works with plastic cups again in chain link fences and it documents how long it took them to set it up and they photograph their work. They also have a sign which they put next to their artwork saying not to remove it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LWsECe_zXBQThis video is made by school children who want to advertise a polystyrene cup as glass cups break and plastic can melt. They show the good side to the polystyrene cups such as they dont break easily they can be recycled and reused.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8uAuL4Y6OTo
This video is campaign for a stainless steel cup company trying to encourage more people to buy their cups because they can be used for everyday activities and that are environmentally friendly as plastic cups can be thrown away. Whereas with these stainless steel cups you keep them and reuse them for anything you want to. 

Before I started taking my pictures I planned my media outcomes and which of my ideas would be in what format. I chose to have a billboard, a web banner and a magazine page for my media outcomes. 

So I went into the studio and took my pictures.

Lighting:

I edited my images down and chose the ones would work better for my final images.

I took a picture first without anyone holding the cup because that was what I wanted.

The table was left bare so that it wouldn't look set up also so that it looked like this could be set up anywhere but also because it was just a test shoot so I just wanted to see how my ideas would look. 

I then decided to have hands in the photograph holding the cups because that is part of the game. 

This image was the closest to how I wanted the ball and string to be when in the air. 

I cropped and edited my images to their media outcome:

When I was editing my images I followed the same steps for each photograph I edited which were: 

Levels:

Sharpening:

And cropping:

Magazine:

Billboard:

Web Banner:

I decided to reshoot for my web banner. I wanted to have a white background for my cups and still have no hand within the photographs.

Lighting:

When I was taking my photographs I was trying to find the right angle for my photographs without having the edge of the table in and the angle which worked best was from above. 

I found that the pictures that worked best were IMGP0608, IMGP0613 and IMGP0620. Out of them all I chose IMGP0620 as this was the best photograph due to angles and lighting. 
I found also when I was editing my images that the ball was too distracting from the plastic cups because its fluorescent yellow so I decided to edit my photographs to black and white. 

Although my images looked good in colour I liked them much better in black and white because it was more visually appealing and it didn't affect how the cups looked.

As we then had a critique of our work the next day I decided to add my slogans to my images to see where my text would fit in. 



                                     1)

                                      2)

                                    3)

From the group critique people said that my work was working well as series and it was clear what was being advertised. 
The images that worked best were 2 & 3 as they seemed natural and not intentionally shot this is because they have people within the photographs and the first image doesn't which makes it stand out. 
As I wanted to advertise the fun side to cups and relate them back to childhood games it was suggested that the taglines should be changed to relate to children and not say plastic cups in every slogan. What was good about my advertisements was the font that I had chosen, this was sans serif gill and the colour was grey. This was suggested as I hadn't started to think about my fonts yet.
What needed improving in my images is to have hand interaction with my first image and with my third image to think about their facial expressions or if their faces were needed.


I then went to the studio for my third shoot and re-shot my ideas, as the normal studio was booked I had to use another studio. 

 During this photo shoot I wanted to retake all my ideas for my final images. 

For the table shots with the paper I tried to create an infinity curve so that there was no table edge within my photographs.
Although this image fits and has the infinity curve I didn't like the positioning of the hand, it's distracting and not a simple clean pose. 

I then retook the image and positioned the hand as I wanted it but realised the paper had slipped and it ruined the photograph. 

I tried to remove the background by using the content aware tool and the quick selection tool. 

After many tries I managed to blend the background with the main colour scheme of the photographs using the mixer brush but after looking back at the picture closely I saw the edge of the cup was vanishing. So I decided to undo it all and start again but I couldn't achieve the results I had before.

 I then told my teacher about my dilemma and he showed me how to use the pen tool and the quick selection to select the cups and ball and put them onto a new layer. Although I liked this technique within my image there isn't any shadows and I prefer the image with a bit of shadow as it looks more natural.  Also the cups are nearly white in colour so its difficult to select all the textures/ ridges of the cups and then put them onto a new white layer as you can see if the cup's shape isn't perfect. 

IMGP0656

I originally wanted to use this image but one of the cups isn't positioned straight. 

IMGP0657

I decided to use this image as I was happy with the positioning of the cups. 

When I went to edit the photograph I was testing to see whether I wanted their faces within my photograph and decided not to so I cropped the image to where I thought was best. 

After I had finished editing my image I found that the watch and bobbles were distracting and I wasn't sure if not having a person on the left hand side was still portraying the concept of cup phones.

When  I was in the studio taking my photographs I retried taking this image even though I was pleased with my first outcome. 

I wasn't pleased with this image at all as the cup look battered and out of focus. So I decided to keep the image I edited from the first shoot. 


I also decided to try out a new idea that I sketched when coming up with ideas. The reason why I hadn't tried it yet was because I originally wanted the cup as a party hat but didn't know if I could draw on the cups to decorate it. So I decided to accompany the plastic cup party hat with a party popper and a party whistle. 

I wasn't pleased with this picture because it's hard to tell what is being advertised as the plastic cup is hardly visible. 
I then tried to crop into the image of just the plastic cup:

Although this was a better focus on the cup I still didn't like this photograph so I tried cropping it a bit more.

As I've cropped this so much its not visible that there was a party popper but I still don't like the image or the idea so I wont be using this. 

I was keen on getting back into the studio and retaking my images as I wasn't happy with any of my images from my third shoot. 

Lighting:

As I had decided to keep this image from my first shoot I only was taking pictures of my other two ideas. 

I decided that these two images were the best and used these for my final images:

IMGP5379

IMGP5369

Editing process:

Levels:

Black and white:

Unsharp mask:

Levels:

I did two black and white filters because when I did a black and white mask for the whole image the ball turned a light grey colour so I erased the area of the ball and made another black and white mask for the ball.

Black and white:

Black and white:

I then edited my image to neaten it as I had decided to keep part of her face in the photograph.

I wanted to make my templates for my advertising outcomes in Photoshop as I found this would be easier than Indesign as  I wasn't sure if there was a template for billboards or web banners in Indesign. 

I then decided to move onto making my logo and deciding a font for it.  As I didn't like any of the fonts in Photoshop I decided to find a website that did fonts. 

I then tried adding my logo to the images and found that because there were so many layers the logo became very bright and overexposed. 

So moving the layers around managed to sort this.  

 I decided to make my logo black and white to fit with the colour scheme.

I found a new website which had many more fonts called dafont.com and looked under kids font but they had symbols instead of handwritten fonts. I then found a category named 'handwritten' so I looked through lots of fonts and found that these were the ones that interested me the most and that could be seen as a child's handwriting. 

As I had chosen my fonts and I had my slogans so I decided to try a few out in my pictures. I put two stars next to the ones I wanted to use. 

I decided to try the kiddish font first as a test. 

I tried the spacing between the letters and found this looked better than no spacing. 

I put all the fonts together and decided that 'kiddish' font which I was testing out was the font that most suited the advertisements. But I tested them all out one by one to make sure I didn't like them.

After I chose the font I was looking back on the pictures and saw the font was white and I had it in white so that it wouldn't blend in with the background. I asked my friend for her opinion on the colour font, so I tried it in black and we agreed it was better than white. 

I then decided that it didn't look quite right so I decided to copy the text layer on each of my images and turn one black and one white. I then joined them together having one slightly behind the other created a text shadow. 

When I was showing my teacher my finished pictures he didn't like the bulkiness of the logo and showed me how to delete the white background of it using the magic wand tool. 

My final images:

A5 magazine page:

Billboard:

Web banner: