iPhone Condom

An interesting marketing campaign by DUREX, the condom makers ;)

My initial thoughts was "cool!", but then it succumbed to scepticism as to how successful it will really be in terms of encouraging guys to use condoms. I mean, it'll have the fun element at first with everyone rubbing iphone's, so the viral part of it will definitely have a great 'viral' kick-off. It will definitely get annoying after a while, no doubt, especially if it is, from what I gather, a very hard app to get rid off unless you actually go and buy an actual durex pack. And I know that's the point, but will it really make guys more condom conscious?

But then I remember, this marketing tactic, more than anything, is to market the brand itself, DUREX, and anything that gets people talking about a brand and imprinted in the mind as the first association to a product (in this case, condoms, or even contraceptives in general).

It's been a while since I did the introductory Advertising/Marketing subject, so forgive any of my over simplistic evaluation/terminology - I just wanted to put my 2 cents worth on something that I reckon is interesting in terms of the use of new media in marketing.

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Tribute to Michael Jackson - our cover of "Heal The World"

A year has passed since the departure of one of history's most beloved pop icons and so, in his honor, A.B.C would like to dedicate this video and our cover version of 'Heal The World' to the one and only - Michael Jackson as well as all his fans. We are not professional singers but merely passionate fans of his work.

So enjoy the video and lets all honor his legacy by remembering the love and joy he gave to the world through music.

For the King of Pop.

We recorded this song late last year in the recording studio at RMIT - I just wanted to try out the studio because it's always been there, so I figured why not? And one of the sings I really wanted to record was this beautiful MJ song, because that way we could get a lot more people involved in the one song. I also thought we could film it and do some sort of tribute to one our most beloved pop icons, and had this whole nice MV planned out where we would have a fedora, placed onto a lonely mic, with one spot light shining down.. it was all very epic. But alas, not even time since recording the song alone was difficult enough. But it was really good fun and I reckon everyone did a fantastic job. Big kudos to Peter for putting it all together in what is a more than fantastic, sweet and solemn tribute to the one and only Michael Jackson.

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Useless Experiments

*Courtesy of Andrew Kramer from VideoCopilot and his awesome rack-focus experiment.

Here's a list of the 10 most wackiest experiments of all time - http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/science/article2779808.ece?print=yes&randnum=1193877775343

From Elephants on Acid, to Vomit Drinking, the list provides an interesting insight into the almost limitless imagination of the human mind. The list makes one wonder why the Jackass crew haven't been inaugurated as honourary scientists already...

Hmm.. I wanna try coming up with weird experiments now.. time to hit the drawingboards Poindexter!

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Rising Sun - a mini-series

One of the outcomes from my honours.

It is a draft of an opening credit sequence to a mini-series I am developing about Asian ANZACS. I reckon such a story is highly relevant at the moment, in light of the Billy Sing feature film fiasco.

It is a DRAFT, so not perfect. It's just a way of exploring our options. Will hopefully be able to get out there and shoot the real thing soon.

The title Rising Sun was an interesting decision process. Whilst brainstorming ideas for a title, I started off literal and dragged out titles like "The Diggers" and "The Forgotten". I was trying to capture a sense of the forgotten nature of the ANZACS that have slipped through the cracks of mainstream modern Australian history, including those from the indigenous population.

I arrived at Rising Sun because the symbol of the Australian army is the "badge of the rising sun". But what also occurred to me was that the term Rising Sun is often associated with the Empire of Japan - land of the Rising Sun. Because of this, I became a little unsure, and a began to ask everyone around me what they thought when the hear the phrase "Rising Sun". But then I thought, maybe this plays to an advantage. Since I am focusing on Asian ANZACS, and Rising Sun has the Asian connotations of Japan, maybe the confusion would suit the series purpose on the whole.

I reckon it's interesting that the symbol of the ANZACS is similar to the symbol of one of the former enemies of Australia, and I dunno, that might add an interesting element to it, especially in terms of marketing the show.

Anyway, here are some details of the vid:

Filmed by Changas, again on his d3s.

Music composed by yours truly in garage band, with the orchestra JamPack.

Ending title graphic was knocked up in 10 minutes in AfterEffects with just some jpegs of a hill, the Rising Sun badge, and a digger - sunset flare created with Video Copilot's Optical Flares.

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Reflecting on Creativity

A quote forwarded from my Honours program director. Wise and thought provoking words from the founder of Apple (i.e.; the person who gave creative geeky type people cool laptops and gadgets to play with. Oh and allowing people to go deaf younger.. =D)

“Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask a creative person how they did something, they may feel a little guilty because they didn’t really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after awhile. That’s because they were able to connect experiences they’ve had and synthesize new things. And the reason they were able to do that was that they’ve had more experiences or have thought more about their experiences than other people have.

Unfortunately, that’s too rare a commodity. A lot of people in our industry haven’t had very diverse experiences. They don’t have enough dots to connect, and they end up with very linear solutions, without a broad perspective on the problem.

The broader one’s understanding of the human experience, the better designs we will have.”
- Steve Jobs

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Changed the name of my project to "My Accented Lens".

The change came upon further reflection of the title 'The Slanted Screen' - it was referring to how representations of the Asian male was slanted or skewed, and thus referring to the racist connotations of the term Slant.

It would only be appropriate for my project if I was exploring the negative and stereotypical representations of Asians by non-Asian filmmakers. However, my project is about me dealing with my Asian-Australian heritage through filmmaking, and through my own lens. If i called it Slanted Lens, I would be referring to myself as a Slant. This of course can have it's positives for certain themes of Asian representations in Western media, but it's not specifically related to what I want to say in my project. It is far from it, though it does deal with it somewhat in one of the projects that I am currently developing and hoping to pitch. More on that after this Friday!

Anyway, settled on My Accented Lens since I have been using Hamid Naficy's 'An Accented Cinema' to frame my project, and since it's from my perspective as a filmmaker, thus me looking through my lens... you get the imagery.

Anyway here's a preview of what the main menu looks like. The transition is cooler, but no time to upload that - I shouldn't' even be on here writing this! gargh!!!

Wish me luck guys... :s

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Independent Film

Just doing some non-project-related, yet career related.. research...

Picked this up from David Liu's facebook, a talented Singaporean based director I met at the Singapore Film Festival last year.

Nothing amazingly new but in the videos below, producer Ted Hope talks about the benefits of going into Independent Filmmaking, utilising all the opportunities afforded by the New Media technologies. Ted Hope has produced a number of films, the most recognisable for me being 21 Grams, American Splendor, and even Ang Lee's Xi Yan (The Wedding Banquet)!

The most interesting was his mention of the 1000 True Fans 'theory' by Kevin Kelly. That article is definitely worth a look as food for thought to anybody seriously wanting to make a living as a creative artist.

Some Job Opportunities in Indie Film with Ted Hope (part 1) from Hope for Film on Vimeo.

Some Job Opportunities in Independent Film with Ted Hope (part 2) from Hope for Film on Vimeo.

Haven't had time to review and process my own opinions as yet on these topics - I have an exegesis to write for my Asian-Australian Film project. Oh, I have a title for the project now "The Slanted Lens". It is a re-appropriation of a similar titled documentary "The Slanted Screen" by Jeff Adachi, about the representation of Asian men in American Cinema. You can check it out a preview of it on youtube here. It is a really interesting and insightful documentary, especially when you find out that one of the biggest Hollywood silent film actors was Sessue Hayakawa, who actually played romantic leads opposite Caucasian females.

I figure my title is appropriate since it's about me as a filmmaker, finding Asian-Australian stories that I really want to translate onto the screen. Anyway, it's too late to spend any more time thinking up another title.. so it stays... for now.. maybe... opinions please!!! I need help on this matter!

Wish my luck with the rest of my assignment.. 5 days left to go!! argh!!!!!!!!!!!

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