Breaking In

To whet your appetite for his interview tomorrow, here is some fantastic work from Jose Mollá and his agency La Comunidad.

MTV – “Baby”

MTV – “Smells Like Britney”

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In case you missed it, check out some of David Lubars’s work here.

WS: What do you look for in a student book? And what impresses you?

DL: I look to be jealous—I want to see stuff that I wish we were doing.

WS: Can a book of sketches be enough, or do ideas need to be comped up nicely?

DL: You need to show big ideas and how they can be delivered across several channels. The more finished, the better.

WS: Is it important to have long copy in a book?

DL: It’s nice to have any copy, writing seems to be a lost art. But, no, you don’t need long copy—the best ideas can be summed up in a text message.

WS: What do you think about including “non-ads” in a book?

DL: It’s good to show a range, especially today where content can take on many forms, from art installations to TV shows to whatever.

WS: Do you have any tips for someone who wants to get into the business?

DL: You have to want to work long, hard hours, and you need to possess a healthy degree of paranoia.

In preparation for tomorrow’s interview with David Lubars, here is some of his work from BBDO.

Snickers

AT&T

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In case you missed it, take a look at some of Crystal’s work here.

WS: What do you look for in a student book? And what impresses you?

CE: Unexpected ways of solving an expected brief.

WS: How important is finish? If ideas are the most important thing, can sketches be enough?

CE: Anyone can have a good idea, but not everyone can follow through on execution to make it great. Craft is important. Especially for art directors, but almost as important for writers too. Writers should have well-executed, finished campaigns in their book to demonstrate their level of taste and how they can collaborate with art directors. That being said, it doesn’t hurt to have a few cocktail napkins.

WS: How important is writing? Do you need to see long copy?

CE: We’re in the business of communication, so writing is über-important, even for art directors. Long copy never hurt and is a fun design challenge for an art director. Although, as an art director, I probably won’t read your long copy to the end.

WS: What do you think of showing work that is not advertising? Things like art, journal writing, photography, hobbies, etc.

CE: It can show depth. And personality. Since student books all start to look the same, it’s kind of nice to see someone’s talents beyond making ads. But only if it’s good.

WS: Do you have any other advice for a student or junior trying to get 
into the business, either in putting together a book or how to actually start looking for jobs?

CE: Don’t forget to go surfing.

Tomorrow’s interview will be with Crystal English, a freelance art director in San Francisco. Check out her great work, below, and get excited for tomorrow.

Intel – “Rockstar”

Embassy Suites – “Sentences”

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If you missed it, check out some great work from Michael Lebowitz and Big Spaceship.

WS: You mentioned finish. Are ideas more important or is finish more important or does it depend on the job?

ML: Ideas are really important, but the way that the traditional side of the business values “the big idea” is completely out of balance with the way that you actually produce work in the digital space. I say all the time, “The greatest idea in the world, unproduced, has no value whatsoever. A mediocre idea, produced, has some incremental value.” So why is the value always placed on the big idea when getting things into the world is so important? The difference in thinking makes a ton of sense because, when you have to spend a tremendous amount of money to put it out into the world, because there are limited places to put it, you would have to have a huge idea, polish it for however long, and make sure it’s absolutely perfect for one big blockbuster release. But in digital, we publish whenever we want, we republish and iterate whenever we want, and it doesn’t cost much, or anything, to do the actual iteration in publishing. So the mindsets are so, so different.

WS: Do you hire some more “idea people” or does everyone have to have ideas and skill to make it?

ML: Well, I think everybody contributes in our brainstorming sessions, whether for a pitch or a new challenge from an existing client, across all of our disciplines. It’s not like strategy comes in and defines everything up front. Everybody is involved end to end. We’ve had amazing ideas that have been sold to clients that have come from developers, designers, from interns across all of our different disciplines. Great ideas come from everywhere, and a lot of times, if you’re open to it, a lot of great ideas come from terrible ideas. Somebody says something just because they feel safe enough in their environment to throw something out that they know is crap. And somebody else grabs it, and levels it up somehow, or turns it into something really interesting, or attaches an insight to it that actually makes it relevant. So I think basically, everybody is an idea person and, again, I know that there is sort of this Hollywood-style auteur thing going on on the other side of the fence [traditional agencies]. Maybe I’m naïve but we don’t believe in rock stars. It’s about the team. Everybody here makes each other better and it’s that way of working that makes our work good. And it’s all the same people who are executing that are also coming up with the ideas for it. With traditional agencies the process is always pretty linear: “We’re going to come up with the big idea and polish that idea, then we’ll bring it to the production company and they’ll level it up as well, but only focus on craft and final execution.” And we’re letting that happen in a much more cyclical, iterative way, all the way through. Even before we’ve actually produced anything tangible, anything crafted I should say, the people who are traditionally considered “executional” are in the process of crafting ideas and it works really well for us.

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Take a looks at some great work from Michael Lebowitz and Big Spaceship. Then check back on Monday for his interview.

The Most Awesome Thing Ever:

An online game that asks users to pick the most awesome of two things in order to eventually find out, once and for all, what the most awesome thing ever is. Three weeks after launching, over 40,000 hours had been logged on the site.

Michael Lebowitz speaks about HBO Voyeur:

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In case you missed it, check out some of Tony Davidson’s work here.

WS: What do you think is a good way for people to improve? How would
you suggest that people get better?

TD: The way you learn is by being surrounded by interesting
things and better people. Go to venues, go to galleries, be inspired,
surround yourself. Just be curious about stuff and soak up other
creative influences around you. It’s part of your day job when you
actually get one: to get inspired. And it’s not about copying. It’s about
being influenced. Andy Warhol was influenced by [advertising]…the
artists are influenced by us, we’re influenced by them, and we’re both
influenced by culture.

Second, and most importantly: See people that are better than you. Get
surrounded by people who are better than you. You have amazing access
in this industry, I think, to good creative people who have come through
the same process. So go and see them. If you like them when you go and
see them, keep coming back and seeing them without annoying them
too much. Kim and I, in all honesty, managed to get somewhere only
because we’ve been surrounded throughout our careers by good people.
We went to Leagas Delaney and saw Tim Delaney. He’s a fantastic writer.
He forced us to write a lot more. We had Dave Dye, Paul Belford—they
challenged our art direction. And then we went to BBH where we had
John Hegarty for the first year before he went off to America. And he
was incredibly helpful on Levi’s.

I would also encourage you not to only see people in advertising
agencies. It is important that you have aspirations, I think, beyond that.
You might know an architect who is really interesting. You might do
some ideas with him or products or whatever it is. The great thing is
now the solution doesn’t have to be a press ad or a radio commercial. I
think you can open your mind up and go, “Here is the business problem,”
because that’s what a client really brings in or should do. And you can
solve it in any way. So if you got 5,000 cars sitting in a field, the answer
doesn’t have to be, “Oh, stick a press ad in local press saying we’ve got
5,000 cars.” You might think of an event. You might think of something,
some really clever, smart way that is relevant to that brand tonally, to
clear that field. And that’s where I get excited. When I see people who
are actually taking business problems and thinking about clever ways of
solving them.

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Tony Davidson is Partner and Executive Creative Director of Wieden+Kennedy London.

Honda – “Everything”

Honda – “Jump”

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If you missed yesterday’s post, take a look at some of Ji Lee’s work.

WS: What do you look for in a student book? And what impresses you?

JL: I receive lots of emails with students’ portfolios. From both students
and recruiters. So, for me, the first thing I look at in a portfolio is how a
student organizes his or her work. Good navigation and ease of use are
very important. No matter how great their work is, if I am lost in their
website, if I have to take a few extra seconds to find something, then the
person already lost me. This is also an indication of how well the person
knows how to communicate his or her message. So, if I’m lost in the
navigation, that tells me this person doesn’t know how to use the web to
communicate his own message. Lots of people these days use Cargo or
Index Exhibit and they work well.

WS: Can you explain “Cargo” and “Index Exhibit”?

JL: They are portfolio website templates. They’re probably the most
widely used templates for designers and people in advertising. The great
thing about them is that people can customize the way they want their
sites to look and they don’t have to know PHP or coding. It’s a really easy
way of showing your work.

WS: Okay.

JL: And then, once I am navigating the website easily, obviously I’ll be
looking for the quality of the work. And the work has to be well presented.
Is it well photographed? Is it well designed? Is it well written? Is it concise
and does it communicate the idea quickly? So there are a few steps even
before the work; packaging an idea is as important, if not even more
important, than the idea itself.

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