Sonder And The Art Of Photography

Quick Read: Perspectives can be valuable. A Kickstarter campaign shows us how to create value out of them while a multi million dollar campaign from a global brand shows us what it can learn from the former.

Sonder is a fascinating word.

It is the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own—populated with their own ambitions, friends, routines, worries and inherited craziness—an epic story that continues invisibly around you. (source)

At a fundamental level, Sonder for me is a shift in perspective that makes me cognizant and appreciative of the tens of thounsands of stories unravelling around me, in all their characteristic diversity and profundity.

It’s sonder that makes Street Photography fine art. It’s sonder that makes Vernacular Photography artistic to our eyes.

In fact, it’s sonder that can even help us put a price to perspectives.

Heard of Tribe Photo? James Kell is a photographer and sailor. In his words..

Recently during my work in Haiti I had an opportunity to put my subjects on the other side of the lens – to give them the chance to experience the pleasure of photographing people. I found the perspectives of the locals – when they were making the photographs – was completely, strikingly unique. This was the kernel of the idea that is now Tribe Photo.

Read more about the business model of Tribe Photo on its kickstarter page.

But the essential idea that underlies Tribe Photo is insightful and impactful in many ways than one. It gets to the heart of the “art in photography” by transcending the narrative of the camera gear. It puts a value to perespectives as seen through the photographer’s eyes and thereby puts the photographer first, celebrates the art of photography and gives back to the community.

I Am Generation Image

Now, contrast that to the campaign that Nikon is introducing this week timed for the Christmas shopping season. This campaign with an estimated budget of $ 5 – $7 million themed “I am Generation Image“, is essentially a plea to the generation Y – the millenials – to shoot more with a DSLR than with their phones. (source)

So what is this campaign all about? Check this video out.

This attempt at speaking to the millennials by asking them “Are Your photos good enough?” loses out on two counts:

In putting people first: in fact it challenges them in a way that might actually provoke them to go out of their way to shoot outstanding photos with their phone camera
In celebrating the art of photography: While the campaign does have at it’s core this page being promoted through this video audaciously titled “See Through The Eyes Of This Generation”, the content on the page tries hard to dumb it down for their TG. Sample this: “Zoom out as wide as you can, and you can even do selfies on a DSLR”

Really? All this from the brand whose theme has been to be proudly “At The Heart Of The Image”?

(Featured Image: IamGenerationImage.Com)

Rationalising The Emotional

Quick Read: At one end we have ads with heavy emotional messaging and at the other we have those with hardcore rational, persuasive messaging. And then there are those that make interesting attempts at occupying the space in between.

My contention is that truly great advertising does something far more important than deliver a rational message, and far more important than entertain: what it does is to establish associations. (Heath, 2002)

Seducing the Subconscious is an acclaimed book by Robert Heath on how advertising works. A key argument that he makes in this book is that the best advertising actually works through emotive as opposed to persuasive messaging, and emotional content is processed most efficiently at low levels of attention, not high.

Read this great post by Steve Genco for a more detailed commentary on Heath’s theory. He says..

..a substantial body of research has shown that emotional associations established at low levels of attention lead to longer-lasting influences on attitudes and behavior than rational arguments (i.e., traditional persuasion).

This is because they facilitate the memory activation mechanism of recognition rather than recall. Recall requires effort, fades relatively quickly, and has to be reinforced regularly. But recognition is triggered effortlessly and lasts indefinitely. So recognition, unlike recall, is more likely to result from low attention processing.

(So the thumb rule?) Combine a brand with an emotionally engaging ad, repeat the association under low attention conditions like TV watching, and you will get both recognition and a favorable default attitude toward your brand.

That’s probably why the new John Lewis ad works. And that’s probably why we have attempts at advertising like this one for Obsession by CK.

While this ad and its iconic print campaign by Robert R. Taylor are said to be some of the most memorable advertisements of all time, it is also billed by many as “the ultimate in abstract and meaningless advertising”. (source)

Arguably it does take a strategic leap of faith for a marketer to ride on just emotion and disband the century old model of ‘rational’ or ‘persuasive’ messaging that much of marketing communication still cleaves to. So it’s not uncommon to see many ads that – while narrating an emotional story – also ensure they rationalise it and close the spot with a persuasive messaging for the viewer.

Interestingly, almost as if to exemplify the above point, Pfister‘s new ad on its touch free range of faucets called REACT takes a dig at ‘Obsession’-isque narratives by attempting to unwrap the enveloped message for us.

Talk about rationalising the emotional.

(H/T this nytimes report)

(Featured Image: React Faucet by Pfister)

Inspiration From Across The Category Fence

Quick Read: Sometimes, the best idea for a brand campaign might be just around the corner, albeit with another category. Even when the core of the campaign idea is ‘Originality’. And perhaps rightfully so.

Inspiration from across the category fences is no new news. But that’s no excuse why we should take such instances for granted. Some recent examples of brands taking inspiration from other categories and appropriating them in a way that is relevant to their campaign idea/ brand personality. Virtual High Five (Coke – KLM) In May 2013, Coke had this huge hit campaign that ‘connected’ people from different countries (India – Pakistan) through what it called as ‘Small World Machines’.

Cut to this year (Sep 2014), KLM gave a reason for Amsterdam and New Yorkers to ‘get connected’ through this Virtual High Five campaign.

As this article says, KLM’s deployment of this idea is clever because it underlines the message that while technology has the power to interactively connect people like never before, it’s airlines that have the ability to physically connect people faster, easier and more effectively than we have ever experienced in the past.

(Source: Creative Guerrilla Marketing)

Unique, Original & Extraordinary (Absolut – Coke) In Sep 2012, I wrote about Absolut’s brilliant execution of their limited edition design series called Absolut Unique. A story of carefully orchestrated randomness powered by 35 different colors, 51 different pattern types all governed by algorithms meticulously devised to induce a method to this madness of design.

(Source:Absolut)

Result: A first of its kind design spectacle at a massive scale resulting in over 4 million bottles where no two bottles are alike. See the video here.

And then in 2013, Absolut followed this up with Absolut Originality. Video here.

Cut to this year (Oct 2014), a new campaign for Diet Coke in Israel revolves around the concept “Stay Extraordinary,” as part of which it produced over 2 million different bottles using a printing system that printed every bottle with a different look. Video here.