Leica recently ran a series of billboard advertisements promoting the S2 medium format DSLR and V-Lux 1. The billboards were quite unique in that they were individually made to show the wall they were placed on, with the details of the wall blown up to highlight the 12x optical zoom of the V-Lux 1 and the 37.5 megapixel sensor of the S2.
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Olympus’ most recent E-PL1 commercial, PEN Giant, is stop-motion with a big picture — or big pictures, literally. A total of 355 prints were made on billboards and shot again, all produced with the Olympus PEN.
Olympus has a way with narrative in their commercials.
The first PEN Story came out last July, and was a little over three minutes long, but comprised of some 1,800 photos of 9,600 prints, out of a total of 60,000 photos originally taken for the project. Yeah, it gets kind of meta.
Both commercials give a creative nod to Takeuchi Taijin. Takeuchi’s stop-motion, “Wolf and Pig” might look a little familiar, if you’ve seen the original Olympus PEN Story.
We’re on a roll with controversial advertisements today. New York garment company Weatherproof has gotten the attention of the White House after illegally using a photograph of President Obama’s visit to the Great Wall of China on a billboard in New York City (41st St. and 7th Ave.)
While Weatherproof did pay the licensing fees to use the image from the The Associated Press, they didn’t ask for permission from the White House, which has a pretty strict policy of not allowing the President’s image to be used for commercial purposes.
It all started when the company’s president Freddie Stollmack recognized the coat in the photo, and had it confirmed by examining a high resolution version. After having an advertisement containing the image rejected by a few of NYC’s top newspapers, the company installed the billboard advertisement two days ago.
Since then, the White House has in fact contacted the company about the ad, and the company has agreed to take the ad down but — get this — in two weeks. In the end, Weatherproof is likely the big winner, having succeeded in generating a buzz with this publicity stunt.
(via A Photo Editor)
Image credit: Photograph by Brechtbug and used with permission.
