Things that caught my eye this month

Creative inspiration for the advertising professional | August 2020

Each week, I send a things-that-caught-my-eye email to my creative colleagues. Here are all those things from this past month.

This window swap

The Emmy-nominated show title sequences

This thread about sexism in sports photography

This promo to relieve the stress of pandemic breakups

This agency that’s putting out their own new publication

This new installation from the Museum of Underwater Art

This instagram account

This app that lets you train at home with some of dance’s biggest stars

This fun use of avocado pits from Chipotle

These new snaps from Robin Harper

This behind-the-scenes look at how they shot this 7–11 spot

This is how space smells, apparently

These award winning campaigns from AdAge’s annual small agency awards (and the agencies, too, but it’s the campaigns I was most interested in)

This new “TikTok killer” from Instagram

This agency that does just one thing: shoot products on white backgrounds

This (pretty major) news that Disney is going to release “Mulan” on demand after all (and what it means for the future of the entertainment biz

This new virtual theater concept

This creative studio in NYC (and the recreation of a famous photo)

This appreciation of Lucile Ball

This Coke ad (although, I’m not sure that 2-minute short films should really be called “ads”)

This makes-you-want-to-scream deep dive at how the pandemic defeated America

These 5 lessons that advertising can learn from actors (why, yes, my OWN article caught my eye, thank you very much! 😉)

The return of the “The Far Side” cartoon

This terrific film from Apple that fully utilizes vertical video (also, Apple has a lot of money to make things, don’t they?)

And this reminder that sometimes it takes YEARS for clients to buy a great idea

These 1-star reviews of national parks turned into posters

These 20 Black photographers to follow

This new way to greet one another in the era of Covid

This music video’s use of corporate stock imagery

This sobering reminder that TikTok is probably ahead of us on any production technique that we can think up

These new versions of a famous kiss

This new way to pedal through the redwoods

This small, creative idea using the hashtag emoji

This reminder that no brief is too small to do something interesting

This VFX behind-the-scenes look at how a guy changed himself into balloons

These D&AD typography winners

This reminder that clients get tired of successful campaigns well before the public does

These mini shops for mice

The most popular songs on TikTok in 2020

This Fortnite “1984” parody that’s taking Apple head on

This reminder that if you do good marketing, you can sell your brand for $610 million

And this, a treat for those who this far, Hieronymus Bosch’s “butt music”

These teachers who know how to welcome kids back to school

These, the 10 latest creative trends in the time of coronavirus

These transparent toilets

This Lego World Building promotion (talk about turning your brand over to your fans)

The continued rise of consultancies (and what it means for ad land)

This “brand Twitter” stunt from Wendy’s (Photoshop FTW!)

This Animal Crossing content creator that made an ad for Tommy Hilfiger

These, the best bird photos of 2020

This thread about product photography that actually sells on Facebook

This new brand film from the New York Times (that uses their headlines as poetry)

That influencer marketing is bouncing back as the pandemic rolls on

These “just do nothing” shoes from Nike

This look at why tech is embracing maximalism

The return of “wine holes” (Covid silver lining?!)

These special effects

This BudLight promotion to find a new “Chief Meme Officer”

This “experiential showroom of the future” from Nissan

This campaign from KFC that walks back their famous “finger licking good” tagline

These insects in flight

This Zoom magic show that’s got all sorts of buzz:

This darkly comic campaign about the perils of distraction

This 25-minute (!) ad is from three years ago, but I re-watched it this past week and was reminded how terrific it is

This article about rap (but really about all art) that “ratings” and numbers don’t equal relevance

This look at consumer demands for personalization and how brands are giving it to them

The idea that you think you’ve seen an advertising case study about every idea under the sun and then you see one about…ocean dildoes

This behind-the-scenes look at how that amazing Nike ad was edited

This provocative take (using the above ad as a example) on whether or not marketers are obsessed about the wrong thing

This look at how we’re changing the surface of the earth

This depressing AF but sobering look at whether the “silent majority” on Facebook might just swing the election

This street art

This (also depressing AF!) deep dive on one woman’s experience with Reddit’s toxicity

This 5-minute Powerpoint that this woman put together about herself (IMHO that everybody should have a personal deck about themselves in addition to their resume)

This look at what TikTok is doing to calm employee fears that they might soon work for WalMart

This new Gondry music video

This explanation of why we all feel so exhausted (our surge capacity is depleted)

This web series that we keep adding episodes to each week, whether you want them or not 🤷🏻‍♂️

This animated short

Previous things that caught my eye: Early 2019 | Late 2019 | Early 2020| June 2020 | July 2020

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

John Kovacevich is a creative director in San Francisco. He publishes a weekly newsletter with bits of creative inspiration, just like the stuff above. You can see the newsletter here and subscribe if you’d like.

You can read all his musings about the advertising biz here.