Absolut Vodka features Spike Jonze

I'M HERE - SPIKE JONZE

Walking around the streets of Shorditch and Soho I constantly felt like I was being haunted by this tiny little photograph plastered on nearly every lamp-post, brick and street corner i.e this little guy:

The first one I spotted on Goodge street by a newsagents.

It was to advertise a new small film by American director and producer Spike Jonze who's work includes Being John Malkovich and Where The Wild Things Are, this new film called I'm Here was in conjunction with Absolut Vodka, as the brand want to start associating themselves with contemporary art forms (kinda like what Becks have done for years).

I was invited along to the Absolut event to watch the premiere of the film. It was set in the basement of a car park just off Brewer street - amazing venue and they set it up nicely, plus free cocktails that took the misery out of being in the POURING RAIN before-hand (and i got splattered by a bloody taxi!). There were cardboard boxes lying randomly around the floor all wired up to cables that later had inflatable mattresses bursting out of them, which were used as seats.

The film itself was beautiful. It's about a robot boy who is lonely and ignored meeting a robot girl who is adventurous and clumsy, which means he always ends up saving her (story of my life lol). Her care-free attitude to life leads her to losing her robotic limbs, fortunately for her though boy robot loves her so much he gives up his limbs for her to the point where he is only left with his head.

It got a couple of laughs throughout and I was nearly moved to tears, which isn't difficult but still. I loved the film and the cocktails so it was a great night, we were given vouchers to venture out to retrieve more vodka from bars and then I set off to view Banksy's new film (will post tomorrow!).

Reassessing Advertising in Recession

Can the recession be beneficial to young talent in the advertising world? Where can your degree take you?

With the constant reminder that we’re deep in a recession and watching news coverage of redundancy in all different industries, it’s sent fear round the grounds of many universities. Students are graduating with over a crippling £17,500 debt according to a 2008 annual poll survey. This is leaving graduates feeling disheartened by the money they’ve spent that seemingly offers nothing in return and discouraging college students to want to carry on with higher education.

Yes there may be less money out there to give inexperienced hopefuls that are trying to start a career, but there are opportunities out there, you just have to show that you are hungry for it.

Two university graduates with a degree in advertising, talk me through the opportunities that have opened up for them through the past year. They have done work experience in top ad agencies such as Leo Burnett and EHS Brann.

EHS Brann (who invented the Tesco Club card) has recently been praised for their employment of young hopefuls like these two graduates Tom Harvey and Dan Hooper, who were given paid work experience with the agency even before leaving the comfort of university.

“Work experience gave us more valuable insight in to advertising and how we can improve our work,” says Tom Harvey, the art director of the group. “At EHS Brann the creative director gave us feedback, we carried on working on it and it got shown to the client, which was amazing.”

From Tom and Dan being part of the industry, it has shown them how hard the competition is to get a good job. “There are quite high levels of competition between creatives in the same agency, let alone the same industry.” Dan said, quite bewildered by the levels of rivalry between people on the same team.

This experience has made them both see the incredibly high level of work that they have to submit to make it in this tough industry. Some good advice was given to them by creative directors as Leo Burnett, Tony Malcolm and Guy Moore: “Through our course we’ve been making ad’s for big brands like O2 and FCUK, but they already have award winning work, which we’re trying to compete against,” said Tom. “We’ve been given advice by Tony and Guy to concentrate our portfolio on smaller brands like our local bistro or brands that aren’t globally recognised.”

Tony Malcolm who has produced timeless adverts such as ‘Park Life’ for Nike and ‘Just Passing By’ for McDonalds talks about the benefits of asking graduates to come in for work experience. “The advertising industry is finding ways to advertise through new media, which graduates seem to understand.” Tony also sees the recession as a advantage to the industry because if the economy is down, they need all forms of media and advertising to persuade people to consume more. “It should be a very exciting time for graduates, everything is changing and they are the ones who are going to change the way people think.”

According to Campaign magazine the creative industry is what is going to pull us out of the recession rather than the financial sector. This statement makes the future for graduates studying in the media field look positive. “The government wants more people to spend money. So brands need advertisers to create the need for their products,” says Tom. “Put enough spin, pretty bells and whistles on something can drag someone’s mind away from money.” “It’s a whole mental thing of ‘I deserve that’ message that needs to be in peoples heads,” replies Dan.

Though according to Caroline Lovell a journalist for Campaign magazine, the advertising industry is also going to benefit students from a variety of different degrees. Lovell believes “hiring people from different industries, is that you end up with a fresh perspective on advertising.” So not only is the advertising industry benefiting the economy, young creatives, but also lawyers, police, gardeners, accountants and many others.

“I think it’s an amazing approach because they’re going to get experienced individuals from a wide variety of sectors and they’re all going to think more creatively,” said Tom. “It might not be necessarily great for advertising students, as they study to be creative rather than focusing on being an expert in a certain subject,” said Dan.

Tom harvey and Dan Hooper Advertising graduates

Elliott Abdo, a criminology student from Southampton Solent University has never considered going down a creative career path before. “If they’re willing to have me I would love it. I love to think imaginatively and I guess it would be a good career move.”


Amelia Hooper a product design student from London Southbank University said, “a lot of what I do in my degree I can relate to advertising. The money is good. Why not?”


Caroline Fairbrother a graduate from Nottingham University said, “if you studied journalism there is nothing to stop you from becoming a fashion designer or a teacher. It just depends on you and what you want to do with your life, not your degree.”

Some of my work

Here's some of my written work, my new years resolutions are to get more articles published and to write a script...and hopefully get that made in to a tele drama but don't want to get to ahead of myself there. I might make one of my resolutions to act in something...even if it is a small speaking part. I want to try as much as possible.

Got a secondhand SLR D70 for Christmas! Found some old lenses and using my boyfriends lens at the moment and if you check out my flickr you'll see some lovely romantic pictures of my surroundings.

Just getting used to it and playing around with lighting at the moment, so it'll all get more exciting in the future. Want to do a few more fashion shoots as well. If you want to see some more please go to www.flickr.com/yazminmalcolm

Hello 2010!!! It's going to be a better year people!

I'm so happy that 2009 is over! It was quite unpleasant, but we are undoubtedly going to have a MUCH better year in 2010. But before we look forward in to the hopeful future, let's turn our bowed heads and say a fond farewell to the ones who never managed to reach to the new beginning.
Firstly, magazines:

American I-D Magazine - Cosmo Girl - Men's Vogue
Click here to see more folded magazines.
Newspapers:

London Lite - The London Paper -

And many more! click here to see a full listing of folded newspapers.

Last but not at all least, the celebrities:

My Beautiful Brittany Murphy, 32 - Michael Jackson, 50 - Patrick Swayze, 57

These ones were my favourite, especially Brittany Murphy. I've watched Clueless a million times since and cannot believe what a tragedy, she was so young! As was Heath Ledger who died in January 2008.

I also remember when I heard Michael Jackson had died, I was working for Oxfam in Glastonbury Festival waiting for my shift to finish when i got a million texts all in one go. I didn't believe what everyone was saying, every year at Glasto someone spreads that a celeb has died, and it usually is MJ.

Click here to see other passings of celebs in 2009.

Well in 2010 we can look forward to virtual mags and newspapers that feed us our current affairs and celebrity gossip. The iPhone is bringing out a new 'app' that you can download a subscription to your fav magazines and newspaper. Maybe it's just me but zooming in and touch screen is just my biggest nightmare and I'd personally rather have the copy in my hands...no? I loved this advert for The Sun newspaper who describes my case perfectly.