You might remember Air New Zealand’s latest Hobbit-themed video, featuring a special cameo from director Peter Jackson. If you were wondering how a horse got on the plane, or what it’s like to film with Jackson, Air New Zealand has released a behind-the-scenes look at the making of its latest in-flight safety video. The company is known for its quirky in-flight safety videos, but it went all out for this particular one in preparation for The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. The video has gained nearly 8 million views in less than a week. Several Air New Zealand crewmembers made their acting debut in the video, along with actual actors from The Hobbit, like Dean O’Gorman, who plays Fili the Dwarf. Air New Zealand is also offering a global sweepstakes. Travelers who count the hidden Elvish codes in the original safety video, then visit the website to unlock the code and enter to win a round-trip for two to attend the World Premiere Screening of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, six nights accommodation in New Zealand, a movie set tour in Matamata, WETA Cave Visit in Wellington and other great Middle Earth prizes. Read more: http://mashable.com/2012/11/07/behind-scenes-air-new-zealand-hobbit/
Airtime — Sean Parker‘s new startup that lets users video chat with friends and strangers who share their interests — released a slick new video Tuesday that shows off the power of the service. Describing Airtime as “the Best Internet You’ve Ever Had,” the slickly produced ad shows off the service in a way that is both entertaining and easy to understand. Of course, it wouldn’t be Airtime without celebrities. The spot features cameos by Kurt Russell, MC Hammer, Gary Vaynerchuk and Ronnie Lott. I’ve had my own brush with celebrity using Airtime. The first time I tried the service, it connected me with none other than co-founder Sean Parker. The spot was produced by Portal A, the company behind the Ed Lee 2 Legit 2 Quit video. (Disclosure: Portal A also works with Mashable on original video content.) The star of the video — Ian Pfaff — is described as Portal A’s “creative jack-of-all-trades.” He works full-time at Portal acting, editing and producing music. Read more: http://mashable.com/2012/07/17/mc-hammer-airtime/
If there’s one takeaway from Verizon’s newest phone ad, it’s probably that Edward Norton needs to do more karaoke. The actor stars in the Droid Maxx commercial that is a mini-movie about Norton’s adventure-packed 48 hours. He sings karaoke, meets a girl, crashes a plane and almost dies at the hands of a really creepy dude. But thanks to his trusty phone, he remains unscathed — unless you count waking up in a morgue. The commercial ends with the tagline “Whatever you do in 48 hours, Droid does,” referencing the phone’s impressive battery life. The ad also showcases Google’s hands-free commands in several scenes, most notably when Norton is tied up and hanging upside (a situation Verizon probably assumed we could all relate to?) The spot aired on television Dec. 5, but was posted to YouTube a week prior. The video already has more than 9 million hits. Verizon’s recruitment of A-lister Norton comes after Robert Downey Jr. starred in a similarly odd ad for the HTC One over the summer. That campaign didn’t seem to do much for HTC’s sales. Now only one question remains: Could the Droid Maxx survive a fight club? BONUS: The Most-Shared Ads of 2013 The Most-Shared Ads of 2013 1. Dove “Real Beauty Sketches” 4.24 million shares Dove uses a clever method to make women confront misconceptions about their appearance and the result prompts some very emotional reactions. Video: YouTube, doveunitedstates 2. Geico “Hump Day” 4.03 million This ad, featuring an excitable camel, gets a spike in views every Wednesday. Video: YouTube, GEICO Insurance 3. Evian “Baby & Me” 3.34 million The sequel to the uber-successful “Roller Babies” ad does just fine on its own. Video: YouTube, EvianBabies 4. Kmart “Ship My Pants” 3.05 million A silly, off-color pun goes from mildly amusing to hilarious in 30 seconds. Video: YouTube, Kmart 5. Cornetto “Yalin Keyfi Yolunda, Aşkı Sonund” 2.91 million A Wes Anderson-esque tale of young love from Turkey. Video: YouTube, cornetto turkiye 6. Budweiser “Brotherhood” 2.72 million One of the best-received ads of this year’s Super Bowl features a sentimental trainer raising a Clydesdale. Video: YouTube, NFL TV Super Bowl Ads 7. PepsiMax “Test Drive” 2.69 million OK it was fake, but it was fun: Nascar driver Jeff Gordon goes incognito for a test drive and an actor does a great job pretending to be freaked out. Video: YouTube, Pepsi 8. MGM/Carrie “Telekinetic Coffee Shop Surprise” 2.17 million More fakery, this time in a coffee shop to promote the movie Carrie. Is it me or does everything seem fake about this? Ironically the movie was overtaken by Gravity at the box office. Video: YouTube, CarrieNYC 9. Ram Trucks “Farmer” 1.88 million Another ad that proves that you don’t have to (try to) be funny to be remembered during the Super Bowl. The ad was a rip off of an older one, but this one was much better. Video: YouTube, ram 10. Volvo Trucks “Jean-Claude Van Damme Epic Split” 1.82 million A latecomer, Jean-Claude […]
Not since Denise Richards donned a lab coat in The World Is Not Enough have we seen such an unlikely scientist as Megan Fox. Yet Fox makes a somewhat convincing marine biologist in this ad for Acer, which shows a hidden side to the sex symbol — a passion for dolphins. Like a previous ad that presented Kiefer Sutherland as a baker, the aim is to underscore Acer’s brand mission to “explore beyond limits.” Fox, however, is no stranger to technology. Back in 2011, she was seen slinking around a bathtub and exposing her famously unattractive thumbs in a Motorola Super Bowl TV spot. Read more: http://mashable.com/2012/10/30/megan-fox-acer/
DC Shoes and Ken Block are back with another gripping stunt reel: Gymkhana FIVE: Ultimate Urban Playground; San Francisco. Last year, Gymkhana FOUR was one of the most-shared ads in 2011. Can this one top it? Read more: http://mashable.com/2012/07/09/gymkhana-returns/
“Here come the balls, big orange balls…” Sound familiar? That’s essentially the NBA‘s take on the classic holiday tune “Carol of the Bells,” as seen in the creative ad embedded above. Featuring five of the NBA’s biggest stars covering the song via basketball dribble, it’s meant to promote the NBA’s special one-color jerseys players will wear Christmas Day and premieres on TV during Wednesday night’s games. The spot was produced by Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, the advertising agency behind the legendary “Got Milk?” spots and other well-known campaigns. Read more: http://mashable.com/2012/11/21/nba-ad-holiday/
If Wayne Rooney wasn’t a footballer, he’d probably be a fisherman. But the only way he wouldn’t be a footballer is if the clones took over. Nike’s latest ad, “The Last Game,” in support of World Cup fever takes on a similar premise to the latest dystopian sci-fi movie. It pits man vs. the “perfect” clone — a soccer player that performs like a machine and is, supposedly, unbeatable. But they’re missing one thing: heart (or, as Nike puts it, the willingness to take risks). It’s sort of like a Gattaca that substitutes soccer for space travel. The best players unite to challenge the clones. We won’t spoil the ending, but lets just say it’s clear is Nike is reminding you that winning players are willing to take risks. Risk makes the game worth watching. Yay risk. All the 2014 World Cup action starts up on Thursday, June 12. BONUS: Six Apps to Fuel Your World Cup Fever Apps to Follow the World Cup ESPN FC Soccer & World Cup ESPN’s app for the World Cup featues in-depth analysis and commentary from their team of experts. Customize the experience by choosing your favorite teams to follow and set detailed alerts for everything from in-game substitutions to sore updates to team stats. Users in the U.S. can also see exclusive video highlights from the games. The free app is available for iOS and Android. Image: ESPN FIFA ’14 Fans of EA’s FIFA series for Xbox and PlayStation will appreciate the company’s latest World Cup iOS offering. In FIFA ’14 players can compete in their own World Cup brackets and customize their team’s lineup to compete with their ideal fantasy team. Those who want to make it more competitive can challenge friends and other online player’s in the game’s multiplayer mode. The free app is available for iOS. Image: Electronic Arts FIFA Official FIFA Official provides comprehensive profiles of each team, player and coach detailing the past national and World Cup history of each organization. The app has a daily live blog that provides a constantly-refreshed stream of updates from the matches and exclusive photos and videos from the tournament. Super fans can also play games, vote on each game’s “Man of the Match” and sign up for a shot at winning kick-off balls used during the actual games. The free app is available for iOS and Android. Image: FIFA Onefootball Brasil Choose your favorite teams and get up to the minute updates from both on and off the field. Listen to live commentary from matches and chat with your fellow fans when you connect the app to your Facebook account. The app also has in-depth pre and post-game videos of press conference, interviews and analysis. The free app is available for iOS, Android and Windows Phone. Image: Motain GmbH Travel Portuguese Futebol Edition For those actually traveling to Brazil to watch the games, Travel Portuguese Futebol Edition from Rosetta Stone will give you a crash-course in essential Portuguese to help you […]
Penny Arcade, a popular gaming web comic, is asking its fans to fund its advertising revenue for an entire year so it can remove ads from its website. The creators of Penny Arcade launched a Kickstarter Tuesday morning asking for at least $250,000 to remove advertisements from their site for the 2013 calendar year. The comic was started 14 years ago by Mike Krahulik and Jerry Holkins, better known as their alter-egos Gabe and Tycho. Since then, it has spawned two annual conventions that attract 70,000 gamers each, a charity that has raised millions to improve the lives of children in hospitals, and a series of video games. The Kickstarter goal represents just the amount of revenue Penny Arcade would lose by eliminating advertisements. Krahulik says not worrying about pageviews — which are around 70 million per month — or ad revenue would free up the staff of Penny Arcade, 14 in total, to work on other projects. “We have two ad sales people, but they also work on PAX [the convention] and developing things like the new Penny Arcade video game. If they didn’t have to sell ads they would just have more time to devote to our creative projects. This seems like a good thing to us,” Krahulik told Mashable. Krahulik hinted on Twitter that many of those other projects would be new content for fans to supplement the comic, which publishes three times a week. He and Holkins have worked on projects for game companies to boost their advertising revenue, and he hopes he can devote more time for making things for Penny Arcade’s large fanbase. to everyone telling me we are crazy…I agree. — cwgabriel (@cwgabriel) July 10, 2012 Removing advertisements would also remove any allegations of bias from games Penny Arcade promotes, and also prevent sticky situations from when the comic pans a game the site is currently running ads for. “No company likes to pay for an ad and then see us skewer their game the next day. It’s nothing we can’t handle but if we could avoid it all together that would be cool,” Krahulik said. While the comparisons have been made to member-supported media like NPR, but the situation is different because Krahulik will still try to make a profit off its other ventures and merchandise sales. If the Kickstarter doesn’t reach its goal, Krahulik says they will not pursue any other form of donations, such as a pay wall, and will continue business as normal. Do you think web comics could support themselves without advertising? What do you think this experiment means for online comics, or other media? Let us know in the comments. window._msla=window.loadScriptAsync||function(src,id){if(document.getElementById(id))return;var js=document.createElement(‘script’);js.id=id;js.src=src;document.getElementsByTagName(‘script’)[0].parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}; _msla(“//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js”,”twitter_jssdk”); Read more: http://mashable.com/2012/07/10/penny-arcade-no-ads/
eyetracking-cropped Top Banner Ad Take a look at the next four slides. Which ad do you think will receive the most eyeballs? Right Above Fold Left Above Fold Right Below Fold Industry Average for Different Placements If you want eyeballs — and who doesn’t — the best ad placement is on the left side above the fold. The worst is below the fold. Ads Without Faces Now let’s take a look at side ads — seen by 84% of people on the left and 74% of people on the right. Do you notice the two side ads without faces? How Your Eyes See Ads Without Faces Ads With Faces What about the two side ads with Faces? How Your Eyes See Ads With Faces Industry Averages The most successful ads, noticed by a full 100% of people, have faces. In order to make the most of your ad dollars, include people in your ad campaigns. Read more: http://mashable.com/2012/07/06/eye-tracking-online-ads/
Verizon Wireless just passed 3 million fans on Facebook, beating out competitors like AT&T, Sprint and T-Mobile to that milestone. To celebrate, Verizon has released a special video thanking its fans that features a Rube Goldberg machine. For those who don’t know, a Rube Goldberg machine is one that uses an unnecessarily complicated series of steps to accomplish a very simple task. In this particular video, the end goal is to switch on a tablet that displays a thank you message to the company’s fans. In recent months, we’ve seen several brands come up with clever ways to celebrate reaching Facebook fan milestones. Bonobos released a video parody of The Golden Girls when it reached 100,000 fans on Facebook and The Walking Dead put out an awesome poster when it reached 100,000 fans. Read more: http://mashable.com/2012/09/13/verizon-facebook-fans-video/
