Nobu Hill Blog

50. my website

nobuhiro11 — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 09:06:21 +0000

My website http://nobuhirotsuji.weebly.com/

This blog and website are my last work in my college life!! Yes, I’m graduating.

I was happy I could study Advertising at University of Oregon.

49. Sapporo Brewery in Canada

nobuhiro11 — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 08:12:33 +0000

Sapporo is the largest Brewery in Japan. In 2007, they purchased Sleeman Brewery and started expanding their business in Canada. In order to appeal Sapporo Beer to Canadians, Sapporo created 2 minutes long commercial.

The commercial is titled “Legendary Biru” (Biru means beer). The commercial is very “Japanesey”. There are Sumo wrestlers, Samurai, Japanese drum players, geisha… Sapporo brands themselves as Japanese Beer brand.

I found comments of creators here

“The original concept was to create an other-worldly visual experience that would gradually tell the story of how Sapporo beer is crafted” Co-director, Gary Thomas said.

I really liked this commercial, because of its high-quality. The images are beautiful and cool. Music is also amazing. Many people are moving in the screen, so I repeated many times to see. I believe Canadian people also love this commercial.

I also found a making video. It’s also fun to watch!!

I am happy that creators did research Japanese culture very well. Sometimes I see the misunderstood Japanese image, movie in other countries. However, the commercial introduces true Japanese cultures.

by the way there is no Samurai or Ninja in Japan anymore…

48. Manga + Commercial

nobuhiro11 — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 07:05:32 +0000

Cosmetic Company, Shiseido, used Japanese comic artist when launch of their brand UNO’s new Deodorant Body Spray. Comic artist is Takehiko Inoue, famous for “SLAMDUNK” and “VAGABOND”. His comic is released in the U.S., so you may know him.

I think it is clever to pick Takehiko Inoue, because the products’ target audience (12-30 yrs old male) had read his comic. I can say that 100% of men of my generation know his comic “SLAMDUNK”, and 99% of them had read it. He is that much popular in Japan!! That means this commercial can get attention from all of the target audience. Also, Takehiko Inoue’s drawing style is real, not like other comic artists. Audience will think “I want to be a cool guy like that!!”.

Takehiko Inoue drew picture for other UNO commercials.

Hairstyling

Making video of commercial

47. Video Ad on the Newspaper

nobuhiro11 — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 05:05:30 +0000

New advertising service started from Jan. 2010 in Japan. The new service is called “A-Clip”, that is iPhone application. iPhone read an “A-Clip code” on the newspaper, and video starts on iPhone. It is similar to the QR code, but A-Clip leads iPhone to video directly. “A-Clip” code looks like this ↓

Now, only one Newspaper company is doing this service. I wish that the A-Clip appears many places like magazine, poster, flier and so on. It became easier to convey commercial to the audience.

46. Color + Color + Color

nobuhiro11 — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 04:07:27 +0000

Every time I design something, I struggle with choosing colors. It becomes really hard when I want to use more than 3 colors. I studied what’s effective and cool color combination, but I need more experience. I collected successfully colorful ads.

Colorful ads are outstanding, noticeable, and eye-catching. Also, colorful ads make people fun, I think.

↓My Favorite Color Combination↓

45. Typography

nobuhiro11 — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 00:47:08 +0000

I didn’t know that how much Font is important before I study Journalism. Each font has tone, color, emotion, and impression and convey to people. I like creative, interesting looking, different Font.

Also, placement of each letter is important. Space between the letters and rows. I always spend time to work on placing of letters and words.

But, some fonts are too complicated to read. Please don’t design too much.

??what??..?

44. Controversial Ads

nobuhiro11 — Sun, 05 Dec 2010 23:29:03 +0000

Sometimes, companies make controversial ads. Some ads are too sexy, some others are too sexy, violent, creepy, or profane. Why are there controversial advertising? I think controversial ads are different, outstanding, and memorable.

lots of other controversial ads

43. Animal mascot

nobuhiro11 — Sun, 05 Dec 2010 22:29:48 +0000

There are so many companies that using animal mascot character. I want to introduce one Japanese company which has great mascot. Yamato Unyu is a logistics service company like FedEx in the U.S. Their mascot is black cat. Sometime people started to call Yamato Unyu with a nickname “Black cat Yamato”.

I thought it is a great idea courier service company picked a cat as mascot, because it tells company goes to anywhere to deliver like a cat.

This is a recent Yamato’s TV commercial. It is funny and cute. Also, I see message from Yamato, “we go to anywhere like a cat”

42. Honda CR-V

nobuhiro11 — Sun, 05 Dec 2010 22:08:56 +0000

I compared launch of Honda CR-V in Japan and the U.S. with my group members. It is interesting to compare ad with ad in other countries. Some companies don’t change strategy at all. Some other use completely different strategy.

41. Sensitive Issue in the U.S.

nobuhiro11 — Sun, 05 Dec 2010 21:52:20 +0000

When I watch TV commercial, see poster, billboard on streets, sometimes I think that American people are sensitive to race. I feel some ads use diverse people, even that ad don’t have to do. I feel some ads are trying to be fair to all the races.

That the feeling I had never had when I was in Japan. 98% of population is “pure” Japanese in small island, Japan. Advertisers don’t have to think about complicated thing. On the other hand, the U.S. is the country made of immigrants. There are diverse people, and there are sad history of discrimination. I think that is why I get strange feeling with some ads.

I feel discrimination is still in this country. I had seen and experienced discrimination in this country. I wish it disappear from the world.