List of Young Director Award Winners

Last night the Palais Stéphanie hosted the 13th annual Young Director Awards, which promotes the work of young directors in advertising, short films and music videos.

Here is the list of winners (videos included when they were available). European and non-European entries were awarded separately. Note that some categories only awarded second prize winners:

Music Videos

Second Prize EU (two awarded):

"Esther's" by Director Charles de Meyer (UK). Production company: Tall Stories.

"Flames" for karl x johans (Sweden). Director: Gustav Johansson. Production company: Camp.

Humor me ››

Eric Schmidt Talks Revolution + Consumer-Driven Innovation

Yesterday afternoon at the Lions, Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt sat with VP-Google Creative Lab Andy Berndt to discuss innovation, imagination and the internet.

Schmidt kicked off the discussion by pointing out the internet is a special kind of business because it is highly Moore's Law-driven: "If you take a country that's got 40% internet penetration, and you see it in the next five years, broadband penetration will be up to 80%." Your business just doubled and you didn't have to do anything -- this doesn't happen in any other industry.

The idea that your business can be expanded as a function of users broadening your market, as opposed to you taking steps to expand in the traditional sense, is something we are still grappling with.

"The implications for this consumer-driven phenomena are not well-understood," Schmidt said, pointing out that the Middle East's current ongoing social media-driven struggles for democracy are a good example of the unexpected fruit such phenomena yields. This is just the beginning of users' muscle-flexing.

Read the rest of this nummy num-num on Yahoo! Scene, for which I'm doing Cannes Lions coverage this year.

'Transparency' Used to Hide Truths, Says Terry Gilliam

We had a treat on Tuesday night. Fast Company's Le Rooftop party played host to a short evening panel featuring American Express, Arcade Fire and Terry Gilliam, best known for his Monty Python work (and maybe also for Lost in La Mancha, because that was bloody magnificent).

Gilliam didn't speak much, but when he did it was with a kind but long-suffering smile -- the sort you give when you're tired of a topic but understand others' persistent curiosity. Of the things he said that one can easily scale from advertising to life, he half-jokingly observed that "transparency is a word used to cover the truth in most instances."

Read the rest of this nummy num-num on Yahoo! Scene, for which I'm doing Cannes Lions coverage this year.

The Cannes Lions Midweek Existential Crisis

It's hard to describe the state of you in Cannes by the middle of the week. By Wednesday night, it's likely you haven't slept in four days. The drinking starts around noon, and you're constantly being blindsided by huge vacuums of people who want to chat about their creative ideas, which seesaw between brilliant and horrific, depending on what fluid you just swallowed.

One guy spent a night regaling Ask Wappling and me about his "sublime" comic strip idea, in which men and women have short, terse exchanges -- sort of like XKCD but stupid. (Man: "Hi!" Woman: "I shaved my legs for this?") The men are always smiling penises, and the women are squiggles in the shape of their pubic hair. Squiggles can vary by size and type.

Be careful when you've been chosen for a creative revelation like this. The less convinced you look, the more insistent the person gets about his genius.

But the trauma I felt, watching those banal prattling penises and vaginas appear in front of me, is only a distant memory. It was Monday around 5 AM.

Read the rest of this nummy num-num on Yahoo! Scene.

Bob Garfield on Creativity + the Ad that First Inspired Him

Creatives young and old have had a love/hate relationship with Bob Garfield, who for the last 25 years has produced his "Ad Review" segment on Advertising Age. (His position on this? On a scale of one to five, few ads are total zeros and few ads are prize fives. Over his whole career the average ad has received about a 3.4, significantly higher than the average true quality of industry television advertising output at large.)

Ad bloggers, whether or not they agree with his arguments, arguably see him as the person who began what they continue today. He's also the author of The Chaos Scenario and co-hosts National Public Radio's "On the Media."

I ran into Bob at the Carlton this weekend, then later Monday in front of the Palais, sporting a decidedly cannois summer hat. (I didn't know at the time, but it was also his birthday.) He thoughtfully agreed to sit and talk at a nearby beach side restaurant -- which we only later discovered is probably the loudest atmospheres in all the land.

Read the rest of this nummy num-num on Yahoo! Scene, for which I'm doing Cannes Lions coverage this year.

SapientNitro: Anatomy of a Culture Cult

Some moments after I sat down with SapientNitro’s Worldwide Chief Creative Director Gaston Legorburu and Creative Director John McHale, I got a hard sense of what our time together would be about.

“Our secret weapon is our culture,” Gaston said. And the culture is bred and nourished with conscious attention.

They reflected that they've never actually discussed this with the press before, and maybe because of that, they sat and outlined the entire blueprint.

Read the rest of this (EPIC!) nummy num-num on Yahoo! Scene, for which I'm doing Cannes Lions coverage this year.

SpongeBob in Stop Motion

I don't think I need to tell you this is magnificence to the nth.

This reinvention of the Spongebob Squarepants opening theme, which bears new fruit without losing fidelity to the material of origin (like all good tributes should - consider), is brought to you by Screen Novelties. Added bonus: music by Cee-Lo!

It appeared in place of the normal opening theme for SpongeBob Squarepants' 10th anniversary episode (which I would now very much like to see).

Via The Curious Brain.

Jonah Lehrer at Cannes Lions: The Science of Creativity is Instinctive

Author and Wired editor Jonah Lehrer joined DraftFCB's Director of Strategic Planning Matthew Willcox to discuss the science of creativity, specifically what triggers it and whether it can be honed.

One major problem we have with creativity reveals itself in linguistics: we talk like it's singular, but it's plural. Our job is to think creatively the right way at the right time, applying the appropriate mental tools to the task at hand.

Relaxation Breeds Insight

To understand the different facets of creativity, it helps to know what precedes a moment of insight: alpha waves, closely associated with states of relaxation. Walking to the beach, taking a shower, daydreaming -- doing something you really like doing, in other words -- is what makes it possible for your mind to arrive at what we traditionally understand to be creative epiphanies.

The logic is simple. When we're not relaxed, we're too focused, producing both physical and mental tensions. Tension only restricts and builds upon itself, stifling any semblance of insight before it can even be born.

This is the first key: We assume productivity means we're at our desks, staring at a computer screen. But when you need huge conceptual breakthroughs, get away and bury your toes in the sand, or take a warm shower. Do whatever you must to release your mind from the manacles of the problem.

Read the rest of this nummy num-num at Yahoo! Scene, for which I'm doing Cannes Lions coverage this year.

Because Every Dog Show Should Have a Rube Goldberg.

Then, more people would come.

This cheery piece of work, dubbed "Un chien conduit une voiture" ("A dog driving a car") in hopes of maximising YouTube spread, is by Ford France for the C-Max with Active Park Assist. (For a minute after the video, I thought the latter had something to do with helping you out of parks, but that's probably just symptomatic of sleep loss.)

Find Us At Cannes. In PowerPuff Girl Outfits.*

With a little help from Cake Group, Yahoo's launched Yahoo Scene, a magnificent little destination that aspires to give you your industry conference + nightlife fix in the unhappy event that you can't dance on the kegs yourself.

Beginning next week, I join Steve Hall of Adrants and Ask Wappling of Adland in covering the Cannes Lions for Scene. It's going to be entirely too much awesome; what's more, Ask has already promised the whole internet we'll be coming as PowerPuff Girls. (I will be the angry one, Steve will be bubbly blue, and Ask, of course, will be Blossom.)



If you miss our coverage, you will die of sadness. But if long-form bloggage isn't your style, catch our up-to-the-moment tweets on who's where, who won what and desperate cries for attention: @adland @adrants @luckthelady.

Do not miss! Also, for a feel of the ... feel, catch my wrapup from last year, and this reflection on seaside smoking, and this interview with Richard Gorodecky whom I love more than highly productive anthills.

We are so going to rock your ad shit for seven whole days.

---

*Actually, not really unless Ask pushes hard for them.

Hey Adrants, Long Time No See!

This week, I'll be guest-editing for Adrants while Steve Hall gets his jollies at Internet Week in partnership with Yahoo! Scene.

Finally, a place for all my rage and bile!

Actually, it's not all that ragey and biley -- today is my birthday, and age has softened my gnarly griffon's touch -- but if you miss reading my reviews, tune in. Adrants is still the best place to get your ad fix, be yours shock-factor, gags, tits or beauty. It feels good to be back.

AdVerve Episode 74: McGameification.

Play the show now.

Aka, that big, juicy badge in the sky. It was one mic/two guys as Bill took a roadtrip to Savannah to join one of his co-strategists in crime at BFG. The Frenchman Known As Cyril Guichard (@luxregina) went live and uncensored as we kicked back for a high-rolling adventure on the topic of gameification.* It’s probably a word you're sick of, but he takes us deep into the philosophy of gaming, and why sites that "gameify" – like Foursquare – aren't games, per se (but will need to be).

Want more? We also find a way to pose that age-old question: can social media sites like Twitter really be used to construct the governments of tomorrow? Learn all the nuanced answers to this riddle, and others, this week. WE EVEN TALK 3D. Of course we also take our trademark™ left into fun areas like politics and discuss how Gen My dealt with the end of Osama, if at all.

(Also, learn why you're becoming a symbiant.)

Linkfegnugen:

- Heineken Star Player
- Cyril's blog on Luxgames.net

*Gamification or Gameification. Spell it any way you want, we don’t judge.

(Image.)

PacSun's Sinatra-Laced Anthem for 'Irresponsible' Youth

Not sure when last you walked into a PacSun. But for certain you'll see one at any suburban shopping mall, a fact as ageless as this ad dripping heavy with American Dream As Seen By Cameron Crowe.

The choice of Sinatra's "Call Me Irresponsible": apt, because we've been recounting this same myth about ephemeral adolescence, carefree and sexy youth, Lolita if she'd had the means and the chance, for generations. Sinatra is part of this same thread, and his voice frames this beatific ruddy-cheeked PG-rated chaos as faithfully as it did his swooning, screaming PG-rated Bobby Soxers.

And hell, it is a little irresponsible to gallivant into a PacSun just for a pair of Billabong shorts to muddy up two weekends out of four. That place is crazy expensive for its target market and product proposal. But I guess if teens can afford chrome rims, they'll find a way to afford Roxy sunglasses and faux-bamboo flip-flops, too.

This charming piece of Americana is brought to you by 72andSunny (@72andSunny) and production company Brickyard VFX.