Alice in wonderland

Maybe because of my name or the fact that when I was little my mum used to always read me alice in wonderland and I went though a period of watching it at least once a day for about a month, or the fact that I was in a ballet production of it, I am really excited about the new alice in wonderland film coming out next year. 

Its a Tim Burton production which just at that you know its going to be amazing, but he has teamed up with Johnny Depp for the seventh time. Johnny Depp will be playing the mad hatter, the role was apparently part tailor made for him, and with his past performances in charlie and the chocolate factory and pirates of the Caribbean you know he will play the mad hatter like no one else would be able to. Other famous names in this film are Stephen Fry who is playing the voice of the cheshire cat, Matt Lucus who is playing both tweeledee and tweeldedum and Alan Rickman who is playing the caterpillar. Watching the trailer it looks part cartoon, part CGI and part realistic. I may go and watch 'Nightmare at Christmas'  to get myself ready for the Tim Burton alice in wonderland experience. 

Kenco coffee advert

I saw this advert a few weeks ago and it made me laugh and it still does now, but know I also think its a very interesting advert and a brilliant way for the company to put there sustainability objectives across to the public. I personally love nescafe and have alway drunk it and thought that kenco was horrible but recently I have been buying kenco basically because of this advert as it informed me of there sustainability objectives and the care they take in all they do. Nescafe's recent advert is just a bit pointless, compared to Kenco's,  catching the light of coffee in each jar, its not telling me about anything other than the fact they take from the environment to give us, and they dont seem to put back.

Kencos advert is informative while comical, however its say that it has 97% less packaging which I kind of didn't believe, how can that actually be possible it is still packaged, reading articles online about this new campaign I found out that it is actually 97%  less packaging weight, its very cleaver that they have missed out this one word. Even though I feel like I have been kind of lied to because of them missing out this one word, I am still now in full support of kenco and shall forever be drinking it because of there commitment to source there coffee from an entire range of rainforest certified farms by 2010. 

This advert is one in many in there above-the-line advertising campaign to promote its sustainably pledge, as well as the ad they are doing in-store, outdoor and digital promotions as well as competitions to win eco friendly holidays. This is one company after my own heart.

Everland Hotel

I have been trying to find some sort of architecture all summer which inspires and intrigues me, and I feel I have finally found it. While watching 'Design for life' I saw that they visited the Everland Hotel, I was intrigued by this and wanted to learn more, so I visited its website. As soon as I went on the site I saw that this hotel moves around the world into different amazing locations giving the hotel user an incredible view out of the many windows. The hotel was made by the artist Gianni Jetzer for the exhibition concept 'everland' at the swiss national exhibition in the year 2002. The hotel was then taken on tour around the world, the room could be booked for one night only, the mini-bar was fully stocked and included in the price, breakfast was delivered to the door and a record collection stands at one's disposal. The hotel in all locations was open for public viewing in the day and then at night booked for the over night use. I think this is a original and amazing idea having this very modern looking building placed in very different stetting and areas of design to it, ie on the roof of the old Palais de tokyo in paris.

TED.COM

Just found this website really interesting, it has lots of filmed lectures on it, which are really interesting to listen and watch, it has a whole section for design lectures, check it out, its interesting and you learn a lot. However all I have watched so far are of american lecturers, so not a globe section of lectures

Typography - The london design festival

Some interesting typography I found from the London design festival, I do personally prefer the more simple, posters ie the last one, its simple but shows the point of london with an iconic image of the london buses within the typography.

Che - iconic photograph

Ever since I went to Cuba this summer holiday I have been interested in Che, I am half way though reading a book about his life, I have watched one of the Che films, which was really good but hard to watch as I usually avoid sub-tiled films, I am just waiting for a good time to sit down and concentrate on watching the next one. So when I saw an article in the creative review about him, and the iconic photo of him I just had to read it. 

Its all about how the photographer Alberto 'korda' diaz Gutierrez who was part of Che's revolution party as there photographer  as Che realized how important it was to have photos in the public domain to strengthen there revolution. Its sad to realize through reading this article how Korda received none of the huge amounts of money this picture has created. As when he took it he said it was ' just another shot' and he didnt realize how important it could be, he did however crop the photo very well to make it in to the portrait photo it is today as it was actually taken at a memorial service for the victims of the La Coubre explosions in havana in 1960, and so had another person in the original photo as well as a tree.  Because of the no copyright laws of the time, anyone could use this photo and did so, for capitalists reason. So people where getting rich of someone else's work and using the iconic photo to sell alcohol and cigarettes, which is sad and not the revolutionary goals of Che, and just seems wrong, however in 1990 Korda did finally manage to gain copy right of the one image and know his daughter controls his estate as he died in 2001.  I do feel that it was wrong for the original photographer not to get created for the image straight away but resently the korda estate has denied the Guevara families request for the image to be nationalized and used as a free image representing Cuba, I feel this was wrong of the korda's estate, as the image is of  Che and his family should have some kind of decision making over it too, and I am sure Che him self would have been proud for his image to be used as an image to represent cuba. Even though it is not an officially image of cuba, whenever someone sees the image they think of cuba and whenever someone thinks of cuba they see the image, its too strong of an image not to. The article also talks about a new documentary out in London's ICA called 'Chavolution' which is about the photograph and how it has been used as well as about ches life in cuba, I wish I was in london to go see it, but I am hoping I will be able to find it on the internet soon. 

Social Workers ad

This is a youtube video which helped me understand the advert and realize that it was a good one, - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MLSWWxY9Cdg&feature=related

When I first saw these adverts I was like what is going on, it was the one that it shown on tv, of about 5 so called celebrities talking individually about different thing, (another thing which I dont think works is the fact that they are not really house hold now celebrities) but the shots are cut together so fast you dont really have time to realize that its not there voice which is coming out of there mouths. However after watching the individual celebrity adverts on youtube, each about 3 mins long of just the one celebrity and the issue they are talking about, it makes lots more sense that its not there voice coming from there mouths but someone else's, making the tag line of the whole campaign, 'help give them a voice' more meaning full. Its a good and effective campaign if watched as individual tv ads, not all cut together too fast. I think that the organization should reconsider the way they have put the ad on tv, and show the individual ads, as you can see on youtube on the tv to give the proper, desired and deserved effect. 

Cadburys goes fair trade

Cadburys new advert can be seen here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ktLtvinZBs - its a long version of the ad which is shown on tv.

Cadbury has finally gone fair trade, which personally I am very happy about as I try to support all fair trade products, and I love my dairy milk so having the two finally joined is a good thing. The advert publicizing this fact is a good one, as its vibrate and shows where there beans are from, ghana and it also shows local artist work in the ad as well as famous Ghana singers, However if i didn't watch ad for the first time with a friend who had just come back from 6 months in Ghana I would not have known this, although on the Cadbury fair trade website it informs us of all the Ghanaian people involved in the making of the ad. I am very impressed with cadburys for the import they have got from the locals in ghana for the advert,  it shows true fair tradeness and is an excellent way to publicize there new certificate. 

For the Ghanaian press ads they even used a local artist for the work which is an excellent idea, rather then getting a western artist to try and represent the areas art. It helps to show a commitment from cadburys to keep the Ghanians involved in there work. This local artist was called jasper and he was born in to a family of coca farmers so it was very fitting for him to paint the moral for Cadburys in there ad, and it is also a real life moral in the town of Kof.  For cadbury he bought the cocoa beans to life, showing them celebrate the new fair trade of cadburys, with arms, legs and smiles, as shown above, and cadburys carried these beans on throughout the advert as real characters expressing joy and celebrating with the local Ghanaians. 

Rankin anti-smoking

Birmingham NHS has recruited the photographer Ranknin to help them produce a new anti-smoking campaign. The campaign involves a sort advert which was co directed with Chris Cottam, and shows a man being invisibly attacked (see link below to watch advert), with the slogan 'smoke and your body takes a beating, fight back, quit now' at the end. The video has been touring birmingham though a mobile exhibition in the past few weeks, and with it, people can go up and get there lung age tested as well as there carbon monoxide levels tested. As well as this video the team also came up with some posters, with didn't men beaten up on them and different but linking slogans, such as 'Smoking: GBH to your insides' and 'When you smoke, its your insides that get beaten up'. Birmingham's NHS wanted to produce this new campaign to get to the heard to reach smokers, the white males between 35-55 living in deprived areas of the city. I personally feel this campaign is a good one, and effective, I think all the aspects of the campaign link together really well. the beating up and violence does fit there target market well, as its the only sort of thing they most likely react to and know about. However if it was shown to none target group people they would just see it as unnecessary unrealistic violence, whoever for this target market group I feel it is the most effective thing they could have done and the slogans are thing which this group knows and response well to such as the GHB comment in one of the poster ideas. I feel that this campaign could work well in other deprived areas of large UK cities. 

Video can be found here - http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/sep/21/rankin-nhs-viral-ad

Trafalgar Square Plinth

I was in london a few weeks ago, for the Nottingham hill carnival, and while hanging around waiting for my sister in trafalgar square I noticed the plinth (forth plinth) was getting a lot of attention, I had totally forgotten about the plans for it, and when asked my sister she reminded me of the competition where anyone can go on the plinth for an hour and do anything. Then I saw this in the news just a week ago, and thought that it was a good way for someone to use there won, one hour. The fourth plinth competition is about public art and the many possibilities that can bring, I think this one is good as it brings reality and truth and a plea for help in the art which is real and constant for this one person, it has also helped widen the women's case and move it more into the public domain, making the government take action, which they may have not done if this man had not done what he had. But some may say that this is not a place to demonstrate its a place to show art, but when has art ever been something but a demonstration of human life, art is more then a painting or sculpture in this modern day and I think this was an hour of powerful art, which has in the end helped someone stay alive.

Sorry I forget to say what was on the plinth in the photo. It is a Scottish man, and a photo the 51 year old British grandmother, Linda Carty, who is one death row in america right now. The man played a voice recording of the women over and over for the hour.It was a voice recording of her in jail talking about her circumstances.  For more information on this see the CNN news page -  http://edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/europe/09/10/uk.death.row.plea/index.html

Loosing the Thames

A new london tube map has been created, missing of the Themes river. Some have been shocked and disappointed by this, because it has messed up the classic design of the early 30's Harry Beck design. It was said that the redesign was done to make the map more simlar and clutter less, but many have said that it has removed a vital orienting point, demirching the capitals history and worst of all according to some Londoners, (which i am not one of) annxed the separate kingdoms of north and south london. I just found it interesting that london felt the need to change such an iconic design which has worked so well in past years. 

Something I learned last night while talking to some friends about this new tube map with out the themes was that the reason the map was designed in this way was because the designer worked in the construction on the underground when it was first made, and was part of the 

circuit board team for the electricity down there. He decided that there was no need for a true to scale and size map as when someone is down in the underground they have no sense of direction, area, size or scale, so decided to draw it just like a circuit board map, and because of this original idea which worked so well nearly every other city thought out the world with an underground has used a simular idea. I found this very interesting, and I was also told that in the london transport museum you can see all the underground maps of london which have ever existed and see how they have changed over the years, it is apparently very interesting and even though I am not a londoner myself I am very keen to go see this.

Charity/public awareness campaigns

These area  few print adverts which I found today,  for charities and public awareness campaigns which I feel are effective and work well for there organizations.

This is an organ donor campaign targeted towards men but which i thought was quite funny, an advert bring humor into a none hummus environment is a very clearer and rise taking advert indeed.

This campaign was commissioned by Duval Guillaume Client in need: National Association for Organ Transplant Helping people in need it's good for you and for humanity! It is not a shock tactic campaign but a subtle calm advert, using the cold hospital whites as a sign of depression and illness, as well as a sign of an awaiting death.

This is for a campaign against child abuse (NSPCC, Uk) , which has used the shock tactic to draw attention and cause a buzz, but do charities really need to use this shock tactic to create awareness?? 

Obama - Hope or Joke

Dont get me wrong, at the moment I am all the way behind and in support of Obama. He is the best presented the USA has had in a long time, and he bring hope to his country and the world as a whole. But I saw these picture the other day while browsing the net and found them interesting, its great how in America this can happen and the artist will be safe from harm and imprisonment in many countries if this happened the artist would be in jail most likely with out a trail, it show the freedom of speech in american and how will there constitution has worked.

I am not personally offend by these picture but I am sure some strong supports of Obarma are, I would love to know peoples opinion on these pictures, if they are offended or not, or find them liberating as a form of freedom of speech and opinion in the apparent free world.

The image has made quite a stir in the USA is many questioning the term socialism under his face as it does not fit anything he stands for. The artist as 20 year old university student Firas Alkhateeb  didn't even write this under his original picture he was only messing round in  photoshop on his winter holidays and posted the result on flicker in january where is was picked up and used by a Obama critic. To read the whole article go to http://www.thefirstpost.co.uk/52450,news,obama-as-joker-poster-creator-unmasked. 

Cleaver way to get you point across

This is a Charity campaign in mexico warning about the use of matches around children I just thought it was a cleaver, original and  an effective way to get the point across so I wanted to share it with you all, as I am very interested in new ways of adverting for charities which make then stand out from the other adverts out there. This one is cleaver as the picture is made out of used and none used matches using the thing the campaign is warning against makes the impact more meaningful and powerful.

The advert is created by

Creative Directors: Carl Jones, Adrian Brizuela, Ramiro Plascencia
Art Directors: Arlette Farah, Mario Aguilar, Carl Jones
Photographer: Paolo Gori
Copywriter: Lilianzur Fuentes
Agency Producer: Ivonne Cortes

Adverts using body paint.

After looking at the Barclaycard competition adverts, in previous blog I decided to look at other adverts which use body paint to get there point across. Above are a few which i really like.

The Ultra thin Panty lines campaign is very cleaver, showing that they are as tight as your skins. What better way to show the thinness and perfection of a feminine hygiene product than by using a totally naked, or fully painted model. However there is some controversy that this is not actaully body paint but photoshopped to look so, either way the images of girls wearing nothing but body paint conveys the message quite clearly, even in the tightest trousers, or dresses, no one is going to know she is using the product. This campagne was realsied in south Africa, and its creators where - Grey South Africa /Executive Creative Director: Mike Barnwell / Art Director: Gareth Pretorius / Copywriter: Andrew Moore.

The rock 'n' roll McDonold fries advert is just another example of how the body can be used in adverts when painted, and also shows how the body in this case the hand can be used in such a way as to resemble the organizations product. In this case the McFries packaging.

In the Hot wheel adverts, if the painted fingers where not there you could be forgiven for mistaking the cars as real life size cars as they look so realistic, therefore having these painted fingers helps to show the size of the product but at the say time, making then more luxurisouse as they show the kind of people who would use the cars, it also is trying to bring humor into the campaign. “The toy cars look so real that with the ‘finger models’ you would think they were life-size,” says a recent article in Trendhunter.

Barclaycard slide advert competition

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwSfDcU5SWQ&NR=1

I heard a while ago that braclycard where doing a competition related to there water slide tv advert. People had to entry in there own versions of the water slide, I saw this one on youtube yesterday and though it was so original and different from all the other ones I have seen. It is a cleaver idea painting the slide on you body, this has got be quite interested in body art, so I am going to do some research in body art as i think it can be an interesting form of design and adverting if used in the right way.

Inspiring website

http://www.blog.spoongraphics.co.uk/

This website is really good, I have recently been playing around on the internet and on adobe software on my computer to try and improve my computer skills and I found this website which has some really useful tutorials and some really good little things which have inspired me and given me ideas for future projects, giving me a wider knowledge of what I can actually achieve on the computer so hopefully in my final year I can be a bit more adventurous with my project ideas as I know I can do almost anything on the computer if I just take my time. 

New Michael Moore Film

Michael Morre, the director who brought us Fahrenheit 9\11 is back with his new film about the credit crunch and how it all happened and trying to get answers and money back from the US government and banks. In the film he apparently try's to make a citercens arrest of a bank executive and takes empty bank money bags to banks requesting the $10 billion owed to the US people to be given back. It sounds good, even though it is something which we have all kind of expected to happen sometime because of his previous films and the huge impact this global problem has had. I feel it is too early to bring out a documentary of the issue, as it is one which still haven't be resolved and is no way never the end of its run. Morre's Fahrenheit 9/11 film was so successful because he had left time between the event and the filming, time for things to be considered, questions to be formulated and reasonably answered by people. But with this film people are still anger with the issue as they are having to live thought  it still everyday with no end in sight, and banks are still scared of going bust and people loosing there jobs. I feel Morre was right to make this film but he should have left it a few more years. I believe he will not have got many solid answers from this film, however I am still keen to watch it, even though, all that is in it by the time I watch it is properly out of date or already known and solved but I will go with an open mind to watch it in any case.

To watch the trailer go to - 

http://www.youtube.com/watchv=IhydyxRjujU&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Eguardian%2Eco%2Euk%2Ffilm%2Ffilmblog%2F2009%2Fsep%2F02%2Fmichael%2Dmoore%2Dcapitalism%2Ddocumentary&feature=player_embedded#t=118

New way to get charity funding

Found this article while doing some dissertation research and thought this was a very interesting way to use the new media of twitter, so sharing the article with you all, as I have not seen it publicized anywhere else other then in the charity industry newsletters.

Twestival opens to all charities

By Kaye Wiggins, Third Sector Online, 20 August 2009

Twitter fundraising events will allow site's users to vote for their choice of charity

A campaign that uses social networking site Twitterto organise fundraising events will be open to all charities for the first time. 

The campaign, called Twestival, encourages Twitter users to set up fundraising events in their area and promote them through ‘tweets', or short message updates. 

Previous events, which have included picnics, raffles, fetes and DJ nights, have raised money for US-based clean water charity charity:water.

A Twestival spokeswoman said that for the next one, to be held from 10 to 13 September, local communities would be able to vote online for the charity they would like to receive the funds they raise.

Twestival events will take place in 14 UK towns and cities including London, Birmingham, Edinburgh, Glasgow and Cardiff.

Local, national and international charities would all be eligible to receive the funds raised, the spokeswoman said.

More than 1,000 people attended the London event of the latest Twestival, held in February this year, which raised £180,000 globally.

Age concern photographs

While doing some more dissertation research today, i found this. 

Photographer Christian Sinibaldi has taken photos of the older generation and posed the question what is glamour in the aging. The photos are simple portraits of people above 60, but because of there simple quality i think they are stunning photos. He has named his exhibition of these photos 'I can see into your eyes' and he is exhibiting it at 'the Guardian's King's Cross headquarters until 4 September.' because Age Concern Camden is a charity which the guardian truly believes in and supports. The exhibition is going to be up until 4th sept. If i lived in london i would defiantly be down there to check out the photos in person. Instead i have had to just admire them from the Guardian website.

 http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/audioslideshow/2009/aug/18/christian-sinibaldi-age-concern-exhibition check it out if you have time the photos are so inspiring and makes you remember that when we grow old we dont have to be the stereotypical, old, boring, sad, people that everyone thinks the aging are. 

Barnardos complaints

New Barnardos TV advert- can be seen at this website address http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/video/2008/dec/10/asa-advertising

(I haven't figured out how to put videos up on this yet, if someone can tell me that would be great as there are loads i would love to share)

For my dissertation i am hoping to do something along the lines of how adverting/branding is used in the charity industry or NGO, as i want to work for an NGO in the future. While doing some initial research for this i found this advert by barnardos, i think its very effective and is very clear with its aim and point and i feel it really works and is very thought provoking and the images stick with you. But because of its harsh realistic content it has been banded from tv. I did some research on barnardos and its advertising campaigns and found that many of barnardos tv ads have been band because of there realistic, preserve, in some cases gross imagery. i am wondering know if they are doing these adverts to get banded on purpose to give themselves more publicity, free publicity at that or they are doing them to be shown and be so thought provoking to the audience that they make them do something with the charity and the banding is just a unforeseen thing. 

Art movement in Berlin hotel

A friend told me yesterday that they had read about a hotel in Berlin where they invite artists, painters, sculptures and even conceptual artists to stay and the way they pay is to donate there work to the hotel, making the hotel ever changing as it gets new peaces of art. I thought that this was a fascinating idea, having somewhere, which is always changing as art moments change and adapt, instead of the place staying in the same time fashion for many years until the owners decide to refurbish. The most recent artist to stay there is Anna Jandt who created this room with a horses head she said that doing this peace of work ''was both really strange and inspiring to live in the hotel at the same time as redesigning the interior," she also says ''The horse's head gives the room quite a sterile atmosphere and the room is overly replete with patterns – it's a … comment on the anonymity and overpowering nature of posh hotel rooms."

It is such a different and unique way for artists to show of there work that the hotel has a huge waiting list of artists to come and do work for them, artist to have already visited this hotel (Hotel Marienbad in Auguststrasse) include Turner Prize winner Douglas Gordon, Helga and Hartmut Rausch, Wolfgang Breuer, Mark van Schlegell. The next artists is to be ''Sarah Ortmeyer, due to check in this month, plans to remove the horse's head and transform her room into an "area of comfort and contemplation" in a tribute to the Eiffel Tower.''

Book cover race row

In one of my other book blogs I commented on the fact that I didnt believe the cover represented the books story well at all. The other day while on the 'GUARDIAN' website I saw an article commenting on this idea. But instead of the cover not representing the story the cover purposely showed a totally different person then that described in the book.                                                                                                      

The book ‘Lier’ by Justine Larbalestier, not yet published in the UK, is about a black woman with short hair and on the cover of the original book was a picture of a white women with long hair, the publicist told the author that this had to be because books with black people on the cover don’t sell well, this is both false adverting of the book and morally wrong and raciest I personally cant believe this happens. Thankfully so many people complained about this as well as the author her self that the publicities Bloomsbury decided to change the book cover to a black women not one that the author had imaged the women to be but nether the less better than the first cover, so if the book ever comes to England we shall not be horrified by the deliberate and obvious racistum.

Thinking about this more however I have noticed that books about black people don’t have them on the cover. At the moment I am reading the book, 'the other hand' by Chris Cleave that is about Jamaican and Nigerian asylum seekers and on the front cover is only a silhouette of a small child either back or white. I am so shacked by this concept, and strangely agree with Larbalestier comment ''If black kids, Hispanics, Indians both Eastern and Western, don't buy fantasy – which they mostly don't – could it be because they never see themselves on the cover?"

OXO Cube

I heard about oxo plans a few weeks ago, but thought it was a prank just to get more interest into the brand and so more customers but apparently its all true. Oxo are changing the shape of there cubes to an 'x' shape, they say so that they are easier to crumble, but I dont think this is true, I believe they are doing it purely for publicity and to increase the creativity of there advertising and promotional strategy, as I have never had a problem crumbling an oxo cube. Yes having it in an 'x' shape I can see how it would be easier to crumble but they are changing the shape of an old iconic product of england, they cant be doing this purely on easier crumbling as its a lot of time and money on there part. I believe they have done it to increase there customer base and think of all the publicity they could have, they could sponsor the 'x' factor next series, they could promote them selves as the 'x' factor in cooking, and its an excuse to advertise themselves more and a sort of rebranding of the product. However I my self will be a little sad to see the cube disappear and for this 'x' to replace it in october.

Film costing only £45

In the guardians g2 on Thursday this week I read an article about a 30 year old man who had written, filmed and produced a film about zombies called ‘Colin’ for only £45, and it had been received really well at Cannes and we now going to be released in nationwide cinemas in October as well as being released on DVD afterwards. An amazing achievement for a man who works in a call centre. This is the online version of the article - http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2009/jul/30/marc-price-zombie-film-colin.

He filmed this film on an old camcorder and edited it on a simple laptop, leaning most editorial and film creating skills from extras on DVD’s. It just shows how developed today general technology, which we can all afford is, and how simple and easy it is for any enthusiastic filmmaker to make films cheaply. But this does bring around the question of why is it that Hollywood films cost so much. I have not seen this film so I can’t personally comment on the quality and realistness of the film, to compare it to the extremely more expensive zombie films, but if it is being released nationwide it cant be to bad. I think out of curiosity I will be going to watch it when it is out. How ever it looks realistic or not its an amazing feet for this one man to have done, to have gone from a bit of fun, to the Wales film festival, to Cannes and finally to nationwide cinemas.

Book 2 – Twenty Years, Two People, One Day by David Nicholls

This book is traditional in layout compared to The Tenth Circle, there this is no hidden quotes and no artist input and it is very different in story telling and story. It is kind of a romance but more just about human life the way we change over the years, the way peoples dreams don’t always work out the way they hoped and the way people paths change and interchange over there life’s. It’s a very real to life book, realistic, raw and highly descriptive, both of places, people and happening. The author has either done a lot in his life, researched immensely or done a very good job a winging it. The book is about 2 young people Emma and Dexter, who meet on there last day of university with high hopes for the future dreams and ambitions and then every chapter after that is exactly a year on in there life, ie the title twenty years, two people. You feel like you know them so well as characters by the middle of the book as you have read about them grow as people and change. Its goes though all the stages of their lifes, from the getting a new house, new job, partners, to their thirties were every is getting married and having kids and what happens afterwards, devoice or happiness, I don’t want to spoil the book but it’s a very sad ending and the best thing about it its so unexpected and shocking. The book was so descriptive and I got so in to it and I felt like I know the two characters that I feel it could work so well as a film, but I also worry when books are made into films, that Hollywood just destroys the story and charters so I hope this book never turns into a film because of this and the love I found myself having for the characters. 

In the past month I have read two really good books, can’t put down page-turners, both very different in approach and story. I highly recommend them both and in the next two blogs, hopefully with out spoiling the story line too much, I shall tell you why.

Book 1 – The Tenth Circle by Jodi Picoult

The thing that makes this book different from others is the comic novel which it is combined with. The main character in this book is a father who is a comic novel artist and he is doing a comic about family life and the nine/ten circles of hell. The novel relates to his life in the book and so at the end of ever chapter is a chapter of the comic novel. The anther got a real comic novel artist to produce this part of the book and so the draws are amazing and so detailed, and fit so well with the books content and dantees circles of hell.

The author deals with so many issues in the book. All which relate to the main theme of dantees 9 circles of hell. (This book has given me a keen interest in dantees circles of hell, so much that I really would love to read his theory book, however its in Italian and apparently the translated version is very hard to read, which is a shame). Such as adultery, rape, suicide, murder, self harm and anger all which are dealt with around this one family. The author does amazingly well with describing teenage life, issues and pain, as well as the emotional straights that parents feel when they children grow up, or are harmed and the lengths parents will go to, to protect there children. It’s a very deep, sad and at times depressing book, but with a happyish ending.

Another thing, which makes this book, so individual other then the novel its self is that with in the comic novel the artist has hidden letters which you are meant to find and with spell out a famous quote and its author. The quote is meant to sum up the book as a whole. However the letters are very hard to find, you are told that there is 86 letters in all, however I have only managed to find 74. So I still do not knew this quote, so it anyone has read the book and found out please let me knew its killing me. The reason that the letters and this idea of finding them are in the comic is because in the story its how the parents met. The dad draw a cartoon of the mother on the street as they do in some places in American and he had hid a time and place for them to meet with the drawing, a romantic hidden gesture. Its clever and nice how the author decided to continue this hidden idea with in her own book.

One thing I didn’t like about this book however was the cover, yes the book does half take place in a cold snowy area of American so it represents that, whoever it is a very family issue based book, so I feel it should have had at least 3 people on the cover not just 2, especially as this family was 3. But that is a very minor thing and me just being extremely picky, however I do usually choice a book from its cover naively and I was initially attracted to this book because of its cover.

September 4th 2009 - 

I have literally just had my lunch brake from work and seen this book as a film on channel five, I was shocked and quite happy at first to see that this good book had been make into a film and only last year. But as I sat down to watch it, I was disappointed, the thing which makes this book is its comic book, and in the film there is no comic book, we are not even told what the dads job is, which was very disappointing for me, as that is why I liked the book so much, other then that though, I have to give the film some credit as it sticks to the story and pretty much uses the same words which are in the book for its script. It is one of the only book films that  I have watch which sticks so closely to the books story line.

Larger packaging

(Bucanero beer can and Cristal beer can, photos taken by me, all others are google image picture)

I have just been on a two week holiday to Cuba, and noticed that the beer can Cristal looked very familiar. I realized that is was because most European beer cans have the name and branding of the beer in an oval shape such as the Stella beer can and Becks beer can does. Then I remember a beer that I had in brazil on my gap year called Skol and that too had its branding in an oval shape on its cans and even bottles. Why does this oral seem to be an international form of branding style among beer companies, is it because it is the best and most ascetically pleasing shape to have an on circular packaging? It just seems a bit boring even though the Cristal have tried something different by having its name diagonal crosses the oral compared to the straight across of the European beers.

I was very happy to see that another local cuban beer that I found on the last day called Bucanero, was completely different in design. It has no oval shape and its name was vertical on the can. It had some individuality and character to the branding, because of this it stood out well amongst the other brand and so I was drawn to buy it as it was different. Its a shame that all beer companies seems to have the same branding style and no real individuality to them. However as I was looking for pics of the European and Brazilian beer I came across the Bucanero bottle and saw that it had the branding in an oval shape. Is there a technical reason for comapanies to have branding in an oval shape on bottles and cans or is it the designers lack of creativity?,  I do hope its the first reason.