1) I find the Slow TV trend quite amusing and actually fun to watch. What’s Slow TV you ask? Started in Scandinavia, it’s the airing of completely ordinary events in it’s entirety. Netflix just released a series of these that range from train rides to firewood to even knitting. It’s an interesting trend that is the complete opposite of our short-form binging on YouTube, Facebook and Instagram. It’s oddly meditative and relaxing. You can also take it a step further and go for some Live Slow TV. My favorite is the “Jackson Intersection” on YouTube. It’s basically a live view of its main intersection and people populate the comment feed with what they see. Red Truck! Bird! Funny Walker! Red Truck Again! You get the drift.
2) 22squared had a busy year embracing the speed of change. Having the flexibility of being an independent shop, 22squared is constantly tinkering with our structure, processes and agility. For starters, we expanded our content department’s production capability with 22pictures. This allows us to create arresting video art quickly and it also gives us the ability to scale it up to larger video assignments when necessary. We also folded our social media department into strategy, media and creative early in the year. We just don’t believe that there is social-only creative anymore. It’s become part of the fabric of the agency now.
3) My favorite piece this year is our Interface “From Negative to Positive” campaign. Interface is a carpet tile company who was founded by Ray Anderson. Ray had a vision to become one of the most sustainable companies on the planet. This was quite a challenge given that carpet manufacturing is one of the dirtiest industries–where they take from the earth and make waste with their production. So the company set an audacious goal to reduce climate change and are asking other industries to join them. We decided to tell this story with a beautiful animated film entitled “An Unlikely Hero” inspired by Ray’s “Spear in the Chest” moment to change the company. The production company we partnered with was LOBO and they did a fantastic job bringing this story to life. Love those guys.
4) How can you not say VR? I’m sure everyone is going to say VR right? VR. There I said it again. Can you imagine sitting court side at an NBA game? Or driving around Los Santos in Grand Theft Auto? How about my favorite game of Crazy stuff.
