Non-trad ad for The Yoga Center.

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In Non-traditional Advertising, ads are strategically positioned in the most unexpected places e.g. the sidewalk, a manhole cover, and as in the brilliant¹ example above, a straw. The trick is in fusing your big idea with the 3D properties of the medium without making the proposition seem contrived². On that note, I stumbled upon this really cool collection of Creative Ads Around The World I thought you might enjoy!

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UPDATE: Mr. Katana of Hemmy.net is the real creator of the Creative Ads list, and not the webmaster of Eglobe1 like I originally linked to. Apparently Onion82 of Eglobe stole Mr. Katana’s entry and is passing it off as his³. Read more about it here.

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Heyheyhey, why don’t you deck out your windows with these dooper-cute Halloweenie windsocks our good friends Nina and Carlo designed⁴ :

They’re available in Maxitoylab Alabang Town Center and Maxiworks Powerplant Mall in Rockwell. They’re made of nylon, are 2.5 feet in length and 18 inches in diameter, and cost P150 each. Grab one now, yes?
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It’s been said time and again that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Last July, our 2-year old magazine Wedding Essentials came out with a Special Issue called WE Beautiful Weddings featuring 25 real wedding stories and photos submitted and written by actual brides. We even included a “supplier box” listing down all the vendors each couple worked with.

Remember?

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Fast forward to this month: look what our more-than-5-year-old rival mag did. For their, um, version, they also asked brides to write the stories themselves — something WE has been doing since the very first issue. At least the art direction is different but the overall concept and format was copied right down to the supplier box.⁵) Well, well, well, how utterly flattering! 😉
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So if you love WE, pretty please wait for our next issue and do feel free to take a peek at the behind-the-scenes action via my phlog.

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Arn and I will be away from home⁶ for a couple of weeks but I’ll see if I can post from where we’ll be. Seeya. 🙂

1. It’s so simple, it makes you go “why didn’t I think of that?”[ back]
2. I’ve actually seen it employed locally, some better executed than others though, but it’s good to know that the brand people are becoming more open to the non-conventional approach.[ back]
3. Sigh, aren’t we all victims of intellectual property thievery lately.[ back]
4. They’re sooo cute! I’m guessing that sock #s 1, 3, 4, and 5 are by Nina and #s 2 and 6 are by Carlo, correct?[ back]
5. The only difference is that ours was a true labor of love and not something borne out of marketing warfare. ;[ back]
6. …and our dear little Abbas 🙁[ back]

Edsa before:

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Edsa after the storm:

I don’t miss the billboard clutter at all¹ but the highway just looks so forlorn undressed, no? 🙁

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On to brighter things:

Katamari Damacy² has been around for more than 2 years now but believe it or not I only got into the craze last month *sheepish smile*. It’s so fun! And easy! And weird! Lovit, lovit. The soundtrack’s really good, too. Click here if you don’t know (and would like to know) what I’m talking about.

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And I might as well announce it since SonyBMG already did.

The Eraserheads Anthology Two will be out by October 16. Cover and interior artwork is again courtesy of my fabulous husband³ 🙂
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Related projects:
– Eraserheads Anthology (volume 1)
– The 2-in-1 Series (batch 1)
– The 2-in-1 Series (batch 2)
– UltraelectromagneticJam

1. Especially not the ones with ginormous photoshopped-to-perfection images of her, what a relief they’re all down hehe.[ back]
2. I know you told me about this MONTHS ago, Nest — ngayon ko lang nilaro![ back]
3. With layout duties again by yours truly.[ back]

Halloo, I’m back. This site was down again all weekend so I finally left Affordablehost, my home for five years, for the it – seems – to – me more reliable Axishost. You can read about — and possibly learn from — why I did so on this page.

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My Arn turned, umm, another year wiser last weekend! 😉 How did we celebrate it? Why with food, food, and more food of course. See the phlog for more pics.

I got him a dress watch and the first season of the 1970s series The Incredible Hulk on DVD and I’ve been watching along, which is a first since I usually get him DVDs for his birthdays¹ but I don’t last long watching them. I didn’t think I’d actually get hooked on Hulk since I never got to watch it when I was young² but it’s very engaging and the way it’s produced makes the situations look so real — bellbottoms, sideburns notwithstanding.

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Hanging out and spending time with good friends has become extremely difficult now that everyone’s always busy nowadays. Thankfully though, most of us were able to sync our schedules these past couple of weeks. Again, more pics in the phlog.

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Check it out, the great komikero himself, Gerry Alanguilan made a short video featuring an interview with Arn in time for his birthday, no less. Thanks “cousin” Gerry! 😉

You can view — and learn from — all his videos here.

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By the way, for those of you looking to find extraordinary works to experience, I made a list of graphic novels that are big in heart — basically, stories that made me fall in love with the medium of graphic storytelling. These exemplify what I think has just the right mix of narrative and pretty pictures: not too artsy that the stories don’t make sense anymore, and not too wordy or high falutin that there’s no room to appreciate the story and illustrations. Let me know what you think. 🙂

1. Last year it was The Alien Quadrilogy, the other year it was Flash Gordon and Battlestar Galactica, and the year before it was the collector’s edition of 2001: A Space Odyssey.[ back]
2. Wonder Woman and The Bionic Woman being whom I considered superheroes[ back]