Interesting video from Antonin Kratochvil on his style of photography. Particularly enjoyed this quote:
“You should never use camera to make your pictures. You use yourself, your experience, to make the pictures with the camera. Not the other way around.”
Watched and amazing TED talk this morning by iO Tillett Wright (@iOlovesyou) titled ‘Fifty shades of gay’. Discussing her own experience of growing up ‘different’, but also the exploration of her sexuality and photography project she embarkeed on a couple of years ago to take portraits of the LGBT community across the US. Very interesting and insightful.
Everyone laying my the pool on a down day:
The view of St. Emilion (such a beautiful place to walk):
For the first time PRWeek has released its top 50 digital consultancies in the UK and Hotwire Group – including Hotwire, Skywrite and 33 Digital – achieved a top 3 placing. It’s great to see PRWeek breaking out of the traditional ‘Top 150’/‘Top 50 by sector’ mould, proving the business opportunity that digital income offers agencies of all sizes. A recent survey we conducted through the Holmes Report also revealed that 46 per cent of communications professionals believe that PR has the greatest influence over social media, compared to 36 per cent who rated marketing as the most influential.
Some quick analysis of the rankings also highlights a couple of interesting insights into the growing importance of digital to PR agencies. Firstly, the average across the top 50 for digital fee income is 26% of total fees, while the top 10 recorded an average of 47% of their business coming from digital activity. This accounts for an estimated £3.6m of digital business each. Across all of the top 50 agencies, this totals up to just under £56m of digital work.
The other interesting point is the range of agencies clearly doing great digital work, from the big multi-nationals with their dedicated digital teams, right down to the smaller boutique agencies with just 8-15 people. In fact, 17 of the top 50 ranked in the bottom half of the Top 150 (with 2 not appearing at all). Therefore, whether it’s three people in a basement or an entire floor of digital specialists, it’s clear to see that digital is here to stay.
(Previously posted to Hotwire Interactive)
So…I’m thinking of giving up on the constant ‘potentially…’ platform that is FourSquare. It’s been two years since the service came to the UK and I have been major of places I frequent on a daily basis as well as a few locations I will never visit again (including a couple of hotels and coffee shops in Helsinki!). Over the last year in particular I have found myself sticking up for the platform and telling all my friends (and some colleagues) to get with the programme.
However, I have officially lost the will to defend the service any longer. I have spent the last month occasionally wondering whether or not I care about checking in here, there and everywhere. There is no real benefit to it, other than the competitive streak that drives me to be top of my contacts and mayor of my workplace, local train station, etc. The offers and local knowledge I was constantly waiting for FourSquare to incorporate are available from services like Groupon, so I don’t really see the benefit of the platform? While there are serious rumours that Groupon will be teaming up with FourSquare, it’s all just hearsay and too little too late for me, I’m afraid.
On Tuesday, when I started to mull over writing this blog post, I came to the conclusion that “My name is Tim and I am a FourSquare addict,” but more importantly that I don’t want to be anymore! In the interest of full disclosure I’m now 3 days clean and am posting after the initial withdrawal is over, which I won’t lie, was tough. But without FourSquare taking up the first minute of arriving anywhere, I find I have much more time to explore Twitter, try out new apps/services and keep on top of my news feeds for work, as well as my personal ones (for a change!).
Together, united, maybe we can all make birds happy again. Creating a world where pigs and birds can live in harmony!
Found these via Vincent Laforet, but they are two really impressive videos and an exciting sign of the times and the possible future! No, not because we’re all going to live in space and wear ID wrist bands, but because these were both completely created by a computer! For the above video (with the exception of the actors) the surrounding world was created in a computer, using a green screen to put the people in the scene.
The second video is arguably more impressive as it is entirely CGI, created using 3D software on a computer. Not a single frame was shot in the real world. It really is amazing! Anyway, enjoy…
Saw a video of the Qatar 2022 stadiums this morning (via LitmanLive). They look incredible! Some really interesting design choices and stunning surroundings. I’m not sure how they will deal with the heat and when they’ll be used again after the tournament.
But as design pieces, they look stunning!
Found this through Sociological Images, it’s a tally of military suicides outside the studio of Brooklyn artist Sebastian Errasuriz. It’s one of a series of pieces called known as “engaged public space”, highlighting the quiet but political use of public spaces to inform and incite.
