russellmarsh

This is one of the coolest examples of creative innovation I have seen in a long time!

Watching "World's First Ever Touchable Hologram! (Holography)" at Vodpod. Very clevery technology!

Great instore example of the AT&T Microsoft Surface instore sales tool. Place your phone on the table top and see all of the options for that handset.

A very nice example of how microsoft surface can be used by Razorfish. Shows a whole physics engine in use generating realime interactions with both physical and virtual objects - Nice Work!

A fascinating glimpse at what the future of interacting with information may look like. All possible right now using components already available but put mashed together to create a new way of using the technology together.

It’s interesting to see Microsoft jumping on the cloud band wagon recently with Azure a cloud version of Windows. It seems that a lot of the major players are now looking to follow the Google route of trying to get their applications and document storage on-line . Apple with it’s “Mobile Me” that takes email, contacts, diary etc and allows you to access them from any where.

Google with numerous tools that link photography, documents, email.
Adobe now has a version of Photoshop up there and there are now even video editing tools available from companies like Jumpcut.

Even Amazon are in on the great migration to move into the cloud with the development of some of their services like S3 and hosting. All very well and good but there are a couple of things that make me a little nervous.

I am a big user of these types of services and there are couple of things that concern me. The first is what happens if I accidentally break the “rules” or am even just reported for breaking the rules? My account and all my connections and tools get “killed” or at least suspended until I can contact someone. Given there are never any “old school” phone numbers to call and the chances are that your integrated email also gets suspended then this could be a problem. The second is what happens to the usability, lag and service when the system gets stretched? As more data is transferred over the Internet and the growth of video content this is inevitable.
The idea of cloud where we can all store oodles of data forever and access it from any where at any time is a very seductive proposition, but if you or your business is depending on this type of integrated on-line connection then there could be some major problems brewing for the future.

With the potential of an Exaflood on the horizon there are more and more conversations about prioritizing data packets over the networks and charging for the privilege (Net Neutrality).

I have heard both the UK government and the...

That is a pretty tough touch screen!

Although I am not sure how many people would be out using a touch screen in a war zone or a gun battle.

I am a strong believe that creativity is driven by technology. This is when creative minds get hold of new tech and ask themselves "What if". This video is a great example of someone playing with technology and coming up with a very simpel and very cheap way of interfacing differently with a computer.

It is quite amazing how fast this industry moves. Microsoft comes out with an expensive but very cool surface computing system and before they have even made market headway a competitor is already there. A very clever bit of kit that allows you to turn pretty much any flat display into a touch screen.

A very interesting application being developed on the iPhone showing how augmented reality can be used.

more about “IFAW UK - “World Without Gorillas” PSA“, posted with vodpod

Posted in Creative, Marketing Tagged: Interactive

So, after what feels like forever (only 9 days) the video footage from Sokol has arrived. The DVD’s had a whole heap of stills on them (some good, some not so good) which I have already added to this blog in the relevant sections.
I also got a DVD with footage of the flight which I have re-edited so it’s shorter and  I’ve taken out the cringe worthy transitions.
I have broken out the aerobatics sections and the flight into the stratosphere so that they are shorter and easier to watch but in reality the aerobatics bit is all part of the same flight, which is why, when you see the landing I look like I have been in a tumble drier. (I have!)
This is the Hammer

In the hammer the pilot takes the plane vertical and then slows to a stop. A cool but freaky feeling to be in a plane thousands of feet up but going nowhere. I think you can actually hear me swear when the plane stops!
This is a Loop

Pretty straight forward although the G-force as we start the climb was pretty uncomfortable (I am pretty sure watching it this is where we pulled 6 g and I blacked out at the start) You can see my breathing pattern change as I get the “stuffing” squashed out of me as we go into the climb.
This is Flying Inverted

This was more freaky than the Hammer!
Dangling upside down by a couple of seat straps and looking straight down to Terra Firma through a clear canopy makes your heart pump. I was much happier once we had spun back around and my ass was back in the seat and not dangling in the wind. I did have a cocktail stick bouncing around though, which gave me something to focus on and raises the question “why did I not get an in-flight meal”? Obviously someone else did and did not clean up after themselves!
A Roll

This is pretty tame, it’s over very quickly and the G-force on you is minimal but after a few of them you do start to feel a little queasy! Be warned!!!
A Low Level Pass

This was very cool. As the plane gets lower to the ground (we were at about 20m

Today was my second planned flight, this time in an L-39 with the specific intention to do some aerobatics.
We set off early from Moscow because it was a two and a half hour drive to the base, along a huge long straight road with no bends in it. There just seemed to be trees on either side for miles, punctuated with the odd petrol station, monument, shop and truck stop.
Unlike Sokol, when we arrived this base had many L-39’s and helicopters and is used to train pilots every day.

Air Base - Google Maps
 
The Base
I had the obligatory medical with yet another very nice doctor and then had to once again sign my life away and accept that what I was about to do was dangerous.
Medical
Next came the briefing on all of the systems in the aircraft and details of what I could and could not touch. All of this was done in Russian and I hoped that Alexandra (my translator) was explaining all of the details I needed to know. The last thing I wanted was to drop the landing gear instead of turning on the oxygen - that would be bad!
Finally, I was taught how to use the ejection seat in a simulator.
Ejector Seat Training
This was great fun to have a go with and to see exactly how it worked. The first couple of attempts nothing happened. It turned out that the lady doing the training had forgotten to plug it in (which was a little worrying).
Pull The Handles And Kiss Your Ass Goodbye!!!!
Third time it worked fine and I kept my fingers crossed that the one in the jet would work FIRST TIME if I needed it. (In the unlucky event you have to eject for real then the seat pushes you out so fast that you can pull 17.5 g and be a tad shorter as a result of your spine compressing).
So That's How It Works...
Next I was introduced to the pilot whose name was Savluk, he would be taking me on the flight .
Savluk
He was a very experienced pilot and a member of one of Russia’s aerobatic teams called (can you believe it) RUSS.
(RUSS were the early East Slavic people from which

One of my favourite blogs and web sites at the moment is by Johny Lee. (If you are not familiar with him go have a look at the link and be amazed).
Johny is taking very simple objects and turning them into new ways of interacting with our digital environment. He is a new breed of “technology hacker” that is making us think differently about what can be done with relatively cheap hardware. One of the objects he has been experimenting with is a simple Nintendo Wii controller.
Wii Remote (Contoller)
The work Johny has done has been picked up by Electronic Arts, who have now built an “Easter Egg” into a new game called Boom Blox that utilises some of the smart ideas he has had. What interests me about this is the future possibilities. How it has the potential to change how we interact with digital media of the future in many different ways. We have already seen companies like Apple revolutionise the mobile phone market with the introduction of the iPhone. The touch screen and motion sensing capabilities of the phone give it a whole new dimension in how you ”play” with it, making the usability a joy in comparison to some of the other phones on the market.

iPhone

Wii Remote, the Wii controller is actually pretty sophisticated and is a cheap, Blue Tooth capable, Infrared Camera. What Johny and others have been playing with, is how to build interactive experiences of the kind that we have seen in films, like Minority Report. The sort where Tom Cruise interacts with a screen via hand gestures and head tracking and all of this for under £50!
Microsoft is also pushing this type of touch technology with the development of Surface Computing.
Surface Computing
Surface computing allows the user to interact with objects via a table based touch sensitive screen. Some of the demos they have put together are quite compelling, showing the ability to drag and drop photos and music from one device to another just by placing it on the table and dragging and dropping.
W

Every day I am more amazed by what is going on in the digital world and how it’s changing.
In 10 years we have manged to create the most complex “thing” humans have ever built - which in that short but complex time has never broken down.
It spans the world, has millions of users, billions of connections, trillions of bits of information and almost all of the world depends on it for commerce, communication, entertainment etc. In my opinion it is without a doubt the most important and influential development in our history.
What I find even more incredible is that the majority of what we have built we can’t easily find and we have huge amounts of “Dark Data” lurking out there un-indexed. The Internet is growing at a stupendous rate as people become more accustomed to applications like Flickr, You Tube, Facebook, Myspace etc more data and information is being added into the system.
In October 2005 Eric Schmidt from Google said that, “…a recent report shows that there is about 5 million terabytes of information in the world”. Google at that time had only managed to index around 170 terabytes. If Google was to index the remaining 3.3 terabytes at the same rate it would take about 300 years, and that’s assuming that no one added any more to it.  Since then the amount of information in the world has continued to grow exponentially. This massive increase is raising some interesting problems, questions and opportunities about who and how we index all of that data if it’s going to be of any use.
There are also questions being asked about if this “unbreakable system” we have, can actually cope with so much data and there is a risk that there will be so much that it generates something being coined as “The Exaflood” (a film title there i think). This is where there is so much data it clogs the whole system and it grinds to a halt on a global scale. Is this possible? I think that you only have to look at what happens to the UK...

I found this site by complete luck but it’s one of the most incredibly innovative tools I have seen for a very long time.
The tool, which is called Trendalyzer, takes large data sets (almost like a pivot table in Excel) but it allows you to see it animated over time in different ways. This gives you a whole new insight into the data you are looking at and making it a hell of a lot more interesting.
Gapminder Tool
There are other companies trying to do similar types of things, like Many Eyes and Swivel but I just don’t think that they have the same level of simplicity in how they deal with the data and can bring it to life.
A great example of the Gapminder data and tool in action can be seen from one of the TED conferences - see below:-

The company that developed it is called Gapminder. A non-profit company based in Sweden. (Yet another innovative smart company based there!)
Obviously Google think it’s a cool idea because in 2006 they bought it from Gapminder and the smart fellas that built it have joined Google in California.
If you look at where Google has come from and at some of their recent acquisitions, like Double Click, they obviously see that anything that makes complex data visualisation simpler, has to be a winner!
If you are interested in having a play with the software yourself, using some of the global world data sets you can find it here:-
http://graphs.gapminder.org/world/
This is an amazing tool and it’s going to be interesting to see where Google take it next! They have already built it into Google Docs (their online office tools) and I can see this only becoming bigger, as it’s an interesting differentiator to Microsoft tools at the moment.
I absolutely believe that the next digital evolution is NOT going to be played out around integrated creative ideas (as some of the big advertising agencies seem to think), but around the understanding and sharing of data and the power of data driven insights!
Smart easy to use tools, that

Is a great creative idea still great if it adds no value?
Late last year (December 2007) in an FT article Cadbury’s suggested that the “Gorilla ad” had played a major part in helping to raise its sales in Dairy Milk Chocolate.

TNS recently did some work for Marketing Magazine that looked at the biggest brands in the UK by sales.
One of the most interesting facts that came out of it was, that although Dairy Milk had a huge profile and PR success with the award winning Gorilla advert, they actually lost market share, posting growth results below the market rate of 2%. Galaxy on the other hand grew 12%!
Jan Jesenovec from TNS said that “advertising will not significantly increase your sales…it simply reinforces the positions of big brands”. I think the Gorilla ad is a great demonstration of this at work.
I personally loved the Gorilla ad. I thought it was bold, different, unexpected and had great stand out but I am not that surprised it seems to have had zero impact on sales.
Just like many others, I stood around the water cooler at work talking about it and emailed my friends the You Tube video link. Did it make me buy any more Dairy Milk…well errr no. I thought it was great entertainment but it did not make me feel like buying a chocolate bar, let alone Dairy Milk. What it did do, like many others, was make me want to talk about the piece itself - very much like a great bit of artistic work, a great film or a good book.
In doing so, the ad became more about the Gorilla than the brand or the chocolate bar. My emotional connection was with how “clever” the ad was and not with what it was ultimatly looking to sell me (that is unless Cadbury’s is moving into the entertainment business and out of the chocolate one).
When you look at Galaxy on the other hand, it is aimed squarley at women and plays on the soft seduction of chocolate. The emotional connection is clearly seductive in the way you visually enjoy the emotional sensation of the ch

We take the BBC's iPhone-compatible iPlayer for a spin...
See more at www.ElectricPig.tv

Turn on your Wii, install the Internet Channel, head over to bbc.co.uk/iplayer, and watch BBC iPlaye