WEEK 2: PLAYSAFE CONDOMS

Lecture

Mr. Vinod provided me with prompt feedback in regards to my previous eportfolio post via email. I found this very useful as it was textual, hence I had his verbatim feedback to later refer back to. In line with his feedback, I re-studied the Bernbach Principles, and it did help in forming the parameters of my brainstorming. 
 I believe the most challenging aspect of this task is that is to be a black and white advertisement. I will need to find a way to make the advert impactful either without relying on color, or by using black and white to make a statement.

Instructions: Project 1

Your first task upon understanding Bernbach’s principles in advertising, is to conceive of a single quarter page press advertisement in black and white. Your execution will reflect the knowledge gained from your understanding.

The marketing objective is to promote Playsafe condom, through a mass medium (press advertisement). The challenge is, to create an ad that would not contravene strict publishing laws and moral codes of the countries multicultural and multi-religious populations. How you skirt these obstacles to produce an ad that is targeted (young adults) and effective whilst using the knowledge gained from the Bernback Principles to achieve the marketing objective will test your creativity to work within the narrow confines of the brief.

Newspaper: TheSun
Size: 128 (w) x 178 (h)

Client: Playsafe Condoms.

Marking Criteria

Communication (5%)
The message needs to be creative, clear and concise. The message has to be truthful and not gimmicky. The message must be unique in order to stand out from the rest of the competitors. The message must have a sense of personality that relates to, or reflects the target audience.

Visual Impact (5%)
Visual impact here refers to the overall effect of the layout and or the artwork (visual or copy) in the layout. The visual/copy must integrate well with the message for there to be impact. The visual/copy must enhance the message to create a smile in the mind. The visual/copy must relate or connect with the reader and should illicit an emotional reaction. The visual/copy must be memorable. The visual/copy must have a sense of personality that relates to, or reflects the target audience.

Process (5%)
There must be exploration in the form of sketches, mind maps, thoughts and epiphanies. The journey from start to finish must be methodically documented and dated. oral or written Feedback must be documented. The written reflections must be clear, concise, revealing and insightful.

Learning goal:

1. The student will understand and apply Bernbach’s principles in advertising in order to assist in a marketing objective.

Major Learning Outcomes:

1) Writing & Presenting Competencies – Demonstrate knowledge and apply understanding of design principles, technical processes, tools and software

2) Critical Thinking Competencies — Use critical thinking to explore, analyze and test a diversity of conceptual ideas.

3) Creating & Documenting Competencies — Plan and execute unique creative works

4) Appraising & Valuing Competencies — Constructively assess work by yourself and others.

Deadline: Week 3

Research

Ideas & Strategies

I'm looking to target young women in the hopes of raising awareness of sexual protection. In the battle against patriarchy, its important for women to know that the taboo of sex and buying contraception is merely a social construct, one that only hurts them. 

1) 
Visual: A cropped image of a girl, showing her back and top portion of her jeans, and her pulling out a condom from her back pocket
Copy: 

• In a game for two, why depend on the other?
• It's so slim, there's no excuse
• Why risk it?

2) 
Visual: A party handbag and its spilt contents, with a condom in the forefront.
Copy: 

• You never know when you'd need something
• Apparently, girls prepare for everything
• We don't expect someone else to bring our lip gloss, do we?

Feedback

Specific:

I have viewed your progress for week 2 on your eportfolio blog. Your strategy and the subsequent ideas (1 & 2) are sound – Well done! It would seem you are quite adept at this, your visual message and the line (headline) in your plan are well integrated. The line does support and enhance the visual message, and this is inline with the Bernbach Principles as described in the 1st lecture presentation slides.

Reflections

Experience

It truly hit me this week the difference of being in a foreign country. Although I was aware of the load shedding and electrical faults in Zimbabwe, this was the first time I actually experienced it. There was no power for two whole days, and as the cyber cafes were charging twice as much due to generator usage, I was stranded without internet and digital devices. 

In completing this weeks task, my OCD levels skyrocketed while sketching, as I don't quite have the skills necessary to properly put on paper what was visualizing in my head. It was quite hard to get to the point where it only somewhat came close to my imagination.

Observations

I am lucky that almost all of the people around me are extremely open about the subject matter. My main sounding board was my soon-to-be brother in law, who really is more like an actual brother, as we had a lot of fun goofing around with silly ideas. He is also the one who helped me find Playsafe condoms here in Zimbabwe.

Findings

It seems that there really aren't that many condom advertisements that target the female audience. This is quite infuriating, seeing as to how that is half the world populations and it's them most often burdened with complications of not using proper sexual protection.