Great 80s style viral from Pixar

At first glance this looks like a typical 80s TV commercial, but it's actually a viral ad for the Toy Story 3 which is scheduled to premier in June. To introduce one of the new characters from the film - Lots-o'-Huggin' Bear - Pixar has created this fake retro commercial and uploaded it to Youtube. It's very convincingly done, the noise at the bottom of the screen and the distorted sound makes it look like it's been transferred from an old VHS tape. The Youtube account it is uploaded to looks very authentic as well with lots of other 80s commercials. All in all a great attempt to blur the line between reality and fiction.

Via: Yahoo Movies

Colour sensitive billboard by IBM

As a part of their Smarter Planet Agenda campaign, IBM created this billboard that changes colour according to the colour of clothes people in front of it are wearing. The result is a very simple form of interaction where no technical devices such as mobile phones or cameras are needed to be able to take part in the experience.

Draw your own iPhone game!

Sketch Nation Shooter is a new game for the iPhone that allows you to design all the elements of the game yourself. You simply draw a player, enemies and levels on a piece of paper and take a picture of it using the iPhone camera. When your images are imported to the game an editor function helps you set up everything. Once you have created a level it can be submitted to Facebook which makes it available for everyone to download. I really like this idea!

Pixels

Loving this short film from Patrick Jean. Watch Space Invaders, Tetris and other 8bit creatures take over New York. And it's shot on location too.

Hello Wall

Cool initiative from the global art project Wasted Spaces. Their mission is to transform neglected buildings and empty shop fronts in cities around the world by turning them into exhibition spaces for artists.

the Hello Wall is their latest project and is created by London based duo Hellicar & Lewis. People passing by on Wembley High Street are encouraged to interact with the large-scale installation by tweeting commands like: circles, triangles, squares, faster, slower, bigger, shake to @thehellowall. The art work will then change appearance according to the instructions it gets.

Via Wasted Spaces.

Codeorgan

If you've always wondered what your favorite website sounds like, then here's you chance to find out. Codeorgan by London based agency DLKW is a Flash application that analyses the body content of a web page and translates it into music. It uses an algorithm to create the musical composition that best fits the site's code. Key, synth style and drum pattern is determined by the page content and the result can be shared through Facebook and Twitter.

Sidetracked sounds a little like Boards of Canada over an 80s beat. Not bad.
For more details check the Codeorgan site.

Via Mashable

American Apparel turns user-generated content into lookbook

In December 2009 American Apparel held a contest in collaboration with online fashion community lookbook.nu. Community members were encouraged to upload photos of themselves in outfits featuring their favorite AA pieces. The objective was to create a lookbook solely consisting of user-generated images. Nearly a thousand aspiring fashionistas from all over the world participated and 77 were chosen to appear in the lookbook. The best pictures were reshot by professional photographers and used as cover and centrefolds. Some of them will also be turned into ads.

The lookbook is free and is available in all AA shops and via their website.

Something similar has probably been done before - I know Uniqlo has done some online campaigns showcasing people on the street wearing Uniqlo - but I still think it works because it gives AA a valuable insight into how their customers understand and use their brand. What might be even more valuable these days where peer recommendations in many cases are considered a much more trustworthy source of information than ads is, that the lookbook takes on the shape of exactly that: personal recomendations. Instead of professional models it's real people sharing their creative ideas with other AA fans.

Via PSFK