Apple broke a new ad for the iPad Air last week, which is an absolute gem. It already has more than 1 million views on You Tube.
The spot, called “Pencil”, is beautifully written and art directed. It has Bryan Cranston, Walter White of “Breaking Bad”, the hottest actor on the planet, doing the voice-over. And it has a killer demo to visualize just how thin the new iPad is.
For most of this 60-second ad, this cleverly photographed commercial focuses on that classic tool of artists, writers and composers – the everyday No. 2 yellow pencil. Cranston goes on about how this simple object can be a powerful tool that transforms how we work and share, as the camera zooms in on a pencil sitting horizontally against various backdrops. That is, until the big reveal – a hand comes in the last couple of seconds to pull something obscured by the pencil – Apple’s new iPad Air.
Apple’s advertising, the standard that other marketers measure themselves against, has been floundering in recent years. The “Genius” Mac spots that ran during the Olympics last year were embarrassing. Earlier this year, an ad with the signature “Designed By Apple In California” felt defensive and disjointed.
Well, Apple is back, big time, with this new ad for the iPad Air, just 7.5 mm thin, weighing only one pound, making it the lightest and most powerful iPad yet.
The clever “Pencil” ad points to the various ways that the iPad has become an enabler of content creation. Like the yellow pencil, it “can be used to start a poem, or finish a symphony,” Cranston’s narration says.
“It has transformed the way we work, learn, create, share,” he intones. “It used to illustrate things, solve things, and think of new things. It’s used by scientists and artists, scholars and students. It’s been to classrooms, boardrooms, expeditions, even to space.”
“And we can’t wait to see where you’ll take it next.”
Just beautiful, graceful language.
Apple always understood that coolness is an appeal to our imagination and passions, defining who we are and who we want to be. Its greatest ads were always poetic, and aspirational.
Apple’s greatest ad, in 1997, had actor Richard Dreyfuss lend his voice to “Here’s to the Crazy Ones” – a spot portraying visionaries like Albert Einstein, John Lennon, Alfred Hitchcock, Jim Henson, and Jerry Seinfeld, with the actor reading Steve Jobs’ famous “Crazy Ones” speech.
And “Pencil”, while perhaps lacking somewhat in that spot’s off the chart goosebumps quotient, is its legitimate heir.
Apple ads at their best connect with us viscerally because of their optimism, and appeal to our self-esteem. They encourage us to dream and follow our dreams. What can be cooler than technology enabling the possibility of creativity and innovation?
Bravo Apple. With “Pencil” you write a new chapter in a legacy of great advertising.
via apple - Google News http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=t&fd=R&usg=AFQjCNE4oJMcTbdNixQPqvvfs_OhWWFfnA&url=http://www.forbes.com/sites/avidan/2013/10/28/apple-rediscovers-cool-brilliantly/
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