Some stuff from years ago

Economist Posters

Any creative who has spent time at a wonderful agency called Abbott Mead Vickers should have an Economist poster under their belt.
Saying that though they were none too easy to write and even harder to get past the dearly departed master of writing David Abbott himself. So I was chuffed to pieces when he approved these two.

THE BIG ISSUE

Anita and Gordon Roddick had an idea to launch a magazine that would give homeless people a job and part of the proceeds they would keep to help them get back onto the straight and narrow.
This was particularly harrowing for me as I spent three days on the street befriending people and gaining their trust so they would allow me to take pictures of their lives. I’ll never forget it.

THE SUN TRADE ADS

The Sun asked me to produce a couple of trade ads to highlight that booking an ad with them was far more cost effective than booking an ad in The Mirror.
Art directionally I took the strong graphics of the paper and then created silly typical Sun headlines.

VOLVO BOATS

I didn’t realise that Volvo produced boats!! 
So when asked to let people know that they were pretty nifty in the water I produced this. I learnt a lot about the kind of knots sea fairing types tie.

Safex Vasectomy

This film came about because of my true life experience.
Having already had two children I decided to go and have the snip.
Obviously petrified by the decision to do so, I went to see the doctor who did nothing to alleviate my fears…still I went ahead with the operation. Ouch!!

EBLEX

The English beef and lamb organisation approached us to do a campaign to extoll the qualities of their meat and the standards that they uphold. 

So who better to get across this message than Beefy and Lamby aka Ian Botham and Alan Lamb. Totally stupid and close to the meat knuckle but it got them talked about which was the primary objective.

Howies

Last year 158 bikers were killed on Britain’s roads. Thousands more were seriously injured or hurt. The main culprits of this annual massacre are careless drivers in cars, vans, lorries and buses.

To draw attention to this perennial problem, we worked with Howies to stage an exhibition, the theme of which was ‘Bike cut up by’.

The project was briefed to leading artists whose names tally up with the names of motor vehicles, like Arturo Bravo, Steve Cavalier, Jane Ford, Graham Ford, Rosalind Ford, Louise Morgan, Martin Bedford, Robert Talbot, Tagashi Suzuki and Beth Mary Wright whose initials have been used. So bike cut up by Ford, Suzuki etc.

Mars Lockets 'Stuffiness'

This commercial got me into a bit of bother with the country set!!! I loved it lol.

ELECTRONIC YELLOW PAGES 'MR X'

This radio commercial featured the dear departed Spike Milligan. It was a real honour to work with him and he didn't change a word of the script!!! It got into the Radio Advertising Hall of Fame. Spike would have been proud.

Drambuie

'An intriguing Scottish blend for a more unusual character' is the endline I wrote for this campaign for Drambuie. I then went slowly insane over a period of weeks looking at everything Scottish, and seeing a nose here or an ear there. Good fun though, and well worth the effort.

DFT 'Trapped'

What do you do with a convicted drink driver? Lock him up or put him out there as an example to people? Well we did both. We imprisoned him under a giant pint glass and did a travelling experiental stunt. The young lad was brilliant, and didn't mind telling people what an arse he'd been. It gained more column inches and TV coverage than the client could ever afford to pay for.

Warburtons 'Rigmarole'

By 'eck, you can't take your kids to the duck pond these days without them wanting to snaffle the bread themselves.

ICL Computers

This was my very first ad to get into the D&AD Annual.

I was twenty years old and was working as a junior art director at JWT. I loved this because it didn't have a packshot. The endline was 'We should be talking to each other' and I remember my grandfather talking about chinese whispers when I was a kid. So here's a group of soldiers in a classic boys comic book style illustration saying 'Send reinforcements we're going to advance' which changes to 'Send three and fourpence we're going to a dance' as it gets passed on.

Cocaine Unwrapped

To help raise awareness of the effects the UK’s cocaine habit has on people thousands of miles away in South America, we produced a piece of film for a documentary called Cocaine Unwrapped.

Apparently, the UK snort more of the stuff per capita than any other country in the world, so we wanted to help people make a more informed decision by showing them their role in the process of the production and trafficking of cocaine under the end line ‘You can’t ignore what’s under your nose’. 

The screening took place at The Prince Charles Cinema in Leicester Square and it was a packed house!

Huge thanks to Stink, Grand Central and The Moving Picture Company as well as the directors Rohan Blair-Mangat (Run for your life) and Tomek Baginski (The Machine)

Before you press play on the screen below...sit down somewhere quiet, put on your headphones (the SFX are amazing) and watch. The beginning is meant to be all black by the way.

BT 0345 'West Wittering'

How do you put across a a pretty dull message that the cost is low if you use Lo-call 0345? Have a good laugh was my answer.

Bhopal

A very good friend of mine called Indra Sinha has devoted a great deal of time, energy and money to this. The least I could do was art direct it for him. The Bhopal gas tragedy in 1984 in India was considered to be one of the world's worst industrial disasters. It was estimated that 8,000 died within two weeks and another 8,000 or more have since died from gas-related diseases. A government affidavit in 2006 stated the leak caused 558,125 injuries including 38,478 temporary partial and approximately 3,900 severely and permanently disabling injuries. The negligence case is still going on today as is the suffering.

MTV 911 ANNIVERSARY FILMS

We had the MTV account when the anniversary of 911 arrived. We took a decision with the client not to air any commercials that day, and instead we produced 27 commemorative pieces of film to try to promote World Peace.

Thanks to some wonderfully talented people like Tom Carty, Mike Stephenson and Aardmann Animations to name but a few, we managed to produce some gems.

Here are a few examples. The first film by the way is a real recording...quite chilling.

MCDONALD'S FRUITIZZ

This took forever to get the bubbles to look effective at Moving Pictures, but it was worth it.

The Sun 'A day in the life of'

At the time of Princess Di's death, the tabloids were under heavy criticism for hounding people. The Sun asked us to do a commercial that celebrated that moment of joy that it brings into peoples lives.

Guinness 'Fast forward'

A commercial for Guinness that ran in the days when you hired a VHS (remember those) to watch a feature film on. What do you do when the commercials are at the beginning of the tape? Well you fast forward them that's what, and that's what people did with this ad...therefore making sense of it. To make it easy, after 22 seconds I've fast forwarded it for you.

Terence Higgins 'Knobs in Space'

Sex is fun. Then shouldn't messages about safe sex be fun also?

McDonald's 'Weather'

Using classic weather symbols, we inform the general public that the good old English weather is good for McDonald's.

London Association for the Blind

We went to visit a group of blind people in South London. They were working at a factory binding folders and we sat and had a good old chat with them.

They told us all about the issues they face on a day to day basis because of other peoples behaviour like parking their cars on the kerb or not cutting their over hanging branches that droop over the pavements. In fact they almost gave us our endline 'Blindness is the least of our problems'

Whilst talking, they mentioned several sad stories about their friends who had either been killed or had nasty accidents because they didn't know where the edge of train platforms or roads were.

Well I'm proud to say that we mentioned 'well you need the equivalent of braille for your feet as you currently have for your fingers'. Raised paving was born!

As well as a press campaign, I also produced a cinema ad for the blind highlighting the problems they can encounter by simply walking down the street.

Doing a film in complete darkness was always an ambition of mine, and here was the perfect opportunity.

Because money was an issue, I was the actor and everything you hear was for real as I did this in total darkness. I was bruised all over for days. Talk about suffering for your art.

Capital Radio 'Party in the Park'

A couple of posters for Capital Radio's annual 'Party in the Park'. We just wanted to illustrate that everything including the park can get into the groove.

McDonald's 'McBites'

A neat little ad for McDonald's. Well it's certainly a bit different.

Ronald McDonald Childrens Charity

For those people who don't know what those blue plastic boxes are for in McDonald's that you put your spare change into, then this piece of work should set the record straight.

MTV 'Eggcentric'

If this young man took Edwina Currie's advice he'd take years trying to soundproof his house.

LDV Vans

Unless you happen to drive a van, then van advertising is pretty boring. Well we wanted to vamp it up by using famous people who had the word van in their name and sustitute it for the LDV logo. It certainly was the first van campaign to get talked about.

Ryvita

How do you sell carpet tiles? Ryvita, it's not exactly the most exciting of bases to put toppings on.

Well we instructed a top home economist to come up with some funky suggestions then created a unique way of showing them off. We wanted to end their last campaign, hence the end line 'The inch war is over. Enjoy the liberation'.

Pimms 'Summertime'

A bit of deception going on here. You think the girl is on a beach or by a pool sunning herself whilst quenching her thirst, only to reveal she's been in her living room the whole time under a sun ray lamp as it throws down with rain outside. All shot using carbon burning lights to give the film that 1930's feel.

Low C Beer. Tub Tubson

A low calorie beer commercial that would never in a month of Sundays get made today. Featuring a man who is as fat as a house and relys on his size for his career.

Becks Futures

Becks annually hold a competition to find the next generation of Tracey Emins and Damien Hirsts and we had to do a poster to promote this.

So, what did we do? Well we couldn't do something ordinary for such an event could we? So with the help of artist David Hiscock we created a 60 foot long headline (look at the size of the ladders for scale) out of scaffolding and tarpaulin on the beach at Camber Sands and waited for the tide to come in.

It took us four days and was bloody freezing. It caused a bit of controversy as we were saying British CON temporary artists...still it was good fun. There's also a little video showing how we made it.

California Raisins

What can you do with raisins? Lots of wacky stuff by the way. And that's exactly how we shot it!

Marstons Pedigree Beer

All shot using an original hand cranked camera and a song to the tune of 'What a picture' by Tommy Steele. This was a lot of fun to make.

Marstons Cross Track posters

Completely ridiculous facts about Marstons Pedigree and the process by which they brew their beer. Only one fact was correct and you had to guess which one it was.

I mean, would you believe that the brewery, once upon a time, only hired people who were 5' tall because of the low ceilings in the maltings room. Imagine getting away with that one today?

Nationwide Anglia

Two insightful ads for Nationwide Anglia. How do you know how long you're going to live for, and how come your mate who is on the same salary as you with roughly the same spending and lifestyle habits, always has more money than you?

Volvo 'Dog'

Whilst sitting outside a pub having a pint, we observed a dog going along the street cocking his leg and peeing on all the cars hubcaps. This was the inspiration for this commercial.

Tetley Bitter 'King Richard'

You'd be forgiven for thinking that poor old King Richard is a major piss head and rampant alcoholic as you watch him cling to his pint even after having his crown jewels battered!

Sony Playstation

The first commercial Sony Playstation ran. We wanted to create a message that the circle, square, cross and triangle have strange powers. It created what is now an iconic brand.

Goldfish credit card

It was great fun shooting this. Well why wouldn't it be? We spent ten days in Los Angeles and the Yuma desert in Mexico with the Big Yin, Billy Connolly. He's a top top man.

The Big Mac 'Faultless'

McDonald's Big Mac is the iconic burger. It's big, it's clumsy and it's messy. This ad makes a positive out of its negatives.

Batchelors Mushy Peas

Being a Northerner, this is probably one of my favourite foods, and if they are done well are pure bliss.

Nike Golf

There was a young turk on the golfing scene called Gary Orr. He was winning everything including sheds of money.

Hamlet Cigars

Before the advertising tobacco ban came into force, Hamlet were probably doing some of the best commercials in the world. We were asked to see if we could make 'Happiness is a cigar called Hamlet' work on posters. Here's a few award winning examples of what we did.The spangly finger by the way was the original lottery symbol of 'It could be you'. They went on to win two Cannes Golds at the Cannes Advertising Festival.

Lime Blue Jewellers

A small but very funky jewellers called Lime Blue were opening in Glasgow and they asked us to help cause a fuss around the building and opening of their store.

We clad the store with dark material and got the workmen to wear lights on their safety helmets. It looked like they were digging diamonds out of the ground under the shop.

Electronic Yellow Pages

This ad was done years ago, well before the world wide web really took off. People struggled with the notion of looking on a screen for services and numbers. 'Where is our big yellow door stop' they cried. Have you seen a Yellow Pages recently? They are almost magazine thickness. This was an ad before it's time.

Tetley Bitter

A coupon ad! Remember those? Well this got me into quite a bit of bother as the MP for Rotherham issued a complaint and even held up this ad on Yorkshire television as an example of how Southern people typecast Northerners. My father didn't speak to me for months ha ha.

Transport for London

The brief was to try and tell people not to park at bus stops. So hence the boxed in London Bus, with thick die-cast illegal parker and frustrated passengers.

COI

Our future. It's in our hands. That's the line we won the business with and then we set about creating a commercial for them featuring...yes you've guessed it, hands.