Breaking In

For a little pre-interview inspiration, check out some classic Nike work in yesterday’s post.

DW: …I like to see the book before I meet the people because I’m too easily swayed by the personality. But what I look for in the book is that personality. I want to see if there’s a voice there that’s unique or an eye that sees the world a little bit differently, and has a unique sense of taste, and color, and all that kind of stuff. Or a way of talking to people that is unique to them. I think those traits make for much more interesting advertising or art. I really want to know more about who they are and what they’ve done, almost to get a sense of what their life experiences are.

WS: So the personality and the voice are really important?

DW: Right.

WS: So a lot of people would say, “But don’t you want a variety of voices, so that you can write for anything, or art-direct for anything?” How does that fit with what you just said?

DW: I want a very specific voice and that’s our job to make sure we can find some place that that works. When you take Nike, Nike has [many different voices]—primarily because they’re appealing to so many subsets of an athletic audience. Tennis players are far different from runners, or basketball players. And all brands have some similar sort of latitude. Times when they’re funny and times when they’re more serious. So my passion is for the individual talent, and we’ll find that place to plug it into.

WS: How important is the finish of a book?

DW: Well, for a writer, not at all. I mean, Jeff Kling can tell you, the book he sent me was a joke. It was all [sketches]—although he’s a pretty damn good cartoonist—and it was extremely rough, but you could just feel the idea there. But I think when you look at the art side of the equation, you expect a little bit more of a sense of, “What are you capable of, and what’s your aesthetic range, and what kind of finish do you feel more comfortable in?”

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Time to get excited. Tomorrow’s interview will be with Dan Wieden. (In the unlikely event you don’t know the name, he wrote “Just do it”.) Because his agency, Wieden+Kennedy, has so much amazing work, we’re going to narrow it down for this post to “just” classic Nike TV spots. There is still way too much. But here are a few.

“Bo Knows”

“Frozen Moment”

“If You Let Me Play”

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In case you’re not familiar with it, check out some of David’s work in yesterday’s post.

WS: What do you look for in a student book? And what impresses you?

DD: It depends on what needs we have. For me, the most important thing is—and there’s a couple of high-level generic things—but I’ll drill down. Obviously, there’s no question it comes down to their thinking, and the diversity of their thinking, and the originality. I think a lot of students spend their time trying to emulate what’s been done before, and to be on a level that’s in sync with the certain agencies that they’re going into, or stuff that’s won awards in years gone by. And for me, it’s not about that. For me, it’s about the broadness of their thinking and really just seeing how they tackle something in a lateral way.

Obviously, being a student is a fantastic thing because you can cherry-pick any brand and work on anything, right? The canvas is huge and completely open-ended. And I think I like to see the degree of difficulty that they put in their book as well. I said the broadness of their thinking, and how they’ve brought it alive in more than just a couple of mediums. For me I’m not seduced by the finish of the work. If I’m looking for someone as a designer then I want to see aesthetic sensibilities and all that sort of stuff. But if I’m looking for someone purely on a conceptual level, I really don’t care how it’s mocked up. It’s more just to see the diversity and the degree of difficulty. Because, as I said, I’m a classical advertising guy. I was sort of brought up in, and built my career on, TV and print. But now, particularly with what we’re trying to do now, while we still do that and I still believe in that strongly, there’s so much more out there than that. So I want to see the different canvases that people play on. That’s what I look at. And the thinking within those.

WS: You mentioned the finish of the work. What about just sketches? Can that be enough these days?

DD: It can be enough. There are some books that I’ve seen where the finish is so extraordinary. They’ve put so much effort into how they’ve mocked something up and brought it to life. But the idea—the foundation of the idea—is so rubbish. So I feel bad for them that they’ve wasted so much time. Again, if it’s someone who’s going to have a heavy art-directional role or a design role, then I want to see their eye. No question. But if it’s a conceptual thing, I don’t care if it’s on a…I mean, in London I’ve hired people who literally did have, almost, scraps of paper. Maybe that was a statement [from] them, but it was original. But it was what was on those scraps of paper.

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We’re about to kick things off with an excerpt from my interview with David Droga. To whet your appetite, here are some examples of work from his agency, Droga5:

The Tap Project

Guitar Hero

Net 10

Droga5 also promoted Jay-Z’s book “Decoded” by releasing it in its entirety but in pieces scattered across the country. Fans collaborated online to put it back together. From the New York Times:

While about half of the pages will be displayed in traditional outdoor advertising like billboards, the rest will be offbeat, printed in one instance on the bottom of a hotel swimming pool, in another on the lining of jackets in a store display window, and in another on the felt of pool tables in a pool hall, said Mr. Droga.

You can check out the Decode Jay-Z website here.

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