Anderson and Low
This duo's images of naked athletes for the Danish athletic team are based around the elemental concept of earth, water, wind and fire. The athletes are obviously physically fit and the photographers have used this to their advantage in these compositions. Their bodies are shown going through different contorting positions as they dive or twist, somersault and stretch. The images that show pairs or groups are the most successful as they interact with each other in an almost dance-like way.
The images are simple with hardly any other detail except sky or water to detract from the bodies as their movement is captured and frozen. The images denote group collaboration and healthy living; endurance and determination are two other attributes that spring to mind when viewing these images.
The photographers have taken the concept of athletes in motion with their ad for Flora. This time the images are shot outside but leave plenty of space for sky so that text and strap lines can be added. The strap line is prominent using a vary large font. Because of this the solitary runners, a wheelchair athlete, and two footballers leaping to head a ball, inhabit a place close to the edge of the frame. Proximity to the edge of the frame gives the athletes a prominence that belies their small size and creates balance in the composition.
The messages used in the images relate to keeping your heart healthy - because you need one to have the attributes of endurance, ability, skill, etc. The athletes are used to create an affinity with the health conscious viewer and the attributes of endurance and determination are transferred to the Flora logo that is overlaid across the edge of the blue sky.
The course notes state that:
Products are able to cross class boundaries and, in their perceived reality, move people across those boundaries through attaining the product. Baudrillard would see this pretence of social change as a simulacrum because of its reality to those involved: they know the social change isn't real but because it happens (peers feel the buyer has moved up the world) then it (social movement) becomes a sort of reality. (Gesture and Meaning).
I can see that a simulacrum can also occur in images where a healthy lifestyle is sold through products such as Flora. A prospective viewer watching TV or looking at a magazine would read the images of athletes and absorb the message in the strap lines. They might want to buy a product that gives them a feeling of at least attempting to participate in healthy living and hope to identity with having endurance, stamina and the skill needed to compete in sports.
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Peter Lippmann
This photographer has used the genre of still life and traditional painting as the concept for one of his campaigns. The images are painterly and full of detail creating richly decorated tableaux. The images show designer shoes placed into these scenarios. All still life objects traditionally have a meaning assigned to them that could be read and understood by the viewer. By placing Christian Louboutin shoes in close proximity to the other objects they attain equal status in the arrangement. The high status of fine art painting and it's elitist culture is also transferred to the shoes. The implication is that anyone that can afford these high end shoes is also someone that likes, appreciates and understands the finer things in life.
By associating the Christian Louboutin brand with the long tradition of fine art painting, the notion of longevity is also transferred. The campaign appears to have been very successful as the company have used Lippmann's work for a number of seasons.
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George Logan
This photographer has used the technique of placing incongruous objects in proximity to create a strong visual dynamic. In his work with Whiskas cat food, small domestic cats are seen making contact, rubbing noses etc, with big cats in wild African surroundings. The images are glossy and full of detail; the kind of high quality that's expected in wild life photography. Photoshop has obviously been used to post-process the domestic cats into these surroundings.
A similar technique is used for Sky Go. In these ads a laptop is used to meld an image of a sportsperson on screen with the laptop's environment. This work is very effective indeed. For instance, the laptop is shown on an unseen man's lap by a pool. He is watching a wrestling match. In the background a man is floating on the water; his torso and head are obscured by the laptop and matches up with a mans upper half on screen where another wrestler is frozen, mid-air, about to land a heavy body slam onto the prone wrestler. Even though we know the unsuspecting man in the pool and the prone wrestler about to get slammed are different people in different places, there is a visual tension created between the two.
In the Sky Go campaign men are seen relaxing by the pool in a sunny climate while they watch sports on laptops. Technology and technology services, such as streaming TV, place entertainment at a person's fingertips whenever, wherever, they want. An aspirational lifestyle is also being sold in this ad. It is more than likely that the person using a streaming service is watching from an iPad on a cramped commuter train every morning - certainly much more often than when they are able to take holidays.
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