Weekly Advertising Analysis: Endangered Wildlife Trust - Print & Poster

Good morning,

It has been awhile since my last post using this blog. I have been managing a Facebook page for Fools until the website is up and ready.

Today, I have chosen a very special advert. It is for the Endangered Wildlife Trust and was conceptualized and created by Lowe CT. Last week at Red and Yellow we were fortunate enough to have a talk by the creative director for Lowe CT; Kirk Gainsford. It was an incredibly enlightened and inspiring hour or so. During his talk he went through some of the work that they had done and this specific ad he was very proud of because It was conceptualized by the interns at Lowe CT. 

The advert aims to to bring attention to the alarming rate at which we are currently depleting our oceans resources.

The body copy reads: "In the last 50 years we have devastated approximately 90% of large fish stocks in the world’s oceans. We have a small window of opportunity to save the last 10% before they are pushed to extinction. Halt the plunder of our seas – visit www.ewt.org.za."

This ad makes use of very powerful imagery. From a first glance the image appears to be of a shoal of fish swimming in the ocean. However after a few seconds pass the eye moves to the detail. You start to see that in fact the it is a distant shot of a whole fleet of ships and fishing vessels. It shocks the mind that the eyes have been fooled and forces the viewer to pay closer attention to the message - That if we carry on the way we are going, that shoal of fish will disappear and be replaced by fleet of ships. The image matches and mimics the message. The headline ("In our lifetime there may be more fishing boats than fish in our oceans") allows all the pieces to fall in place in the viewers mind. It is a strong fact that calls for action. 

The real success of this advert lies with the simplicity of the imagery and the message. It enables clear communication of the message and has a striking almost shocking effect on the viewer. The rusted metal type effect used for the body copy and headline draws the eye and gets the attention. The effect gives a serious tone, rust and decay are what we hate most about ships. It is not appealing nor desirable and is a sign of neglect which again feeds through into the message.

A great advert that showcases South Africa's advertising talent. I'm sure we will see a lot more great work from LoweCT in the near future.

I hope everyone has had a great start to their week. 

_____________________________________________________________________________________________

Credits:

Executive Creative Director: Kirk Gainsford
Art Director: Dane Alexander
Illustrator: Chris Eloff

Interns -
Copywriter (AAA): Lauren Rimmer
Art Director (AAA): Natasha Dobbs
Copywriter (Vega): Phillip Black
Art Director (Vega): Tammy Hart