Cool news out of Honda camp: The American branch of the Japanese automaker is attempting to revive the dying drive-in theater industry with Project Drive-In, an awareness campaign that will provide five drive-in theaters with new digital projectors. Currently, about half of the 368 drive-ins still operating in America may be forced to close in the next few years unless they switch to digital projects to support the technology used for most new releases. New digital projectors cost between $75k-$100k, which as you may be able to guess, isn’t chump change for theaters that mostly exist in Middle America.

Honda, teaming with its longtime ally RPA, launched the super-duper social flood on the usual networks and has anchored it all to projectdrivein.com for users who want to donate, spread the word, vote on theaters to save, etc. And even if the good press will ultimately fail to save the obsolete drive-in theater industry, kudos to Honda for jumping in with both feet anyway.

After their global campaign in which people could buy personalized Coke bottles and cans, Coca-Cola Israel and Tel Aviv-based Gefen Team built a campaign around personalized billboards. Users downloaded a special app, then entered their name. Using geofence technology, the billboard would sense the user’s nearness and display their name. Each user would receive a message notifying them their name was splashed for the street to see.

Coca Cola used Israel’s “main billboards,” meaning users would see their names in lights more than once. And no matter how finite, people love fame: during the campaign period, the app reached 100k downloads and ranked #1 in Israel’s app store.

It seems like an elementary gimmick, but it’s got new-technology legs and exciting potential. Maybe the next brand to use these billboards will display a full message, making commuters’ life that much more fun.

Seattle shop Creature really loves their window space. We’ve covered some of their pane projects before, like the motion-sensor-triggered mirror installed in April. There’s also the pop-up window shop from last winter. And now recently, as part of Seattle’s Capitol Hill Block Party that ran from July 26-28, Creature used their window space to chute out creative fortunes to festival-goers and set up cameras, so they could see who had what fortune and then make that fortune come true.

Creative Director Pam Fujimoto blogged about the whole experience and described the project as “pure Creature,” which aside from being lyrically fun, also sounds like the name of a bad 80s rock band. Makes you wonder what impure Creature would look like. A sample fortune was: “Someone will tell you you look like a younger Tony Danza.” Others involved $2 bills and Mike & Ike’s. The fortunes themselves aren’t that important, but the execution from staffers who spent their weekend on the venture is not only good free publicity, but just a cool bit to cover on a rainy Thursday.

Ahh, nothing like a day of summer respite on San Diego’s Imperial Beach…the sun, the sand, the waves, the–oh shit, what the hell is that?! Well, it’s not quite a Trojan horse reenactment mind you, but this little scene basically played out on July 12 at said location. Why? Well, it’s part of an effort from hometown agency Vitro and longtime client ASICS that basically aims to get people’s asses in shape.

The parties involved trotted out a 16-foot-tall wooden horse that actually doubles as a personal trainer–complete with rope climb, pull-up bar, Olympic rings and more–and dishes out prizes to those taking part. Since crashing the San Diego beach party, the fitness-focused beast, which is part of ASICS’ “Next Epic Challenge” effort, has veered its way north to Los Angeles, where it planted itself in front of the Staples Center during the ESPY Awards on Wednesday evening (see below). Next up to bat on the horse’s SoCal tour is a week-long stop at the ASICS World Series of Beach Volleyball, which kicks off Monday. Not sure how this effort measures up to Vitro’s other interesting campaigns for the brand over the years, but we do agree that is as good as any other kick in the ass to get our summer figure in shape.

To promote extraordinary moments and a general sense of YOLO, Pepsi Max, with the help of London-based Arnold KLP, employed the skills of Dynamo, a young magician from Yorkshire. “London: I love the energy of this city, and the sense that anything is possible. But sometimes, with the pace of city life, it’s hard to appreciate the magic that’s all around us,” Dynamo drawls.

He proceeds to levitate and go for a ride around Londontown, one hand on an iconic double decker bus. The people look up in surprise. “How does he do it?” “I don’t know!” We hear in the background. Online, the illusion got the same kind of attention, with 4.9 million views in 48 hours.

If we’re to believe YouTube commenters, Dynamo is either Jesus, Satan, or using a fake arm and harness to stay afloat. Take your pick. In any case, the stunt is a fun way to pull people out of the daily grey drone, though its accompanying hashtag is an unfortunate double entendre. Try levitating on the side of a bus crossing Westminster bridge, and live…for now. Credits after the jump.

Read more

The press release for the new 60-second recycling spot from Keep America Beautiful, the Ad Council, and Periera & O’Dell states that the average American generates 4.4 pounds of trash per day, but only recycles 35% of that output. It’s unclear whether that means 35% of all recyclable trash is properly recycled rather than 35% of all trash, but the creators of the campaign don’t seem too concerned with stats. After all, people probably won’t respond to numbers.

Periera & O’Dell have decided to redirect the campaign with an emotional tilt, turning an empty plastic bottle into a protagonist that thinks and talks – through voice-over, thankfully. The result is a corny, yet necessary plea to viewers who should be recycling more. Credits after the jump.

Read more

To demonstrate the purpose of a Kleenex Hand Towel, the brand set up a free handwashing station in Carroll Park, Brooklyn. They provided people with two drying options: a “sketchy” cloth towel and a dispenser filled with Kleenex Hand Towels. Studiocom and director Paul Iannacchino (of the original Coke Happiness Machine) then filmed a video in which people look dubiously at the dirty cloth towel and joyously wipe their hands on Kleenex’s offering.

The opening shot of babies swinging is adorable, and a hands-on approach is smart, but all the Purell-squirting people who are now tempted to use Kleenex Hand Towels should know that the video is set to a soundtrack of trees crying. The wail is just indiscernible to the human ear.

While we’ve seem almost every iteration of brands turning fans’ tweets into ads by this point, here’s a new spot for Wendy’s new Pretzel Bacon Cheeseburger from agency VML that adds a musical component to this formula.

Using that hashtag #PretzelLoveSongs on Twitter AND Facebook (gah, Facebook has hashtags now), consumers who say exceedingly positive things about Wendy’s new burger had the opportunity for their praises to be turned into a musical number, with some having even been sung by former 98° frontman/Jessica Simpson spouse Nick Lachey during a live event last night in New York, where live-streams always take place for some reason. While the press release doesn’t say if the specific location was Times Square, we’re going to go ahead and guess this happened in Times Square.

Nothing like watching a former boy band member/reality star sing about a cheeseburger in probably Times Square. Oh, and VML offered the chance to participate via your social media, because the most effective use of it is to either praise or make fun of brands who spend a lot of money on advertising. If we’re lucky, it might even be a trending tweet. Update: The event actually took place at a Wendy’s location, natch, on 34th St in NYC.

As much as I appreciate a good fail video and laugh regularly from schadenfreude, Lowe Roche’s latest for Fuzz Wax Bar in Toronto just made me cringe. To advertise their dedication to smoother skin, Fuzz covered a male model in wax strips and sent him onto the streets. People could tear the strips (and hair) off him to receive a 25% off gift certificate. The strips were illustrated with grim-faced smileys, varying based on the amount of pain they would cause. Many people appeared to delight in making this man shout in agony.

“Street Waxing” seems to me the opposite of an attractive ad campaign. The selling point of waxing is the final product: smooth skin. In between appointments, one primary goal is to forget about the pain. That makes this experience more of an anti-waxing PSA. Fuzz Wax Bar reminds us, very viscerally, that waxing is not a pleasant experience. And adding insult to injury, (unlike this model), you’re going to have to pay to get yours yanked off.

Credits after the jump

Read more

In case you missed it during May’s One Show spectacle, the folks at VFX/production studio MPC have unveiled a little making-of video complete with the minimal house strains of Pantha Du Prince that gives us an inside look at their installation at the Bowery Hotel called “Fracture IO.” The esoteric-sounding project was created for JWT specifically for the One Show and was essentially MPC’s way of “reimagining the photo booth” by rendering images into 3D pieces. Just a little peek into some eye candy as we get out bearings post-July 4th. For more info info on “Fracture,” go here.