by Christoffer Ejby @ HMKW 2020/2021
This visual analysis was part of a course in design & social research at HMKW Berlin lead by Prof. Dr Jan-Henning Raff. I have chosen to analyse one of my favourite advertisement campaigns: 'Highlight the Remarkable' from DDB Germany, for Stabilo International.
How much of an advertisement can be recalled after just 25 milliseconds? To test that, I used a digital Tachistoscope (a device that displays an image for a specific amount of time). I showed four of my friends a video of the advertisement for 25 milliseconds on my smartphone and recorded what they could recall. The results are categorised in colour, objects and shapes, positions and environment.
75% of the participants recall a black/white object in a white environment. 50% also recognise some contrasted coloured shape or object.
75% of the participants recognise a picture; non of them can answer what it could imagine. 50% recall the picture having a shape or frame around it.
Some primary object is recalled and used as a position marker for describing other objects or shapes. 50% places this primary object on a background.
What did the participants overall recall after 25 milliseconds? This image is created to simulate the participants' recall: some black/white image on a white background, whit something in a green/yellow colour.
What emotional effect does the advertisement have? I sent five friends a video-clip showing the advertisement for half a minute (using the Tachistoscope). I asked them to fill out a bipolar scale of 6x2 pairs of adjectives directly after seeing the video. Half of the adjectives shared a similar meaning; like ‘exciting’ and ‘in motion’ which are opposites of ‘monotonous’ and ‘static’.
The advertisement is rated as exciting and static. The image itself is showing excitement, as in ‘waiting for something’ (to see if Apollo 11 will return to earth), but it does not have any movement and could be seen as static. The highlighting could be seen as ‘in motion’, but I do not believe that this is recognisable in the short time frame of half a minute.
![Bipolar scale graph emotions; Highlight the Remarkable Advertising. Spatial or claustrophobic, widely or tidy.]](graph_ee_scatter-line_spatial-widely-claustrophobic-tidy.svg)
The difference in the image in the advertisement and the advertisement as a whole may result in this unclearness. The image shows a room filled with people which could be seen as claustrophobic or tidy. The advertisement as a whole has a large amount of white space, which most likely would be seen as spatial or widely.
The people in the image are 'waiting for something, waiting is mostly a neutral situation where the future outcome is unknown but hopefully ‘joyful’, which could interpret the participants rating the advertisement as rather ‘joyful’. The highlighting is green/yellow, which is colours there mostly is perceived as ‘joyful’. In the next chapter ‘construction’, the colour contrasts are calculated and show that the advertisement to 52% consists of white and 47% of grey or black; the advertisement is seen as slightly brighter and therefore understandable concerning colours.
The format is vertical, which suggest vertical stacking of elements. This is clearly demonstrated in the second picture, where the format is changed to horizontal. The whitespace changes to being on both sides of the image, and the
arrangement appears cluttered. The vertical format is excellent to reference the condition in which a highlighter typically would be used; in a textbook or printed A4 paper; both (mostly) vertical formats. Therefore, the embodiment
of the product through the highlighting seems easier to imagine.
The advertisement appears a bit tilted because of the product image, where the rest of the elements is placed centred. That lets the product break up the balanced composition. The historical image appears as a stable element in the composition. Blurring out the image’s borders removes its opposition through the product image; instead, a general crooked composition occurs.
That the advertisement contains so little colours is partly because of the historical image. That the product is coloured and inserts colour through the highlighting make the product the eye-catching element in the advertisement. The immense amount of white space reference the product ‘environment’; paper.
The composition does not follow a grid but appears to be dictated by the historical image. The variations show a principal where the historical image is placed in the centre bottom. A highlighting of the remarkable women is made, defining the placement of the product image. The caption is placed on top of the historical image in alignment with the highlighting.
The advertisement story is told within the composition. The product changes the image's story by highlighting what elsewhere have been overlooked: the remarkable women. The balance shift because of the product; the product adds colour to the story and correct what is overseen. The hierarchy in the composition appears turned around. The advertisement has similarities in style with car advertisement campaigns from the 50s but with an information hierarchy in opposite order where text captions would be under the image.
The picture of the highlighter is an icon. A highlighter is a writing tool used to highlight information in text or pictures and typically used in a learning context. This could offer associations with universities = academic = intellectual.
The highlighting is an index, expressing something is important here.
The historical image is an index. The image is indexing an occasion where these people were waiting in this room. The room is filled with technical equipment, and the men are formally dressed; this appears to be important. The equipment and that the image is black and white imply it to be a historical image. The image is also an icon because it resembles the things it refers to.
This could symbolise that the intellectual (the highlighter) is correcting (the highlighting) the important (the historical image). This is attributed to the advertisement story; Stabilo (the intellectual) corrects what has been overseen; the remarkable woman.
Breaking down the advertisement as in ‘generative principles’ to inspect its multimodality. The historical image suggests importance, the caption supplement with what: NSA and Apollo 11, the highlighting who: Katherine Johnson (also mentioned in the caption). The highlighting seems to have been made by the highlighter, why: to advertise for Stabilo highlighters.
“Subject the object to our own eyes."
Immanuel Kant, Critique of Judgment (§8, 5:215-216)
In Immanuel Kant’s Critique of Judgement, he argues that aesthetic is a subjective matter. Beauty is a question of personal pleasure. In this capture I will compare the advertisement’s aesthetic to my personal aesthetic, to understand if my appreciation of the advertisement is answered through personal preference.
The advertisement's aesthetic refers to an advertisement style from the 50s, 60s in its composition and the black and white image from 1969, presenting that times technology assemble a retro atmosphere compared to our present. Retro often refers to nostalgia, which is the feeling of pleasure (and slight sadness) when thinking about things in the past. The recollecting of technology in the 60s hypothesis a feeling of successful technological accomplishment from the last sixty years. The sum of white space, the learned composition and the centred quadrat, construct an easily decoded and pleasant visual impression.
The board is a selection of things in my home, suggesting that they together represent my personal aesthetic. Through that may be correct many things are in my home because of their essence rather than their aesthetic. My wardrobe consists of plain (mostly black) t-shirts, trousers and pullovers assembling casual minimalism. The sofa I have has soft, inviting curves. My living room table is round, an infinite form, as so my kitchen lamp whit its ongoing pattern of simple forms in a colour of action. I surround me whit colours representing nature from brown leather chairs to my coffee cup’s playful combination of green and yellow. Many of my furniture and the old telephone and camera I have may imply retro.
The two boards have similarities. Retro is a description used for both boards, and I indeed enjoy aesthetic from the 50s and 60s, especially in architecture and design. This is an essential period for danish design which still can be found in most danish homes and institutions. Therefore, I have grown up with and are cultivated to like that aesthetic. The word minimalism is used in my personal aesthetic, and the advertisement has a simplicity that could be described as minimalism. I would conclude that my appreciation of the advertisement is influenced by which aesthetic I find pleasurable.
Selling Stabilo highlighters and gain brand awareness
The advertisement is designed by the advertising agency DDB Germany for Stabilo International.
The advertisement has been digitally created with a design program. The historical image is a digitalised analogue image. The highlighting is a yellow-green colour with transparency.
The 50s and 60s advertisement style. The advertisement has strong similarities with the Volkswagen advertisements from 1959, created by the same advertisement agency Doyle Dane Bernbach (DDB).
The advertisement campaign takes a stand on women empowerment when the topic is ‘breaking news’ because of the #metoo movement started the year before. A 2018 opinion poll done by Kantar Public for the SPIEGEL shows that two-thirds of Germans think that the #MeToo debate was positive. Women empowerment as advertisement strategy had already shown successfully through campaigns like “The Real Beauty campaign” (Ogilvy & Mather) from Dove in 2004.
‘Values-based’ or ‘social good’ campaigns is when brands take a stand on political or social issues. A study from Edelman (Brands take a stand, 2018 Edelman) show that 1 in 2 customers are believe-driven: 67% bought a brand for the first time because of its position on a controversial issue. “Communication focused on a brand’s stand has an even greater effect on a consumer’s intent to advocate for the brand than one focused on product features." The trend was successful before 2018 and still engage customers in 2021 with campaigns like “The Tampon Book” (Scholz & Friends) from The Female Company.
The Pepsi campaign failed because of its insensitive content, but what about the connection between the product and the social issue? Is there a limitation? I have taken the advertisement (Highlight the Remarkable: Katherine Johnson) and created four new versions with different products. Scroll through and see what you think.
In the advertisement a highlighter (Stabilo) takes a stand on women empowerment and success with it, but what about the other products? ‘Kånken’ (Fjällräven) was developed as an answer to a social issue, is unisex and have a Swedish aroura of equality. United Colors of Benetton use as clothing brand successfully ‘social good’ advertisement. Lipstick (Chanel) is a product to feel beautiful and confident and targeted women. Dove is in a nearby product category. Detergent (Ariel) may be more difficult. The women movement freed women from the household, detergent is a household product, that could be seen as a direct provocation. Meatloaf (Herta) would be a problematic product for this social issue. It could be seen as not taking the issue seriously. It is interesting why households and food products may have to be more careful in choosing a ‘social good’ issue than more “luxuries” products.
Storytelling is a vast part of advertisement and design. People are willing to share and engage in stories on topics where they are personally invested. ‘Social good’ advertisement shows how effectively that can be in creating ambassadors for brands. This advertisement did succeed in this, reflected through the positive feedback on social media.
The advertisement got diligently shared on twitter and some user even made their own version of the advertisement, suggesting women they meant have been overlocked.
Amazing campaign from Stabilo, and @kuasasiswa’s localized take on this. Malaysian women ARE powerful! #HighlightTheRemarkable https://t.co/jIgZ1ipBMG
— WOMEN:girls (@WOMENgirls_) July 6, 2018
Women have made major contributions to science, mathematics, literature, politics...but have been overshadowed by their male counterparts or just written out of history. This great campaign is highlighting their achievements. #HighlightTheRemarkable pic.twitter.com/uWeWvHcPSw
— Adesuwa (@AdesuwaVO) July 8, 2018
Simple but so powerful. How often can you saw we are better people from seeing an ad? We should all know these women, and so many more! Can't wait for round 2 @DDB_Worldwide #Stabilo #HighlightTheRemarkable pic.twitter.com/ibyWj9VsVC
— Lea Johnson (@BuriedInData) July 9, 2018
