The Perils of Stock (photography that is…)

We are drowning in a sea of stock photos. A tsunami of smiling gray-haired dads and sprinting business executives and pensive hipsters and buoyant moms and kids with balloons. And while there are many experts and savants and pundits who would point to the rise of the Internet or video games or MBA’s as the cause of the immense boredom and suckitude (to use a scientific term) that cloaks all advertising these days, I believe the cause is much simpler. Stock.

It is just too damn easy to make ads that look good, look acceptible, look like real ads — for presentation, to run — by using stock photographs you pay for, or even worse, ones you swipe. Why is this so bad?

Well, it’s like eating pre-digested food. That’s bad, right? It’s like going to a restaurant and them saying to you, “you can order anything you want, as long as half of it contains hot dogs and beans.” It’s like Shakespeare attacking a new play and someone saying to him, it has to feature circus clowns, stock car racing, and a big scene involving a marching band.

The bad thing about stock is that you come to the “making things up” table with one (or two, or three, or seven…) hands tied behind your back. No matter how pretty and slick things look, YOU JUST CAN’T THINK OF ANYTHING NEW.

And what does that lead to? Yawnnnnnnn….

Luckily, there is a remedy for this. And I didn’t think of it. A caveman (or woman) did. Draw pictures. Make up pictures. Scribble stuff. You don’t even have to be able to draw that well — stick figures can do it. In fact, I’d prefer stick figures to another shot of a happy pharmacist with just the right tint of gray in his hair and half-glasses serving up…

Well, you get it.

So leave stock to the brokers, and start scribbling already!

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Shooting our barefooted children in the feet — and we’re the shoemakers, or, a question about the state of the advertising business spurred on by watching the Today Show.

The Today Show has its problems. But the loss of Katie, America’s sweetheart, isn’t what I’m talking about today. I’m talking about the ads. The things that are supposed to be supporting the show. As sick as the content of the show is, the way the advertising business is treating our clients, our messages, and our viewers (consumers? customers?) is a self-fulfilling prophecy of doom.

But first, remember the old saying “the shoemaker’s children are going barefooted?” How certain people have a tendency to take care of every one else’s needs except their own? Good. Now, park that for a moment.

Remember the saying, “shooting ourselves in the feet?” How, no matter what some people do, they end up harming themselves first? Good. Now, take those two sayings, combine them, and you’ll get an idea of just how ridiculous the ad business is dealing with the media and clients and customers, as evidenced by a recent viewing of the Today Show — and just about everything else on TV. And you’ll get an idea of how, as an industry, advertising and media are conspiring to do more harm to ourselves than 10,000 Mark Zuckerbergs on steroids. OK, enough waffling. To get to the point, here’s what I saw.

I saw a pod of TOO MANY DAMN COMMERCIALS, TOO SHORT COMMERCIALS, AND TOO MANY OF THOSE DAMN PODS TOO CLOSE TOGETHER. Thus, training the audience to turn off their minds, relax and float downstream — or even worse, GO TO THE BATHROOM!

1: TOO MANY SPOTS IN THE POD. Why do we need so many commercial breaks? Especially when the content of the show itself is so weak? Can’t the networks break up the pacing of the spots a little, to surprise the audience and keep them off guard. It is so predictable, we have Pavlovianly (sic) trained them to scram.

2: WHY SUCH SHORT SPOTS? We, in the creative departments, are not immune. Our wonderful, creative, Cannes-ready scripts are chopped down to 15 second abortions. Noise, noise, noise. Who really thinks these 15 second commercials, no matter how expensive the production or how wonderful the idea can do anything to CHARM AND DELIGHT our audiences? NOISE, NOISE, NOISE.

If we, as an industry, don’t start getting back into the business of surprising and delighting our audiences (with selling messages they love because, although people hate advertising, they love great advertising), if we don’t start doing that all we are doing is cashing the checks for the passengers on the Titanic after the noble ship had already sunk.

And we’re not doing that, are we?

Are we?

Too much coffee this morning. Now for some yoga. And tofu.