Only recently, The Upper Storey created a print/POSM campaign for MSI. What was especially heartening was how it started as a brief for a regional campaign and the subsequent decision to implement our work globally as well. It’s always a treat when we get to do a shoot, as we get complete control over every single element, instead of spending time looking through image libraries. Raymond from Capsule Productions was our lensman for the campaign.

Our DI house then added the final touches, bringing out essential visual elements as well as adding the pièce de résistance – the all new 2010 Intel Core  processor.  Here are the final images that made the cut.

Friday: Toshiba celebrates 25 years of laptop development with two great new products. The Portégé R700 and the Libretto W100. Both outstanding products, the R700 features new Intel cooling technology allowing a fully featured Core family processor to be placed in a very light, very thin, laptop. And the W100 certainly has everyone talking with it’s dual screen.

The Upper Storey developed the pan-SEA campaign mainly executed through Print. However a key component was digital activation online and through a new innovative POS initiative. I will post the material as it goes live around Asia, and we’ll post a special edition about this retail idea.

Even before we get the time to send out a post on Tech Therapy, POPSOP has already done a pretty good review. This campaign is still in soft launch as we have only shared to a small group. Videos are starting to pop up everywhere (Vidz, Scary Ideas, Daily Motion, Kewego, Viddler, Guba, …. ), mostly uploaded to their own server, some re-branded and some crediting the wrong agency (again), but as we know we cant control these things.

We will post a more complete background for this campaign soon.

Microsoft announced the general availability of Office 2010 in Singapore with the 2010 IDEA JAM launch party, at *Scape Youth Park.

The 2010 IDEA JAM, an launch idea that was developed from the best launch idea crowd-sourced from more than 5,000 fans on the Facebook page “Office 2010 SG Insiders”. It was a celebration of local alternative art and music, creative ideas that were made better with Office 2010. Rock acts Jack & Rai, 53A, and DJ Perk (Pietrek) used Excel 2010 to visualize their music.

The winners of the evening’s Demo Challenge also won themselves the first retail copies of Office 2010, autographed by Steve Ballmer.

The event was executed by a local Singaporean event company.

The Upper Storey has launched a new campaign for Microsoft Singapore to help promote the key features of Internet Explorer 8. The campaign called ‘MysterIE8 Ball’ allows users to receive fun messages to foretell their future, and to potentially win cash and partner prizes.

Utilising a new, specially designed Web Slice, a user can shake the MysterIE8 Ball daily to win cash and prizes. In addition, the campaign will help showcase content Web Slices from Zuji and Golden Village, and Zuji travel vouchers and Golden Village tickets will be available for winners daily.

For details on how this program uses a partnership strategy to help business KPI’s, give me a call and I will run through the approach.

Intel’s Jeffrey the Robot, recently featured in a 2010 Superbowl commercial, was scripted in as one of the (minor) characters in an upcoming site we are developing. As the original Jeffrey is an actual puppet, which was unfeasible for our purposes, a three-dimensional digital version had to be created by The Upper Storey’s animation arm, Mofuro.

With the aid of reference images of Jeffrey, taken in various angles, we were able to create a faithful reproduction of the puppet. Modelling was done in Autodesk Maya, textures and mental ray shaders were developed for ‘coloring’ Jeffrey.

For the putting Jeffrey through his motions, we setup an animation rig that allows him to have a range of expressions in facial and body language.

If you own a pair of red/blue 3D/stereoscopic glasses, you can see these anaglyph images of Jeffrey in stereo format. So go on, have a look.

Jeffrey Test Animation Click to see Jeffery in action.

Dell Swarm has just won “Best Use of the Digital Landscape” at the Festival of Media Awards in Valencia Spain. This is a very prestigious award up against some very stiff (big spending) global competition.

I am glad it is doing the rounds, winning global awards (while we are hard at work :p)

The Upper Storey – Malaysia was very excited to get their first car client earlier this year. After all, every agency wants a client in the automotive industry, right? What better than to work on a brand that is all about being ‘Bold & Sexy’. We took that to heart and designed a hip ‘Bold & Sexy’ pre-launch site to get all Malaysians excited about the brand new Ford Fiesta!

The goal was to excite and tease, keeping everyone desiring for more, simple things like a data collection tool enabling further consumer outreach were included.  And, what about the ‘Ford Fiesta Movement’?  As there is not much that can be revealed until the official launch (stay tuned!), Ford Malaysia launched the Ford Fiesta Movement, which includes a series of missions that ‘agents’ (the general public) can take part in to win exciting prizes. These missions span across major media, from exciting on-ground activities like flash mobs to Facebook video submissions, check out the website to learn more!

The bolder and sexier, the better!

On location in Australia. For a new program all to be revealed in June/July. This is a two day film shoot in Brisbane for a new innovative online campaign. It is a great mix of sophisticated film work and innovative online/social integration.

Of course there was time to bond with cast and crew, and what better way than footy. Seems like the whole country is football mad.

Confirmation of a few rumors that were reported by Media and Marketing. Nice to know people are talking…

Singapore, 18 March 2010 – The Upper Storey has been engaged by Microsoft to develop and implement an integrated marketing campaign to drive interest and uptake  of the new Microsoft Office 2010 due to launch in June 2010. The campaign will cover extensive use of social media, online communications, data capture, various events and planning across paid media in conjunction with the existing media buying agency, Universal McCann.

The campaign will focus on driving trial of the new product features within Office 2010, and purchase through existing retail channels. The Upper Storey will engage traditional media, events and newer online and social media thinking. The agency will also work very closely with Microsoft’s incumbent PR agency, Edelman, to ensure tight integration with online and traditional media relations activities.
The win confirms The Upper Storey as a new breed of ‘digitally ready’ agencies in Asia capable of strategic thinking across all channels and able to embrace new thinking in engaging consumers.

Haresh Khoobchandani, Senior Director, Business & Marketing Organisation, Microsoft Singapore said: “The way our customers engage with us has changed tremendously. Microsoft has embraced digital and the need to connect with our audiences both offline and online in a big way. We continue to drive discipline in measurement and impact, but are always open to breakthrough ideas. The Upper Storey brought to us fresh ideas to achieve this along with comprehensive planning capabilities to help impact the total business opportunity”.

Prakash Kamdar, Managing Director, The Upper Storey said: “We are very happy to be working with Microsoft on this project. They bring a discipline and willingness to embrace new thinking which will make this a great project for us, and a real testament to the effectiveness of digital programs with a disciplined marketing framework”.