Design Annotator: #designindaba expo product highlights, new Polo Vivo ad a hit

by Uno de Waal (@Unodewaal) Today’s Design Annotator features the best from 10and5 in the form of:

Highlights from the 2014 Design Indaba Expo, and where to find the products now
A selection of brand activations from this year’s Design Indaba Expo
“The Hit”, a new ad for the Volkswagen Polo Vivo
Native VML’s fully equipped e-reader app, bookly
An ad that shows you can start the fun by paying your TV licence anywhere
An interview with SA-born comic book artist Willem Samuel on his new graphic novel series
A feature on filmmaker, photographer and founder of Mirage magazine, Henrik Purienne
More on what it’s like to be in the top 10 of the Absa L’Atelier competition
A My Day Job interview with visual development artist Lorraine Alvarez Posen

DESIGN INDABA

Highlights from Design Indaba Expo + where to find them now

Like tens of thousands of others, we headed to the Design Indaba Expo last weekend to peruse the vast locally and most often hand-made wares on show.

The large amount of visitors provides excellent exposure for South African/African designers and makers but can be quite challenging to navigate. So, here are our pic(k)s of the 2014 Expo for a peaceful online browsing experience.

Brand activations at the 2014 Design Indaba Expo

Among the hundreds of independent designers showing at Design Indaba Expo were the big brand sponsors who play a key role in making the annual event such a success.

Here are the exhibits, installations or activations by brands at this year’s expo and a little explanation of how they’re using spaces such as these to connect with a design-minded audience.

ADVERTISING

Volkswagen Polo Vivo: The Hit

Almost exactly one year on, Ogilvy & Mather Cape Town has released a followup to Volkswagen’s Polo Vivo TVC ‘The Answer’ which plays off the premise, “If Volkswagen can make Polo Vivos available for such a crazy price, then who knows what other crazy things might happen?”

In this commercial titled ‘The Hit’, an involuntary reaction becomes the next nationwide sensation.

bookly by Native VML | From e-reader app to writing platform

bookly is a fully-equipped e-reader app by Native VML that was initially launched on Mxit in May last year (2013).

This week, it launched a second phase becoming not only a platform for reading, but also for sharing writing. Here we take a closer look at the app and how it works.

Pay your TV licence anywhere to start the fun

SABC – Clown Love from GIANT FILMS on Vimeo.

This ad, directed by Peri van Papendorp for DDB Johannesburg, features a hilarious love story between the main female protagonist and her clown lover, set in the veggie section in a supermarket.

The SABC aims to show that, no matter where you are, you’ll be able to pay your TV licence which, as a result, means that the fun can start anywhere.

Find out more and see the credits here.

INTERESTING

An Interview with SA-born comic book artist, Willem Samuel

Willem Samuel, a South African comic book artist currently based in the UK, has been busy with some very exciting projects of late.

One of these takes the form of illustrations for Protea Boekehuis’s reissue of Die Swart Kat book series. Additionally, Samuel is in the process of releasing a six-issue graphic novel called Mengelmoes, which charts his life growing up in South Africa.

Here we get to know a bit more about Samuel and what he does.

Featured: photographer and filmmaker Henrik Purienne

Henrik Purienne is a photographer and film director currently residing in Cape Town, Paris and Los Angeles. In 2010, he founded Mirage, an international fashion magazine for which he is now the co-editor-in-chief and creative director.

Purienne, Purienne’s book of summer holiday snapshots, portraits and outtakes, was published by Prestel Publishing (Randomhouse) last year.

We spoke to Purienne to find out more.

Absa L’Atelier | Being in the Top Ten

As we heard earlier this week from the 2013 Absa L’Atelier award winners, winning isn’t actually everything.

In fact, just entering the competition is the most important part. By doing so, you position yourself alongside the other young South African artists who are busy forging their art careers and creating important networks.

We’ve spoken to some of last year’s Top 10 finalists to find out more about what entering this competition really means for you as a young artist.

My Day Job: Lorraine Alvarez Posen

After living in Zimbabwe, Canada, Argentina and Norway, Lorraine Alvarez Posen returned to Cape Town, where she now works as a freelance designer and professional visual development artist for feature animation and film.

Here we find out more about her, as well as the various things her day job consists of.

Design Annotator is a regular column on MarkLives featuring the top design work from South Africa’s biggest online creative showcase, Between 10 and 5, which is curated by publisher Uno de Waal (@Unodewaal), inaugural South African winner of the British Council South Africa‘s Young Creative Entrepreneur (#YCE) Digital Publishing Award in March 2014.