Illustration 5: True colour
When the receiver is a printing professional, the advised recipe is to enhance the advert with a colour calibration target.
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Illustration 5: True colour |
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| You'll need two players to convince people that
your product is synonym with good sharp colourful images. The procedure
comes rather expensive because one of the actors gobbles the other down : cat eats fish, cat hunts mouse, mouse savours cheese.
When the receiver is a printing professional, the advised recipe is to enhance the advert with a colour calibration target. |
| © | first published: II.2003; updated: IV.2003 | Nederlands |
| Point and shoot and our camera takes care of everything else. That's what this Spanish advertisement (ad 1 dated 1993) says.
The image will materialize before your eyes (it was long before the age of digital cameras !) and then the quality : astounding.
The brand uses the very strong couple mouse and cheese. If a mouse can be
misled then the image must be extremely realistic, almost to the scent. (The same brand
in 1986, used Colourful fish in a knowledgeable manner to illustrate brilliant images.)
The Color Publishing System (ad 2) guarantees reliable colour and high image quality in a desktop-environment. Notice the absence of a calibration target : at the time desktop publishing wasn't considered serious yet. The lengthy text (lots of cool stuff like WYSIWYG and 'uvL colour space') stresses the built-in intelligence : True colour now extremely easy. The cheese in both ads is remarkably similar: a big chunk with lots of holes. That's probably to avoid connotations of soap. |
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| (1) 1993 - Shoot and you won't believe your eyes. | (2) 1992 - True colour, now child's play. | (3) 1996 - Introducing photorealism |
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| True colour and image quality is purely visual. And yet, in ads 1 and 2 it's sold through an olfaction oriented species. The other adverts
call for an eye-hunter.
The Color Laser Copier (ad 4, I edited the image to better show the mouse) is a break-through in digital colour technology. When we compare with earlier ads of the same brand (f.e. Elephants ad 7) a shift in accent emerges. In the 1982 ad copying and resizing was important and shown with hordes of the same species (elephants, lady-bugs). In 1991 any decent copier could resize and make good duplicates. Time to stress colour and image quality. |
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| (4) 1991 - There's only one way out | (5) 199? - Colour good enough to eat ! |
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| The same brand
in 1996 (ad 3) recycles the same idea for its inkt-jet printer with
photo-print kit. Once again the output is so extremely realistic that someone
couldn't resist the temptation. Follow the foot-prints from the fish and find out
who.
It's remarkable how how often (gold)fish are chosen to radiate reliable colour (ad 3, 5-9). And except for ad 6 the fish always is cast as the victim ! Look at the cat in ads 3, 5, 8 and 9 and at the Kingfisher's bill in advert 7. Cat and bird is also a strong couple. I don't have any sample though. Copy-writers consider cat and bird in the setting of advertisement 3 undecent, I suppose. Don't risk to disturb the customer. Play it safe with a pest-species or a cold-blooded animal. |
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| (6) 1995 - professional colour proofs | (7) 199? - Dazzling colours |
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| Our last examples are interesting because we have two versions, one in Dutch and a second in French (ad 8 and 9). The French text is the more direct When a picture becomes real. and Make your pictures become alive while the Dutch version only indirectly alludes to the superior quality: Nothing sells better than a picture that brings the water to your mouth. (Also very appropriate in view of the fish.) Peculiar detail: the printing width is between 60 and 220 cm in Dutch but between 61 and 200 cm in French. |
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| (8) 2003 - Prints that sell autonomously. | (9) 2003 - A picture becomes real. |
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| Copywriters make a clear distinction between colour (printing) professionals and other people. An advert directed towards the professional is marked as such by the presence of a white sheet with a colour reference bar. See ads 5-7 and Goldfish ad 12 |
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