Big Budget Advertising Photography

[MagRat Garlic]

For those who've never worked in the advertising industry, I'm placing a few links to the pivotal big budget tobacco advertising campaigns run for Benson & Hedges' "GOLD" cigarettes, run in the 1970s and 1980s.

The second link is probably the more interesting of the two, as it contains very detailed descriptions of how the photography sets were designed and exactly how much resource (as in £££) was invested in this advertising campaign.

I've also included a link to the introductory article. This contains less description, but does illustrate have the Marketing and Advertising Consultants developed the "GOLD" brand over time.

The third link is to a discussion of how symbolic imagery in advertising photography owes its long heritage to European painting. This is particularly important, as most of us are subconsciously trained in how to read and interpret these subliminal symbols, which is something you may wish to think about when composing your own images.

I'll be discussing this kind of big budget advertising photography with Rob in this Sunday's livestream. One thing you should be aware of is that much of what you see is not what it seems. There's also a great deal of subliminal imagery used to work on your subconscious mind. I'll be explaining some of this in my mini guest spot, in this Sunday's livestream.

Enjoy,
Rick Bear

https://davedye.com/2015/01/29/that-fun ... rand-pt-1/

https://davedye.com/2016/05/02/that-fun ... years/amp/

https://www.academia.edu/11957240/All_that_Glitters_

[Thomas-Paul]

Thank you Rick, very interesting and revealing.
"Saludos" to the cat

[FlyfishnFoto]

Hi Rick,
Thx for those links.
Incredibly creative photography but also incredibly disturbing that so much money has been spent on trying to challenge the link between smoking and disease.
Profit before people will see the end of human civilisation.

[MagRat Garlic]

Hi Rick,
Thx for those links.
Incredibly creative photography but also incredibly disturbing that so much money has been spent on trying to challenge the link between smoking and disease.
Profit before people will see the end of human civilisation.

Oh yes, there was a somewhat sinister agenda to ensure that "brand awareness" would be maintained even after all cigarette advertising was prohibited.

I was told that subliminal power of the images used in the last few years of big budget tobacco advertising campaigns (when everyone knew the advertising ban was inevitable) was intended such that when you saw a similar image (used to advertise a totally unrelated product) your subconscious would prompt you to think about certain brands of cigarette.

It wasn't so much that the tobacco companies were telling porky pies, but that they manipulated the "I don't want to believe it" mentality that was so prevalent amongst the smokers of the day. This is why they could incorporate death imagery without offending their own customers.

Although I worked for a studio that had one of the biggest tobacco advertising contracts, I was never personally involved in tobacco advertising, although I did work on creating advertising that had similarly beautiful and creative imagery. Strangely enough, the company had a strict No Smoking policy.

Rick

[deboco]

Thanks Rick, very interesting:
1965: The Government banned cigarette companies from advertising on T.V.
I had to check that comment, as I remembered lots of tobacco commercials in the '70s. Australia allowed advertising until 1976. Not like us to be behind!