The shortlisted artists this year for the Deutsche Börse Photography Prize are Anna Fox (UK), Zoe Leonard (USA), Sophie Ristelhueber (France) and Donovan Wylie (UK).

The Deutsche Börse Photography Prize has run since 1996 and ?rewards a living photographer of any nationality, who has made the most significant contribution, in exhibition or publication format, to the medium of photography in Europe over the previous year?.

The Photographer?s Gallery originally set up the prize, and it?s thought of as one of the most prestigious prizes in the world of photography. Deutsche Börse has sponsered the £30,000 prize since 2005, hence the current title.

The winner will be announced at The Photographer?s Gallery 17th March. After London the exhibition will be shown in Berlin and then at the Deutsche Börse Group’s headquarters in Frankfurt.

http://www.photonet.org.uk/index.php?pxid=961

Years worked in digital media are a bit like dog years ? technology changes so quickly, with new applications and ideas flying thick and fast that a year definitely feels like three, if not more.

When I first started designing and building websites, Twitter was a mere glint in Jack Dorsey?s eye and the idea that John Lewis would sell nearly £52m worth of goods online per week was unbelievable. Huddled in my spare room back in 1997 with a copy of FrontPage and a very basic edition of Photoshop, I remember being very pleased with the animated flaming torches and marquee script adorning my first online creation. In those days, to get onto the Yahoo search engine listings (again, there was no such thing as Google) you found the category you thought your site fitted into and emailed the person managing that section. You usually got an email back within 48 hours and lo and behold, there was your site, ranked #1!

Fast forward 13 years and the digital world is a very different place, with whole agencies dedicated to the mysterious art of SEO, barely a High Street name who isn?t trading online and where a company?s use (or rather misuse) of Twitter can quickly turn into a PR nightmare.

And I?ve been lucky enough to move out of that spare room and work with some amazing clients, including Paul Smith, Jasper Conran, Myla, BAFTA and the Natural History Museum, helping them navigate the digital world and use the web to benefit their business or organisation.

So if there?s something you?ve always wanted to do online, or you need some help with your digital marketing or want to talk about how you could use Social Media to your advantage, then get in touch and I?ll put my 39 years of experience to work for you!

To help attract expert staff for the elite Samsung Electronics Research Institute (SERI), VGroup created a new brand identity for the institute and a brand mascot called Magnuss (an anagram of Samsung). SERI provides R&D support across Europe for Samsung’s production complexes, focusing on technological development and product design for a number of areas including telecommunications, audio/visual, multimedia and other consumer electronic products. Within mobile communications, established competitors such as Nokia and Ericsson were traditionally viewed by technical experts as best of breed employers. With the imperative to attract candidates of the very highest caliber Samsung’s research institute required a compelling new message.

The solution
Our brief was to create both a new advertising concept and also a new brand identity that would re-position SERI as a leading edge employer and attract world-class talent. We also had to ensure that the creative solution would work alongside Samsung’s existing branding.

Consultation with SERI confirmed that the new brand would need to be smart, individual and fun while reflecting the key values of an ideal employee. Our solution introduced Magnuss the dog - a new brand mascot using a fresh, contemporary and quirky ‘cartoon’ style. The brand mascot was complemented by the development of a distinctive brand identity for SERI.

The result
SERI corporate and mascot branding was applied across a wide range of media including recruitment advertising and events, plus online and printed collateral. The advertising was a great success, generating both increased response rates and improved quality of response. The brand has played a vital role in helping to reposition Samsung as an employer of choice.

‘SERI is very excited by the Magnuss theme and feel this new character is very eye catching and also emphasizes that ?it’s fun to work at SERI’. Our previous cartoon theme was tremendously successful and we hope this re-branding will provide a further boost for our recruitment campaign.‘ Samsungs HR & Facilities Manager at SERI.

If you would like a new slant to either your recruitment advertising or employee communications - let?s talk!

Download our Internal Communications brochure here.