Countdown to Cannes 2012: Scarecrow banks on MVL Mobiles and Taxxi Vitamin K for Lions

For Scarecrow Communications, it is important to have a symbolic presence at Cannes 2012. The creative team has selected its work for MVL Mobiles and Taxxi Vitamin K Store to do the job.

One look at Scarecrow Communications' ads for MVL Mobiles and you're compelled to cock your head to the right to get a better view of the creative. If viewed on a computer, one is tempted to rotate the image and set it right. This seemingly erroneous physical positioning of the ad is a deliberate tactic used by the agency in order to demonstrate a very specific product proposition.

Raghu Bhat, founder-director, Scarecrow Communications explains the idea behind this potential winner. The objective was to convey the product's wide screen and panoramic view while clicking photographs. The agency demonstrated this product benefit by deliberately placing vertical monuments/structures horizontally in the ads. The aim, explains Bhat, was to generate immediate disruption at first glance, with the help of this simple yet visually striking creative idea.

Three such ads (that feature structures such as the Burj Khalifa, Washington Monument and Radio Tower at Kuala Lumpur) have been entered in the Outdoor Lions category. "We're used to seeing these structures and images in a vertical manner. Seeing them horizontally strikes us as odd," he elaborates. It is this superimposition of horizontal onto vertical that the agency has used to spell out MVL Mobiles' prized product feature.

The second campaign that Scarecrow is hopeful about is the one for Taxxi Vitamin K Store. The three films (Bedroom, Othello and Maid) for this fashion brand have been entered in the Cyber Lions category.

The films are unusual as they have no conversations, are pretty slow moving and have barely any layering. Bhat explains that the team intentionally created such ads because it reflects what the brand itself stands for. "The brand is a minimalistic, aesthetically-inclined one. We have thus carried forward the minimalism in the brand's communication as well," he says, insisting that if a story can be told without resorting to dialogues or other tactics, then there's no need to use spoken words or conversation in the advertisement.

Taxxi Vitamin K, with its eclectic designs, caters to a very niche clientele. It is particularly targeted at individualistic people and attempts to stand for a point of view or perspective that transcends product-related benefits. Bhat says, "The communication empowers women." One of the ads even urges women to have an extra-marital affair if they're trapped in an unhappy relationship. The other films address different things, for instance, how a person's lack of good taste or absence of a superior fashion sense can be viewed as nothing short of a crime.

Additionally, the agency has also submitted a self-promotional film titled 'Shelf' in the Short Form Ad Film category (Film Lions).