AdFest 2012: Doug Schiff’s day two observations

Doug Schiff is sitting on the Direct and Promo jury at this year’s ADFEST. Here, Ogilvy Beijing’s executive creative director gives his observations at the halfway stage of judging.

Greetings from the land of a thousand campaign videos. Or so it feels, judging the Direct and Promo Lotuses.

Actually there are just over 500 entries this year in the combined categories – up from last year – and even though entry repeats in different categories are plentiful, the eyes do go a bit buggy.

The first day our group of 7 diligently sat through all the Direct videos, shaping it into a shortlist, and ending up the last team to show up at dinner. But with less of a sore head the second day, we were able to chop the Promo submissions by 70% in the morning and trim both shortlists into finalists in the afternoon. Which leads Saturday to more leisurely finish the metal rounds.

Entries this year are easily as strong as last, with the Aussies and their Kiwi neighbors not only showing up big, but showing their work well through simple, engaging videos that don’t muck around. Something this group of judges much appreciated.