“Creative people and the ones working in the ad world are often considered as artists, in reality, we are scientists as most of the time we use pure mathematics during the ideation and creative procedures of ads,” said Agnello Dias. He was speaking at the event organised by Ad Club Madras, “A Day in the life of Agnello Dias”.
He further spoke on the creative energy and the medium through which it is communicated.
“Most of us have creative energies within us and there have been languages invented for the creative energy to be manifested into the world. Cinema, Music, Painting, Calligraphy, Poetry, Photography, etc are a few examples of those. In advertising, we use all the forms and various combinations of above-mentioned languages, hence we are actually curators,” he said.
“Most of the works that come out as advertisements are our 2nd or 3rd best work, all our best work may still be lying in the iPads, even mine. With time, we realise that the reason why some of us are creatively more successful and recognised is that my fifth work is better than your fifth work,” Dias added.
He further spoke the stories behind the ads he ideated and created. Dias spoke about the Indian Oil ad that won him several accolades, but the campaign failed miserably and that resulted in his agency losing the account. “Failure is a better teacher than success,” he said.
Dias spoke about the Fiat Palio ad which featured Khadoos uncle- another ad that failed despite the ad being shot twice. The ad featured an elderly man who was the owner of a gas station who loses his cool because people visit the gas station to ask for directions.
“We understood that people were sympathetic towards the gas station owner, but we thought that audience sensibility will be on the creative side of the ad, which failed miserably,” Dias said.
He further spoke about Times of India’s 175th-year celebration campaign and the ideation process behind it.
He elaborated on the famous Pepsi- Change the Game Campaign for ICC Cricket World Cup 2011 which featured the world’s best cricketers like MS Dhoni, Harbhajan Singh, Tillakaratne Dilshan, Virender Sehwag, Kevin Pietersen & their signature shots.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yKFGFoWp2Q8
“Most of the successful campaigns happen accidentally and as creators, we work towards making such accidental ideation processes happen frequently,” he added.
Dias spoke about TOI’s 60th year of the Indian Independence Campaign- India poised Campaign. The campaign was conceived as a call for action and the prime objective was to involve common people, creating a sense of participation and empowerment. The campaign portrayed individuals and their stories and actions which hardly ever reach the media houses.
The Campaign was a huge success and it culminated in to “Lead India’ campaign that had a huge impact across all sections in India. RK Mishra who started the ‘Change India Initiative’ to engage educated youth, middle class and working professionals in the matters of public policy and electoral polity was declared as the winner and was honoured as The Lead India “Mahanayak” by Dr APJ Abdul Kalam, the former president of India.
Dias spoke about the ideation process behind Century Ply ad, Teach India Movement by Times of India, National Geographic, Airtel etc.
He spoke about Aman ki Asha- a campaign jointly started by two leading media houses The Times of India in India and The Jang Group of Pakistan. The campaign aims for mutual peace and the development of diplomatic and cultural relations between the two nations in South Asia.
He said, “Aman Ki Asha movement created a massive peace movement across the borders and opened up many integrated cross border events, concerts, business conclaves etc.”
