• by Amy Corr , Staff Writer @MediaPostOTL, October 18, 2006

Sony Bravia paints a new canvas. Dove breaks down stereotypes. Gucci Group gets a stylish corporate Web site. Let's launch!

BMW is positioning its X3 as an SAV (Sports Activity Vehicle) rather than the dreaded SUV, via print, TV, outdoor, online and wildpostings featuring the headline "This is Not An SUV." One ad shows a SUV stopping at a red light only to have the entire top layer slide off to reveal truck parts. Watch it here. Another ad shows a women packing her groceries in a SUV that falls apart to reveal a truck. Click here to watch the ad. In addition, BMW will advertise on cement trucks, armored cars and buses with copy stating, "This is an SUV." Ads also include the clever URL nobehemoths.com. GSD&M handled all aspects of the campaign.

Last week we mentioned Volkswagen'sad campaign where anyone who purchases a VW goes home with their own First Act GarageMaster electric guitar, which can be played via the car's audio system. The first TV ad featured Slash, late of Guns N' Roses and current member of Velvet Revolver. Click here to watch Slash. There are now two other spots, one featuring he who grew up in the same hometown (Fairfield, Conn.) as this writer, John Mayer. The other has actor Christopher Guest channeling Nigel Tufnel, the character he played in "This Is Spinal Tap." Watch Nigel here and John here. Crispin Porter + Bogusky created the campaign and handled the media planning. Mediacom handled the buying.

The first ad spoke volumes with its imagery and music. The follow-up ad, while impressive, is no match for the original. This is like when a musician's sophomore CD tanks compared to his debut disc. Sony launched the follow-up to "Balls," the ad that launched 250,000 bouncy balls onto the streets of San Francisco. The latest ad promoting Sony BRAVIA LCD TVs, entitled "Paint," sticks with the color theme, but this time it's paint that's launched--70,000 liters to be exact--onto an abandoned tower block in Glasgow, Scotland. Thanks to some precision timing, the buildings are blasted with a variety of paint colors. A bad clown makes a cameo, and the ad concludes with the sound of the paint falling, like rain, atop playground rides. The ad uses the same tag line as "Balls," "colour like no other." A 70 second version of the ad debuted in the U.K. last night during the Champions League match, Manchester United vs. FC Copenhagen. Check it out here.Fallon UK created the ad.

Ogilvy Toronto created a fabulous commercial for Dove showing that even size 00 models look bad when they wake up and are airbrushed and retouched more than you'd imagine. The ad begins with a model, sans makeup, waiting to be primped. Simple changes in lighting drastically change the model's appearance. The hair and makeup alterations come next, but seeing the model's façade altered via PhotoShop was quite the eye-opener--even for the model. The ad pans out to the finished product, an outdoor ad, and concludes with "no wonder our perception of beauty is distorted," along with a URL where girls in Canada can sign up for a Real Beauty workshop. Watch the ad here.

Too bad all corporate Web sites aren't this stylin'. The Gucci Group launched a branded corporate Web site that simply exudes sophistication. The site incorporates the Gucci Group's new identity using full-screen video and motion graphics highlighting all of the brands that fall under the Gucci Group umbrella: Gucci, Yves Saint Laurent, Bottega Veneta, Boucheron, Alexander McQueen, Stella McCartney and Balenciaga, to name a few. Visitors can view full-screen videos of the latest runway collections for both men and women or review a history of Gucci, from its founding by Guccio Gucci in 1921 to its incarnation today. AKQA created the site.

Jack Link's Beef Jerky launched a set of four TV spots under the theme, "Messing with Sasquatch." "Salt" shows a group of camping buddies loosening the lid on Sasquatch's salt shaker, causing it to ruin dinner. The boys place Sasquatch's hand in hot water in "Water Bowl," causing the animal to release some liquid of its own. Sasquatch has a handful of "Shaving Cream" in another ad, but the hairy creature has the last laugh. "Binoculars" features the Sasquatch way to use binoculars. The ads are running on National Geographic, VH1, Fox Sports Net, Comedy Central, ESPN, Spike TV, Speed Channel and TBS. Carmichael Lynch handled all aspects of the campaign. In fact, Sasquatch has been making the rounds in advertising as of late. He recently made an appearance in this print ad, created by Crispin Porter + Bogusky, promoting the return of the Volkswagen Rabbit.

TM Advertising has launched a branding campaign for oneworld, a global airline alliance. The theme of the campaign, the group's first global ads in four years, is "Flexible World" and targets frequent international business travelers. The campaign consists of print, online and outdoor ads; four print ads will run in newspapers and worldwide business magazines including Financial Times Deutschland,Les Echos and Travel Talk. The same ads will run online on more than a dozen Web sites, including FTD, Marco Polo and National Geographic. In addition, two microsites were also developed to support the campaign. FCB handled the media buying.

Fast Company magazine launched a print and online branding campaign targeting the advertising and media buying communities. The trade campaign runs through Nov. 10 in The New York Times, and online at AdvertisingAge.com, Mediaweek.com, MediaLifeMagazine.com, MediaPost.com (publisher of Out to Launch) and SRDS.com. Ads tout the magazine's editorial voice and readership. The campaign was developed in-house, and Cleverworks handled the media buying.