Hello, I am known as K-8 (aka "conscious_object"). Here I keep a fetish blog with a (skewed) sense of humor. Contained herein you will find my various random thoughts on my unique fetishes, and interesting finds culled from all over the intarweb, including art by my friends, and sometimes my own art.

Note: You do not need to have a Livejournal account in order to reply to an entry, as I have "anonymous posting" enabled. Just make sure to sign your name at the bottom, or I'll have no idea which comments are yours.

And yet instead, I'm tempted to buy a CapriSun and lay the discarded pouch behind the back tire of my car...

Who came up with this campaign? Was it one of you? ;-)





Found out about these from masteroftoys after a new RLV curse popped up in SL based on the whoopee cushion (with a twist).

There's also a website with a series of mini-games featuring adorable cartoon versions of the characters from the commercials. There are a few characters who haven't yet had their own commercial, but I'm hoping that's only a temporary thing, because I'm kind of curious to see one for Handlebar Harry. ;-)

Thanks to lmcdosman, who had some old VHS tapes with commercials still intact, I think I've finally got all the Puttermans ones. You can see my full list at the bottom of this entry.

Turns out the commercial that I thought the Trish character had more than one line in still had her speaking only one line. But she does get more screen time in this one than in any of the others:

Ever wanted to see what you'd look like as a Bjork-style iRobot? Svedka has launched a new meme related to their bot-themed ad campaign that let you do just that. There's even a choice between male and female, so you boy bots can join in too.

It's an amusing idea, but not quite as fun as I think it could be. For one thing, something about the face mapping process leads to the appearance that robotization adds 10 pounds to your face. This is counter to the body, which is fairly anorexic. I question the thought process that led to designing a robot where the torso is just a small fraction larger than the head. Seriously, they're almost the same exact size. And that's including the breasts, which end up amounting to an odd uni-boob.

Also, if you're someone with long hair and don't have it tied back, the face-mapper for some reason will frequently pick up a bit of the hair on the sides, giving the appearance of sideburns (or just one sideburn).

There are some amusing pieces you can mix and match in creating a bot. They all have the same skewed proportions, but I was very amused by the fishbowl stomach, and the rocket feet. Unfortunately, once you've designed your robot, there's not much you can do with it. You get to choose from a half dozen 10-second animations that end in striking some sort of pose. Unfortunately, none of those animations is "surprised to suddenly be a robot." ;-)

I'd show you my result, but I have this thing about not wanting my face to appear in this blog. (Also, I don't think the bald look flatters me.) So here's Liv Tyler instead.

For those having trouble getting the link to work:

Thanks to "rotwang" and "dosman" for pointing me to these, here are some new (old) behind the scenes photos of Krystee Clark as Trish Putterman:





Also interesting, a photo from one of the earlier makeup tests, showing that originally the character was going to have plastic-y eyebrows to match the hair, which personally I think they should've kept. I love her doll-like smile in this one.



I've also got six of the commercials on Youtube now. There are still at least two (possibly as many as four) that I still don't have in decent quality. For the sake of being a completist. I know there's at least one (set on a porch swing) where the Trish character actually gets more than just a single speaking line.

Fishing
Drive-Thru
Cabin
Golf
Barbeque
Museum
Update:
Grandman
The Date
Porch

Found by "Merlyn" from StuckPosing:

I can't tell if this video lmcdosman spotted is a parody or actually for real. Lines like, "we tried to satisfy every man who couldn't find the perfect woman. So she could love them, and understand them, while taking care of the housework," have me thinking (HOPING) this is the former.

Because if it's for real, the logical conclusion one could draw would be, as one commenter stated: "I see future quite clearly. Females will have woman rights, and males will have female robots. ;-)"



(That actress does a pretty amazing job, though.)

Someone mentioned to me in an email that they'd been looking for a crash dummy where a family in a car suddenly turn into "dummies," with startled reactions (does anyone else remember the movie Stay Tuned?). It sounded just amusing enough that I decided to do a little search for it, where I found it kind of "hidden" in a commercial focused around a fairly silly dummy rap. It's pretty brief, but I thought I'd share it here for your potential amusement:



Also, here's a more recent crash dummy spot. I guess this was created for the Ministry Of Transport in Finland, because teens there have been having an attitude about buckling up. An amusing role reversal (though does anyone else find the "check out that dummy's hot ass" bit a little creepy? And is that a tattoo she has...?). Make sure you watch all the way to the end:

I swear, I'm being bombarded with more cool things to post about than I have time to post. It's absurdulous!

Here's a fantastic find, thanks to utsumi99 -- the behind-the-scenes Putterman footage (that I'd posted two crappy, heavily cropped found images from in the previous entry):



I love the scene where the one make-up guy is talking about how they are "living dolls," while showing off one of the dolls right to his side, who just kind of stands there and poses, like a living work of art. ^_^

Interesting that they don't show much at all of the son during the behind-the-scenes footage. I wonder if it's because they weren't wanting to reveal the fact that the son is actually played by a short woman (with experience in voice acting, hence why the kid sounds more like a cartoon character than an actual boy). After reading in that magazine article about how there was a 10-year plan for the characters, I realized the reason they probably didn't just cast an actual boy is because they didn't want to deal with the inevitable growth-spurt and voice-breaking.

Equally interesting, but for more confounding, is why the daughter does not end up being featured in that golf commercial for more than a few seconds. All the time to make her up, and then all you see is her back in two shots. *shrugs*

A handful stills I've taken the liberty of enhancing in Photoshop:





( Click Here To See The Rest )

A few of the old commercials have popped up on YouTube, in varying quality. Y'know, for me it was only the son that really creeped me out (and *so* creepy...).







An amusing bit of additional trivia: anybody who remembers the music video for "Winona's Big Brown Beaver" -- the song that first broke the band Primus into the mainstream -- may recall that it had a very similar look to these commercials. Figuring it was filmed around the same time, it turns out it was no coincidence:

Claypool is having himself, Tim "Herb" Alexander and Larry "Ler" Lalonde fitted with prosthetics to turn themselves into toys. They're being assisted by the special effects team of Steve Johnson and XFX (yes, they did the Duracell commercials).

No girl toys in the video, sadly, just the three band members...but here's the video anyways, for the curious:

[This one's been a long time coming.]

In the mid 90's, Duracell was looking to establish some sort of mascot of their own, in response to the popular "Energizer Bunny" ad campaign. What they ultimately came up with was the idea of a family of plastic toys, who run on Duracell batteries (which are clearly visible sticking out of their backs).





The big innovation that they hoped would make their campaign unique was to have actors made up in shiny foam rubber prosthetics, giving them an almost claymation appearance. The hope was that, with facial features exaggerated to give a slightly cartoonish look, viewers would be wondering the whole time if they were watching CGI or animatronics or claymation or actors, and that would help create interest interest towards the characters.

Intensive test marketing went into designing each of the characters, and yet in the end, they didn't get quite the reaction they were expecting. Instead a sense of wonder, the general public's reaction to the actual commercials was to find them a little unsettling. (See: "The Uncanny Valley.") Many people felt sort of creeped out by their jerky movements, and clearly human eyes on the sort-of-toy, sort-of-cartoon figures. (Maybe if they'd figured out how to make the eyes look less human, they would've achieved the affect they were going for?) After a few years of failing to catch on, Duracell abandoned the campaign.

I, on the other hand, was quite fascinated by the campaign. Part of this was being fascinated by the idea of using make-up to look plastic. But I became even further interest upon reading a magazine article that I came across almost by accident, which talked about (among other things) how the suits were made purposely restricting in ways, to "force" the actors to move like toys. I was sold! ;-)

I came across this article trying to kill some time in a B&N Bookstore one day, I was browsing through the entertainment section of the magazine rack. There was this hefty magazine towards the back that appeared to be devoted to make-up effects. And in particular, make-up effects, judging from some of the ads (for places like movie make-up schools) that immediately grabbed my attention.

Unfortunately, the issue was a little too expensive for me to afford at the time. And I later couldn't even remember the name of the series, leading me to wonder if it was my imagination. I'd occasionally searched for the magazine series on the magazine rack after that, but bookstores must've stopped carrying it -- I never saw further issues anywhere.

However, just recently I managed to Google up not only the name, but that particular issue number as well! It took a little doing, but I eventually managed to find a library that carried it, and got a photocopy of the article via inter-library loan. So now I can share with you that article that got me thinking about all sorts of other make-up possibilities. ^_^

(If you only want to skim it, I've bolded the parts that most stuck in my brain all these years.)

( Under A Cut To Spare You A Longer Entry )

Funny? I'm not so sure. But potentially fetish-y...? ;-)

Though I'd be more interested in these techniques being used to create something less exaggerated and cartoony. I think the coolest thing would be to use these materials to create an amazing-looking mannequin makeup, with joints and all. The faces of the mannequins in this image I found already look quite similar to the Putterman make-up, just less exaggerated and more glamorous:



Yes, I totally wouldn't mind being made up like that. ;-)

A few more images before I close this entry. Here are a few behind-the-scenes pics of the daughter character, Trish, being made-up:



Those both were found at The Makeup Room, the earlier incarnation of The Makeup Gallery. Why the more recent incarnation has only a placeholder for Puttermans rather than a full page, I have no idea.

As you can see from the first image, these appear to be captures from a segment that looks to have been on Oprah? If anyone knows where to find the actual video, I'd be very interested.

And here's "Trish" as she appeared in the commercials:



After the first set of commercials, a different actress was cast in the role:

Another robot vid find, care of Rotwang. This one is a commercial for a new campaign by Philips, that I guess is showing only in the UK. The idea of a bot that exists only for shaving one's face strikes me as just a tad silly, but it's nicely designed at least:



Person in a suit, or CGI? Rotwang looked into it quite a ways, and is certain it's a combination of both...a person in a suit enhanced via CGI. Apparently in post-production they even stretched the robot a bit to make her look slightly taller/thinner (getting rid of the tell-tale bulkiness that happens when you have to fit a person inside the bot).

My main disappointment? When I first read the phrase "RobotSkin" before seeing anything from the ad campaign, I was imagining something else entirely (a little more TF-based)... ;-P

I saw this crazy commercial just last night, and knew I had to post it here, lol:

Doll? Robot? No, it's a robot doll!



Though I would've played it up as dark humor, starting off with more neutral-toned or even happy music at the beginning, rather than setting the horror tone immediately, so that the ending was more surprising, and more like a punchline. Happy, happy, happy, ARGH!..."Lascivious -- Lingerie To Kill For." But that's me, and I have the morbid sense of humor to enjoy something like that. ;-P

And how cool would it be to be that actress, seeing yourself assembled into a bot via shiny SFX? ^_^

There's a making of video, as well. Hilarious seeing the guys acting out the women's roles for their "research purposes" or whatever, hehe.

Rotwang pointed me to an old commercial that showed in Italy back in 1985, for their Lancia Y10. Their ad campaign for the launch of the car used an image of a Sorayama-style bot, and for the car commercial they decided to do up a live-action version!

Though I'm not sure what disturbs me more...the very 80's music in the commercial, or the fact that they actually thought the ugly look of their car actually resembled the sleekness of a Sorayama creation...! What a silly decade, inhibiting so many people's sense of goodness. ;-P

But at least the robot turned out quite nicely:



My one minor complaint? Why the "bolts" on her jaw? I take it back, what disturbs me most is that they thought the robot equivalent of beard stubble would look attractive on a female bot. The poor girl.

A collection of stills I've tried to clean up a little:



Would be an awesome suit to have...I love the hands and legs in particular. ^_^

A friend pointed me to this completely bizarre commercial, that had me thinking "did they really just do that...?" I mean, who else could think this up but a doll-fetish fan? ;-)




I like how restrictive the doll form appears. ^_^

When I saw this series of Amp'd Mobile commercials, I thought "the Mind Control fetishists have got to love this." Maybe not in an erotic way, as much as just in an amusing way...random people who appear to have developed mind control abilities, entertaining themselves by making people do silly/embarrassing/slightly mean things.

I thought this one was the best (the subway one was kind of dull), with a girl entertaining herself at a random family gathering:



The girl playing with her face makes me giggle every time. ^_^

Found at Doll's Realm -- it has both bondage *and* doll-esque packaging, so of course I had to repost it here. ;-)



Looks similar to a shoot Gord did once.

And here's a vid explaining the story behind the commercial, and the controversy it's created:



Those cheekie brits, and their silly words like "cheekie." ;-)