iPod Giveaway #4: We Have a Winner
John Whittet (whose illustration is to the right) said it best when he clarified the purpose of the 4th Monthly Mike Industries iPod-A-Monthly Creativity Competition:
“This particular contest is about telling a story, not writing one.”
With 60-some entries to read through over the last week, I encountered a great many well-written ones, but none told the story of a lost iPod more creatively and convincingly than the audio-blog-umentary by Ohio State University’s very own Josh Schoenwald.
You see Josh bought a very special iPod Shuffle about a month ago; one that not only had a personality but was also smart enough to set up its own account on Blogger, keep an audio diary, and even fade U2 songs into the ends of its blog posts. “Flit”, as Josh calls him, is no ordinary Shuffle.
As of today, I’m happy to say that Flit is indeed in my possession and will be returned to Josh first thing tomorrow morning along with a pair of $150 Etymolic earbuds courtesy of iLounge.com (formerly iPodLounge). Congratulations Josh!
I also want to draw attention to a few other spectacular entries of note, the first one being John Whittet’s amazingly well illustrated animated docudrama entitled “Little White Cookbook”. John produced some amazing visual effects by overlaying his own hand drawn figures against a backdrop of photos pulled from Google Images and then Gaussian blurred. It’s a really cool effect and one I’d never seen before… you can read more about it here, and perhaps hire John for any illustration projects which require such awesomeness.
Another standout was Paul Santolaria’s take-off on one of my favorite films “A Shot in the Dark” starring Peter Sellers as Inspector Clouseau. Very creative and extremely well done.
My favorite two pure text entries (which each were worthy of first prize) were David Barrett’s account of his iPod-Shuffle-turned-pregnancy-test and Kat’s hilarious yet tragic home mugging.
There were five others I found very amusing as well, but I’ll leave those a mystery.
Thanks to everyone for entering, and the next contest will launch around the middle of this month!
Congrats and I agree that was the best!
Great stuff.
No doubt about it. I had every intention of entering the next Ipod Giveaway that Mike had. Once I saw that entry It took about 5 minutes to conclude that I wouldn’t be able to think of a more unique entry.
Big time congrats John, you deserve it. And thanks, Mike, for organizing these competitions. It has allowed for other designers and brainiacs to act as inspiration for me to move toward a new level when working on my own projects.
(Editor’s Note: Actually, it was Josh who won the contest, but hopefully John will get some illustration business from this blog post. :) )
I guess all I can say is that my heart skipped a beat when I saw my, uh, ear on the home page (Mike, you tease ;) ). No iPod for me, but I’m glad Flit found his way home to his rightful owner. And hey, I got screenshotted, quoted, and pimped, so I’m happy. Thanks for jump-starting my designer’s block and I’ll see you all in two weeks!
Yea… when I saw the contest entry this time I knew i wouldn’t be able to be that creative. Though 90% of my story is true.
I’m glad you liked my story!! Congrats, John, Paul, & David!
Er, and Josh of course!
Really nice work. Those illustrations were fantastic, and the audio blog was well written and creative.
I missed my opportunity to submit something for this contest, but in retrospect, I’d have been facing some top-notch competition with a slim chance at best. Maybe I’ll try my hand at the next contest.
Good luck with your future illustrations Mr. Whittet. These ones were superb.
Congrats mate :P can’t wait for the next contest
My mistake. Congrat’s to Josh for the winning entry.
I guess I was wrong on 2 counts, John. Thought for sure you had it locked.
Hey does Flit know Navi? Navi hangs out in my car a lot singing Van Morrison and Creedance songs. I guess he’s kind of an old timer. I’m not sure if Flit hangs out with Class 1 Laser brained Riovolts. But if so then perhaps Flit could ask Navi to stop scratching my CD-R’s? He won’t listen to me!!
Flit might know Navi. He mentioned something about talking to another shuffle when he was just made (before being shipped to the apple store here in ohio). I’ll have to ask him when I get him back. :-)