From Christina Armbrust, Studio Manager, Palio

I was looking at all of the new features offered in Photoshop CS5 and I thought I would share some things about the new software I’ve found particularly helpful.

One of the cool new tools in CS5 is called Content-Aware fill. I have done quite a few projects airbrushing objects in Photoshop and this is such an incredible time saver if you want to remove unwanted image detail. Here’s how it works: first, select the healing brush tool and click the box that says content aware; then just brush over the object that you don’t want in the image. This part is really cool as objects disappear before your eyes and Photoshop automatically fills on the lighting, tone, and noise and it looks as though that part of the image never existed.

Next I want to highlight is Puppet Warp which allows you to select part of an image and then bend and move the image around. It’s easy to use and gives you a lot of control on warping and moving around the image. Go under the edit menu and select Puppet Warp; place points on the parts of the image you want to maneuver. It’s a great tool for repositioning objects, resizing parts of an image, or changing focal points.

The Mixer Brush tool is really nice because it allows you to take everyday images and work with different brushes to create nice painting effects. Just click on the brush tool in the palette and select Mixer Brush tool and start painting. It’s that easy.

As we all know one of the hardest things to do is cut a path for images when hair is involved. We all want to avoid the “Helmet Head” look. And, luckily, Adobe did their homework. Go into Refine Edge, give yourself a larger radius, and click on smart radius. Then use the touch up brush to work with the mask until you achieve your goal. The Refine Edge can also remove color contamination of the image if it was on a background that you are trying to knockout. Brilliant!

Lastly, I would like to touch upon the ability to turn 2D text into 3D. This is so cool! Make a text box, set your color, go under the 3D menu and open Repoussé. It will rasterize the text and automatically bring up a 3D model of the image. There are all sorts of controls for you to manipulate the object. A really nice thing about this is that you can bring the image into After Effects and it will work with the program.

Nice job, Adobe!

Palio is a full-spectrum global pharmaceutical and consumer advertising, marketing, and communications agency that excels in brand creation and specializes in brand strategy, product launches, global marketing, and digital and integrated media.

From Angela Williams, Editor, Palio

Hyphens and dashes are internal punctuation marks used for linkage and clarity of expression.

Hyphen (-)

Use a hyphen to avoid ambiguity or to form a single idea from 2 or more words.

Avoid ambiguity. Use a hyphen whenever ambiguity would result if it were omitted.

• He recovered his health

• He re-covered his leaky roof

Compound modifier. When a compound modifier (2 or more words that express a single concept) precedes a noun, use a hyphen to link the words.

• First-quarter touchdown

• A full-time job

• A know-it-all attitude

Many combinations that are hyphenated before a noun are not hyphenated when they occur after a noun.

• The team scored in the first quarter

• The woman works full time

• His attitude suggested he knew it all

When a modifier that would be hyphenated before a noun occurs instead after a form of the verb to be, the hyphen usually must be retained to avoid confusion.

• The man is well-known

• The woman is quick-witted

How hyphenation can affect meaning

Sometimes it is especially important to hyphenate the compound modifier because words can mean different things depending on the hyphenation. For example, there’s a difference between “hot-water bottle” and “hot water bottle.” When you hyphenate hot-water, you’re making it a single compound modifier that applies to the word bottle. It’s a bottle for holding hot water. But when you don’t hyphenate hot water, the words are separate modifiers and you’re describing a water bottle that is hot.

En dash (–)

The en dash is longer than a hyphen but half the length of the em dash (and gets its name from the length of the letter “N” in most typesets). The en dash shows relational distinction in a hyphenated or compound modifier, 1 element of which consists of 2 words or a hyphenated word, or when the word being modified is a compound.

• Post–World War I

• Non–small cell carcinoma

• Multiple sclerosis–like symptoms

Em dash (—)

The em dash is the longest of the three and is used to indicate a marked or pronounced interruption or break in thought (and gets its name from the length of the letter “M” in most typesets). It is best to use this mode sparingly; do not use an em dash when another punctuation mark will suffice (for instance, the comma or the colon) or to imply namely, that is, or in other words when an explanation follows.

• All of these factors—age, severity of symptoms, and choice of anesthetic agent—determine the patient’s reaction.

Palio is a full-spectrum global pharmaceutical and consumer advertising, marketing, and communications agency that excels in brand creation and specializes in brand strategy, product launches, global marketing, and digital and integrated media.

From Amy Levinson, VP, Communications Planner, Palio

Google Analytics says it…

Manhattan Research says it…

eMarketer says it…

Kantar Research says it…

The proliferation of smartphone usage is changing the way people engage online with content and one another. As such, we live in a world where information-seeking behavior is increasingly more prevalent while “on the go.”

In our world of pharma, today’s customer profiles demonstrate to us that there are definitely nuances to this adoption curve (whether it be an HCP or a motivated health-information seeker), however, over the next 4 years, this will radically change.

eMarketer recently projected that US smartphone users will increase by 50% over the next 4 years. From a global perspective, this increase will be by 107% with 75% of smartphone users concentrated in Asia Pacific (excluding Japan), Western Europe, and North America. So, for a channel that transcends global barriers, why aren’t our clients paying more attention to mobile strategy and Website optimizations?

Experiential connections are the name of today’s game. So when it comes to our Websites or digital content, we have one shot to engage. Subsequently, that experience needs to be device agnostic for seamless and uninterrupted access that will ensure a positive customer experience, whether via PC, MAC, iPAD, iPhone, Droid, Blackberry,  or Braille. This means our clients need to understand that this alters the composition of their budget and impacts their digital strategy.

To ensure that optimal customer connection, our thinking needs to evolve to include deployment from a technologic/device perspective but also from a user experience perspective and actually define what that optimal experience looks like that will support overall brand objectives and strategies. On the flip side of the equation, all good tactics must have a defined metrics component to track success (or lack thereof).

Interestingly, ClickZ recently published an article that not only supports the need to pay more attention to mobile but discusses a data capture game changer with the article “Device Fingerprinting Could Be Cookie Killer.”

Device finger printing is an emerging device identification technique that captures bits of information that get transmitted when content or services are accessed. These bits of information communicate details about that particle device/operating system that can get collected to form a unique “fingerprint” for that device that can be used for ad targeting, profiling, etc., which essentially replaces the standard of online measurement: the “cookie.”

While this technique may take some time to infiltrate our pharma world, the point is that this is another reason to move away from the current “desktop mentality.”

All this and we still haven’t talked about QR codes. Kudos to those brands who are deploying integrative mobile/print campaigns but if you’re going to invest in it, do it the right way! For most of the campaigns I have tried to access, mobile content was not optimized for my blackberry; I want to know, for these brands, who’s asleep at the user experience wheel?!  Someone is not paying attention to cross platform integration.

And what about the need for universal scanner software?! But that’s for a whole other day.

Palio is a full-spectrum global pharmaceutical and consumer advertising, marketing, and communications agency that excels in brand creation and specializes in brand strategy, product launches, global marketing, and digital and integrated media.

From Marty Hardin, SVP, Director of Emerging Media and Technology, Palio

1. HAL Robot Suit – pre-release beta in international testing (Japan and Denmark)
http://www.crunchgear.com/2011/03/21/video-newest-version-of-cyberdynes-robot-suit-hal-up-and-close/
Categories: Technology, Medical Devices, Assistive Technologies
What it is: A robotic suit that can help paralyzed persons walk (and lift heavy objects) by transforming brain signals sensed through the skin into motion
Why it matters: Soon, devices will require less and less direct input, but will become aware of desire driven by neurological impulses. The human to machine interface will recede from our awareness, making devices more intuitive. Think and do – not – think, interface, wait, think, adjust, interface, etc.

2. Microsoft 3D Phone app – alpha 2.0
http://www.technologyreview.com/computing/37021/
Categories: R&D, User Experience, Mobile, Apps
What it is: A mobile app that converts a series of still images into a scrollable 3D object
Why it matters: If this were just a computer program, it wouldn’t be that amazing, but this is sophisticated image processing on a CELL PHONE. As processors get faster, and code gets lighter, the limitations of mobile apps will fade away, allowing us to create robust applications that would have tied us to a home or office computer. While the image processing takes place on a remote server, it is a pretty remarkable beginning.

3. Kinect Surgical Device Hacks – alpha 1.0
http://www.medgadget.com/archives/2011/02/kinect_3d_gaming_camera_used_to_control_da_vinci_surgical_robot.html
http://www.crunchgear.com/2011/03/23/kinect-lets-surgeons-navigate-medical-data-in-the-or/
Categories: R&D, User Experience, Gaming, Hacks, Kinect
What it is: A new system that uses Microsoft’s Kinect to allow surgeons to browse through diagnostic images without having to physically touch any controls
Why it matters: Now the world of hackers and healthcare are starting to collide in new and exciting ways.

4. The first plastic computer processor – alpha 1.0
http://www.technologyreview.com/computing/37126/?ref=rss
Categories: Technology, Devices, R&D
What it is: The first working, non-silcon based computer processor
Why it matters: Currently estimated to at 1/10th the cost of a traditional silicon processor. It is flexible and thin. This opens the door to making disposable smart devices. As on of the development team said: “… imagine an organic gas sensor wrapped around a gas pipe to report on any leaks…”  Take that a step further: smart patient ID bands in hospitals; drug packaging with digital PI’s; thermometers with readouts of temperature, BP and pulse… You get the idea.

5. Paranga – alpha 2.0
http://www.crunchgear.com/2011/03/23/video-tactile-feedback-device-for-e-readers/
Categories: Technology, User Experience, Dynamic Feedback
What it is: Tactile feedback device for E-Readers
Why it matters: Okay, so this isn’t earth shaking, but natural feedback and gestures let users focus on their task and not the device. While touch devices have created analogs to physical actions (squeeze, tap, swipe, etc.), this takes observed human actions and makes the device behave in an expected way – not in an adapted way.

 

Stories worth noting:

Post-Jeopardy, Computer Watson Is Taking on Medicine
http://mashable.com/2011/03/21/watson-medicine/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+Mashable+(Mashable)

The computer that defeated humanity’s finest Jeopardy players in February isn’t stopping at game show domination. Its creators have been busy retrofitting the computer to help doctors diagnose and treat patients.

Fake tweets by ‘socialbot’ fools hundreds of followers

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20928045.100-fake-tweets-by-socialbot-fool-hundreds-of-followers.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=tech

Three anonymous teams have let loose software that pretends to be human, and used it to manipulate a group of Twitter users. And, it worked.

Mechanical “thinking machine” built from scraps
http://www.engadget.com/2011/03/25/turing-machine-built-from-wood-scrap-metal-and-magnets-geek/
It’s not code driving this machine. It’s a purely mechanical device capable of simulating and solving algorithms. It would take “months to add two numbers together,” but all good things start off humbly.

Happy exploring!

 

Palio is a full-spectrum global pharmaceutical and consumer advertising, marketing, and communications agency that excels in brand creation and specializes in brand strategy, product launches, global marketing, and digital and integrated media.

From Peter Hopper, VP, Account Services, Palio

I was told many, many years ago – it might have been my uncle – that in the old days on a submarine in the close confines of a submerged vessel shared by dozens of others, on that occasion if you “broke wind” you were obligated to raise your hand and take responsibility. There really was little to be gained in any attempt to dismiss or deny  that an offense had occurred, nor was it in the spirit of the task at hand – patrolling deep under water, depending upon each other to do your job because lives were quite literally at stake – to do anything less than raise your hand, take responsibility and move on, perhaps a little more mindful of your shared circumstances.

Accountability. What a thought.

Over the past few years in the public arena, the very idea of accountability has been visibly shaken. In its place, finger pointing, hyperbole, abject denial is more and more the common response – from deficits to bailouts, healthcare to gun control, profits to spending. The list goes on. The arguments are steadfast, stubborn and divisive. There is no sense of middle ground or common ground or common good.  The accountability gap just grows wider, and wider. And no voice is raised above the din to slap folks upside the head for a reality check: no one has all the answers, and all too often singular ideas are mired in self-interest. Rather, I maintain that the concept argued by Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes almost 100 years ago still stands up to the test, that the marketplace of ideas brings forth the best ideas. Discussion. Dissent. Argument. And a whittling away at the fringes to arrive at a core concept in the best interest of the majority. Perhaps even enlightenment.

I was at my doctor’s office earlier this week and we had a brief conversation about his business and my business. The responsibility of taking care of people’s mental and physical well being, his role certainly on a much, much higher plane than mine. I told him about the excerpts from a recent speech made by a GSK executive, Deirdre Connelly, president of North America pharmaceuticals for GSK. Her core message reflected on how our industry may have “lost its way.” She noted, with exceptional examples, how the pharma industry has done a great deal of good, and one would think be held in high regard as one of the greatest contributors to health in our society. Yet, a recent Harris poll reveals that only 11% of the public believes the pharmaceutical industry is generally honest and trustworthy.

She went on to say that the business-to-business competitive selling model may be OK for other industries, “…but we do not sell chocolate or cars. We bring life-altering and life-saving medicines to patients. Society holds our interactions with our customers – healthcare providers and payers – to a higher standard. And it should. Society expects our business to be conducted openly and transparently and in a way that does not create even a perception of inappropriate influence.”

Ms. Connelly openly admits to GSK’s contribution to fueling the fire of distrust from prior transgressions, and then bravely outlines a new path forward based on four core values: focus on the best interest of the patient, transparency, integrity and respect.

Do the right thing for the right reasons. Serve a greater good. And success will follow.

Accountability.

So, in your life, in the industry you work in and the community you live in, are you willing to raise your hand?

Palio is a full-spectrum global pharmaceutical and consumer advertising, marketing, and communications agency that excels in brand creation and specializes in brand strategy, product launches, global marketing, and digital and integrated media.

From Steve Dubansky, MD, SVP, Medical Director, Palio

In 1999 the Institute of Medicine published a report entitled To Error is Human: Building a Safer Health System. The report cited two major studies stating that from 44,000 to 98,000 patients die in hospitals each year as a result of preventable medicine-related errors. Moving with its usual alacrity, the government ordered the FDA to fix the problem in 2007. Congress, realizing the urgency, passed a law asking the FDA to offer a solution by September 30, 2010.

Yet, as noted by Stephen Barlas in P&T in October 2010, “…the FDA to date has no guidance, much less regulations, on the naming of drugs. Typically, when a drug company applies for approval of a new product, the FDA uses techniques such as human factors development and failure modes and effects analysis to determine whether the name is acceptable.”

Presently the agency and their agencies assure themselves that new drugs avoid drug names that have orthographic or phonologic similarities to drugs already on the market. Physicians have notoriously bad handwriting, and I assume that either we mumble more than the average person, or pharmacists on the other end of the line have a higher than normal prevalence of hearing loss.

The FDA reviews about 400 drug names a year and rejects about one third of them. The institute for Safe Medical Practices in conjunction with the Joint Commission publishes a LONG list of look-alikes or sound-alikes. Examples listed (http://www.ismp.org/) include:

In addition to look-alikes and sound-alikes, the agency now proscribes using names that imply efficacy (Paingona, Snotclyr) and dosing interval (Onlyonceawik). They will reject drug names that are misleading, including names that suggest the name of one or more but not all of the drug’s ingredients, or names that imply the drug is superior to a competitor. It wasn’t always this way: Lopressor (lower blood pressure), Coreg (help regulate heart rhythm) come to mind.

In Act II, Scene II of Romeo and Juliet, Juliette Capulet says to Romeo Montague, “Deny thy father and refuse thy name.” She suggests it because their love is more powerful than the feuding between the Montagues and Capulets. She follows with, “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” She’s simply saying she loves Romeo and the Montague name is of little concern to her. For Juliette, a name is an artificial and meaningless convention, not nearly as important as the individual who bears it. For too many pharmaceutical companies, the names of their products are now becoming similar meaningless appellations.

There are appropriate restrictions on naming, but it seems as if the FDA has totally emasculated efforts to allow creative and meaningful product names. Some brands do seem aptly named (Femara has an obviously womanly tone) and Sonata (I can hardly say it without dozing off). But while many names are aptly named, many others are awfully named. You know what brands I’m speaking about. Their names seem to have been made up by a computer or a random drawing from a scrabble box, often nothing more than an incomprehensible and/or unpronounceable olio of letters.

Many might say that their names are integrally connected to the success of this or that blockbuster brand. I say “Phooey.” Brands are blockbusters most often because they are novel, first-in-class products in disease states with a real need and a high prevalence, or they have real (or perceived) advantages over their competitors. But a name that actually tells you something about the drug certainly can’t hurt sales. Lipitor, a #1 selling statin from start to patent expiration this year, wasn’t first to market, but it had great data and a name that surely implied “lipid” to any physician.

Palio is a full-spectrum global pharmaceutical and consumer advertising, marketing, and communications agency that excels in brand creation and specializes in brand strategy, product launches, global marketing, and digital and integrated media

Alan Steele, VP, Head of Art, Managed Markets

Larry Page and Sergey Brin met as PhD candidates at Stanford in 1996. They founded Google in 1998. Google is a play on the word googol, a mathematical term for the number represented by the numeral 1 followed by 100 zeros. The word googol was invented by Milton Sirotta, the nephew of a well-known American mathematician Edward Kasner.

Google’s mission is to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful. Google Search is the dominant Web search engine. The numbers are staggering: Google runs over one million servers around the world, and processes over one billion search requests and about twenty-four petabytes of user-generated data every day. One petabyte is equal to 20 million four-drawer filing cabinets filled with text.

How search works: You aren’t actually searching the Web, you are searching Google’s index of the Web. Think of an index at the back of a book: the index is Google Search, the book is the Internet. Software programs called spiders (crawlers, googlebots) fetch a few Web pages, then they follow the links those pages point to, and so on, until hundreds of thousands of Web pages are selected across thousands of machines. Google decides which pages to prioritize by asking questions – more than 200 of them. How many times do the key words appear in the document? Is the document from a quality Web site or spam? How many outside links point to it, and how important are those links? Page are scored, or ranked, using these questions, and then prioritized in your search results. Each search result includes a link, the URL, and a “snippet” (short text summary). As you know, if you have entered a few keywords and hit return, all of this happens in 1/2 second!

Advertising. Google receives 90% of its revenue from advertising – over $10 billion. Ads appear to the right and above search results. Google Adwords is software that allows businesses to enter words and phrases relevant to their business, so when people are searching on Google and one of those keywords is picked up, the ad appears on the search page. A sister service, Google AdSense, allows Website owners to display these advertisements on their Website, and earn money every time ads are clicked.

Diversification. Google has grown from two computer scientists developing a Web search engine to 24,000 employees involved in innovative products such as Google Analytics, Google Earth, Google Maps, SketchUp (3D rendering), Picasa (photo sharing), GMail (email), Chrome (Web browser), YouTube, Talk (instant messaging), Buzz (social networking), Android (mobile phone app) and most recently, the Art Project (http://www.googleartproject.com/).

While researching Google, I came across one of their core beliefs: it is best to do one thing really, really well. Google does search really, really well. What is it that you, your organization, or your client do really, really well?

Extracts from Wikipedia, Google, and Gizmodo.

Palio is a full-spectrum global pharmaceutical and consumer advertising, marketing, and communications agency that excels in brand creation and specializes in brand strategy, product launches, global marketing, and digital and integrated media.

From Angela Williams, Editor, Palio

Who is used when you are referring to the subject of a sentence (like he, she, or they), and whom is used when you are referring to the object of a sentence (like him, her, or them). Generally, who does something. Whom has something done to it.

Still confused? Try mentally substituting he or him (or your pronoun of choice) where who or whom should go. If him fits, you want whom (both end in m); if he fits, you want who (both end in a vowel). Ask yourself, “Who is doing what to whom?”

Q: The captain chose teammates (who or whom) he thought played well.
A: The captain chose teammates who he thought played well.

Why: In this case, the who or whom in question has done something: played well. Or, if you use the substitution trick, he or they played well. You wouldn’t say, for example, him played well or them played well. Therefore, you know you want who.

Q: Joe wouldn’t tell John (who or whom) he chose for his fantasy team.
A: Joe wouldn’t tell John whom he chose for his fantasy team.

Why: Here, the who or whom in question is having something (the action of choosing) done to it. Ask yourself, “What did Joe choose?” and substitute. He chose them. You wouldn’t say he chose they. So, you know you want whom.

Palio is a full-spectrum global pharmaceutical and consumer advertising, marketing, and communications agency that excels in brand creation and specializes in brand strategy, product launches, global marketing, and digital and integrated media.

From Jon Hussey, SVP, Director of Brand Planning, Palio

I was sitting around with some time to kill and happened to be on the Yahoo! homepage. Under their Video Picks they had “Viral hit: Texting girl falls into fountain.”  I love the intersection between technology and karma, so I figured I would watch. Nice. But then something started to slowly penetrate my awareness. Yellow. Crunchy. Goodness… Butterfinger.

Oh my God. The whole page was Butterfinger. Somehow I had stumbled into the Butterfinger Comedy Network on Yahoo!. Ads for Butterfinger Snackerz, a video on how to “Become a Sanckerz Sommelier!”, links to the Butterfinger Facebook page, Butterfinger games, Butterfinger imagery everywhere – this page has it all…  if by “all” you mean “all things Butterfinger.”

I cruised over to the Butterfinger Facebook page and became the 714,448^th person to “Like” it.  I got a recipe for Gooey Butterfinger Cake which I will never, EVER make – even though it looks like it might be pretty tasty – at least not until I lose all self respect.

That led me to discover the Butterfinger Defense League (Eric “Sex-Strada” Estrada, Lou “Strong Man” (really creative…) Ferrigno,  and the obligatory eye-candy Charisma “Sassy” Carpenter). “When all hope is lost, they make life delicious again.” I took a look at the winner of their video contest to find out who would become the newest member of the team. And stayed to watch a few more. Apparently this wasn’t their first video contest. Finally, I clicked over to the Butterfinger home page for some more info to round out the experience.  The whole process took around 30 minutes.  30 minutes of interaction with a brand that I barely notice otherwise.  I left feeling impressed – and with a mild snack craving.

How do you take a brand and turn it into an interactive experience for your customers?  Clearly Butterfinger knows.

Palio is a full-spectrum global pharmaceutical and consumer advertising, marketing, and communications agency that excels in brand creation and specializes in brand strategy, product launches, global marketing, and digital and integrated media.