Canons big reveal

[waday]

Bubble...popped...

Yep. "Branding Effort".

Canon U.S.A. : About Canon : Newsroom

 

[Derrel]

Canon U.S.A. Unveils "Canon See Impossible" - A Branding Effort Empowering The Creative Spirit In Customers To Make The Impossible Possible
From Hollywood Films to Publishing and Medical Technologies, New Inspirational Brand Ethos Spotlights the Breadth of the Company's Capabilities and Contributions to Developing Imaging Technologies that Showcase the Impossible for Customers

MELVILLE, N.Y., October 7, 2014 - Canon U.S.A., Inc., a leader in digital imaging solutions, is proud to announce "Canon See Impossible" - a branding effort aimed to inspire customers to see impossible with Canon products. As part of the companywide marketing initiative, the iconic brand will roll out a new logo visual to include the addition of the "Canon See Impossible" tagline, accompanied by a 3-D visual of an expanding box, symbolizing the Company's desire to break the boundaries of what is possible and shift the focus from Canon as being solely a manufacturer of quality digital imaging products to a Company that empowers the creative spirit within its people and customers.



Central to the new marketing initiative, the light within the borderless box represents the dedication the Company has to building new collaboration paths with both consumers and commercial clients to constantly innovate and to challenge convention. As the next chapter in the Company's long history unfolds, Canon is working to listen, adapt, and build a prescient understanding of the changing market forces it faces today and the opportunities they present.

Creative is featured on seeimpossible.usa.canon.com, a digital hub housing consumer, professional, and commercial stories of inspiration, imagination, and innovative end-user applications of Canon imaging technology.

(the photo above is a free-use, advertising kit image from Canon, and is the brand-new, borderless logo from the press kit, which has only the one, single image in it. The image is not copyrighted, but is instead, designed to be used as many times as people can be convinced of the desirability of running said image and PR materials!)

 

[Scatterbrained]

It looks pretty legit to me. It's just not singed at you guys.

They seem to be announcing new suites of products built around, mostly, the same collections of objects. As object fetishists, photographers are mostly immune to products as such.

There also seems to be little or nothing photography related here. I'm seeing office productivity stuff.

They didn't announce any products. They've always been making office products. This was all just a way to launch a new marketing campaign for pre-existing products that currently aren't marketed directly to the retail consumer. To put it in perspective: Imagine Ford setting up a "countdown" website with all the "get ready for the impossible" hype. Then when the timer counted down all we got was a new website loaded with videos and 3D animations showing how people used the Ford cars, trucks, and accessories.

 

[waday]

It looks pretty legit to me. It's just not singed at you guys.

They seem to be announcing new suites of products built around, mostly, the same collections of objects. As object fetishists, photographers are mostly immune to products as such.

There also seems to be little or nothing photography related here. I'm seeing office productivity stuff.

They didn't announce any products. They've always been making office products. This was all just a way to launch a new marketing campaign for pre-existing products that currently aren't marketed directly to the retail consumer. To put it in perspective: Imagine Ford setting up a "countdown" website with all the "get ready for the impossible" hype. Then when the timer counted down all we got was a new website loaded with videos and 3D animations showing how people used the Ford cars, trucks, and accessories.

Isn't that what American car companies do for their commercials during the Superbowl?

 

[Scatterbrained]

It looks pretty legit to me. It's just not singed at you guys.

They seem to be announcing new suites of products built around, mostly, the same collections of objects. As object fetishists, photographers are mostly immune to products as such.

There also seems to be little or nothing photography related here. I'm seeing office productivity stuff.

They didn't announce any products. They've always been making office products. This was all just a way to launch a new marketing campaign for pre-existing products that currently aren't marketed directly to the retail consumer. To put it in perspective: Imagine Ford setting up a "countdown" website with all the "get ready for the impossible" hype. Then when the timer counted down all we got was a new website loaded with videos and 3D animations showing how people used the Ford cars, trucks, and accessories.

Isn't that what American car companies do for their commercials during the Superbowl?

Technically, I thought that's what most advertising was about; showing an idealized representation of what the product could do but I guess Canon thought differently. I mean really, I thought the street luge guy racing down a hill to get a picture of a rolling tire on fire was a pretty "idealized" representation of what you could do with their product. I guess they feel like that isn't enough anymore.

 

[Derrel]

Yeah, I get the concept: that Canon can help people go beyond borders; the logo itself is described as borderless. The red box, expanding, opening, and from inside a radiating light....yeah, I get the symbolism of both concepts: no borders, no constraints, only ever-expanding walls around a central core of brilliant light.

The idea makes sense: Canon is more than just a camera and lens maker. They make photocopiers. Printers. Scanners. Other stuff too, I guess. The idea of building the brand as an enabler of expression is a noble concept, at least when it occurs organically. But a marketing campaign to announce a marketing campaign smacks of desperation to me. But whatever...if they want to borrow Apple's latest concepts, and try and coattail onto the idea of being an "idea" company, well, whatever, it's a free market. It's a feel-good campaign. And besides, they need to convince people to buy those Pixima printers and stuff, and they need to sell that $8,000- to $13,000 -per-gallon printer ink. You did know that inkjet printer ink is extremely high-priced, right? [ Printer ink costs how much? | LarrysWorld.com ]

Frankly, I think this whole campaign is designed to get more people thinking about PRINTING their images, and perhaps also digitizing older prints and letters and cards and memorabilia for scrapbooking and album-making, making photo books, and so on. The reason I think this is that Canon is basically a hardware manufacturer, but the photo hobby, the photo "world" has tremendously shifted to the point where on-line, on-screen, image storage and display is hurting Canon's core businesses, which is the photocopier/color copier business, as well as their highly prized camera and lens business; if people are happy with showing and seeing images on Facebook, alllllll the other profit centers take a huge hit. Long term, that means the scanner business, the printer ink business (which is a huuuuuuuuge profiteering niche), the color copy and photocopier business...all those things lose out when people do not use, well, "office equipment" in the old, traditional ways.

I think this is an effort to cast the company in a good light, and to build a feel-good, big-brother-friendly-neighbor type of feeling, but I think it's actually an effort to hide a serious shift in how people view, and how people use photographs. You read that phrase quite often, but a lot of people are not really aware of what it means. The most condensed idea is that we no longer print images onto paper very often, and people expect NEW, fresh images, very often. Once an image is shown on social media, the image disappears, often to never be seen again after about three days on Facebook. if your corporation makes printers, scanners, color photocopier systems, printer ink, and so on, you NEED to CONVINCE people that your products can still be relevant to their lives.

 

[Scatterbrained]

Yeah, I get the concept: that Canon can help people go beyond borders; the logo itself is described as borderless. The red box, expanding, opening, and from inside a radiating light....yeah, I get the symbolism of both concepts: no borders, no constraints, only ever-expanding walls around a central core of brilliant light.

The idea makes sense: Canon is more than just a camera and lens maker. They make photocopiers. Printers. Scanners. Other stuff too, I guess. The idea of building the brand as an enabler of expression is a noble concept, at least when it occurs organically. But a marketing campaign to announce a marketing campaign smacks of desperation to me. But whatever...if they want to borrow Apple's latest concepts, and try and coattail onto the idea of being an "idea" company, well, whatever, it's a free market. It's a feel-good campaign. And besides, they need to convince people to buy those Pixima printers and stuff, and they need to sell that $8,000- to $13,000 -per-gallon printer ink. You did know that inkjet printer ink is extremely high-priced, right? [ Printer ink costs how much? | LarrysWorld.com ]

Frankly, I think this whole campaign is designed to get more people thinking about PRINTING their images, and perhaps also digitizing older prints and letters and cards and memorabilia for scrapbooking and album-making, making photo books, and so on. The reason I think this is that Canon is basically a hardware manufacturer, but the photo hobby, the photo "world" has tremendously shifted to the point where on-line, on-screen, image storage and display is hurting Canon's core businesses, which is the photocopier/color copier business, as well as their highly prized camera and lens business; if people are happy with showing and seeing images on Facebook, alllllll the other profit centers take a huge hit. Long term, that means the scanner business, the printer ink business (which is a huuuuuuuuge profiteering niche), the color copy and photocopier business...all those things lose out when people do not use, well, "office equipment" in the old, traditional ways.

I think this is an effort to cast the company in a good light, and to build a feel-good, big-brother-friendly-neighbor type of feeling, but I think it's actually an effort to hide a serious shift in how people view, and how people use photographs. You read that phrase quite often, but a lot of people are not really aware of what it means. The most condensed idea is that we no longer print images onto paper very often, and people expect NEW, fresh images, very often. Once an image is shown on social media, the image disappears, often to never be seen again after about three days on Facebook. if your corporation makes printers, scanners, color photocopier systems, printer ink, and so on, you NEED to CONVINCE people that your products can still be relevant to their lives.

So what you're really saying is that Canon needs to develop a social network website?

 

[JacaRanda]

I was hoping that they announce a name change to CANNON.

 

[photoguy99]

Look up the phrase 'whole product' and then my remarks will make more sense.

These are indeed new products. Just not new things.

 

[Scatterbrained]

Look up the phrase 'whole product' and then my remarks will make more sense.

These are indeed new products. Just not new things.

They haven't released anything new. Nothing was updated for this launch. Canon actually has a ton of non camera related product (hell, they even have an "augmented/virtual reality" suite of products) this was purely a marketing "about face". I think Derrel hit it on the head; Canon is having their own little Kodak Moment™, and by that I don't mean memorable.

 

[Derrel]

So what you're really saying is that Canon needs to develop a social network website?

Well, I thought about that for a few minutes. I would not be surprised if they DO try to create some type of a tie-in between their printing products and social media. This is all new territory for them.

But imagine for a second what would happen if, somehow, they could get a small cut of the price of the supplies needed to make a PRINT of say, just ONE out of every 500 images uploaded to Facebook in North America, every day. Even one of every one thousandth image would be a money-maker.

What is they have some crazy ideas about getting people to prjnt out their favorite Twitter tweets, say from celebs. I dunno... what if they get people into the habit of making inkjet print albums of Instagram photos? There are ton of sexy models and actors and actresses with very provocative Instagram streams; if Canon could convince people to make photo books based on Instagram pictures, they might be able to create a new trend.

See--the thing is, what we SEE on social media DISAPPEARS almost, well, within a day or two. Canon might, and I emphasize might, be able to push people toward a modified use pattern for social media images. And--if a person were to PRINT OUT say a 50-page book of, oh I dunno, say Bar Rafaeli's Instagram feed, then said person might also be tempted to make copies of that book.

Today's young women, the selfie queens: are they printing any of their selfies? Probably no as many as Canon would like them to.

 

[astroNikon]

i dont get it.

seriously. I see a countdown went to 00:00:00 with no other links to see the impossible.

Is it possible to see the impossible?!

Possibly

 

[Braineack]

Uggggh! So, I went to dPreview this morning (it's early here on the west coast), and saw this notice: "UPDATE: When Canon's countdown clock reached zero this morning, the big surprise turned out to be... a 'marketing initiative.' Canon wants to remind consumers that their products can help them 'see impossible,' and they're doing so with an interactive website. The campaign will also include efforts in print, digital and live events. If you were waiting for the next big thing in imaging, it looks like you can keep on waiting."

Bubble...popped...

oh awesome. a website that's impossible to navigate.

I'm so glad I'm a UI designer for systems that matter.

 

[Derrel]

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^Well, there it is, a screen capture of the top most part of Canon's "See Impossible" site (top right I had a window of an episode of Chuck playing...love that show!

Canon's new site is, at least today at 1:50 PM Pacific time, literally, IMPOSSIBLE to navigate, because the site is....fricking EMPTY!!!!! I mean, oh my gosh--they hype this up, then launch with an EMPTY site??? WTF?

 

[photoguy99]

Apparently you can't see impossible.

Don't tell. All the better people can see impossible without any trouble. What's the matter with you?