Lauren Costa

The assignment was to tell the world about IBM's research labs. So we got on the phone and listened to a lot smart people talk about the super smart science they do. Like the team that moves individual atoms in an effort to make storage devices (like hard drives, and smart phones) smaller and smaller.

We thought, if you can move atoms, can you move a LOT of atoms? Like, enough to make a movie? 

They could. So we made one. It's the World's Smallest Movie. 242 still images with 65 pairs of atoms (carbon monoxide molecules). Each frame measures 45 by 25 nanometers (1/100,000,000,000 of a meter).

The movie, which holds a Guinness World Record, surpassed 1 million views in 24 hours, and 2 million views in 48 hours. It got some good reviews. And it got people talking about ... data storage. 

Like any good movie, there was bonus content galore. We filmed a documentary as well as 10 "Atomic Shorts" and 10 "Reports from the Lab" — diary entries from the scientists. Plus movie posters, trailers, t-shirts, infographics and more. See it all here. 

The film launched at the Tribeca Online Film Festival and was streamed to classrooms around the United States. In New York City, it screened at the World Science Fair and NYC Tech Meet-up before being launched in several other countries.   

Recognition Included:
Cannes, 2013 (gold, silver, bronze x2)
One Show, 2014 (gold, silver x2, bronze, merit)
D&AD, 2014 (in-book)
AICP, 2014 (most next)
Clios, 2014 (gold, bronze)
London International Awards, 2013 (silver, x2, finalist x2)
Webbys, 2014 (honoree)
ADC, 2014 (silver)
Effies, 2014 (gold, silver, bronze)
Ted Ads Worth Spreading, 2014
A-List Hollywood Awards, 2014 (bronze x2)
 

We made a TV show about people who love a TV show. For Xfinity, the people who bring you ... TV shows.

We hired Sharon Horgan as our showrunner and held a writers room with all her friends (a personal bucket list item, checked). The resulting 6-episode series debuted on YouTube and Xfinity On Demand. And people actually binged watched it!

Watch 'em all. Or, if you're cherry picking, try episodes 3 and 4, my personal faves.

Recognition Included:
Creativity, 2016 (Editor’s Pick)
Shots Awards, 2016 (Nominee, Branded Entertainment Series of the Year)

A lot of moms (ok, me) feel like they’re struggling to work as hard as they can. And struggling to “mom” as hard as they can. And sometimes, just plain struggling. And they (ok, me) only feel slightly ok about it all because they know most every mom out there is like, ditto. Even Serena Williams (GOAT athlete … and Chase spokesperson!).

But we (ok, me again) also know that deep, deep, deeeeeeeep down, we know (hope?) that each part of our lives makes us better at the other.

That was the aim of this film - my first at Droga after returning from my second maternity leave. To celebrate Serena’s return to the US Open, and inspire all moms to bring that deep down feeling to the surface a little more often.

Serena took the film and its message to heart, even shouting out the campaign hashtag #thismama in her post-match interviews. Her fans loved it too - they posted messages of solidarity on twitter and Insta, shared their own #thismama stories, and (one Insta commenter) even declared she was inspired to open a Chase bank account #effies.

Recognition Included:
Cannes, 2019 (bronze x2, shortlist x2)
One Show, 2019 (merit)
Athena Ad Award Winner, 2018

The story of a poor schlub living in Chicago who just happens to share a name with the biggest icon in sports. Because it's not crazy this guy disappoints everyone he meets, it's sports.

This was one of ESPN's most popular spots in its 2012 brand campaign. Sports fans loved it. It racked up more than a million views on YouTube in one day. And I got a lot of emails from people named Michael Jordan saying, sadly, this was their absolute real life.

Recognition Included:
Cannes, 2012 (bronze x2)
One Show, 2013 (gold x2)
D&AD, 2013 (nomination, in-book)
Clio, 2013 (gold, silver)
International ANDY, 2013 (silver)
ADC, 2013 (bronze)
Sports Emmy Award, 2013

Everyone thinks they know S&P Global. But they know it for what it used to stand for — credit ratings and the S&P 500. After a major merger, the company needed its first ever-marketing brand campaign to prove that S&P Global stood for something beyond the stock market.

“Seek & Prosper” became an inspirational call to action, and a redefinition of what the brand stood for. Turning an old name into a meaningful rallying cry. And making a brand out of a business.

You're in the stands at the US Open. Watching a big match. A set just ended, and as the players switch sides, you - what else - flip through Instagram. In your feed, you see an animation, made from the data of the match you just saw. That, my friend, is a datagram.

See, IBM tracks all the data for every player at the open in real time. Literally. The data updates faster than the match gets broadcast on TV. And they wanted a mobile experience at the US Open that used all this data. We wanted something awesome, that wouldn't take fans away from what they were there to see - the match.

Enter 15-second videos on Instagram (which had JUST launched). We worked with the design shop Buck to write a custom algorithm that turned IBM's match data into beautiful animations that we posted as soon as each set was over. And As Soon As was for real. Most were out less than two minutes after the set ended. Our record? 1 minute, 35 seconds.

Recognition Included:
D&AD, 2014 (pencil)
One Show, 2014 (gold, merit x3)
Cannes, 2014 (silver)
Webbys, 2014 (nomination)
Google Creative Sandbox
FWA

I love the moon landing. And it so happened that the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11 occurred while I was working at Google’s Creative Lab, which was great because at Google YOU CAN DO ANYTHING.

So I was trolling around for a way to celebrate the anniversary, and found out all about Margaret Hamilton, the software engineer who led the team that wrote the code that put us on the moon. Basically she is a very big deal and its thanks to her that software and computer programing works the way it does, but no one talks much about her.

Meanwhile, some other guys at Google (Isaac Blankensmith, Mathew Ray, Matthew Carey…) had an idea to turn a solar field into a canvas that would reflect moonlight and reveal a giant portrait to celebrate the moon landing (BECAUSE AT GOOGLE YOU CAN DO ANYTHING). They just didn’t know what to put on the canvas..

So we all teamed up. Found Margaret (she’s 83, still lives in Cambridge, still amazing). Dug deep into her story. And - against all odds - the whole angling 100,000-plus individual solar panels, each at a precise degree, to catch the light of the full moon and reflect an intricate portrait thing actually worked.

We presented Margaret with the image (life highlight) and the whole thing was as joyous and inspiring as it all sounds.

Read more about Margaret’s story on Google’s blog here and more about the technical efforts of the project from the insanely talented minds of Isaac, Mat and Matthew, et al, from Mat’s medium post).

130 million girls around the world are denied an education. That’s 130 million girls who are more likely to face a lifetime of poverty. 

Anti-poverty organization ONE.org asked us to show the world just how big this problem is. So we took a rather literal approach. We asked the world to count to 130 million. Out loud. One by one. One number for every girl denied an education.

People from 210 countries and territories have joined #GirlsCount, including celebrities like Tom Brady, Malala Yousafzai, Lena Dunham, Sheryl Sandberg and more. 

All told, the site generated more than 577 million social impressions and 26 million media impressions in its first few weeks. Ultimately, all the numbers will be brought together consecutively to form what would be the world’s longest lobby film— 100% user generated. Reminding politicians, and the world, that every girl counts.

Recognition Included:
Creativity, 2017 (Editor’s Pick)

While I led the Chase Retail (anything not credit cards) account at Droga, the bank came out with a cool new DIY investing tool, aptly named You Invest (we did not name it).

The cool thing about it is, you can trade however you want, but it gives you helpful advice and info if you need. Like bowling with bumpers. Because yeah, we all know how we SHOULD invest, but our primal human brains are actually hard wired against this in every possible way. We’re spontaneous, and we’re nostalgic. We follow the crowd, and we bite off more than we can chew.

We had a lot of fun with pointing out how obvious (and silly, and low stakes) these behaviors can in everyday life while showing off a product that helps protect you against them as you trade.

Air Wick needed a big, bold new global brand campaign that went beyond "home fragrance" and tapped into something bigger.

We created a powerful, emotional campaign about the hidden power of scent. The way it can change the way we think, and act, and feel. And how, at Air Wick, it is the driving purpose behind every single thing they do.

They loved it. But had no anthem film, or big activation, to house a big brand message. We had to put it out there through single product ads, which I'm very proud to say, we managed to do.

Hillary Clinton's campaign asked for a film to play at the Democratic National Convention to play before her introduction as the country's first female presidential nominee.

We said yes.

The effort was heroic, and dozens of editors, composers, sound technicians, music publishers and others donated time and resources (and sacrificed sleep) to work literally around the clock to get this done in time. It was humbling to be a part of and awesome to witness. 
 

Since creating the first sneakers for women in 1916, Keds has had a long history of encouraging women to be comfortable and explore the world.

And yet, as the years had passed, Keds had begun to be associated with one type of woman – preppy, petite, cis-gendered and white. This was not what the brand, or its audience, had in mind.

Made for Women, Whatever That Means. This new mission mandated that we tell stories inclusive of all types of women -- and let those stories find life across all of our assets. JOAN and Keds took an editorial approach to rolling out this new positioning, inspired by an artifact from the brand's legacy. We re-imagined the "Keds Hand-book for Girls," which had been printed in the first part of the 20th Century as "The Keds Hand-book for Women."

Part magazine, part look-book, part campaign and part call-to-arms, each season will be told through a different lens, featuring many different women.

Beginning with “The Power Issue” -- and featuring stories from women across the globe, copies were printed in a large-scale run to be distributed worldwide.

While the Hand-book for Women is an engaging stand-alone content piece in print and online, it also provides the assets used in advertising, in-store signage, online social content and e-commerce.

The result is that the content drives the campaign, not the other way around.

Recognition Included:
Creativity Editor’s Pick

I’ve wanted to be a marine biologist ever since I saw Ace Ventura Pet Detective when I was 12. We can debate the logic of that another time, but let’s just say this project is as close as I’ll ever come and I’m cool with that.

The gist of it is this: NOAA (the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) has hundreds of thousands of hours of underwater recordings, which they use to do things like track and monitor whales and dolphins. But that’s a lot to listen to - and even more to analyze. The tech guys at Google developed AI that tells you which sounds in those recordings are whale (humpback in this case). And they developed a website that makes those recordings available for anyone to listen to and explore.

I helped develop the website, (Pattern Radio), especially focusing on the guided tours you can take from various members of the whale song community.

I also directed the film about the project, for which I traveled to Hawaii to interview an actual marine biologist. I did my Ace Ventura dolphin impression for her, which means I can die happy.

You can read more about the project on a few blog posts I wrote - this one for Google’s Keyword blog and this one on Medium.

And of course, listen to whale songs at your heart’s content on the Pattern Radio Website. It’s quite soothing.

What to do with all the tennis data IBM generates at the US Open...

In 2014, we turned it into music. Well, we got James Murphy (of LCD Soundsystem fame) to turn it into music. 'Cause he's good at stuff like that.

Working with James, and Tool of North America, we created a custom-built algorithm to turn data points from more than 400 hours of tennis play at the 2014 US Open into music cues that produced real-time soundtracks for each match. So things like pitch, timbre, and tempo were determined by things like the score and game events like aces and faults.

The music was streamed on a website that was both a music visualizer and a tennis score tracker. So when you heard a change in the music, you saw what happened in the match to cause it.

Then, the cool part. James created a full album. Using those 400 hours worth of live streaming music as a soundboard, essentially, he remixed his favorite matches to produce Remixes Made With Tennis Data, which dropped Dec. 19 to some pretty nice reviews from the likes of Rolling Stone, Pitchfork, and KEXP.

Recognition Included:
One Show, 2014 (silver, bronze)
D&AD, 2015 (graphite x2)
FWA Site of the Day
FWA Cutting Edge Project of the Week
Google Creative Sandbox Feature

Dixie's Ultra paper plate is quite simply the strongest paper plate on the market. So we stress tested the crap out of it in the most stressful situations we could think of (all very loosely inspired by real Dixie R&D tests).  

We showed off this series of stress tests on TV, social, print and banners.

Then we capped the series with a live event called RAISING THE BBQ, where we opened a hanging restaurant 40 feet in the air and hired high wire walking waiters to serve up heavy BBQ on Dixie Ultra plates (they handled the pressure, natch). 

The Stress Test Center on Dixie.com featured all the films, as well as bonus content from each test. 

Recognition Included:
Creativity, 2017 (Editor’s Pick)

The Masters golf tournament selects three advertisers. And that's all you see. About 60 spots from each, over five days. So, instead of running six ads 10 times, we ran 62 ads one time each. Viewers - most of whom watch the tournament closely from beginning to end - saw a new piece of content every single time an IBM ad aired. 

In most cases, we let the clients tell their stories, and it became a 31-minute case study on the way IBM is changing the way companies work and people do business, all around the globe. The media strategy alone made news. And the ad guys liked it, too.

The entire Ogilvy IBM team - from New York to Singapore - pitched in on the effort, conducting an interview here, writing a script there, running a shoot, editing a spot, and on and on. I helped ECDs Mike Hahn and Ryan Blank lead the overall effort from New York, and also worked closely on about 16 of the final 62 spots. 

Recognition Included:
Effies (silver x2, bronze)

Back in the early days of social media (2009), I helped Wieden launch the agency's (maybe even industry's??) first-ever Social Media Lab. We were an experimental, dedicated 5-person team that launched and ran ESPN's facebook and twitter pages, as well as sportscenter.com, the flagship program's first blog. 

As part of the SML, I wrote more than 500 blog posts over the course of a year (offering a quirky, "SportsCenter-esque" take on the day's top sports news stories) in addition to creating film and image content for the blog, facebook and twitter. 

My favorite was a video we did the week of LOST's season finale (a really big deal back then).

But the day-to-day blog posts were simpler, more like these:

The Official Hospital of the Boston Red Sox Undermines The Entire American Revolution

When It Comes To Teen Wolf, We All Win In The End

We also did some super lo-fi "interactive" stuff, like the LeBingo game we played with fans on the night of "The Decision." Again, 2009...

For me, all of this was a perfect transition from journalism to advertising, one that gave me a deep appreciation for the power of social media and a real understanding of how to cultivate an honest conversation with your audience, day in and day out. 
 

We took a new approach to building an influencer-based global campaign and started by looking for influencers that our audience actually spent time with every day. The TikTok, YouTube and Instagram creators that actually inspire their audiences.

To inspire a whole new audience not with the usual fitness models they see from those others guys, but the people who really make them want to get up and go, to be kinder to themselves, to feel their power. All to prove the brand’s relevance by actually being relevant.

A global fitness campaign featuring the likes of @marcrebillet aka @loopdaddy and @petey_usa telling their fans to listen to their own bodies to feel their own power? We’re listening to that.