Patrick Surace, Award-Winning  Flash Developer / Motion Designer

My role in the creative process:  I am an independent contractor for a number of successful creative agencies.  I think of myself primarily as an artist, though my role changes from project to project - I am an Art Director who also provides a lot of Flash programming for rich media ads.  I work on major media campaigns for the music and movie industry.

My favorite brand experience:   I worked on the Johnny Cash and Paul McCartney campaigns, which stick out because both of them won awards.  And Nirvana was great because they’ve been so influential in my generation.

But more recently, I created the campaign for Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium.  I worked closely with Dave Silva, who art directed the campaign.  I provided all the Flash programming, video, 3D, data capture and Eyeblaster integration.  The campaign came out beautifully.  That was probably one of my cooler experiences. 

Future of Interactive Advertising:  I think that’s pretty much the wave of the future - get good content out.  All the mortgage ads and the “shoot the beaver” ads - those are the distractions.  Online advertising doesn’t have to be a distraction.  When ad creative doesn’t fit in w/page content, there’s a disconnect.  When it does, you feel it.  You’re drawn to it. 

One of the best examples of creative executions is on the gaming sites.  Games are colorful, games have photorealistic imagery, they’re the best of animation - the ads on those sites are designed in that same style.  When you have great creative on the right sites, I think advertising is a wonderful world.