The Workbench Dispatch: 011

"Let's Not Talk About Work"

This edition I finally got around to filming the first of a hopefully ongoing interview series I’d been thinking about for a while, talking to people whose work I love about things they love outside of their work, because let’s face it, it can get boring saying the same stuff over and over again. I’ve found that some of my favorite, most thought provoking, or motivating conversations I’ve had with peers and artists I respect are usually about something totally unrelated to what we do for a living. You really learn more about and from a person when you’re just shooting the shit casually. Toss this episode on while you work or make dinner or however you enjoy, and let me know what you think.

Behind the paywall are some creative lessons we can take away from one of, if not my favorite commercial of the last year or two. Thanks as always for the continued support, I really appreciate all the feedback on this as it’s grown the last few months. Here’s hoping that substack becomes a more regular place for people to hang out.

-ms

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Table of Contents

1. “Let’s Not Talk About Work” ep. 1: gum.mp3 on Raf Simons

2. Recent Pieces

3. Lessons from a Great Commercial

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Recent Pieces/Mockups

Available at hello@marksabinodesign.com

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Commercials are in a really weird spot right now aren’t they. What was once the prime real estate for advertisers of the cable generation has, over the course of the last ~15 years, been caught in the throes of the Great Shift to Digital. For a while there was a bit of a balance between the two realms. Big advertisers would still focus primarily on TV spots (higher quantity of easier to track eyes at the time), while sending “condensed” versions of their campaigns to places like Youtube and in-feed social media ads where they could be rinsed into the ground until the next one came. Easy enough. Eventually however, as the digital and phone space became a more substantial source of eyes and ears, advertisers had to quickly adjust to the norms of online communication and consumption. Commercials now aren’t just competing with other advertisers or bathroom breaks (though they kept the annoyingly deafening volume trick), now they vie for attention against Mr. Beast and brainrot doomscrolling, the veritable undefeated champions of attention hoarding. As a result of this, commercials have mutated to better fit into the now weathered and raisin-sized attention spans of our generation. More obnoxious copy, more digital slop, more synthetic nostalgia-gooning pastiche, more nails-on-chalkboard attempts at terrible jingles, all desperately trying to keep up with the era of the mega optimized #consoomer. It’s no wonder that a 15-30 second unskippable ad feels longer than The Godfather. So many ads seem so inconsequential and grating that they turn into a dull buzzing white noise. We’ve already accepted the fact that endless commodities, fast food, detrimental apps, and more are being pushed to us every waking moment, but we can’t even get the dignity of a decent quality sensory assault? A silver lining to this barrage of cheap hucksterism however, is that when an ad has noticeable effort put into it, it can clearly stand out above the rest of the noise. Inherently evil as the advertising industry may be, as someone with a soft spot for the art of storytelling or micro filmmaking trojan-horsed through commerce, I still find myself taking note of the ones that “work” on me (get me to pay attention). One of these examples, probably my favorite commercial in recent memory, is the Calvin Klein campaign from last summer starring Greta Lee. I’ve been thinking about it a lot this past week as New York began to (slightly) warm up again and the allure of conspicuous outdoor exercise peeks from the last frosts of winter. I figured it’s worth breaking down both why the ad works, and what lessons we can take away from it.