RKCR/Y&R has created new work for ghd, the professional hair styling brand, featuring Katy Perry for the launch of its Scarlet Collection.

The ads, which were shot by world renowned photographer David LaChapelle, show Katy Perry, the face of ghd and the epitome of modern style and fashion, with a ‘20s make over bringing to life the decadence and sophistication of the time. In the ads, Katy is immortalised as a mystical Snow White for the Scarlet Collection campaign.

The print campaign launched in women’s glossies this month.

Executive creative director Damon Collins says: ‘The second instalment of Katy Perry as the face of ghd continues the Twisted Fairytales theme, showing her as Snow White. David LaChapelle brings his touch of magic to the shots.’ 

Bank of Scotland has today launched a new integrated advertising campaign to bring to life its brand promise, "With You All The Way".

A 40 second TV advert, created by RKCR/Y&R and directed by Scott Lyons, zooms through various scenes of daily Scottish life in which customers would be reassured to know Bank of Scotland is there for them.

Created by RKCR/Y&R and Rufus Leonard, the print campaign features photographs of moments captured from everyday Scottish life. These were taken in one week across 52 locations in Scotland by photographer Matt Stuart. One ad features a house late at night, with a single light on visible through the window. The headline reads: "when your day is long – we're available 24/7 at our UK call centres." Media planning and buying was handled by Mediaedge: cia.

As part of the campaign, Bank of Scotland is also offering people the opportunity to nominate someone who has made a real difference in their community to carry the Olympic Flame through Scotland. It’s just one of the ways Bank of Scotland is bringing London 2012 closer to its customers.

Philip Grant, Chairman of Lloyds Banking Group's Scottish Executive Committee said, "Bank of Scotland is part of the fabric of Scottish society and it is important that we continue to demonstrate our understanding of our customers, as well as our continued commitment to Scotland."

Matt Steward, Business Director at RKCR/Y&R commented, "This campaign has come from a great combination of understanding our customers, garnering real insights into the role they want the bank to play in their lives and then producing truly integrated work from one core client/agency team."

Neil Svensen, Chief Executive of Rufus Leonard, added, “We have developed this campaign by consulting with Bank of Scotland customers and the result is something that feels instinctively natural, authentic and genuine and really breaks the mould.”

To celebrate the start of brand new awards year, RKCR/Y&R has launched brand new, interactive product, designed to ensure that agencies and creatives need never miss an awards deadline, ever again.

The free service, called T-Minus, has been developed to help creatives around the world keep track of up upcoming awards deadlines, allowing them to plan getting their projects out of the door without the usual last minute panic.

A visit to the T-Minus website enables users to choose from the 130 awards currently registered globally, then download their own personal calendar as a dynamic infographic screensaver, which tracks not just the awards entry date, but the date on which work has to run in order to qualify for entry.

T-Minus was created by Steve Moss and Jo Finch at RKCR/Y&R in collaboration with digital hotshop B-Reel.

Damon Collins, Creative Director at RKCR/Y&R says: “For creatives the self-inflicted pressure to win awards is constant. And the stress of making sure your work has appeared by the various dates of each of the numerous awards competitions only adds to that pressure. No matter how brilliant your work is, if it’s not eligible for or entered into the competitions no one’s walking for anything.

Jo and Steve always had a sheet of layout paper on their desk listing awards deadlines and they’d cross off the weeks as they went by. Having been caught out in the past they used these calendars to remind themselves when they needed to pester me, the account team or the client, to make sure a particular piece of work was approved, made or had run.

We thought it would be great to create a digital version of those scraps of paper: a utility that anyone who had ever suffered that last minute panic of “Christ, it needs to have run by next week and it’s not even shot yet!” could benefit from.”

Mark Wheeler, Art Director at B-Reel adds: “We considered several approaches to the awards calendar dilemma before deciding on an approach that could remind without intruding and yet also provide enough detail to be genuinely useful. The solution is a tight combination of ambient information – a screensaver that passively reminds you of deadlines – as well as detailed reference information in the form of a fast, flexible, one-page website that's accessible from anywhere.

As well as creating a practical tool for creatives we also wanted to make something that would look great aesthetically running as your screensaver every day. The result is a constantly updating colourscape, with individual award deadlines growing and becoming more agitated as units of time flow around them. Given how often you see a screensaver we felt it important to add as much variety as possible to this view, so opted to use physics-based animation throughout. Working like this makes for some cool but unexpected results – you have to be ready to experiment and see what happens!”

The calendar launches with over 130 creative awards worldwide, from UK based D&AD to the Asia and Dubai Bespoke Awards.

Plans are being developed to further enhance the product with a series of new services – such as an archive of past winners, an awards newsfeed and social networking functionality. Various options to monetise T-Minus in are currently in development.

The product is free to download from http://www.t-minuscountdown.com

ENDS

Rainey Kelly Campbell Roalfe/Y&R has created a tongue in cheek press ad for Cancer Research UK which will run alongside the Wimbledon Championships coverage.

Launching today, the ad takes a light hearted approach in spirit of the Brits favourite summertime event which aims to prevent men ever needing to ask for ‘new balls please’ by encouraging them to be aware of symptoms of testicular cancer. These include pain or discomfort or a hard lump in the testicle or an unusual difference between one testicle and the other.

Although fewer men than ever are dying from testicular cancer with survival rates now hitting 95 per cent it isn’t yet game, set and match in the fight against men’s cancer.

Testicular cancer is relatively rare, but among men aged 25-34 it is the most common form of cancer. Each year nearly 2,000 men are diagnosed with testicular cancer, and 70 die from the disease. Yet – thanks to research by Cancer Research UK and others – more than 95 per cent of men are cured.

Hazel Nunn, Senior Health Information Manager at Cancer Research UK, said: “Getting to know your body makes it easier to spot anything unusual. Testicular cancer is quite rare and the chances of successful treatment are good, but if you do notice a lump or other change in one testicle it’s worth getting it checked out.”

But overall over 155,000 men are diagnosed with cancer every year. And the death rate for male cancers has been consistently higher than the rate for female cancers over the last thirty years.

Recent figures show cancer was responsible for 30 per cent of all deaths in men in the UK compared to 25 per cent for females.

Research shows that many men are not aware of the symptoms of some of the most common types of male cancers – prostate, lung, and bowel – and that they often ignore problems with their health rather than seeking advice.

Cancer Research UK encourages all men to be symptom aware and know what is normal for their bodies. 

London, Thursday 21 April: RKCR/Y&R is set to launch a new Land Rover campaign designed to appeal to businessmen with an adventurous streak.

The campaign fuses the business world with adventure in a humorous way to create stand out in a business to business environment.

Using three executions the campaign shows how the most classic of office environments can be used by those with a more adventurous disposition.

We see a climbing a wall as an alternative choice to an elevator, piranhas circling the water cooler and a blowpipe used to stick memos to the office notice board.

The Freelander 2 eD4 has CO2 emissions below the 160g/km threshold, giving the model greater appeal to fleet managers.

The campaign tagline “The adventurous businessman is back” not only suggest that the Freelander 2 is now back as a fleet option but that you can again add a little adventure back into your business.

Tim Brookes and Phil Forster, the creative team behind the ads said: “Land Rover is a great brand that always allows you to do eye catching work and this was another of those dream briefs to work on”.

The campaign launches in April using business targeted print and digital channels.