By: Stephanie Hoo
Pity the poor advertiser who pays to insert a can of soda or somesuch into a hit TV series, only to have a pesky actor stand in front of it during the money shot -- or worse, an overly creative director pushing it out of the shot entirely.
To solve these and other woes, products can now be inserted into a frame digitally -- after shooting -- to ensure the box of Cheez-Its is facing the right direction, the Ziploc bags are front and center and the Star-Kist tuna isn't out of focus.
Yes, we know advertising is important, but isn't this going too far?
Not really, says David Brenner, president of Marathon Ventures, which is putting virtual products in prime time.
"Part of the reason product placement is becoming more popular is people think it works," he says. "It would suggest that consumers don't really have an issue with this."
Already, Marathon has inserted products into the CBS shows "Yes, Dear," "Out of Practice," "Numb3rs," and "Still Standing" -- whether it's a box of crackers on a kitchen table or a bottle of window cleaner on a countertop.
"We work very, very hard to find that fine line where location is meaningful enough to be interesting to an advertiser but not so intrusive that it interrupts the creative flow of the show," Brenner says.
"We could put a car in a living room, but that wouldn't be contextually logical."
Digital product placement debuted last spring -- on "Yes, Dear" -- and industry watchers are already questioning whether it's effective or if it blurs the line between entertainment and advertising.
Brenner isn't fazed. He points out that advertising has been a part of TV -- and radio -- "since the dawn of electronic communication," whether it was the original "soap" operas or newscasters hawking cigarettes and vitamins.
"I think the short answer is that no advertiser or marketer wants to advertise in a way that's going to discourage people from buying his or her product," he says.
What's clear is that advertisers need new ways to reach consumers in age when the classic 30-second spot can be fast-forwarded or Tivo'ed out. Last year, the number of product placements on TV rose to 107,839, a rise of more than 25,000 from the year before, according to Nielsen Media Research.
The ability to digitally manipulate moving images has been around for years, whether it was Forrest Gump shaking hands with JFK or Natalie Cole singing with her late father.
Other uses are now considered indispensable, such as TV networks drawing virtual first-down lines on a football field.
"Given where technology is today, it would seem illogical if we weren't digitally inserting products occasionally into programs," Brenner says.
There are also signs the trend could be going too far -- witness the uproar two years ago when Major League Baseball teamed up with Columbia Pictures to put "Spider-Man" logos on bases. The deal was quickly abandoned.
And, if ads are all over the place, will we one day become immune to them?
Perhaps, but advertisers evidently haven't reached the saturation point yet. In the meantime, they're going to keep putting ads everywhere imaginable.
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