Driving into the mouth of the tunnel


It would be cool if there really was a tunnel entrance somewhere in the world that looked like this. But this is one of those brought-to-you-by-photoshop images. The original is an image showing a billboard created in March 2007 by the Austrian ad agency Demner, Merlicek & Bergmann for the restaurant chain Oldtimer. (link: adsoftheworld.com)



What's puzzling me is whether the original image is itself photoshopped? Did this Oldtimer billboard ever exist in real life, or is the photo just a concept piece?

I can't find any pictures showing the Oldtimer billboard from a different angle. I can't find any sources that list the specific road where it was placed. Nor can I find news sources from 2007 that discuss the billboard. I also think it's strange that this was an Austrian campaign, and yet the writing is in English.

All of which make me suspect that the original image is a photoshopped concept piece. Though I'm not sure. It could be that I can't find any more info about the ad because all the info is in German.

Advertising Photos

Posted on Mon Apr 30, 2012


Comments

Yeah I was thinking the same thing, that both of these are fakes. I can't imagine a commercial road anywhere permitting an advertisement like the second one that might (very likely) distract a driver and cause an accident. But I'm pretty gullible so who knows......... both are pretty cool though.
Posted by hulitoons  on  Mon Apr 30, 2012  at  01:01 PM
They're both photoshopped. The writing on the lower one is too clear compared to the slight fuzziness in the rock texture just behind (this applies to the face as well, but it's most obvious with the writing). Also, the light on the poster is too even. It would drop off markedly towards the lower right-hand corner if it were real, because the only lightsource is a cloudy sky, and the poster would 'see' less of the sky in the areas nearest the ground and the wall on the right.
Posted by MrHenderson  on  Mon Apr 30, 2012  at  02:24 PM
It's a photoshop, I can tell by the pixels 😉

Could you link the German-language source(s)/info you're talking about?
Posted by Krischn  on  Mon Apr 30, 2012  at  05:07 PM
I would TOTALLY want to live in a place that had tunnels like the top one.
Posted by Robin Bobcat  on  Mon Apr 30, 2012  at  05:10 PM
Krischn -- I don't actually have any german sources. What I meant was that if I knew German better I could look through german-language archives. But since I don't know german, that's difficult for me to do.
Posted by The Curator  in  San Diego  on  Tue May 01, 2012  at  01:53 PM
Alex hello, I found a reference site for you that seems to indicate it's real "http://www.boredpanda.com/creative-billboard-ads/" (though i must say it looks fake.. maybe the ad agency spruced up the picture for internet release?) Here's how I did it.. upload the picture inside of Google image search new "find similar feature" (for those not familiar, a small camera icon now exists inside the txt box of the Google image search tab). Great tool and reference. Hope this helps, love the site!
Posted by Tim  on  Wed May 02, 2012  at  08:33 PM
Thanks, Tim. But the site you link to doesn't actually have any info about the picture except for the name of the ad agency. Was there something else there I'm not seeing?
Posted by The Curator  in  San Diego  on  Wed May 02, 2012  at  08:57 PM
hmm sorry about that I didn't see you had listed the agency already.. I did some digging on the company's site and looked all over the way back machine at past versions of their site.. if they ever did create it, I don't see any evidence of it.
http://web.archive.org/web/20070710235222/http://www.dmb.at/nichtlustig/content/english/arbeiten/design/
Posted by Tim  on  Wed May 02, 2012  at  10:19 PM
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