When computers become an integral part of a movie or TV show, I usually get the feeling that the computer was force fit into its place in the writing, that the writers don’t really know the computer well, don’t get all the little details right.
I watched this all-Apple episode of Modern Family with low expectations. I loved it. The screens were captured fluidly, the content was perfectly placed, all the little details were spot-on. Kudos to the team that put this together.
You can watch this episode of Modern Family, entitled Connection Lost, on demand here (at least in the US). That link may require you to login through your cable/satellite provider.
Zac Hall, over at 9to5mac, lays out other options, like Hulu Plus, the ABC iPad App, etc., in this post. Happy viewing.
I’m an Apple fan, but this infomercial made me cringe. With iCloud, iMessage, iPhoto, and Facetime, it was just a bit too much. I wish they were just a bit more subtle.
A fair perspective, there certainly was an infomercial’s worth of coverage there. But what I loved was the technical feel of the whole thing, how beautifully captured everything was, how seamlessly the shots fit together, the flow between all the framing shots.
If you can get past the infomercial (not minimizing your point at all), there is a certain beauty to the way this was all brought together.
How many people do you think went looking for the non-existent conference call feature after watching that episode?
me 🙁
Seriously, that was mean. I really did think I somehow was unaware of that feature.
I thought it was incredibly well done as well as hilarious- and yes, an amazing ad for Apple’s integration. I mean, what other platform could you have done the same things so seamlessly with?
Also, I don’t get your point about subtlety. I don’t think they were paid by Apple, as Apple has a policy of not doing product placements. So Apple had no hand in this, and therefore don’t see why you would be cringing. The writers thought it would be cool to do this kind of concept, and realized the OSX/iOS platforms were the best to accomplish that.
Considering Phil’s obsession with getting an iPad, it seems they were more than happy to accommodate Apple.
Let’s hope the multiple window conferencing feature they had inspires Apple to do it!
I liked some of the real-world scenarios:
Lilly being annoyed by Claire’s FaceTime call interrupting her “iPad time.” No little kid wants a FaceTime call from her aunt during her iPad time.
Someone had to tell Jay to move his finger because it was covering the camera on his phone. That’s an occasional occurrence when FaceTiming with my parents.
It did seem a little infomercial-ly, and sometimes the zooming in and out of the monitor was a little dizzying for me, but his goal was to have the whole episode take place on a computer screen.
Given that constraint, I think he did a great job.
I’m biased, though. I love the show and Macs.
They didn’t accommodate Apple. The producers have been very very clear about this fact. The idea was theirs, not Apple. The only involvement Apple had was agreeing to let them do it and providing a bit of assistance in getting details correct in terms of how the UI flows work.
This show has been very pro Apple from the get go. And it’s not uncommon for real life families to use the same brands of stuff. These two details set the stage for this ‘ship in a bottle’ to use Apple products. And truth is that it was far far less blantant than many shows that have actual product placement. No long lingering shots in the logos, no two minutes of extolling this or that virtue of a product is they had on White Collar, no using dialogue that was written to clearly call out a particular brand rather than use a generic term etc when it would make far more sense to go generic.
How many sites will claim that this was an intentional leak by Apple to see if folks liked the idea of this feature and would want it put into the next Mac OS update
I agree. Felt like a too-long commercial. And really, the biggest impact, to me, is to highlight that even good-looking people don’t look great at the angles that FaceTime forces.
Apple has a policy of not doing product placements? Do you have a source for that? It seems hard to believe.
It was a feature back in the days of iChat, it’d be nice if they brought it back.