By sabina | June 20th, 2011 | No Comments | Innovation, Our stuff, Technology

We are very proud to announce that Andrei Blaj, our brilliant research engineer, together with a small group of students from a Romanian high school have won the first prize in a National Science & Engineering Contest. Their participation in the ‘Inventica’ competition was financially supported by Brainient and we would like to congratulate Andrei and the other members of the team: Tiberiu Chibici, Andrei Iacob and Bogdan Antohi.

‘Inventica’ is one of the most prestigious Romanian contests supported by both UNESCO and Intel Romania with a panel of judges that includes prominent individuals such as Alexandru Mironov or Dorel Cernomazu who is the  creator of over 230 inventions.

Andrei’s team have impressed the judges with their ‘Vizor’ project, an innovative face recognition technology that can be used in order to control the access in various high schools. The students have used a computer, an IP camera and some really well written code in order to captivate judges’ attention for more than 15 minutes and in the end win the first prize. Andrei, the coordinator of the project told us he is very proud of the kids and he’s sure we are all going to hear about them again in the future.

We too hope to hear more exciting news about Bogdan, Tiberiu and Andrei and we wish them the best of luck at university. Big congratulations from the Brainient team!

By sabina | March 3rd, 2011 | No Comments | Digital video, Fun, Innovation

Most people skip ads. And if they don’t click the skip button on Youtube, they will check their Facebook profile, will send e-mails or text messages while the annoying ad is running. We’re all familiar to this scenario: watching TV and switching the channels when commercials pop up on the screen. Even though people didn’t like it, the only solution was to get up and refill the popcorn bowl or take a quick shower. However, things have changed and viewers are not just spectators, they’ve become users and their expectations are higher: people want to interact with the content.

Hotspots are cool, Facebook and Twitter buttons that allow us to share stuff are also great. But remember that Tipp-Ex ad called ‘A hunter shoots a bear’. Now that was really amazing. Still not convinced? Then check this incredible Citroen ad out!
Now imagine sitting in your comfortable seat at the cinema, eating your nachos and waiting for all those boring ads to finish in order for your ‘shoot’em bang-bang’ to commence. What if there were some magical 3D glasses with a tiny button that would allow you to interact with the big screen? It might sound like I’m talking sci-fi here but at Brainient we are used to dreaming big and wanting to change the video advertising world

By sabina | January 21st, 2011 | 4 Comments | Digital video, Innovation, Trends

It was last week when I was rather impatiently trying to find out where could I watch a live streaming of the Golden Globes awards ceremony. I was quite disappointed because after approximately 30 seconds of searching I still didn’t have a clue whether there’ll be a live streaming and who was going to do it.

You might find yourselves in the same situation: wondering how a major event could NOT be streamed live so we don’t have to wait until the next morning to read about the winners or get to comment the outfits.
The good news is that progress is being made in this department. Brightcove will bring the Sundance Film Festival online so make sure you check that out and share some thoughts about the experience.
Live streaming will soon be everywhere because people want to be able to watch not only film festivals, movie premiers or awards ceremonies. They also want to discover touching stories brought online like the annual ‘Nick’s Marathon‘ or really cool & innovative initiatives like the ‘HP ePrint Live‘ event- HP has partnered with YouTube in order to live-stream an improvisational comedy show.

Reading about DKNY and their first webcast of the Spring 2011collection on biglive.com reminded me that Burberry were testing the waters last year when streaming their runway show live in different stores around the world and assistants were taking orders on iPads. The first trench coat was sold within minutes.
But live streaming isn’t cool. You know what’s cool? Interactive live streaming. I don’t really have the time to go to a Burberry store in order to watch the show and maybe order a piece that I like. I want to be able to do it from the comfort of my own desk, on my own iPad or laptop. And I also want to be able to discuss the options with my girlfriends via social network channels and have all the details about the products.

When I think about the Facebook live streaming of the Sex and The City premiere last spring, the only thing missing was an option allowing me to scroll over Sarah Jessica Parker’s dress and get more details about it. I had to wait until the next day to find out it was actually Valentino, not Versace as I would have thought.
By now, you should have gotten really curios and excited about this whole live streaming idea, so if you want to see more magic, innovation and interactivity than before, keep an eye on Brainient.