Each year, Google’s in-house agency, Google Creative Lab, combs the planet in search of promising young creatives to become “Fivers.” In Google’s own words:
The Five is a one year, paid program in Google Creative Lab.
Fivers work on things big, small and ideally, first of its kind within Google. Previous Fivers have been writers, designers, filmmakers, developers, and the occasional wild card.
This year, the application process kicks off with an animation challenge.
Animation as cover letter
Applicants can use a simple in-browser vector-based animation application to make anything that cleverly expresses why they should be a Fiver. The animation system uses Flash-like shape tweens that will be familiar to older folks but might be novel for the younger target audience of the project.
While the Google Five program accepts creatives with varied skill sets, by making animation the first step in the application process, Google is signaling a couple interesting things:
- The craft of animation is just widely accepted enough to function as both an expressive tool for candidates and as a filter for Google.
- Conversational command of the language of animation is important to Google — even if you’re a writer or a coder.
Down the rabbithole
As the site’s instructions say, applicants can “write it, design, code it, break it.” While there’s no obvious means of coding, popping open the JavaScript Console reveals an interesting clue for those with a little JS experience…
And therein lies the brilliance of this application.
On the surface, it looks like a basic design or animation challenge. And I’m sure that many interesting creations will be submitted using only the available toolset, which grows richer with possibility as you spend time with it (just like any good toolset).
Playing with the secret Pen tool
For the curious few with a firm grip on both halves of their brains (and a dash of coding experience), this is an opportunity to reveal their inner unicorns — and catch the eye of Google while they’re at it. You just have to find the rabbit hole…
Check out the Creative Lab 5 Application site.
Hat tip to Jarratt Moody for sharing the site.