One of the jobs in the works here at the studio has a component that requires us to create 15 or so small (nickel-sized) icons that will be used in a clients’ conference/training materials. Each icon will represent a particular step or activity in the training, and will allow participants to easily locate and [more]
Friday roundup
A modest collection of phrases and images for this Friday’s roundup post. I was in the office just four days this week after returning to foggy and cold San Francisco from a week-long trip to the hot and sunny Pacific Northwest.
01. While in Seattle last week, I stopped by and visited with friend of the studio Robynne Raye of Modern Dog in their studio. She was very kind for taking a few minutes out of a busy day to show me around. It was also awesome that only half of our conversation was about design—the other half was about, get this, dogs! (I like dogs, so this was win-win.)
02. “This is going to be my legacy to you.” While working in InDesign with Christopher next to me directing me on a particular edit for a client, I began to replace an element on the page with another, forgetting a shortcut technique that he had shown me several weeks before. This was his friendly comment to me before reminding me of the shortcut.
03. We were silently working the other day when Christopher suddenly told us of a thought he had that morning while getting ready for the day. It was about the saying, “the past helps us understand the present.” He offered up the reasoning that it might be, in fact, the opposite that is true; that the present helps us to understand and make sense of the past. I eventually concluded that there is no such thing as the present; that instead we exist in a rapid sequence of “pasts.”
Such are the conversations that randomly occur every now and then here at MINE™.
Penguins + skulls
= hang time.
Today I spent the bulk of my time working on some logos/artwork for House of Air. A little something extra that might grace the surfaces of t-shirts and head protection gear. I got to do a little research on the bone structure of penguins to inform the creation of the work—sweet. We’ll find out in the next few days what the HOA folks think, but it’s all looking pretty nice. Also in the works is a classy red carpet gala/grand opening invitation for another client.
Overall there was a lot of activity today. Christopher is in the process of writing a book, and a lot of his focus the last few days has been directed toward that endeavor—on top of all the day to day details of running a studio. I’m realizing that one of the big challenges in the “real world” (post-school) is in fact balancing all of the daily tasks, client interactions, emails to answer, etc with the creative work—whether it be designing or writing or whatever; the process of making time to think/create amidst the hubbub of the everyday.We also had a potential new client come in for a first meeting. It’s an awesome project from a pretty inspirational guy, so I’m excited to see what happens moving forward.
ILINE, ULINE
Whoa, it’s like I went through a time warp. I go to sleep after a day’s work and when I when I sit back down to blog, two weeks have passed! My apologies for the moment of silence to all of the loyal blog followers out there (I’m especially looking at you, Pennsylvania—keep the visits coming).
Time is…
One of the things we’ve discussed in my Transitioning to Professional Practice class and that I am experiencing in my internship here at MINE™ is the idea that when you’re working for someone else, in their studio, your time is no longer your own. When you start a project, you can no longer approach it in the same way that you might approach a project for school—time-management wise. In school, you might get a new project brief toward the end of a class session, and then have at least a whole day or two before you have to show anything new. In a studio setting, you get the project brief (or direction from a creative director) and in most instances need to start working right away. As students I think many of us are used to working late at night and into the wee hours of the morning, or at particular times we feel most creative or productive. The adjustment moving forward, of course, is how to be creative and productive at any point during the day—especially if working for someone else—and how to overcome any creative blocks along the way. I think showers might play an integral role here.
Rapid rewards
Today I spent most of my time working on design directions for the exhibition catalog project I mentioned the other day. I am very excited about this project and am looking forward to when we get feedback from the client. One of the things that has been nice is finding a way to work around the budget constraints and real-world printing logistics. That’s one of the things that feels so rewarding to me—finding a way to get it done within the constraints. [more]
Piqued
Happy Monday evening to all MINE™ fans and friends out there. We have some new projects on the horizon and spent a little quality time with a few of them today. One is an upcoming exhibition catalog. I read through several pieces of information on the exhibition and did some research surrounding some of the topics and concepts addressed in the show. Because it’s still early in the process I can’t divulge too much information, so in the meantime I will (hopefully) pique your interest with the following project I came across during my research.
This project is from a group of design students in Denmark. Dubbed the ecochair, it is a “multi-functional piece of furniture… made of a 100% cotton mattress and a frame of reusable corrugated cardboard.” (Image below from their website.) The video on their site is also worth having a look!
Properly formatted
One of the things that has been on my mind recently is the upcoming creation of a portfolio of my (mostly student) work over the past few years while at CCA. I will receive my degree at the end of this year (knock on wood), and am currently enrolled in a class called Transitioning to Professional Practice, in which the actual creation of said portfolio takes place. In addition to an online portfolio, we are creating a printed piece, despite the fact that these may be becoming more and more irrelevant in searching for work. There is definitely less emphasis placed on them, at least. Still, a succinct printed presentation of ones work can make a big different when coupled with an effective online one.
If there is a moment or two to spare here at the studio, it is always nice to be able to dig into the archives and browse through the design and paper samples. One of the things I’ve been paying extra attention to lately are page dimensions and different formats. It has been a good process figuring out the best way to show my existing body of work. Today, while doing a little shuffling of the printer sample drawer, I came across two page dimensions that felt really good in my hand, and that I think would work well in displaying my work.
When I sat back down at my desk, I glanced up on the window sill and was reminded of another interesting format—a set of books that arrived in the mail a few weeks ago. Definitely not the best size to display work, but perfect for what they are… cigarette-sized books inside a tin!
Colortypethics
In addition to reading this post, be sure to also make time for Part II—the conclusion—of Christopher’s Design Business + Ethics entry.
When the mail came around mid-day, there was a small poster tube in the pile. Those are always exciting. In it was this small poster by Julian Hansen, loosely based on FontShop’s 100 Best Typefaces. If you’re ever feeling stuck as to which typeface to use on a project, look no further! It’s full of helpful decision-making questions to lead you to that perfect typeface for the job. For example, You cried when watching the Terminator? Yes or No.
This morning began with some revisions to the Singularity University banners. Before we left the studio last night we got additional feedback on a few changes to make, so getting those done was the first order of the day. These banners are going to be printed large and displayed at the NASA Ames campus as a way to highlight and identify several areas of study during their Graduate Studies Program this summer—from renewable energy production, to the frontiers of space flight, to food production for large cities. It was/is a great opportunity to use bold, eye-catching color schemes for the banners. They’re turning out to be quite vibrant. The client really liked them. Each component of the Program curriculum is identified by a particular color and represented with a specific icon. These icons will also appear as a group on t-shirts of the same colors. At one point in the day Christopher made the comment that it was kind of nice using colors that the studio maybe doesn’t normally use—or hasn’t used a lot of in the past. I haven’t used some of the colors in any of my work, either. It got me thinking about a question Jon Sueda brought up in my Typography class last semester. He asked us if we had any particular methods for working with or selecting color. Some people (myself included) seemed tended to gravitate toward certain colors or palettes, but nobody had a particularly strong criteria for selecting them, other than just gut feeling and whether it seems appropriate.
So, to anyone out there reading, do you have any particular methods for selecting or working with color?
Design business +
I will keep today’s post short so as to encourage you to read this timely entry from Christopher. I encourage you all to post your thoughts to that one.
Here at the studio today I spent most of the day helping out on a project for Singularity University. I have been sketching, designing and revising a series of large banners and t-shirt graphics for their upcoming Graduate Studies Program. It is the first time that I have been this involved, contributing to the design of each piece, presenting variations to Christopher, etc. I have had to adjust a little to the process, but I think I am starting to feel a little more comfortable. I have realized that it can be helpful to set a time limit, and after that time is up, get some feedback on the progress made. In certain instances, this can be a real timesaver, preventing me from going down a path that I don’t really need to be going down.
Be sure to check back tomorrow for Part II of the above link.
Friday fan day
Some of you may have noticed over the past couple months on Facebook that MINE™ has been looking for suggestions on stuff to give away once the 1,000 Facebook-fan mark is reached. There have been a handful of suggestions—a few being a jar filled with 1,000 black and white jelly beans (from Brett MacFadden); an ipad (totally reasonable request by Omar Dbeis); each of the posters the studio has printed (thanks, Kate Earhart El-Bizri)—all equally excellent suggestions, no doubt.
Well, earlier this week we hit the magic number (woo hoo!). We decided against the ipad route and spent some time scouring the archives to pull some posters, stickers, and a few surprise items; it was a pretty fun task. Today we finished picking all of our lucky winners by way of a random, but highly structured, process. It was even more entertaining selecting the winners. The first thing we did was open the Fans window in Facebook. This window only shows a small portion of the total number, so we figured out how many of these subsets existed that made up our total fan count. Based on those figures, we began a scholarly, well-respected technique for determining number pairs. It went like this: Justin, pick a number between 1 and 10. Okay, now pick a number between 1 and 100.
After several rounds of this we had our winners, but in number only. The next, and longest step, was to use our previously identified window subsets and manually find out exactly who 3, 44 and friends were, and then getting a mailing address from them. If we encountered any problems—like the person not allowing any emails via Facebook—rather than simply choosing the next person on the list, we would use our 1-thru-10 number and move down that many steps to the next person. Needless to say, it was a very exciting system, and the suspense kept building as the number of available prizes dwindled. As we were selecting, an interesting thing happened. The fan count began to increase fairly significantly in a short amount of time, dropping people into different number slots. This just made it more exciting—like hitting a moving target!
So to all you winners out there, the faster you reply the faster you’ll get the goods!
Is this yours®?
In addition to a number of small-ish tasks that got taken care of today in the studio, there was plenty more discussion and design surrounding MINE™’s new future website. One of the interesting topics that came up—one that I hadn’t really previously considered—is the idea of balancing one’s personal communication (and to a certain extent, work) with a studio’s own communication (and work).
This is especially applicable with a studio such as MINE™ that has multiple streams of information constantly flowing to the outside world—the main studio website, this intern blog, the studio’s facebook page, Christopher’s CCA blog and his twitter feed, etc. If an employee of an active studio like this is extremely active as well, and accustomed to posting links/images/articles throughout the day, at what point do they stop [more]
uu uu uu dot com
Smells like the Internets up in here (said in this manner). All kinds of discussion today about MINE™’s upcoming website redesign. Questions (and some answers) about user experience(s), specific work to highlight, integration with other channels of info (social media, blogs)… goodness in the works!
Potential New client
In the words of our good buddy Ice Cube, Today was a good day.
Mid-morning we got a call from that potential client I mentioned on Monday. Christopher got on the line with him and went upstairs to talk about the proposal he had spent a good chunk of time crafting after the meeting. After a long while he came back down and revealed the good news. We got the job! Sweet. I am really excited to see how this thing unfolds over the next several months. Once the ball gets rolling further, I will fill in some more details. Stay tuned.
As many of you know, Christopher is an adviser to Project M and Tim was a participant down in Hale County, Alabama a few years ago. I don’t have quite as strong of a link to John Bielenberg or Project M, although I did participate in a mini “M Blitz” at the end of 2009 while in Eric Heiman’s level three class at CCA. Well, today we had the pleasure of chatting via Skype with a few current Project M’ers in Alabama. One of them is a classmate of mine on hiatus from school for a bit while doing his thing down in AL. (Hi Matt, aka matt_in_black.) They are part of a team involved in a variety of community projects, but one of the problems they are running into is distinguishing themselves and their scope of work from other, affiliated groups. So who better to contact for advice than the masterminds of identity, MINE? Some really good and smart ideas were generated during the brief conference call. Matt, keep me updated on what happens with it!
The bizniz
Today was awesome. We had a potential new client come in and meet with us over tea for a few hours in the morning. It was exciting for me to be able to listen to, and even participate in the conversations at this really early stage. Plus, the person we met with was real cool, and the business pretty sweet. It would awesome if we end up being selected for the job. Christopher will be spending the next few days writing a proposal, and hopefully we will find out soon. Exciting stuff, no doubt! One of the items on my list of “things I would like to learn/do while at MINE™” that I gave to Christopher is to be a part of a project from A to Z, from its inception to its completion. Maybe this could be the project.
The whole business side of the job is fascinating to me. The presentations and meetings, the creation of proposals—basically everything needed to be done (aside from doing great design) to successfully run a business. One of the things that is hard to simulate in school is this client interaction. I love the assignments I have gotten in school, have loved getting up and speaking about my work, and have learned some invaluable lessons. But creating your own fictitious ________(insert event/publication/etc here) and creating an air-tight, compelling story to inform or back-up your design choices is one thing (a fun one at that). The added variable of a client, and the direction that a project can take based on the clients’ interaction can be quite a different experience. The quote on the back of Dan and Andre’s book Never Sleep (which I have received three copies of as gifts recently) comes to mind: There is a major disconnect between the life of a design student and the transition to being a design professional. I guess you could say that a big part of my internship here at MINE™ is to help with the bridging of that gap.
Road construction
This morning before heading in to the studio, I decided I would try to run an errand that I didn’t get to last night. I left a few minutes before my regular departure time to compensate for the additional driving. The problem, however, is that I allowed just the correct amount of time for a flawless trip—a trip that doesn’t take into account unforeseen circumstances like weird traffic patterns or construction. So, as luck/fate would have it, I did indeed encounter a few obstacles. Literal ones. The first was a block of road construction just getting underway, funneling traffic down to just one lane. A cop was directing traffic by hand which slowed things down a bit more. Second, because my journey placed me in a different part of town (a much more populated part of town) from where I normally get on the freeway near my house, there were many more people trying to squeeze onto the on-ramp. I would say that it took 4x as long just to get on the freeway this morning. This shift in timing to a later freeway departure made a huge difference in the time it took to get to the studio. A few minutes makes a big difference in how many cars are on the road during the morning commute hours. It took me twice as long to get to the studio this morning, and I ended up getting here a little late.
One of the lessons that can be taken away from this experience, and how it relates to design (and just life in general, I guess), is that it’s wise to leave enough time for unexpected things to occur during the process of making or doing. Don’t factor in a “just-right” amount of time to get things done, if you can help it. Instead, it’s best to build in a buffer that will allow you to respond and adapt to any obstacles that might be thrown your way or mistakes that are made. And, as often happens in life, these obstacles and mistakes are indeed often encountered. It might also allow you to explore a different path that reveals itself during the process—a path that you were not aware of previously.
The longest hour
I know you’ve seen the new Stern Grove poster. It’s sweet. If you haven’t yet, visit that link for a moment. The technique Yulia Brodskaya is flexing her superior skills with is called quilling. We had a brief history lesson today courtesy of the Internets, and learned at one point in Europe quilling was thought to be one of the “few things ladies could do that was thought not too taxing for their minds or gentle dispositions.” Hmm, I wonder what Yulia would say to that statement, because from my seat her illustration looks like it would take the mind of a razor sharp paper-ninja.
When I got in this morning, I completed some typical early-morning intern tasks: printed some labels, filed away some print samples, churned some butter. A good chunk of the day, however, was spent by all working on various aspects of the Stern Grove Festival project. Tim was busy working out the type for large signage, several versions of some shirts, and about a hundred other things. About midday Christopher and Tim had me trace the edges of paper within the Stern Grove poster. At first I just did one section to give them an idea of whether it was working and whether or not I should continue. It looked pretty nice, so the plan was for me to spend the next hour or so finishing off the rest of it. But I tell you what, those paper lines just kept coming and coming! It took slightly longer than an hour. The process of tracing became almost a meditative one as I located each edge of the pieces of paper and tried to match its path. I then passed it off to Tim who began integrating into the work he was doing. It looked pretty sweet; hopefully the client thinks so as well. Time will tell!
Happy birthday to Amelie today!
Push things forward
Today was a humbling one for me. At the end of the day yesterday I found out that I would be working on some graphics for a t-shirt; a project that previous intern Reena had begun. The client responded to the first round of submissions and we had some feedback to move forward with. It’s not an overly complicated project by any stretch of the imagination, but I found myself struggling to work fast and just get it done. It’s insightful to see the differences between school projects, where you might have a big chunk of time dedicated to brainstorming, then sketching, then revisions, etc. Here “in the real world” that process just has to be condensed into a much shorter timeframe, and after working most of the day today, I just need to get better and faster. That’s why I’m here. Theme song for my ride home.
d.schooled
Friday was a rather eventful day, and I didn’t even have to step foot inside the office (hence the blog entry about Friday today). Before I left for the evening on Thursday, Christopher mentioned that we’d be heading down to Palo Alto in the morning for the Opening Day of the d.school’s new digs (Building 550, the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford). MINE™, if you recall, recently completed a project for the d.school, which I, and many others in attendance today got to see for the first time.
So on Friday I met Christopher outside of Building 550 at 9:30am (I decided to commute by train + bicycle) and we signed-in and got assigned to teams. I had initially thought I was going down there to hear some introductions to the new building and to meet some people, but I soon realized I was wrong. (I should have known better from description of “d.school hootenanny” in the studio’s calendar.) I was now the newest member of “Team 7″ and was being directed to quickly customize my name tag before joining the rest of my team already underway upstairs. For the next 3 hours I got to experience a good dose of design thinking fundamentals in the form of a hands-on design challenge dubbed “Reboot Camp.” My team consisted of a Clorox marketing person, three Stanford professors, and of course little ol’ me, Intern™. Through a flurry of idea generation, rapid note-taking, strategizing, prototyping, testing, revision and reflection, we participated in a project centered around engaging 10,000 kids for 90 minutes a day over the entire summer, as part of a volunteer program. One of the coolest parts of the challenge was having a group of 5th graders come into the room to test out our prototypes and give feedback.
After lunch we attended a small workshop conducted by the editors of Ambidextrous, Stanford’s Journal of Design. There were about 10 of us at this particular workshop, and the goal was to redesign/rethink the magazine specifically for someone else in the room. We paired off and had 5 minutes each to interview the other person. Based off this brief exchange we then had 10 minutes to quickly sketch/construct a prototype of our customized magazine. I have to admit, at first I was a little nervous at being put in this situation with such a small amount of time to work, in a small space, knowing that I’d then have to get up and share it with working professionals. But what nerves did exist quickly dissipated as we got to work and I realized there was absolutely no reason to be nervous. Not only did it turn out to be a fun exercise, but we were given a boxed set of all 12 Ambidextrous magazine issues as a gift. Nice!
To top off an action-packed Friday, we all gathered in the large central hall toward the end of the day and were ceremoniously recognized as co-founders of the new d.school building. Tears were shed by many in the audience (not so much by me, though). Next thing we knew it was 5pm and time to make the trek back home. It was definitely an interesting event to take part in, and probably a bit of an atypical first full day of an internship.
A Hard Day’s Night
It was a long night, but we did it! Haiti Poster Projectposters are ready to be stamped and shipped off.
We arrived at CCA in the afternoon with the hopes of everything going quickly and without hiccups. That is never what really happens though. At least this time we knew what we were doing. After our first batch of ink ran out, things got a bit trickier. The viscosity was not the same, which lead to some trial and error. Eventually we got it down and were rolling again. At first we were looking at the prints and thinking that they weren’t turning out the way that we wanted. Tim pointed out that the beauty of this art were the imperfections, which caused me to remember what Jim Sheridan of Hatch Show Print told us in a print making workshop that I attended once. He instructed us never to throw away a print that you make. Save it and look at it another day. Mr. Sheridan explained that with print making, we often have an idea of what the outcome is suppose to look like in our heads. When our prints don’t look like that image, we get disappointed. Well today is the next day, and they look pretty fantastic. The imperfections and sometimes hasty looking washes of color add to the urgency of the message. The five posters spell out the word Haiti and have the national motto overprinted in magenta on top of the letter. It says “l’union fait la force” or “unity makes strength.” The posters will be sold as a set on the Haiti Poster Project website.
You can see all 5 posters and some of the process on our Facebook page.
The Final Countdown
Things are picking up around here again. There are so many exciting and new projects on the horizon. I’m kind of sad that I won’t be here to see them all through. The countdown to my last day has begun.
I worked on the Stern Grove Festival poster with Christopher and Tim. We are finalizing the type and adding our own touch of craft to it to compliment Yulia’s cut paper illustration. So for the past few hours, I have been cutting out typography that we will put on the poster. It’s a tedious thing to do. Though if you think about how graphic design was done before the time of desktop publishing, the magnitude of my task wanes in comparison. The way I was doing things was fine, but talking to Tim I learned that there are best practices that I haven’t been aware of before this internship. Not just best practices on how to use cut paper in your design, but other things I wish I could remember at this moment. There are may be a of doing something that gives you better results.
Tomorrow the MINE™ team will be knee deep in ink and squeegees. We’re screenprinting! I am super excited. The posters we make tomorrow will be sold on the Haiti Poster Project website.
Off to the presses
We’re continuing to keep busy at MINE™. In one day we collectively worked on 5 different projects, checked in on one, and was referred for another by poster designer extraordinaire Jason Munn. It seems as though there is a steady flow of work. When we finish up projects, there are more on the horizon.
Today we are working to get this d.School project to press. Tim and I made production dummies for the printer. His was a smaller version with the art on it. The one I did was to actual size without art. Because I did things by hand, they were a little off. So Christopher went back and made notes throughout the piece with exact instructions on what to do. I rarely made production dummies during school, but I see the importance of them now. They are especially important when there is a client paying you. If something goes wrong and your instructions cannot be refuted, the blame cannot fall on you. To make a mistake at this stage would be an expensive one.
We just ate the cake I made. It wasn’t awful. Awesome!
Fresh
There are a lot of exciting things happening at MINE™ today. We are finishing up the project for the Stanford d.School, we received final art from Yulia Brodskaya for the Stern Grove Festival poster, and we continue to rock the House of Air branding.
I apparently need a tutorial in making shadows in Photoshop. Unfortunately for Tim, I looked at the tutorials after I gave him the files of some faked Post-it notes. Christopher made fun of me for how long it took me, but at this point in the internship I’ve got thicker skin. It’s very strange to think back to my first days and how nervous I felt about the tiny tasks they gave me to do. Now I am a more confident person than I was in January, but obviously have much to learn.
The illustration we received from Yulia is beautiful! If you have been anywhere near a design blog in the past year, you’ve probably seen her previous work. She uses the edges of cut paper to make intricate, well-crafted, gorgeous illustrations. We’ve have been back and forth with her for the past few months about layout, typography, and color. Everyone needed to be on the same page about the illustration, because once its made, the illustration cannot be changed. Our clients at Stern Grove have already seen the illustration are delighted. Next steps are to find a secondary typeface and put all the festival information on it. Be on the lookout for the poster within the next month.
Lastly, I got to make penguin feet today! These might be used to make impressions into the floor at House of Air in their so fresh, so clean new cement. It’s been super exciting working on House of Air. I’ve never had the experience of seeing something that I helped create that is “alive” in the world. Sadly, the end of my internship is nearing and I probably won’t be around when House of Air opens. I will definitely bug Christopher about going to the opening though.
How, how, how, now, now, now
Hooray MINE™! We’re in HOW Magazine’s 2010 Design Annual for the identity work for C+. The photo looks backwards to you because I took it with Photobooth. Imagine it flipped.
We have been working hard all day to finish up the Stanford d.School project. I did a ton of image searching while Tim did some hardcore designing. Then Tim and I trekked up to Martha & Bros. to create some images. Christopher asked me to look generic today so that I could be the subject of the shoot. To me that meant dressing in blue jeans, black Chuck Taylors, a grey sweater, and a black scarf. I was a waitress serving coffee while things on the street happened around me. The sun was a bit harsh, so we’re hoping that we don’t have to reshoot. The d.School project should be in the bag by next Wednesday.
I have something exciting to look forward to on Monday. I’m designing socks for House of Air!
Blue: A controversial color
Who would have thought?
We had a meeting with our House of Air clients and I’m pretty sure we spent as much time talking about the right color blue as we did talking about their web site. Color is a very subjective thing. People have different associations with them and feel different emotions. The conclusion was to keep it the same…I think.
Building an identity for a company is a funny thing. For example, we had the House of Air colors planned with a primary and secondary palette. But when we actually executed designs, we noticed that we didn’t ever use one of our primary colors which canceled out our two tier system. It seems that as the project evolves, so do the branding specifications. When you actually start using the elements of the identity, you begin to see a pattern where certain elements work better in certain situations. You end up assigning meaning to these elements and decide to limit the places you use it. We have a stripe pattern that we use in the signage and for super graphics. They can be over powering so we limited their use as super graphics in certain areas of the building. When the building opens and begins to have meaning to others, we might have to adjust the identity again. Then when the brand has been around long enough like Coke, I guess you have the identity down to a t.
The House of Air identity is moving along though. This week Christopher and Tim have been working on the business cards and web site. The concept for the web site and the cards are super rad and will be something to be proud of in the end. Tim taught me how to write printer specs to get a quote on the cards. It’s a totally mundane task, but I was happy to learn it. Each piece of knowledge gained will help me disguise my inadequacies at my next job. “But it’s not like I have that many,” she says as she grins.
The ball is not in our court.
We’re waiting for clients to get back to us, so things are a bit chill today. But that’s the reason why I had time to work on stickers for House of Air for a few hours. It was fun to play with composition, color, and type. But I was some where between uptight and the state of mind I needed to be in to execute them to my satisfaction. I don’t think I have gotten over the fact that people can see what I am doing all the time or the mindset that it’s ok for me to make mistakes. Maybe I just work like Michael Bierut does. He says he has to do a lot of work just so the probability of having something awesome is higher. So yeah, I’m going to compare myself to him (smiley emoticon), even though he hasn’t accepted my friend request on Facebook. I have faith though, Mr. Bierut.
While I was designing stickers, Christopher was meeting with Dave and Paul of House of Air. He presented the signs that we spent the week creating and they are totally stoked about them. This project has been such a great opportunity for everyone involved. Dave and Paul want their space to have a cohesive look and feel so they want to push the branding. For us that means we get to keep working with great clients on a great project.
Lastly, we received a second copy of Stanley Hainsworth’s Idea+ology. We were definitely surprised because when MINE™ has been featured in a book in the past, no one sent a free book. So thanks, Rockport!
Photo taken by my Verizon Wireless Crackberry
Add, subtract, multiply, divide.
It was an environmental design day! We had to figure out scales and specs for House of Air signage. It was quite fun. Christopher has a way of figuring out scale that I didn’t understand at first, but I caught on eventually.
Seeing a giant version of your design is really exciting, because people have to physically interact with it. However, I forgot how tedious the process can be. We’ve been looking at elevations of the building all day, and there are so many details to record. There is the height, width, and depth of the sign, and then there is the location where you want it placed. And when you do the elevation drawing for the sign, you have to specify where the type and image go to the T. After you do all of that, then you have to give each item its own “code” to differentiate it from the hundred other things on the list. I guess it is a necessary thing, if you are working with a lot of people. The designer or architect comes up with the plan, but other people might be implementing it. Thus the process leaves no room for error.
Whew. It’s only Tuesday, but it already feels so much later in the week. We are a bit slammed at the moment. And I haven’t checked myself, but I heard Puppycam is over. No more soft fuzzy things to take the edge off.
Better than a 24 hour punk rock diner
I was just telling Christopher that working here is the only job I’ve ever had that has been more fun than my stint as a server. Oh, I guess teaching was pretty fun too. But I digress.
Have you noticed the blog? It’s new and improved! Now with more visuals! Today I spent the day adding images so it will look totally rad when we make the switch to the new format. It has been fun because with each picture, I get to choose the message I want to communicate for the day. So sometimes I had a picture that worked perfectly, and other times I had to make something up. They are just blog photos, but it was a design task. We make messages with words and images, and hopefully create new meaning and context. I can’t say that all my photos live up to that statement, but I enjoyed doing it nonetheless.
After my morning of bloggery (No, that word is not in the OED…yet.), Christopher, Tim and I brainstormed about signage and graphics for House of Air. I recorded notes on a giant notepad with a sharpie while trying to contribute to the conversation. We came up with some really cool ideas for the space in which we will pitch to our clients on Friday. So after the meeting and watching Puppycam (Thanks, Emily!) for a few minutes, we started adding our signage, color, and graphic ideas to the architectural renderings. They’re starting to look pretty sweet, or maybe it’s just the beer goggles.
Happy St. Patrick’s Day, friends!
Where did the day go?
I know the time changed yesterday, but I feel like I lost track of an hour sometime today. We weren’t particularly busy, but I must have been busy enough to not look at the clock.
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Gitting R’ Done at the d.School
Today was pretty exciting. I went to Palo Alto for the first time ever. I didn’t see much of the city besides Stanford and the d.School building, but the drive there was gorgeous. Sorry for gushing. As most of you probably know, I’m from Texas. I’m used to seeing flat lands and tumbleweeds.