After leaving my house in Vancouver at 5AM, flying all day to finally check into our hotel in Boston at 6PM, Mark and I were exhausted. Time to check in, take a nap and then find a good meal. Not only did we arrive at a super swank boutique hotel called The Liberty Hotel, but [...]

If I was asked who Stefan Sagmeister was a week ago, I could’ve given a handful of knee-jerk descriptions; he’s a designer, he’s provocative, he’s influential. I could’ve said many things to describe the icon he has become, but I would have failed to mention that he’s human.
“Everybody who is honest is interesting.”
On Friday afternoon, [...]

The drive to improve and succeed has increasingly lead to professionals in all trades to specify down to minute processes in projects. A photoshop artist will focus entirely on fashion retouching, or an interactive designer will draw boxes and arrows all day long. Along with this professional focus, influences and inspiration can also become focused. [...]

As featured on Design Taxi
Macro or Micro?
The new Vancouver International Film Centre seems like the perfect venue for something called VIDFEST, a five day “festival” put on by New Media BC and meant to connect and promote the digital media sector. That said, the location is much smaller than the Granville Island facilities used [...]

London was buzzing for the last two weeks of September. Everywhere you looked, on every street corner there seemed to be something about design. The city was filled with museum exhibits, public art and storefronts with interactive installations. I took in what I could in a week before heading to the south of France for [...]

During the iDesign conference in London I heard Bill Thompson talk about design’s role in the world of technology and he mentioned the locking down of Apple’s newest portable products. I did some reading and found quite a lot under the surface. I was very close to buying an iPod Touch but now I’m reconsidering.
Apple [...]

In the UK, where I’ve been for the past couple of weeks, pay rates for design freelancers are up in many cases, particularly when it comes to digital disciplines, according to DesignWeek’s second annual survey.
Overall, pay increases have been extremely healthy over the last twelve months, with increases of 13% cited, and a further 9% [...]

I was somewhere over Northern California headed south when the fear started to take hold. I remember wondering about what lay ahead thinking something to the effect of ‘what am I doing here?’ As a graphic designer only peripherally interested in animation, 3D rendering, motion capture, or gaming, I was afraid that I might not [...]

This blog was started years ago in part as a repository for our inspirations, yet I think we often drift away from that purpose a bit, so I want to share something that inspired me this weekend: discovering new music.
Obviously music plays a big part in most of our lives. It’s always stated as a [...]

June 4th marked the launch of the new London 2012 Olympic logo and it didn’t take long for the controversy to begin. I’d already fielded a number calls and emails before lunch from friends, designers and even the media. My inbox is filled with emails about the subject from various GDC designers across the country—some [...]

Mark just asked me to take ten minutes and jot down my opinions about what a student (or anyone I guess) should do/include/avoid when putting together and presenting a portfolio. A couple years ago I actually did a post on the topic on this blog.

Since then I have been on the receiving end of hundreds [...]

Well, we did it, again. The Industrial Brand/Legends Memorabilia “PicniCANtics” took top honours in this year’s Canstruction Vancouver for the third, THIRD, year in a row (2005 Award, 2006 Award). For those not in the know, Canstruction is an international design/build competition that benefits local food banks, brings together teams of architects, engineers, graphic artists [...]

The longer I stay in this industry, the more I realize the difference between producing graphically appealing (pretty) solutions and creating strategic communication designs that produce results.
Though I use my training in Graphic Design daily and often find much of what I do professionally to be based on visual language and aesthetics, it is only [...]

Some time last year I began considering about the similarities between branding loyalty and belonging to a church after an interesting conversation with Rick Poyner, the design critic and founder of Eye Magazine, who said
“Religion is now just another lifestyle option fighting for survival with all the other brands in the chaos of the marketplace.”
[...]

I feel a rather humbled and a little bummed out since attending Rimmerfest at SFU downtown on November 25. It was both an inspiration and an honour to be among Canada’s Graphic Design elite to celebrate and honour one of Canada’s living national treasures, the printer, publisher, and one of the few remaining typography and [...]

Well, we did it, again. The Industrial Brand/Legends Memorabilia “PicniCANtics” took top honours in this year’s Canstruction Vancouver for the third, THIRD, year in a row (2005 Award, 2006 Award). For those not in the know, Canstruction is an international design/build competition that benefits local food banks, brings together teams of architects, engineers, graphic artists and students to build amazing sculptures using only canned food and other non-perishables. This year, our sculpture contributed over 6,500 items to the Greater Vancouver Food Bank!

Admittedly, it was a close call this year since we were all super busy (and still are). Even so, for some reason the build seemed to go rather smoothly this year (thanks in large part to our architect team member David). Over the years we’ve been refining our approach and it seems there are a few things that seem to really make a difference when it comes time to judging. In the spirit of competition, here they are:

Clear, original and creative concept.
Clean and simple – big areas of solid colour and don’t try to create minute detail.
Play with scale – make small big and big small.
Make it emotive – in character or concept, play to the emotional buttons of the viewer.

Feedback from the judges actually cited the first two specifically as contributing factors for our win. I.e. for our interpretation of the theme, “Our Favourite Thing(s)”. Speaking of which, here’s what we wrote about our sculpture:

It is safe to say that everyone loves a picnic. What could be better than basking in the warmth of a carefree summer day with good friends and tasty fare?

But no one likes a picnic as much as its most common uninvited guest, the Ant. Upon that first whiff of fried chicken or potato salad escaping the picnic basket, you can be sure of these critters gathering their ranks and setting upon your serene afternoon with the regimented force of a small army. And, with the ability to carry over 10 to 20 times their own body weight, you would be wise to keep your babies well anchored. Let them take the watermelon instead. Even an ant deserves a decent meal.

We all do. That is why we support Canstruction. Let’s all help to put an end to hunger in the Lower Mainland.

We had a good mix of people this year, some veterans (this is Industrial Brand’s fifth year participating) and some first-timers. Thanks to everyone who took time from their busy schedules to participate.

We managed to shoot another time lapse video of our 14 hour build thanks to Todd Smith. We’ll post a fully produced version complete with catchy music soon. For more photos check out our Flickr group.
We’ll see how we do when the voting for People’s Choice is tabulated tomorrow. In the meantime, our Juror’s Favourite Award means we’ll go on to the International Award competition in May. Fingers crossed to bring home some honours there and boost the Vancouver competition’s reputation.

Posted by Ben Garfinkel on Monday, March 12th, 2007 10:18 am | Filed under Articles | RSS 2.0 feed | leave a response | trackback |