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 [...]
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 in the past. And therein lies my overall impression of this year’s event: It seemed not only smaller in scale, but smaller in concept as well—like there was only a half-interest in the event and thus it’s now half the size.
While perusing the program guide prior to the opening keynote on Monday morning I noticed that the sessions were split into two tracks: Macro and Micro. According to the program guide you could experience VIDFEST by attending Macro sessions that, “give you the big picture in digital media today”, or Micro sessions that, “offer high level seminars for the cutting edge professional.” What struck me right away was that it seemed a far cry from the two or three hundred people crammed into Performance Works to hear Nolan Bushnell, founder of Atari, talk last year. With barely two hundred people in attendance by my count, it seemed to me that the whole event was going ‘micro’.
DIY?
The conference actually started for me on Sunday, September 23rd, having missed the opening gala and PopVox Awards ceremony on Saturday night, though I heard it was well attended and a good party by all accounts. Sunday began with the Canadian premiere of Infest Wisely, by writer Jim Munroe. Hailed as “DIY triumph”, this “lo-fi, sci-fi movie in seven episodes”—each directed by a different director—was more like “DIY drivel”. Blurry, poorly lit and lacking any continuity or compelling story, it was no surprise to learn that it had only cost Munroe $750 to produce the film. Perhaps it was a good thing there were no more than 15 people in attendance. It stood out in stark contrast to the highly polished sci-fi series Sanctuary, screened as a complete two hour series for the first time. Produced in Vancouver by Stage 3 Media, Sanctuary is delivered as webisodes via the Internet. While not the first time a series has been created for the Web, it is apparently the only high quality HD production of this calibre.
Conquer The Spiders
I’m all for an intensive, more intimate conference though I’m not convinced that was the intention of the event organizers. Where were the heavy hitters this year? While certainly interesting, Ori Brafman’s opening keynote did not have the same impact as Nolan’s and he’d recently been to Vancouver earlier in the year for the Northern Voice blogging conference. Perhaps this is an unfair criticism, since Brafman’s talk did give pause for thought to those who missed him in February on how businesses can organize to avoid the same pitfalls that befell the Aztecs at the hands of the Spanish.
Using historical precedent starting with asking why such a highly developed civilization fell so quickly to such a small invading force, Brafman’s book, The Starfish and the Spider: The Unstoppable Power of Leaderless Organizations, provides insight into how the typical hierarchical structure of yesterday’s corporations makes them similarly vulnerable. In fact, until the Spanish encountered the Apaches in the 1680s, their techniques were very effective. What was different was that the Apaches had no formal, only symbolic, leadership and thus managed to deflect defeat in much the same way a starfish has regenerative power should a limb be amputated.
According to Branfman, don’t ask “who’s in charge?”, instead ask, “where’s the power?” What he found was a long list of David vs. Goliath like takeovers of what one would have previously thought of as unstoppably dominant players in a variety of industries. Some examples include: Wikipedia vs. Encyclopedia Britannica; Craigslist vs. The LA Times (and basically any classifieds section of any paper); Skype vs. AT&T and even Osama bin Laden vs. USA. “Shadow networks” he calls them. The success and spread of Alcoholics Anonymous isn’t in its founder, but that anyone, anywhere can start their own group. And therein lies the power – if one should die, another is there to carry on in its place.
In an interesting aside, Branfman mentions that he noticed that Wikipedia was short an entry on The Ropers, a late 1970s sitcom spinoff to Three’s Company and so took it upon himself to add one. He didn’t elaborate on what circumstances led him to do this, yet in the moment of revealing perhaps a little too much personal information, illustrated the reason why decentralization is so critical to the strength of these new “starfish” organizations.
Mob Mentality
Ever wonder what would happen to professional sports if there were no referees? A good example is a panel discussion with an unprepared moderator. While undoubtedly a successful businesswoman, Jennifer Ouano wasn’t able to guide the debate through a thoughtfully progressive and linear stream directly related to the main topic: The Wisdom of Crowds: Web 2.0 Democracy or Mob Mentality. Thankfully, a few of the speakers kept things lively . In fact, Andrew Keen, author of The Cult of the Amatuer: How Today’s Internet is Killing Our Culture, lived up to the promise of his last name with sharp, intelligent observations and an almost delightfully aggressive stance that kept the other panelists on their toes. I’d have preferred to see him as moderator of this or any panel.
Searing Flesh. Baby, You’ve Been Branded
The previous session only made the well organized moderators—who clearly knew and understood their material at this session—appear even more together as they kept things interesting and on topic. However, one of the downsides of short presentations is that it’s difficult to get into the kind of detail people really want to know about. Such was the case with Baby, You’ve Been Branded. Rather than learn all that much about how marketers can soft-sell their brands to today’s online youth, I found Dave Sylvestre’s show-and-tell of MixSherpa.com rather inspiring. MixSherpa is the kind of creative, take-it-to-the-next-level, I-can’t-believe-the-client-let-you-do-that work that we all aspire to be able to create.
In fact, later in the day at one of the many social functions, I had occasion to talk to Dave. Remember those commercials for American Express with Jerry Seinfeld and the animated Superman? That was Dave’s old firm that did those. Turns out he left his own company to work at Organic.com (a large, international interactive agency) precisely so he could gain access to more high-level clients with budgets to let him do big things. A calculated move for sure, but also an interesting insight that could easily have spawned a session of its own.
Karim Cage Match
The Opus Hotel was a smashing venue to hold post-day “Happy Hours” with free drinks courtesy of the event sponsors. It was there I remembered that often the true value of a conference is more often the energy and interactions we have outside of the organized sessions. Business deals initiated, friendships and alliances made, conversation and intellectual exchange deepened.
Ran into Joshua Davis not doing a great job of being modest, but then why the hell should he? He’s immensely successful, an entertaining presenter and according to him, doesn’t have to do all that much to keep the work and cash flowing in. In what was clearly a stroke of brilliance by event organizers, they brought Joshua back again this year not to speak for one hour, but to lead a group of 30 people through a half-day workshop. It was apparently very well received by those who attended. Joshua was clearly as stoked about the course as we were about his new iPhone (still impressive for us Canadians who have as yet been unable to officially acquire these from our local mobile service providers).
Got a good scoop from Joshua too. For those of you into interior design, pretty soon you’ll be able to toss your design iteration trash into a Joshua Davis-designed garbage pail courtesy of Umbra. Umbra, famous for having pink-suited, plastic-obsessed Karim Rashid designing many of their products, has recently signed Joshua on to design an entire line for 2008. I can’t think of more polar opposites in terms of personal styles. I suggested to Davis that I’d love to see Umbra shoot a commercial with him dressed in a pink suit duking it out with Karim in an Ultimate Fighting Match. Pink vs. Tattoo I’d call it. Davis laughed, but I could tell he’d never be caught dead in pink.
Grab Your Partner
Tuesday morning began with the final keynote of the conference. John Walker from Pixar films inspired the attendees with a look back at Pixar Productions animated films and discussed some of his experiences and recommendations surrounding partnering with studios on large projects. It was refreshing and insightful—the kind of presentation I had longed for more of the previous day.
After a couple days of presentations and social mixers, fatigue was setting in and my mind began to drift back to the office and what I was missing. The planned meetings with various potential clients, vendors and partners billed as the International Partnering Forum were causing me some stress. Thankfully, my fears were misplaced as the day turned out to be a terrific experience and proved to me again how valuable and worthwhile a conference can actually be.
Throughout the remainder of the day I met with various company representatives in a sort of ‘speed dating’ style of quick 30-minute conferences at tables dispersed throughout the conference venue. Perhaps because I went into the day with fairly low expectations, I found myself pleasantly surprised by how interesting all these creative professionals were. I really enjoyed hearing about design, production and media companies and their plans for growth and expansion.
The industry lunch, hosted by PricewaterhouseCoopers at the Opus Hotel, was rather delicious, a welcome break and good chance to continue conversations with old industry friends and new contacts from the forum. The day ended on a high note back at the Opus for another “Happy Hour”. Over drinks, a friend reminded me that you always get more out of an event when you aren’t driven by a purely self-serving ‘what can you do for me’ attitude. So true.
Next Year
The conference didn’t wow me this year, with more misses than hits from the organized part of the program. With the recent news that long-time president of New Media BC and the Executive Producer of VIDFEST, Lynda Brown, is leaving it should be interesting to see not only where New Media BC goes, but what will happen to VIDFEST for 2008. One can only hope that Lynda’s replacement will bring new energy and excitement to the event, and take it from “micro” back to “macro”.
More photos of Vidfest available here.
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