SPECIAL
Special Group is an advertising and design agency in New Zealand. They gave some good advice such as, "you don't have to play by the rules," "keep it simple," and "have ludicrous self belief." They believe money shouldn't be wasted on advertising. Ads are so boring! People ignore them! How about creating an entire event based around your product instead?
-Channel 4 Branding/Advertising (giant rubber duck in Auckland)
-Smirnoff Night Project (TV show)
If you don't want to watch the whole thing than at least check out the auditions for Zombie Idol at 6:36.
Gmunk was awesome! He is into 3D, pop-art, space, and explosions. He did a lot of work for the movie Tron: Legacy. I wrote in my notes, why have I not seen this movie???? He says, "I stay inspired by looking at shit all the time." In other words, he uses sites like tumblr to find and collect images that inspire him. He takes these references and catalogues them so he can refer to them in future projects. Something I really should start doing.
-Title sequence for Flash On The Beach conference 2011
Swifty is into the pre-mac cut & paste methods. He says people don't respect graphic design anymore because anyone can just whip out their computer and do it. He says using the computer is laziness and people are too obsessed with instant gratification. There is something about anticipation and patience that makes design special.
-Leisure project: fake jazz festival posters of artists he'd like to see.
"Music is so important to what I do. It kind of fuels me."
Two brothers who are creative directors. Here are some good quotes from their presentation:
"life as a creative person is full of highs & lows"
"seduce people with beauty & intelligence"
"seduce people with beauty & intelligence"
"if you do nothing, nothing happens"
"be responsible for your work"
"nothing like a giant paper sculpture to take up space in your apartment for 3 months"
"nothing like a giant paper sculpture to take up space in your apartment for 3 months"
"as soon as you say something's cool, it's not"
"knowledge does not equal power...creativity equals power"
"to be interesting, get interested"
I've poorly re-made a diagram they showed us but you should still get the idea. The point is that you can't please everyone. People will love you and they will hate you, but the point is to not be forgettable because that's the last place you want to be.
Benja Harney (Sydney, Aus) is a paper engineer. Not a very common occupation, is it? He is into making things out of paper, like paper self portraits and especially pop-up books. "The letter B is the worst to make, it's really really hard." He puts a lot of detail into forms and makes sure to be precise all the time or else the folds will be off. "If you find something you love, you're very very lucky." He mostly talked about a pop-up book he did for Kylie Minogue, but he also gave some advice that went along the lines of...work for big companies because they have money to spend on your ideas. (haha)
-Kylie Minogue Pop-up
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| http://paperform.wordpress.com/2011/07/07/kylie-the-goddess-herself/ |
Southsouthwest is two guys out of Melbourne who started a design agency off of only have fine art degrees. Did that sentence make sense? Too bad, I'm not rewriting it. So I thought that was cool and pretty brave of them.
-Melbourne Bike Fest promotion/advertising
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| http://www.southsouthwest.com.au/project/melbourne-bikefest/ |
"I don't mind plagiarism, I just mind stupidity."
"To teach that a comparatively few men are responsible for the greatest forward steps of mankind is the worst sort of nonsense" -Henry FordI loved listening to this guy. He spoke about artists and designers who influence him, as well his design process. It was nice seeing the way he worked. He would tell us what the design problem is and then how he found a solution. Often his ideas didn't work out and he'd have to start all over. "Don't go with the first idea," he says, "revise, revise, revise." Nothing is original, you can imitate others, just don't be stupid about it. It's not where you take things from, it's where you take them to. As you design keep these 3 things in mind: Imitation, Intuition, and Imagination. "We have so much to offer to the world because the world offers so much to us." The guy is a genius.
THE MONKEYS
The Monkeys are in advertising. They expressed how making ads today is completely different than before because ads don't have to be in the newspaper or on tv. They can be music videos or stories or sculptures. "whatever industry you're in, you can change it" "make provocative ideas happen"
-The Ship Song Project (Sydney Opera House) (those of you into music will like this.. AKA MOM)
STOLEN GIRLFRIENDS CLUB
These guys are fashion designers. I'm not so much into that. But their promotional videos were fantastic. Plus I learned all about how they have no idea what they're doing, and yet somehow they magically became popular. They make one good t-shirt that sells out and suddenly they have fans and are invited to a fashion show (2007)! They didn't even have a collection or line of clothing at that point! I think they have a good sense of who they are and what they make now, but it seems like a lot of designers get big by accident. Now they are selling tiny, lacy, shirt-dresses for $500....that's just ridiculous. I don't think they have a secret to success, it just kind of happened. I guess the point is to have fun and love what you do.
KELLI ANDERSON
Kelli Anderson is out of New York and I think she is one of my new design heros. Her style is clean, sometimes cute, simple, to the point, interactive, infographical, insert more describing words here... She's done some political works, some experimental projects, and don't even get me started on her wedding invitations. She's interested in entropy, "the natural state of the universe is disorder" and "the world is full of order that doesn't necessarily deserve our respect"
-Counterfeit New York Times portraying only good news and utopian future.
Thousands distributed in NY 2009.
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| http://www.kellianderson.com/projects/fakenewspapers.html |
-Wedding Invitation with paper record player inside that plays a song recorded by the to-be-married.
-Girl Walk // All Day (Girl Talk promo...poster, video, t-shirts...) (I DANCE NY)
Wallpaper magazine is cool because they've embraced new technology. It's true that computers are killing the print industry. However, Wallpaper sees this as an opportunity. They make issues for the iPad. Yup. Magazine covers that already look cool in print are taken a step further as their animated counterpart comes to life on the iPad. "It was interesting working with sound...my collection of 80's music isn't always the best." Neat-o. They also make their articles interesting by making videos. Like. This one.
Design studio originally out of London. Enjoys story telling. Experimenting. Trying new things.
"we took Times New Roman, messed it up, and called it New Times"
"mess means we're actually working"
"there's not enough Africa in computers"
"people love telling stories, help them"
"experience is something you don't get until just after you need it"
"do something that is useless and doesn't make sense"
"look up every once in awhile"
"if children like it then you're probably on to something"
Hi Res's tips on how to work better:
1. Respect
2. Ideas come from anywhere and anyone
3. Be passionate (but there are other things in life too)
4. Show your work to Mom & Dad
Also: Remember compliments, forget insults, be grateful
Documentary photographer. Interested in media and sex themes. 1994 - obsessed with television, follows its evolution...creates series of photographs. 2000 - interested in presence of pornography in society...especially that of the fashion industry. Describes it as "psychological violence" on set. He travelled for 2 years around various countries and was asked to produce a short movie with with the photos he took for a film festival, Cinema Mundi. Recently travelled around Mediterranean Sea for 6 weeks.
-Tele-vision series
This woman does phenomenal illustrations. I didn't take many notes on her, probably because what she had to say was less related to the field I want to go in. But if there is anything I learned from her its that she loves her dog and I can't wait to have my own dog to keep me company someday.
-"Flirting With Shadows"
This company does special effects for movies. It was founded by George Lucas in 1975. The guy speaking, Christian Alzmann, began his design career like most others do...drawing as a kid. He loved to draw Star Wars. Who knew he'd get to work on the movie Star Wars II after being hired by ILM. As a special effects artist, you work more with the film makers than the actors. You do all different types of design: character design, environment design, special effects, animation, art direction...etc. It was fun learning about the process of their work. It looked very tedious, though. "The wonders of photoshop," he says, "not only can it make models beautiful but it can make ogres." His biggest advice for other designers...."HAVE FUN!!"
-Iron Man
RON ENGLISH
Ah yes, Ron English. What a guy! What a very special, different, kind of guy. He takes my favorite childhood cartoons and mutates them into some kind of evil itchy & scratchy versions of themselves. But on the other hand, it's really great. It's cool to see how much fun he has with it. He paints something and then does another version and another version. He also likes putting up billboards without permission. He does stealth missions for a living...I lav it! Dangerous though, makes me want to go out and vandalize billboards. He is a really hilarious guy. I wish he could have talked longer.
"our relationship with cows is everything but sexual, so I thought I'd add a sexual element to it, haha"
"listening to NPR kind of quiets me down"
"i think it's cool to put art in places people least expect it"
"and here are my kids drinking and smoking as clowns...."
-He made this Obama/Abe Lincoln poster and then was asked to make a campaign video for Obama, probably to reach younger crowds. And this what he came up with:
-AmericanDepress
-Fat Tony
-MCMilkshake
Well folks, that's all I got for ya! I hope that maybe this inspired my designer friends who couldn't make it, or at least provide some useful resources. The conference was awesome! I'll try to write about agIdeas next...however this one took a long time. I'm gonna have to shorten the agIdeas post quite a bit because there were a LOT more speakers.
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