31 May 2009

The company I work at was a key sponsor of Saturday’s “Glenn Beck at the Capitol” fund raising gala in SLC. Thursday night, my boss called to tell me that they (the coordinators) granted us permission to play a quick little video at the event—something none of the other sponsors received, so it was a pretty big deal.  Problem was: we had no such video to show.

So Friday morning at 7:30, my boss, Dave, Joe (from Children Kids), and myself met up and ran over ground rules and a few basic concepts. By about 8:30, we knew we needed our stand-by musician extraordinaire, Micah (of Typophile and Children Kids fame… to name but a few) in order to pull anything even remotely ok off. He was there within the hour and we got down to business. With some help from Ashley Mackay (also of Typophile fame) and a few rolls of sushi from Demae here in Provo, we completed the piece from conception to final render in one day—done by 2:30 am.

Now, I know it’s not the world’s most perfect piece, but I think there’s some good foundational work in there. And, honestly, I’m pretty impressed with us for getting it done—period. Especially since I haven’t used After Effects since said Typophile fame…


22 January 2009

Here are a couple projects from Jihad Lahham that make me want to die.


20 January 2009

While not everyone is 100% thrilled for this day, most people, I think, are. And a lots been said about Obama’s near-flawless campaign and his beautiful integration of great graphic design and the exceptional way that he sparked grass-roots effort by new, young voters of all walks and race across the nation, and there’s not a ton I can add to all of that. But in commemoration of this historic day, I’ll point your way to a few Obama-related stories that I found interesting.

First, going back to where it all began for me about three and a half years ago: Dreams From My Father. A couple weeks ago, Pentagram revealed its redesign of the book. It’s simple and elegant… As my copy of the book was actually a Father’s Day gift to my dad (the title had “Father” in it and the cover images were intriguing, so I bought it… I think it impacted me more than him, however), I would love to purchase this edition. Unfortunately, it’s only sold in the UK.

Obama definitely struck a chord with the artistic community in America and that was something that really excited me. Not in my recollection has there been a President that, as a nation, we could respect and look up to. And I was a little sick of all the BUSH*IT flags in dog crap and the “Design of Dissent” that flooded the market. So it was both refreshing and inspiring to see artists create positive work promoting a candidate. And this shirt above—one I just saw today—may not be the most humble, respectful, or whatever T-shirt, but it’s funny. And I like it.

And what more can be said about Gotham and the Obama brand? I’m not even going to try. Just this, though: Hoefler & Frere-Jones released new weights of Gotham today. Coincidence? I would guess “no.”

I know there’s a million more things worth commenting on today, but I’ll rest at that and with this picture of Barack Obama’s sans-typography cover on Rolling Stone that totally blew me away (the articles with words inside the magazine are great, too, if you can get your hands on one…)

Good Luck, Mr President. ~