think tank 09

Yesterday I attended my first conference with AIGA and now I am a member (finally!) The conference was incredible with speakers Ken & Jenn Visocky O'Grady, Dave Werner (okaydave.com), Ian Dapot and drumroll please....Paula Scher! The theme was Design Thinking, and how to communicate your creative ideas with clients when you speak designer and they speak business talk. Dave shared reasons why his portfolio site was so successful and pointed out that "the harder you work, the luckier you get." A theme that stood out to me personally was the fact that you have to embrace the idea of failure in order to be successful. Risk is necessary to do good work and you might bomb but you HAVE TO TRY NEW THINGS. That is something I struggle with, and honestly I would be shocked to meet anyone who said they never fear that. I do not like to fail. I admit I am a bit of a perfectionist and always want to produce good work. But failure has been a reoccurring word this year and although I have been fighting it, I really want to just let go of success for the sake of good work. Ironic but makes perfect sense.
In other news, this weekend is CreateAthon, a 24 hour non-stop working blitz that redpepper does to benefit 9 non-profits by developing marketing and design for them. I am so excited to be a part of it this year! I've been doing a lot of work this weekend to prepare for missing some classes, but I've spoken to all my professors and will be turning in work early. This week is going to be fantastic.

just for fun.

I've been meaning to post photos of some experimental work I did so here are a few, better late than never. These are some collages done with encaustic wax. Dan Brawner, the illustration professor at WCAD introduced me to this technique last year and a friend of mine and I had some fun with it one day. Viola!

fall is here.

Fall is here and I am ecstatic. We've been only a little over two weeks into the semester but its been wonderful. I even completed an illustration for Illustration 2 (see it at the left). We're illustrating Alice in Wonderland in a series of three. I am working from Chapter 1 and really going for a funky, whimsical style. Design 4 is great too, I'm working on an interactive brochure for Esty, the online marketplace for all things handmade. I feel confident about this semester and really plan to work on polishing my portfolio as much as I can.

redpepper is still fantastic. This week I got to be a part of a photoshoot for Kirkland's, the home decor store. They are a client of redpepper's as of this year and redpepper has already launched a community site (mykirklands.com), a huge sweepstakes, and had all the online members vote for their favorite designers to become "the" Kirklands Designers. There are a total of 5 and they flew in from all over the US to be photographed. We rented out a space downtown and had a fantastic time. I got to help out and capture behind the scenes footage of the shoot and everyone involved. Some of the designers were really goofy which provided lots of laughs. I am continually blown away by all that redpepper accomplishes for their clientelle. They're only an 8 year old company but wow, they are so successful and still growing. I believe one of the best things about being at redpepper is their emphasis on personal growth. No one can get stagnant and everyone supports growth in and out of the office. I'm suppossed to be doing a brief interview for Watkins soon about my experience there, so hopefully we'll get to do that soon and I can post it. I'll also try to post some photos of the shoot if possible. Or at least link to them.
I'm off now to have a great labor day weekend!

they like me, they really like me.

I have fantastic news. redpepper asked me to continue my internship through the fall semester! I am honored and excited. It's such a privilege to be asked to continue at a place that I have truly grown to love and has benefited me in more ways that just learning the "business side."
More good things are bound to follow through working and learning there.

Hatch Show Print Workshop: Gallery Reception

So I was fortunate enough to participate in the exclusive workshop for senior level design students with the infamous letterpress shop Hatch Show Print. We were split into groups of three and given the sentence "I Have Lost What I Cannot Find," and have to collaborate on the design we wished to create. I worked with the lovely and talented Valerie Hammond and Lydia Light to create a piece that I am very proud of. On top of printing our very own designs using Hatch's extensive library of fantastic wooden and lead type and beautiful imagery, we all were required to "personalize" our prints which creates a really unique show for Watkins. The work we all did is up in the gallery at Watkins and there will be a reception this Friday. I also got to design the graphics and invitation for the show which was a fun project. Once I get the chance, I'll take some photos of the prints I did. Come this Friday, August 28 from 6 to 9!

Welcome to the World of an Intern

Check out this video that my creative director at redpepper shared with me:
Welcome to the World of an Intern

"A video us interns put together in the last couple of weeks here at Crispin Porter + Bogusky, now that our internship is winding down. Brammo was our designated client for the summer, hence all the Enertia Bike and Brammo references. This video does not represent the culmination of the work we have been producing this summer. It was just something fun we wanted to do. And I think the Lonely Island influences are obvious."

Crispin Porter + Bogusky is an advertising agency that redpepper looks up to and that I have also come to admire since being introduced to them. Check out their website too: http://www.cpbgroup.com/

back to reality

I've just returned to Nashville from a wonderful vacation to Panama City Beach. It was beautiful all week despite reports that it would rain all week and I enjoyed it immensely. But it's always a bit of a rude awakening to go from 5 days lounging on the beach with no agenda to coming back to work and projects. I have a hell of a lot to do but it's all good things so I'm just trying to be thankful for projects being given to me. I took on a video project recently at my internship and I have very little (stress the little) knowledge of editing video. It's been a bit of a pain but I after converting the files to the correct state and then actually editing them, I've learned a lot of new things about digital movie files across Mac and Windows platforms as well as how to make my way around Final Cut Pro comfortably. So although it was a bit of a headache, I'm glad I took it on. I'm also going to be a new work study student for the Graphic Design department at Watkins so that is a great chance to get paid to do projects for the school and practice my design skills. Hopefully that will keep me busy throughout the semester.
My internship with redpepper will come to an end this coming week and although I hate to leave, it's good timing. Class starts in less than 2 weeks and since I'm helping out with Orientation this semester, I will be pretty booked. I'm ready to start though, ready to jump in with both feet. In 9 months I'll be a college graduate and I plan to really make these final two semesters count.