The wanderings of a particularily curious designer

Funweek

2010-07-02T13:43:00.000-07:00

During my job search here in Toronto I've been keeping myself busy by taking on personal projects. This one was a project put on by FreeCHURCH for week of activities for parents and kids. The identity needed to be flexible, fun, approachable, and somewhat neutral to apply to future campaigns. The FreeChurch logo was integrated into the top left corner to make sure the association to the church is understood. The imagery was inspired by different activities that will be taking place during funweek.

The turn around on this project was a couple of days and I wanted illustration for this poster. Luckily I have a very talented and quick illustrator friend in Julia Tiller who provided the imagery funweek needed. Big thanks.

Check out Julia's Website here

Happy Birthday

2010-07-02T12:57:00.000-07:00

During the first week after I moved to Toronto my friend Vicky asked me to help her out on a birthday card she was making. I was involved with the some of the pre-planning but all my suggestions were much less extravagant than she intended. But I'm happy to say she didn't listen to me because this card turned out much nicer than I imagined it in my head. All I did was the typography on the front. It's quite as refined as I think it can be but I only had a couple of hours to get it finished. Regardless I think the card turned out nicely. Great job Vicky.

Check out Vicky's website

And the Winner is...

2010-06-18T08:15:00.001-07:00

This lovely image is taken from the NOOKA campaign my partner Ian Liu and myself developed for the One Show College Competition. We had Ellen Lagore do the photography for us which was critical for the campaign. This campaign was based on the concept of a visual language of time. Normal objects were arranged in a way to encourage reading time differently.

Unfortunately, none of us got to attend the awards ceremony in NYC because it was the day before our convocation ceremony in Calgary. But the recognition is quite enough for us. Ian and myself were the sole canadian representatives in the finalists for the NOOKA Ad competition. Just more proof that canadian thinking is competitive on a global scale. Great work guys.

ONE CLUB award winners

Ian Liu's website

Ellen Lagore's website

Elissa Music

2010-06-18T07:53:00.000-07:00

Another musical person I met via FreeChurch. Her name is Elissa Mielke. She is a pretty girl with a pretty voice. She has a show tonight here in TO for NXNE (north by northeast) at the Free Times Cafe. I particularly her song Everyone is Missing, but you decide. Have a listen.

www.myspace.com/elissasongs

The fun promo was illustrated by Andrea Manica.

check out her blog

First Rate People

2010-06-13T18:16:00.000-07:00

While at FreeChurch's coffeehouse last week I met Liam Senegan. He performed an acoustic set that night but what stood out for me was his electronic solo work under the name Lum. He is also part of the equally talented group First Rate People. Check 'em out.

First Rate People's Myspace

Worthy Causes

2010-06-13T12:11:00.000-07:00

A church down the street, by the name of FreeChurch, held their 3rd Coffee House on June 8th. This event was created to bring the local community together and raise money for Ontario Pioneer Camp. I heard they were looking for additional artwork so I decided to join in and get involved. That night I met a bunch of great people, saw some cool work, and listened to some great tunes. It was slightly reminiscent of PARK Ltd. and what we tried to do. I felt quite at home that night. Next time around, hopefully I can help out a bit more.

http://freechurch.ca/

http://www.pioneercamp.ca/

http://ourparkonline.com/

I Wish I had Design Instruction in Highschool

2010-06-13T10:49:00.000-07:00

During a short visit in my hometown of Sarnia after graduation, I had the pleasure of teaching a 2-day class to Grade 11 -12's at St. Clair Secondary School. I've recently been reconnecting with my former Art teacher Mrs. Ireland and it has come up on a few occasions how I wish I was introduced to design principles in highschool. It was during one of those visits with Mrs. Ireland, I offered to teach her kids about abstraction when she mentioned her students were struggling with the concept. Before my Graphic Design career I fancied the idea of teaching art in highschool, so I jumped at the chance.

I taught them the basics of simplification through abstraction. They got to choose a picture of an elephant or a swordfish and with the tracing paper provided, they slowly found inherent shapes found in that image. From sheet to sheet the images became more and more simple and became more unique. I also asked them at the end of the second day to fill their tracings in. This forced them to think in shapes rather than line.

This really was a crash course in abstraction, but I am proud of the results a lot of them were able to achieve. This was the first time any of them were introduced to this exercise and a surprising amount of them were able to grasp it right away. They were a bright group of kids and I hope I was able to give them a new perspective on how abstraction can be use toward design and art.