We as designers need to have the opportunity to network with different people and share our creativity, get feedback and improve our work. We may talk about current events, favorite typefaces, PMS colors (or Pantone cookies) and HTML coding or whatever is on our mind — This is something that makes each of us grow and learn as designers.
I am taking this moment to look back to last week and thank those who came out and attended our After the Holidayz party down at the Waterfront Hotel. I hope that everyone enjoyed themselves, and enjoyed the food, music and of course the company. Their were many new faces and some regular ones as well. I enjoyed meeting and speaking to each person and I hope that everyone enjoyed mixing with different people and taking a fresh step into the new year. As the membership chair I want to make sure that your voice is heard and that all of our members are getting the experience that they deserve. Because without you there would be no AIGA Baltimore.
So Please if there is anything you want to share or have a concern about shoot me an email: kristin@baltimore.aiga.org I would be happy to help.
I am raising my glass to the new, the seasoned veterans, and those that are thinking about becoming a member, Thank you for being/becoming part of our community and help me grow and be inspired.
Looking for information for a class I’m teaching on Page Layout, I ran across a video on YouTube of Paul Rand, the designer for whom was, perhaps, my first entree to the notion of design as a profession. The interview I attached is by a group interviewing Steve Jobs, who at the time, was developing a company called Next, after he left Apple in the early nineties, oh so long ago.
Job’s description of the work of Paul Rand embodies what, if anything, describes the direction of the modern designer: “[Paul] is the intertwining of a pure artist and somebody who is very astute at solving business problems.”
In another interview from around the same time, I heard Rand speak about the relative simplicity of the solution that he develops. In an interview on Connecticut Public Television (search YouTube for miggb), he retorts that the relative simplicity [of various logos—in this case the logo for ABC] could be duplicated and drawn by a child.
Reading between the lines, the designer is in the solution business, not the art business, nor the consultant business. Rand’s approach was about being both.
There’s a matter-of-fact, bluntness that leaves one wanting when hearing Rand speak of the pursuit of the solution. His book A Designer’s Art, perhaps my first graphic design read, is where his thoughts go into full bloom. But, in the Connecticut Public Radio interviews he’s basically like: I did this or that because I think it works.
I attached this video because the Steve Jobs of the 1990s, captures the speakable and the unspoken of what paul Rand brought to the table and that factor that a designer or design firm should be bringing to the table. Asked about Rand’s process, Jobs said it’s not to so much that he could say about it, but more that you could feel it.
Recently, I was asked by a student what was better generalization or specialization and frankly I am of a divided opinion:
I’ve heard that being a generalist and knowing a bunch of different things in design waters down the thing that one specializes in and devalues the body of professional achievement.
I’ve also heard the opposite: Applying a diverse background of work often informs a designer by giving that person “fresh eyes” to a problem.
…And read a bit on this: In The Dip, Seth Godin says that the way our society is, there’s little value in being ranked lower than, say number six in any category. So, if one were a generalist, it means they do so at the danger of not adding to their strengths, whose achievement more than pays for itself in benefits (i.e. work, awards, money, etc.)
Well, I opened the question up to the AIGA Baltimore LinkedIn group and here are some responses from our great group members:
“I was asked by a student which is better: being a generalist and being moderately good at alot of disciplines in design or being a specialist? What are your thoughts?”
Lucas writes: “Being a jack-of-all-trades type of person I feel that I have had success through that path. But there is trouble finding a job outside of just freelancing that suits this type of process. I think you run into trouble trying to figure out where you fit in with a 9-5 job in terms of salary, “Am I a Web Designer or more of a developer or am I just a poser?” Also, I fantasize about being a hand-lettering specialist. Do what feels right, do it well and things will come your way.”
Brian writes: “From what I’ve experienced when you start out you have to be a jack of all trades to get people in the door and feed yourself. Then as you season you usually are attracted to a couple of things you are passion about and specialize in thus become known for.”
Stephanie adds: “More and more clients are coming to us (professional talent firm) for that Hybrid Designer / Developer. But more than anything they want to see the passion for what you do and they want you to be able to communicate that with those you work with.”
Just a small sampling of the population but opinions abound. Have an opinion? Feel free to add it to our discussion. Thanks.
If you haven’t been already, now is the time for full-speed ahead. Aim for your dreams and aspirations by making each project and every hour work for those goals. In an interview featured on this blog earlier this year with Greg Bennett of WorktoDate, he revealed his secret for creativity on a grand scale on projects: “total immersion”.
Design. Re-Design… But Simply Do.
Design Army’s revelation in their lecture called “Strip” pointed out that while often very busy, not all of their projects are high profile or high budget. Some projects don’t even “cover” the design budget in search of the creative execution. But, they’ve fashioned a formula that doesn’t skimp on creativity, nor success. They work the ideas until the concepts and sketches make just as much sense as the final executions.
Last year, I read a quote from the venerable Michael Beirut in which he said: “Be generous with your work. See something that needs doing or redoing.” Design/redesign. Keeping a bevy of ideas and projects is always a way to keep your concepting and portfolio fresh. Sometimes you may even need to “turn off the meter” in order to let the creativity flow.
Still, this doesn’t mean you have to give away the creativity for free.
Strip Lecture, AIGA Event April 2010, ®Design Army
Sketch. Sketch Often.
Pum Lefebure of the very same Design Army said in the “Strip” lecture that every project that they work on has to work conceptually before they bother to design it. This means that sketching out the idea—which is faster than designing and gets the design to a state where it can be evaluated for things like “flow” and “tenor” can be made and adjustments can go in before the work of laying out the design.
Sketches are just tools to get you to the ultimate piece that you are creating and they don’t need to be artistic masterpieces in and of themselves. They need to make sense to you and need to help you make decisions on the work you’re doing/planning to do/have done.Keep in mind that one of the most famous jazz albums of all time: Kind of Blue was developed on napkins, based on chords that Miles Davis had been thinking about.
So keep your sketchbook and keep adding to it. It helps you offload the ideas—and the interface problems—to a real, tactile environment, helping you to address those problems before putting time into them. Allow the concept to be as good as the execution.
Esquire Magazine, January 2011
Do It and Do It Again. The Result May Surprise.
I read an interview article in the January 2011 issue of Esquire’s “What I Learned” segment focused on Robert DeNiro’s role in Taxi Driver, delivered by Jodie Foster:
“By the time I got the role in Taxi Driver, I’d already made more stff than De Niro or Martin Scorcese. I’d been working from the time I was three years old. So even though I was only twelve, I felt like I was the veteran there.
DeNiro took me aside before we started filming. He kept picking me up form my hotel and taking me to different diners. The first time he basically didn’t say anything . He would just like, mumble. the second time he started to run lines with me, which was pretty boring because I already knew the lines. The third time, he ran lines with me again and now I was really bored. The fourth time, he ran lines with me, but then he started going off on these completely different ideas within the scene, talking about crazy things and asking me to follow in terms of imporvisation.
So we’d start with the original script and then he’d go off on some tangent and I’d have to follow, and then it was my job to eventually find the space to bring him back to the last three lines of the text we’d already just learned.
It was a huge revelation for me, because until that moment I thought beig an actor was just acting naturally and saying the lines someone else wrote. Nobeody had ever asked me to build a character. The only thing they’d ever done to direct me was to say something like “Say it faster’ or “say it slower”. So it was a whole new feeling for me because I realized acting was not a dumb job. You know, I thought it was a dumb job. Somebody else writes something and then you repeat it. Like, how dumb is that?
There was this moment, in some diner somewhere, when I realized for the first time that it was me who hadn’t brought enough to the table. And I felt this excitement where you’re all sweaty and you can’t eat and you can’t sleep.”
® House Industries
Sweat the details.
Rich Roat of House Industries has made a living of having a company that sweats the details. If I could tell one thing about the lecture that Rich gave, it would be that. … and the custom-made House Industries motorcycle jacket that Rich wore was “phat”.
“That the best thing you can do for yourself as a designer is not get too comfortable.”
The often-heard, less seldom followed advice came from Dave Plunkert, of Spur Design, the illustrator and designer of our Pulp, Ink and Hops 2010 campaign.
Your comfort zone is so yesterday. A book I read called the Visionary Handbook discusses how businesses often are here today, gone tomorrow because they don’t successfully undermine their own success to allow it to evolve.
Like, the success of Blockbuster’s mining the 80’s and 90’s video rental era and its inability to translate that success into a business model that could compete with media (and market share) evolution of Netflix.
Invent (re-invent) your reason for being as needed and allow yourself to be uncomfortable.
Find and Guard Your Value.
Spec, or speculative work, and creative exploration are two sides of the street. While it takes no more for you to exercise your creativity than to develop a concept of something that needs doing/re-doing, it’s still very important not to underestimate the value of your work and talents to the role of communication. So, properly value them. Spec work websites or projects often compromise the creative rights of the designer.
Exploring concepts creatively—for your own growth—on the other hand give you the opportunity to add to your portfolio and concept and develop solutions to design problems. In the business world, isn’t this simply called R&D?
It’s the research (work) that is needed to contribute to a breakthrough. By contrast, spec-work is a gamble that could or could not pay off. In many ways, contributing to spec-work has the same fruitfulness of taking your most valuable asset: your time and contributing it to a lottery.
A lottery? which reminds me: “Work hard to take the gamble out of the gamble.” Donald Trump. If you can do that, then what someone else calls a gamble might very well be worth it. In which case, you can do what you want.
The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its overall blog health:
The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads This blog is doing awesome!.
Crunchy numbers
A Boeing 747-400 passenger jet can hold 416 passengers. This blog was viewed about 2,800 times in 2010. That’s about 7 full 747s.
In 2010, there were 83 new posts, not bad for the first year! There were 103 pictures uploaded, taking up a total of 29mb. That’s about 2 pictures per week.
The busiest day of the year was September 8th with 60 views. The most popular post that day was Felt & Wire call for designers!.
Where did they come from?
The top referring sites in 2010 were baltimore.aiga.org, linkedin.com, twitter.com, facebook.com, and email00.secureserver.net.
Some visitors came searching, mostly for design army, pizza box, pizza box design, poster competition no fee, and scott belsky.
Attractions in 2010
These are the posts and pages that got the most views in 2010.
This SHAG program is sponsored by Dolphin Press & Print at MICA and MICA’s programs in Graphic Design and illustration. SHAG website is sponsored by AQUENT, the talent agency for marketers and designers.
A teacher teaching a class on typography asked a group: “I am teaching a course on typography which will touch on the concepts of type in motion. I would love to hear your favorite film titles.” Here are the answers from a creative group on LinkedIn.
“The Wild Bunch”, Sam Peckinpah
“North by Northwest”, Saul Bass
“Sleepy Hollow”, Tim Burton
“Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events”
“Altered States”
“Helvetica”
“Catch Me If You Can”
“Fight Club”
“Stranger Than Fiction”
“Up In The Air”
“Seven”
Often, I like to speak about the importance of “connectedness”. In a past post, I described the Mark Simon matrix of “How We Get Hired” and the fact is being good is not enough, it’s about getting in the crosshairs of people who know and trust your work. This message is one that I try to send to the vendor and partner community with regard to AIGA Baltimore and its thriving community of creative people and designers. It’s also a message that the same community (all of you) should heed when it comes to connecting to your respective communities for work.
Here’s an excerpt from an email sent to me when, as the board has been preparing for Pulp, Ink & Hops, our vendor showcase and networking event, I get a call asking if I knew a vendor that could meet a specific need. Well, of course I do!! And no, not just because they are in our vendor showcase. It happens to be no coincidence that some of our partners who continually reach out to us, both in board capacities and off, are top-of-mind when certain projects arise. Such is the case.
“Thank you so much once again for your help. We are very fortunate to have an association like AIGA around – time and time again, I know I can always count on our great membership to help out with all our crazy designer needs 😉
I passed on [vendor’s] info to [contact’s company] president, [contact] (also former [local AIGA chapter] Board Member) who should be contacting him shortly. I made sure to tell [contact] to let [vendor] know that we got his info from you!”
The facts are clear. There is no understatement about how tough a era it’s been with the overhang of a large recession and its slow recovery. I’ve been in conversations with longtime vendors and community partners whom were unavailable for this year’s show because of the specific compromises the economy has made on their businesses—some who are no longer in those businesses. Those compromises, while in some cases are very specific, cast a pall over the whole atmosphere. Yet, we still must move forward, and pick up where and when we can, celebrating the process that brought us here and changing our practices to fit the new way we work.
Design and the businesses in which it circulates, are still, businesses about great skill, but then it’s also business about fit and trust. Sometimes, the best designer or printer isn’t the most skillful, sometimes the best designer is the most reliable and trustworthy. Choose to be a little of both. In an era when the crisis of confidence is often about one’s ability to pay attention, not a question of the ability itself, our ability to dial-in to our communities’ needs and help to service them pays off. Events like Pulp, Ink & Hops help to mind that gap for designers with projects and vendors looking for contacts.
