Oblada: a decade ago

I was reminiscing about various things yesterday and thought I would look up my old website on the Internet Archive Wayback Machine: 

I had a lot of fun designing this back in 2003. It was my primary introduction to potential clients; within a year, I left my full-time agency gig to start my own creative services "boutique". Working from home and doing what I love, often in sweatpants, was nothing short of living the dream. 

I wanted my site to be like a book and had a splash landing page acting as a cover...which is where my logo was. Yikes at it not being featured anywhere here! I don't think SEO was a thing back then (if it were, I wasn't paying attention) which is why I made all of my links graphics that incorporated elementary rollover tecniques. Style was still very much me though. Street art and the gallery of the urban landscape still very much influence everything I do. 

UCDA Design Awards

I traveled to Louisville, Kentucky this week to attend the University and College Designers' Association (UCDA) Design Conference. It was a great trip and an awesome, very inspirational gathering of those in my field of which I will write more about later. Here's a pic of the "winners circle", which I am very proud to be a part of having received an award of excellence for print design: 

Photo by Matthew Lester Photography ©2013

Artist Spotlight: Sasaki Makoto

I came across the work of Japanese photographer Sasaki Makoto a few years ago via a link on a design website. His Tokyo Layers series enchanted me; the brilliant swaths of light he captured via long, moving exposure reminded me of the frenetic tangible energy I experienced while walking the streets of the modern, imposing metropolis. It is abstract, yet completely figurative of the technicolour playground that the city becomes as the sun sets. 

Makoto has expanded on his Layers series to include other cities. Check out his work by clicking here. 

Tokyo Layers no.6

Tokyo Layers no.21

Shanghai Layers no.12

Shanghai Layers no.17

Design Week

Design Week, hosted by the Design Council of Saskatchewan, will be held October 21-25. The week is an open invitation to the public to learn about the different areas of design through a series of free lectures and other educational events such as tours, open houses and symposiums culminating in the Premiers' Awards of Excellence in Design. Check it out! 

For more information, click here.  

Oblada Vintage

I've been updating my portfolio the last while and came across some pieces I designed/illustrated that I haven't seen in ages. Like this Marilyn Monroe typographic illustration (circa 2003). Typography is one of my main interests of practice right now (in addition to emerging technologies like augmented reality). I'm not particularly fond of this illustration as I feel it's a bit pedestrian in execution, but I would like to revisit the concept and do an updated series: 

Then there's this campaign for Winnipeg's Millennium Library (circa 2007) that was developed in collaboration with Peter Skakum and Carol Marshall of Tangent Strategies. It included transit advertising, direct-mail, brochures and more with the sole intent of generating financial donations in order to buy more books to fill the shelves with new worlds of imagination. We had a lot of fun creating this (but it also helped to have a client that was completely open to anything). The campaign was so popular that an auction was held for the in-branch banners that were located at all #YWG library branches. My favorite of the seven-part series was always the Paris Hilton heiress one. It's like a timecapsule of 2007. I still like the concept (would tweak aspects of the design if redoing today) and it's one of my favorite portfolio pieces.  

Booyah!

Awesome day today. Received word that I won a University and College Designers Association (UCDA) Award of Excellence for work I did on this piece - the 2011-2012 SIAST Annual Report. The wire-o bound document with multiple covers embellished with silver foil will also be displayed in the permanant archive at UCDA headquarters. It's especially significant as my employer was recognized amongst nearly 1000 entries including submissions from institutes such as Harvard and Yale. #goSIAST #Booyah!

More to follow in October when awards are officially handed out at the UCDA Design Conference in Kentucky:   

Go!

One of the major projects I worked on this year was the annual Preview (2014-2015) for SIAST. Acting as art director/designer, my initial thematic concepts were "Sin City" meets "Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band" but I mostly wanted it to stand out from the crowd of clichéd academic marketing materials. Here's hoping it - and all associated projects related to its design - goes far in serving that purpose. 

Designer Magazine

Check out the Summer 2013 issue of Designer to read an article I wrote on finding creative inspiration in Japan. Also includes a portion of my portfolio featuring one of my favorite cities in the world, the neon safari otherwise known as Tokyo. Enjoy!