More Mighty Muggs

Feel free to preorder these for me. Mainly Wicket and the Imperial Guard...and the Yeti.

You know it's bad....

when Microsoft is laying off 5,000, and Wired magazine is half the size. The Wired mag issue is a frustrating one to me, because publication design is what I've been getting into lately, and if advertisers aren't advertising, then magazine is smaller and less people are needed to produce it. So slims out opportunities for me. And if Wired is getting slammed like that, then everyone else is. Everyone seems to be getting hit with this economical beatdown, as well as things that have nothing to do with the economy. It's starting off to be a rough year, but I'm trying my best to keep trekking on.

In other news and previously posted on Mike's blog, we tag teamed on a short winter mix. Here's the playlist:

1. The Snake The Cross The Crown-Maps
2. Radiohead-Gagging Order
3. The Acorn-Springtime in Centretown
4. The Album Leaf Seal Beach
5. Sigur Ros-Samskeyti
6. Alaska in Winter-Dont Read Dostoyevsky
7. Strafraenn Hakon-Rjupa
8. The Middle East-Lonely
9. Bon Iver-Blood Bank
10. Broken Social Scene-Her Disappearing Theme (I just added this)

I was going to try to include a desktop wallpaper, but didn't get anything done in time. maybe next month. Anyways, if you need any or all of these songs, let us know, we'll hook you up.

My typing plus baby crying is keeping Mike up. I'm out.

Leopard

Does anyone have a copy of Leopard they can send my way? Tiger isn't cutting it anymore.

Mike's Day

Friday, Mike asked me to make a chart of how he spends the day. For some reason, I didn't bother asking him why until I was already finished, which he then replies, "why? oh....I forgot why....." Either way, you get to enjoy a little graphic I created, demonstrating the normal and full work day of Mike:

Fog

Last week was pretty hectic, but this week, it has started to calm down. Lately it's been foggy as well, which is odd weather. I can't remember the last time I went out at 3 in the afternoon and it was foggy, usually it' s one of those morning/night occurances, but not lately. And a bit odd that it coincides with my unclear and "foggy" future....maybe I'm reading too much into it.

Here are some links that have just been lingering in my draft pile for the past week:

-Hey, look who's number 2 on the cities that need a fitness overhaul (fattest cities). Oklahoma City, that's who.
-Silent World. Very nice and minimalistic photographs by Michael Kenna
-Just-My-Type. Some nice and downloadable (in .ai format) type faces
-Top Fonts of 2008. Another list, a couple weeks late. but it's all goooood.
-The Murphy's Laws of Graphic Design
-How Not to Design a Logo
-Logos after the Financial Crisis
-The United States of Logos
-Ampersand: little zine coming out Kansas. Very nice. Which reminds me of Q and it's apparent eternal hiatus. I don't know what's going on with it anymore....
-Design in Democracy: a short blurb on how our government needs to utilize good design to properly communicate. I agree. Which also brings upon the revamp of Whitehouse.gov. Very nicely done (Here's a look at the old one).
-Manifest Hope: a look at some of presidential art from this past year. Pretty neat seeing some nice work coming out of politics, which usually has the worse of art/design.
-Shepard Fairey on Colbert Report:

The Colbert ReportMon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Shepard Fairey

Colbert at Christmas
Colbert Christmas DVD

Green Screen
Bill O'Reilly Interview

It kind of baffles me to see that hit the mainstream. And I'm pretty sure that Obama poster has become the new "I heart NY," considering all the lame Obamafications I've seen online...
-Bike Lanes that travel with you. Brilliant Idea.
-2008 Feltron Annual Report. Everything about this I love. I remember seeing last year's and thinking it was a neat project, but the more and more I think about it, I feel the need to wrap myself around a project like this and include all the nitty gritty details in nice information graphics.


Quote of the month:
"Change is inevitable, and if you try to cling to something…you’ve just got to let go. Let go, go with the flow, don’t panic, take a deep breath. ”
-Kevin Calabro, taken from his interview in the Jan. issue of Sports NW, which I helped design....

Martin Luther King Jr. Day

"All progress is precarious, and the solution of one problem brings us face to face with another problem."

Martin Luther King Jr.
'Strength to Love,' 1963

End of Week/Hatch Show Recap

First off, I want to congratulate my sister for being officially accepted to BYUI for college, Good job Sis!

And second. Well. I don't know where to begin. This week has been quite a busy one, while I have been shuffling between working in Seattle doing some freelance for Sports NW, and doing a little for OK Today. Which is kind of funny because I have two overlapping jobs right now, and in about a week, I'll be back to just sitting around again (did I just repeat myself from earlier this week?). But it's all good.

Mike and I attended the lecture at EMP on Wednesday, featuring Jim Sherradon from Hatch Show. It was definately worth the visit and interesting to hear his stories and how he came along to working there. Here's my top from the lecture.

1. "Preservation through Production." This was over emphasized for obvious reasons - working in a 100 year old print shop and still using the old wood cuts. But I think this is very well applied to us today. I think our work, whether it's design or what we do with people, etc is going to find it's place if we put those things into action.

2. "These blocks have souls." Just the idea of using our tools and being in tune with them. I'm sure his explanation to that would so much different, but that's me talking.

3. Having a degree is important. That aspect was a little surprising to me for some reason, I suppose it was because he makes a living off his art. But he somehow stressed that aspect, and also mentioned that everyone in his shop has a degreee of some sort. Education is key kids.

4. If you want a job in the art field, you can do it. This coming from a man that lived in his car for some time. That was a bit inspiring seeing how he worked himself up. Not like someone just handed everything over to him. But something I needed to hear.

5. The Importance of Networking. Nothing new. Also dealing with who you know not what you know (see below). But I think for me, it's just the idea that we/I need to connect with my clients and friends and you never know where that might take you. I think every designer I hear talk, always has friends of friends that somehow hook them up with some crazy job. But you know, that's how it works. So I just have to accept that and try to work it to my advantage (yeah Mike, I know I'm horrible at talking/communicating with people).

Other Notes:
• I don't know anyone in Seattle. Everyone we saw, would be like, "OH, I didn't know you were going to be here?!"
• It's still who you know more than what you know. Sure, having an education is fine and dandy, but every time he mentioned a major client or job that he would get, it was just by some odd chance they would get it. i.e. landing the Smithsonian exhibit was because his friend that set up his other exhibit happened to pass by his friend/neighbor and told them to check out the show and they just so happened to be on the board at the Smithsonian. How convenient.
• "To be sho, Mr. Green, to be sho". There was a joke in the middle of the lecture. You had to be there.
• Repetition in work is ok. I find myself reusing elements in my designs, but there was a lot of that in their poster designs and just was reassuring to me that professionals do the same.
• Never seen/heard so many people impressed by a 16 year old who type set a poster.
• Lady next to me needs to quit making unnecessary noises every other slide. "uh"
• OH WOW, he designed The Show wine bottle.

I have a few links that have been in a blog draft for a few days. I'll get those up sometime soon. Hope everyone has a nice weekend.

Busy Bee

I'm back to being busy this week. I spent the weekend prepping up a new blog: ROCKETPUNCH!, which I tediously tweaked some of the html....anyways, decided to use this blog for more personal notes slash design related items, and use Rocketpunch for more fun videos and links. It will also be more of a community blog, as I have already recruited a few others. If you're interested in contributing, let me know, I'll drop you an invite.

Although I don't have a real job yet, I'm doing some part time freelancing this week, actually doubling over with a couple magazines, so I'm going to be crazy busy for the next week and a half (and then nothing). It feels nice to be doing/creating/producing work....

Finish It

Tomorrow I embark on my last day at Target. and I really need to get serious about coming up with some funds.
I hate bills and I hate loans. But it must go on...

It's been hard moving foreword when you've hardly achieved anything positive in the process. I'm learning this....the hard way. Due to a wave of misfortune the past couple weeks, I'm starting to see a glimmer of hope, as I have meticulously devised a process in which to recover the files off my corrupt external. It's a complicated situation, but I have it copying over right now, and everything seems to be intact (minus a few oddly named files). And that was a run-on sentence. Basically I have to use a program through MS-Dos on MIke's PC. Go figure. When's the last time you used MS-DOS? Yeah, exactly.

And on the sidenote, I overheard a lady at the library talking about how they were still using Windows 98. Yikes. Next to DOS (and Win95), that's almost in the stone age of operating systems. Oh, how far we've come.

Hatch Show Print at EMP

This exhibit is at the Experience Music Project and have been waiting to go. Then today I found this event and then I reserved me a spot. See you next Wednesday Jim.

Objectified Trailer

More Info here

A Saturday Well Spent

Things I did Today:

-Checked this out:


-Watched Star Wars, Ep. IV&V on a super nice 57 inch tv
-Beat Mario 3. Again.

Edit: I did not create that postcard. Ames Bros did. and I'm trying to get my hands on a poster...

Quotes of the Week + Top Five

Both while at my second to last day of work at Target. Not Direct quotes, but as close as I remember.

Tim, Head of the Tacoma Target, in regards of my saying I moved from OK: "That has to be one of the ugliest places, well anywhere in the panhandle." Sure, I admit, OK can be pretty, but it's mostly it's colorful skies. Overall....it's mostly brown there.

Josh, backroom coworker, after I told him I'm a Mac user, and then giving me the worst excuse in the world not to own a Mac: "I could never get into Macs and only having one mouse button."

This being the New Year, I'm taking it upon myself to put more ideas into action. Mostly writing them all down for future reference, as some of my ideas are more long term than a month or a year. and also going to pull a High Fidelity and start Top Five lists. Todays:

Top Five Things to Accomplish This Year
1. Get a job: or a steady cash flow
2. Get out of this house and into my own!
3. Get to Canada: Not really an accomplishment, but something I want to do this year.
4. Release an album. Haven't gotten all the details worked out, but will more than likely be a digital ep.
5. Start planning my own Design Studio. I don't plan to have everything worked out by the end of the year, but I want to start a list of 'to do's' as well as a guideline of what I need to do make it work.

2009

I have yet to come up with a plan for 2009, as far as 'resolutions' are concerned. Just trying to fix one thing at a time. This week's agenda: my external hard drive. Which apparently I was right in the assumption of my files being there. Data Rescue was able to see most of them (after like a 10 hour scan), but they are catagorized by file type. So I guess my directory file is corrupt and not sure if I can get any of my folders/file names/organization back. And I had everything on my hard drive. This is going to be a very time consuming project. and I am not even sure what is or isn't there, so I'm very reluctant to wipe the drive clean just yet. Just going to take every measure to get those files before I just reformat it. I do have the 'recovered' files copied over to a newly bought external, but I'm not sure how I'm ever going to find anything, at least for next couple months. Luckily, I had backed up my Nikon D80 photos (Jan-Oct) and December is on my hard drive, so November is the only month that is limbo. I am also not sure about the status of my design files or my music. Which I had an extensive library so that will take a long while to get back. An ever frustrating situation, but it's the new year and I'm going to do my best to just move foreword.