New York Times: Education Life
It seems like I have become a regular contributor for the Education Life section of the New York Times. AD Nicki Kalish calls in the late summer with articles offering advice for first time students and parents at the college level. The top illustration is for an article about living off campus and the bottom is for an article about meal cards and students sharing cards with students who cannot afford meals. It’s a fun department for me because it feels like I’m preparing for the school year.
Computerworld: Bridging the Generation Gap
It is always a good day when April Montgomery, AD for Computerworld, calls. April and I have worked together for many years and have developed a great work chemistry. We have a “ping pong” process where we swap spreads back and forth. Many times an idea will develop in to something bigger for the assignment. Our most recent project was about IT managers needing to balance workers from different generations. The generational dynamic is more acute in IT where each generation has skills the others lack. It was a complex story but a surprisingly simple idea caught the essence. Paul Rand was an inspiration and the use of simple shapes to build something bigger turned out to be answer. It also catches the relationships one generation must have with another for everything to work. April said the team was very pleased with the final product and I couldn’t be happier since I got to channel Paul Rand or a day.
Alternate version for the story. We went with the green and bluel version because it felt more dynamic.
And here’s the final spread:
Kresge Foundation Annual Report
Hour Media has been a long time client and it’s been a thrill to see them grow along with the resurgence in Detroit. When AD Ken Cendrowski called with an annual report for the Kresge Foundation it was a pleasant surprise. The client and the design team wanted the metaphor of tools to represent their broad scope of support and the process was very collaborative. Ken created a pegboard pattern and it was my job to create characters and tools which would work with the pegboard. Also included was a table of contents section with elements and vignettes which could be used throughout the report. Kresge turned out to be a great client during the process. Most satisfying of all was the enthusiastic feedback from Kresge and their clients. Much thanks to Ken for an engaging project and process.
LDS Magazine: Mormon Inventions
Creative Director Kelly Nield from Hales Creative called with a fun assignment. A cover an couple of illustrations were needed for a feature about Mormon inventions. The fun part was not realizing how many important inventions were created by Mormons so it was an eye opening assignment. I had known about the artificial heart but many of the breakthroughs by Mormons took me by surprise. I tried catching the sense of wonder and it’s always nice to work on a project which opens your eyes.
Digital Sound
Artificial Heart
Industrial Diamonds
Suspicious Minds
One of the best things about illustration is collaborating with others to make a unified piece. The best Art Directors play ping pong with artists dropping sketches into layouts, sending the layouts to artists, and artists refining sketches to send back to the art director. SooJin Buzelli and I use this method often whenever working on something larger. I’m more of an illustrator with a designers mentality so this process makes it easier to visualize what is best as an artist for the page. When SooJin sent back the final layout, it was like a kid opening a present for his birthday.
New York Times: Inconvenient Indeed
Catherine Gilmore-Barnes called with a great assignment for the New York Times Science section. The project called for a cover and 5 spots about the Climate Change movement which is starting to gain critical mass. As with any movement there are growing pains and the feature discussed the many movements within a movement. Naturally this assignment happened during the same week as board duties for ICON9 in Austin so I would work on the project each day at 6:00am before the conference day. Some days I snuck into Jason Holley’s backstage area to work where Jason’s team furiously created an amazing stage design. The energy was exhilarating. Catherine and the editors were happy and conference was a huge success. It’s a week I’ll never forget.
ICON Workshop: How to build a business
Links for handouts and the basics of investing for the ICON9 workshop Setting Up a Business (so you won’t be financially ruined). This is not investment advice since I draw pictures for a living but they are a great start for the new investor. The links are very artist friendly so your head will not explode.
Handouts for Setting up a Business ( James Yang, Melinda Beck)
Create a long term investment plan (Wealth Pilgrim)
Things to avoid at all costs (Fool.com)
Embracing what you don’t know will make you a better investor (Notes from the Hedge)
Words of wisdom from Eddy Elfenbein. He’s one of my favorite financial bloggers (a blog)
Getting back to the Basics of Investing ( Barry Ritholz for the Washington Post)
Good Question, Great Question (A Wealth of Common Sense)
If you develop an interest in the markets and want to take it up to the next level, Abnormal Returns is hands down the best resource for curated articles from the web.