2009 was a very exciting and interesting year for me both personally and professionally. I’d finished up my first year at my day job and have found the time to take on a good deal of freelance work to fuel my more creative interests. On top of all of that my wife and I are expecting our first child in April. I have a great feeling that 2010 is going to be an exciting year and will continue to be prosperous.

Some of the work I did this year can be found in my Work section of the site; some highlights include the branding and website development for Western Spray Foam, wedding invitations for my sister-in-law’s wedding that I just attended, as well as a general design touch-up for my own site which I recently completed.

I’m currently finishing up a new website project and will post it soon. I’ve found lately that it’s much easier to find work developing websites than graphic design, primarily because fewer people tend to know how to design and code a website. This is great for me because websites tend to be longer term projects and can often allow for continuing development after the initial launch, which helps promote longer term client relationships as well.

One of my favorite projects I did this year was for myself. It was a sub page of this site called Things I’ve Recently… The site was primarily developed as a creative outlet for me to review and speak about interesting albums I’ve heard, films I’ve seen, and books I’ve read. I’ve found it’s much easier to update a site that I can feed on a regular basis with creative input than to write a lengthy, well thought out blog entry about design. I think in the coming year I may incorporate the updates from that site into the blog for this site so that it’s sort of a mixed bag of updates in case others haven’t found my RSS feed for the other site.

2010 is looking like a great year and I’m excited to see what develops creatively and in my life in other regards. I’m super excited to become a Dad and can’t wait to meet my new daughter. Without further adieu, here are a few of my New Years Resolutions:

• Update both blogs more frequently.
• Work on more creative projects for myself.
• Develop a website for my Daughter-to-Be as a place for friends and family to see photos of her and get news about her (No we don’t have a name picked out).
• Enjoy life.

In an effort to get myself to blog more, I created a new part of my site called Things I’ve Recently…, essentially this is a log of my media consumption. Things I’ve read (novels, magazines), heard (albums, podcasts), or seen (television, films) I will write a review for and share my thoughts about. When thinking of things to write blog posts about in the past I’ve always struggled with having an individual voice and contributing something of interest to the blogosphere. Because I read, hear, and see so much it’s a much easier outlet for me to describe in short my thoughts about each given item, in a manner than can be done quickly as well. I hope you enjoy the new part of the site. Also, if you’re a Google Reader fan, add my RSS feed so you’ll get updates whenever I’ve added something new to that part of the website. Ideally I’d like to update it once a week talking about the media I consumed that given week.

The basis of what makes Helvetireader effective and attractive is of course it’s use of Helvetica for text clarity and either taking away or hiding certain Google Reader functions. For example, after you’re done reading a post you have a multitude of options at the bottom of the post (i.e. Add Star, Like, Email, etc.); Helvetireader hides this option until you hover over the area, so unless you choose to do one of these things your viewing area isn’t cluttered. It’s use of white space is also another huge benefit of using this script over the typical Google Reader, you really feel like you’re just viewing one post at a time instead of a screen full of text.

Because I use Google Reader every day, having an option to make this experience simpler and more visually attractive is definitely something I’m interested in. I posted a few screenshots below to explain what it looks like, I’ve also made a custom icon for my dock which works out very well. If anyone’s interested I’ve posted the link to the custom icon right here.

Only downside is that you return to this:

Poor Google Reader.

“Every now and then, you are introduced to a character who is erudite, has charm, wit and is worldly. You may be left feeling a little insecure about who you are and how you conduct yourself or you may feel inspired to put on your best shoes and step forward into the world with a little more joie de vivre. Well as they say, “we give you Monsieur Boudin” that stylish little daschund from Paris.”

Absolutely loving these greeting cards via Print & Pattern:

Alan Ball the creator of my favorite HBO show Six Feet Under is back to tell the tale of Sookie Stackhouse, a 25-year-old waitress living in small-town Louisiana where a year or two after the government has began to offer equal rights to vampires (what the show called ‘coming out of the coffin’). One day the new vampire in town strolls into Sookie’s bar they become friends. I won’t go into too much detail on the premise of the show considering there are lots of other reviews and/or descriptions out there. Ball provides a similar style of exposition as he does in Six Feet Under where the show is essentially an ensemble cast but quickly breaks into the private lives of all the key players and relates them back to the group. Each of the characters is so intriguing, from the main characters to the less important ones, I could really watch a show with any of them as the key actors because they are all very interesting in their own way.

If you’d like to see a wonderful show full of all that HBO goodness (the sex, violence, language, and grit) with a fantastic cast which I can’t get enough of, watch True Blood, out now on DVD with Season 2 starting on June 15th, I’m really wanting HBO now.

On a equally important side note, another genre-breaking piece of vampire ephemera I recently saw was the amazing Swedish vampire film Let the Right One In. This film is wonderful in so many ways, from the subtle use of color to the austere Swedish landscapes, the film captures a place in time that feels both old and new while telling a story that feels timeless as well. I won’t bother talking about the details of the film, but highly suggest a viewing.

I have sort of a LOVE/HATE relationship with sites who post lists of great designs on the internet. I really LOVE the fact that they are a constant source of inspiration, and offer a sense of convenience that some other individual has taken the time to scour the internet in search of what is great out there that’s worth seeing in the world of design. I HATE the fact that so many exist yet collectively have a lot of the same content. This is mostly a problem because if I check my daily websites and see the same things posted in 4 different sites, the inspiration is lacking and feels like a lot of people are talking at once yet no one is hearing one another.

This is one of the reasons I’ve really considered not having a blog at all. Yes I’d love to have a place to share my thoughts and inspiration about design, but do I really want to become part of the cacophony ? Simply having blog posts linking to other people’s blog posts seems counter-productive in the efforts to share individual and unique thoughts (what I thought a blog was for). Within the last few years however there have been a few websites that really get the idea of collective blog posting right. The idea that users could visit the site see what everyone collectively thought was interesting, but not having to deal with repeated ideas.

Sites like FFFFound come to mind and just announced today We Love Typography offer opportunities for users to visit the sites, get inspired and feel like hey this is exactly what I was looking for, a place that has a lot of great examples of work yet not just derivative lists of links to other peoples sites, well sort of. Okay both of these sites do link to other people’s sites and examples of work, but it’s done in the right way, by a dedicated community of like-minded individuals that find great stuff and post them all in the same place, eliminating the need for a disparate group of websites linking back to the same content.

It’s becoming more and more apparent that the future of the internet is not to have all of these ‘people’ out there with websites that really aren’t related to each other, but to have collective websites where everyone contributes to a single thought and idea. Take Wikipedia for example, only one individual actually works for Wikipedia (the tech/web site guy), and everyone else whom ‘builds’ the website are volunteers, or others on the web, everyone talks, but they also listen, which cohesively promotes a single, shared idea. The same can be said for websites like Digg or even Facebook; with everyone linking back and forth and promoting shared experiences people are bridging the gap between having private internet lives, to public, shared lives.

I think as a whole this is a great thing, especially because the internet wouldn’t work at all if everyone wasn’t communicating, but what I think is most important about this transition to a social web, is that everyone needs to speak clearly, and when applicable speak collectively. Sure everyone out there has something interesting to say, but if your point of view is the same as another’s, why not speak together to more clearly communicate what you’re trying to say?

So I’ve been a pretty big fan of minimal, grid-based designs for a while and hadn’t figured out an appropriate way to implement them into the website, without looking too ‘minimal’, or as the un-initiated might say “plain”. But I’d been thinking a lot lately about why minimal design works on so many levels and it all boils down to one thing: clear communication.

This is very important when it comes to graphic design because no matter how good an idea is, if it isn’t executed clearly it fails. Ideas work best when they speak for themselves and do not need explanation. I’ve seen a lot of designs where it may look interesting or have artistic value, but beyond the gloss of the piece, does it clearly communicate the idea? This brings me to a crux in my design career, how do I clearly communicate my work and my thoughts and let them mean what they say? Minimalism. Clean lines, less clutter and simple, gloss-free “windows” into my work as it is.

So I humbly present the next phase of my website, a simple, elegant solution to a world of websites cluttered by gloss. More new work shall be posted soon.

I generally love everything Apple usually releases, especially their line of iPods which seem to be getting better over time, including new features, larger storage sizes and cheaper prices, but I must put my foot down and oppose the new iPod Shuffle. First of all, how was the 2nd Generation Shuffle not small enough in size? The new version features a ‘much smaller size’, I’m sorry but I don’t think I’d enjoy losing my new Shuffle three days after I bought it because it slipped out of my hands and forever got lost in a sofa. Also, I’m not sure about you, but having a robot voice tell me what song I’m listening to isn’t an appealing feature, in fact I think it completely takes away from the organic experience of having a Shuffle. I had a 2nd Generation Shuffle and loved it. It allowed me to experience my music in a new way, I wasn’t distracted by constantly seeing what song I was listening to, but my music just flowed with my day either via full album or a wonderful mix.

I think in the case of the new version Apple was trying too hard to promote new features without accepting was was already great about the product. I think that in new devices having a voice over command is a good idea, but with the Shuffle, needing to spend 5 minutes to get to an option to change your playlist seems counterintuitive, especially considering that most people would probably be using the device while running. I think the best feature about the new product is it’s upgrade in size, without increase in price, $79 seeming to be the highest most people are willing to pay for something the size of a paperclip. In addition, moving the controls to the earbuds is also a good idea, considering, unlike the iPhone you’ll always be using your earbuds when using the device. All and all I would have to constitute the new generation of the iPod Shuffle as a fail, but as with other iPods Apple will most likely go back and forth between the designs while figuring out what users really want (see the iPod Nano size and orientation between previous versions).

Love is in the Air

Rainy Days and Mondays Always Get Me Down

In the next few weeks I’m going to try and find the time to update my work section with new projects I’ve worked on in the last few months and actually having the information be accurate and relevant to the images seen next to it. I’ve always struggled with a way to display my work without having too much superfluous content, so hopefully I’ll arrive at something that’s simple and elegant.

If anyone has any suggestions to parts of the site that don’t work for them or feel could use some improvement, let me know, I’m always looking for feedback.

That being said, I am going to start focusing more on having this site be design-related and try (keyword: try!) to update this site a lot more often. I’ve really only been focusing on updating this blog with maybe one entry a month, and that sucks. I read tons of design-related blogs and love the frequency that they update them, it’s what keeps me coming back. Now that I’m a little less busy and planning to hopefully push forward with some new business strategies and actually take on more work, hopefully things will get moving and I’ll be able to turn this site less into a personal website, and more into a business-related / design-related site. But, we’ll see. Take care and keep reading, I swear there will be more to read.

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• I am officially now working for a wonderful large company doing graphic design, I of course won’t post their name on here, but thought it would be nice to say I have an official full-time job doing what I love. No more temp/freelance work to make a living, I can actually start feeling comfortable about planning for the future. 
• I am getting married on October 11th to the love of my life. She and I have been together for almost 4 years, and have had many wonderful adventures including going to Italy and France, Hawaii several times (her home) and soon we’ll be making a trek down to San Francisco for our honeymoon. If you’d like more info about our wedding go to our wedding website Allison Loves Jared Dot Com. 
• I finally have a wonderful new computer set-up with a 20″ iMac with 500GB Hard Drive, 4 Gigs of Ram and a 1TB Time Capsule for all my backing up glory. This may not seem that great, but Allison and I have living off of a MacBook for far too long with way too much music and photos (about 50 Gigs total) and not enough space. Having all of our content on our computer and not having to plug in an external hard drive every time we wanted to look at our photos or listen to music is a huge relief. More on my Apple love later.
• My birthday is next Tuesday (August 26) and I’m going to be 23. A lot has happened in the last 4–5 years that have really changed who I am and where I’m going in life, and it’s always interesting to be a year older and realize how different you are and what’s happened since your last birthday. It’s probably best not to think about this too much, but I can certainly say the last year of my life a lot of really great stuff has happened. 
• For a while now I’ve been supplementing my income by doing design work under my freelance moniker Jared Pendergraft Designs, it’s worked pretty well and I’ve been able to get a decent amount of extra income working with clients I’ve met along the way. A friend of mine had recently contacted me with the idea of starting a new media group focusing the talents and ambitions of several people to work in a creative collective. I’ve been a big fan of this idea for quite sometime and I’m really glad my friend brought it up. Not only do I think designers typically aren’t good at marketing, but they also shouldn’t be spending a ton of their time not-designing. By using a collective’s talent you can get more clients, do more work, and focus on better design (at least if you’re a designer). I’ll keep up to date when more develops. 

It’s hard to explicitly say why Funny Games is a really great film without seeing it. It’s basically a film about non-sensical violence that wants the viewer to feel bad for wanting to see a film about non-sensical violence. Michael Haneke recreates his 1997 film of the same name (this version being the German director’s first English-Speaking film). Prior to Funny Games the last Haneke film American audiences were able to enjoy was Caché, and if you’ve seen this film the pace and style of Funny Games will not surprise you. Of another interesting note this version of Funny Games is a shot-for-shot remake of his older film (an exercise in futility as a filmmaker I suppose).

Basically Funny Games is about an affluent family (Naomi Watts & Tim Roth, and son) who visit their vacation house for a typical weekend away. Upon arriving to their gated community of other affluent families Ann (Naomi Watts) rolls down her window to shout out to a neighbor inquiring about their game of golf for the next day, the neighbor is accompanied by two young men dressed in all white golf clothes and acts very strange. A few scenes later after the family has arrived at their own home one of the young men has come to Ann’s door to ask to borrow a few eggs for the other neighbor. The young man acts clumsily and drops the eggs and ‘accidently’ drops Ann’s cell phone into a sink full of water. The young man now introduced as Peter (aka Tom, aka Beavis), acts very polite and apologizes for his clumsiness and proceeds to ask for additional eggs, Ann becoming very short obliges and whisks Peter away. All the while George (Tim Roth) and son Georgie are outdoors working on their boat, and their dog is barking non-stop. A few moments later the other young man from next door, Paul (aka Jerry, aka Butthead), appears at the door looking for Peter. Unknowingly Ann lets Paul inside to wait for Peter primarily because Paul acts so politely and appears to be a nice young man.

Without going into too much more detail a few scenes later Peter and Paul have completely turned the tables and have basically taken the family hostage in their own home by taking a golf club to George’s leg, crippling the patriarch and in the world of the film rendering the mother and son helpless (a point of contention for some viewers). After holding the family hostage Peter & Paul announce that they are going to play a little game, and basically bet that the family will not be alive 12 hours from now, and the family must bet that they will. So at it’s heart this film is sort of a home-invasion movie, but the trick to it all is that the victims are only as helpless as they want to be. After this premise is revealed the plot sort of runs it’s course and other terrible things happen to the family. But what makes this film so brilliant in this aspect is that the violence doesn’t have a specific purpose, it’s never revealed to the audience why Peter & Paul want to inflict pain onto the family other than ‘just because’. This breaks the general purpose of a horror/suspense film genre in that we can’t blame or identify with the antagonist’s for the bad they are doing. Without being able to say ‘oh those guys are pure psychopaths who are only pure evil’ we as audience members can’t feel sympathy for the victims and root for the good guys to win.

Such unusual things as one of the antagonist’s walking off screen to make a sandwich while the other one shoots a family member is another very weird perspective often not seen in this genre. By Haneke providing these scenes between the scenes views of what might be happening off screen the film feels all the more ‘real’, which is another aspect that I feel is necessary to convey the message he is trying to provide. Will you like this movie? Probably not. Most people don’t because they go into the film thinking it’s just going to be another horror/home-invasion movie and that the good guys will win, but they don’t. The film ends without the satisfaction of any of the modern structures of films we’ve come to know. The bad guys get away with murdering the family and continue on to a next unsuspecting family. What’s the point of this? Well like No Country for Old Men, the film is a thesis on our modern society and the idea that not every ends with happiness, that there is violence in the world and there’s a lot that people get away with. I think most people who go into this film with the understanding that this film is trying to say that ‘hey, why are you so interested in seeing glorified violence in film, it isn’t a good thing, and you shouldn’t be excited to see it, even from the safety of your couch’. One other small note about the film is that even though it seems like this film is violent or intends to be violent, all violence is shown off-screen.

Pixar’s newest film Wall-E is exceptional. Exceptional not in the way that ‘hey this is really great animation’ but exceptional in what it does for animated films. I think it’s the first film to finally bridge the gap between animated films for children, and animated films for adults. Mind you, sitting in the theater waiting for the film to actually start was a daunting task, as you’re surrounded by children, and every god-awful trailer was targeted for what seems to be the exactly wrong crowd for a Pixar film. Of course the only good thing about sitting through the trailers of any Pixar film is their new original short film, this time around it was Presto, and I’ve got to say, it is one of their best. 

One of the strangest things I noticed in the first few minutes of Wall-E was Pixar’s use of what appeared to be either real video footage, or animated footage made to look very real. I’m not sure the exact purpose of doing this, other than to perhaps illustrate the that this new dystopian future portrayed within Wall-E was what we’d become, if we were to continue using the planet at the rate we are now. Speaking of planetary responsibility, that’s another huge step forward for Pixar; in Wall-E, Pixar actually tackles a real social issue. They tackle this issue in a somewhat un-cartoony way as well, by showing harsh examples of what the world would become if we were to be wasteful and uninvolved, for example, humans aboard the spaceship The Axiom sit in floating chairs with video screens in front of their faces, constantly ‘drinking’ food, and are grossly obese. This sort of portrayal I think is necessary to translate a more complex idea to children as well as adults, where more specific adult-oriented ideas in the film such as highly consumer-inflated lifestyles are present to adults. 

All social issues aside Wall-E is a wonderful love story. In the past, Pixar films have tended to be more oriented with issues of friendship and family (i.e. Toy Story or The Incredibles), and less focused on something as simple as a love story between two characters of different backgrounds. Wall-E is a trash compacting robot left on Earth to clean up after a desolated planet, when Eve (a vegetation probing robot) comes to Earth looking for any signs of real life. Instantly Wall-E falls in love with Eve because to him she represents all that Wall-E wants, companionship and someone to hold hands with. After a somewhat complex scenario, Eve eventually realizes Wall-E’s dedication to her and returns the feelings. The film really is as simple as that, but wait, there’s so much more. From the amazing animation to the very Apple-esque visuals Wall-E communicates it’s base emotions with little to no dialogue at all. 

All and all, what makes Wall-E a fantastic film is it’s ability to communicate to multiple audiences with multiples messages and still be a very entertaining film for people who don’t want to think about social issues or how great the visuals look. If this film is any indication of the direction Pixar is moving I’m very excited.

So I’d held off for a while thinking I really “needed” an iPhone, I mean of course they’re amazing, but I’d been going along with having just a shuffle for almost a year, and it really did what it needed to — play music. But just yesterday thanks to Apple’s always wonderful “Back to School” promotion I was able to get my hands on a free iPod Touch, a just-as-good as an iPhone without the hassle of a cell phone plan music player. I must say this new little toy is fantastic. Everything I wanted out of an iPhone — the ability to get on the internet, to be able to have beautiful album artwork while listening to my music, being able to watch videos, and of course having all of my contacts and iCal events — this wonderful device has.

Most people might argue that “you can only get on the internet when you have a WiFi connection” as a huge downfall of the iPod Touch considering that is one of the main differences between the Touch and the iPhone but I must argue that this is a good thing. By this I mean I’m sick of this super-connectivity that people seem to deem so important in their lives. Do you really need to be able to check your email while you’re standing in line at the movie theater? I think that having the occasional option (when close to a WiFi connection) of being able to use internet services and use the iPod Touch for the other purpose it has aside from playing music is a great thing, and prevents people from using their iPod as a reason not to make social contact with other human beings.

When I first saw that the iPod Touch came out I was baffled as to why anyone would buy one, considering you could buy an iPhone and that the Touch was essentially just a phone-less iPhone (which it is), but after playing with it I can really see why they are actually selling, and that’s because the core base of people buying iPods in general want it to do what it’s supposed to do, play music. All of the other superfluous extras like being able to use the internet and send email are just that, extras. Don’t get me wrong if you’re going to go all out and get an iPhone I really do think you should be able to do all the things it’s supposed to do because you are paying a monthly subscription for some of those things, but for most people we want the simple things an iPod is supposed to be, without having to feel super-connected.

If you want something that has great technology (specifically the touch functionality and tight integration with all the major Apple apps), while still being a great media player, you should consider an iPod Touch. If you want the hassle of checking your email in the bathroom buy an iPhone.

So I’ve given in. After nearly two years of the Wii being out, I now have to have one. Am I just hopping onto the Wii Fit bandwagon, well probably, but who wouldn’t. I’ve never considered myself a gamer, or felt like I had enough time to play video games, but with the release of the new Wii Fit, I can trade up the costs I would normally fork out for a gym membership and buy something that’s both good for you and fun to play.

I have friends who really love the Wii and have been telling me how great they are since they’ve come out, and until now I think that the market the Wii is really exciting to has never been the kind of person I am. Wii Fit really changes all of that by offering a reason to buy a video game console without necessarily having the intention to play video games, but instead to get to play video games when happening to get some exercise. Another aspect that really makes the Wii Fit enjoyable for those of us who aren’t used to sitting for hours and playing video games, is that by offering short-burst like games, the idea of playing won’t get boring.

One of the things that’s always amazed me about about the Wii is how smart it is, and how playing games and interacting with your Mii characters become part of your lifestyle, not just plugging in a game and playing. On top of all the other way cool things the Wii offers, you can buy old classic games you grew up playing. Donkey Kong, Super Mario, Zelda if you’re so inclined; all of these can be downloaded directly to your console via a wireless connection and stored on your machine. You simply buy a “Classic” controller and you can play any multitude of old games without having to purchase multiple consoles, and clean up some space for the superfluous accessories you have to have.

So after work today or tomorrow I’m going to go get my Wii, and with a friend’s help a Wii Fit too, and this weekend I will get Mii fit.

Last weekend I had an opportunity to join the 65,000+ people in Portland’s Waterfront Park to see Barak Obama and I must say wow. It’s not so much that Barak is a politician as he is a great speaker, who really makes you believe what he’s saying. I’m sure for many people it’s difficult to look at the idea of having a new president and be excited to hear what they have to say. For years and years all people have felt towards politicians is a sense of distrust and overall apathy for their ideas and the positions and which they stand for. Early on I could see that with Barak Obama this would be different.

Many people have suggested that supporting Barak lately has been part of “Obama Fever” or whatever buzz term they’re using to describe his unprecedented approval rating and overall fandom. I cant’ say this is the case, I mean if you’ve had a chance to listen to the man speak, it’s not about liking him for being popular, it’s about liking his ideas, that also happen to be popular. I won’t go into detail regarding why the things he speaks about are good, because I’m sure you already know why they are, but I will say that the charisma in which he presents his ideas is awe inspiring an d unmatched by any of his opponents.

I stood in line for just about 3 hours on Sunday in the heat of an unusually Summer-Inspired Oregon day, and was amazed not only with the amount of people who were in front and behind me in line, but with the positive-oriented intensity in which all these other fans of Barak Obama had gathered to see and speak about Barak. I was pretty disappointed I missed The Decemberists, considering they played an hour-long free set, but being part of the line to see Barak was more of an experience than is typically associated with a political rally, or rather waiting in line for any large event.

All and all I’m extremely excited to see Barak Obama take the presidency, and for me it’s not so much about a “change” that each candidate seems to be promising, but it’s the integrity and overall good-hearted-ness that Barak brings to the table. Listening to him speak I actually believed everything he was saying, mostly because he was inspiring people not by promising them things (which most candidates can’t deliver), but by suggesting how by everyone working together, we can improve America. That’s the key, he isn’t the catalyst for change, we are; and by de-throning himself and putting the power of politics into the hands of Americans, there might actually be a hope for this country.

So I’m not sure what version this new version of my site really is, but it’s new that’s for sure. I’ve been constantly redesigning my site pretty much since I’ve had it, and I think I’ve finally arrived at a version I’m really happy with. At first I was all into Flash and felt that with my background in video work, Flash would be the best environment to showcase my work. As I started doing more print and web work, I started to realize that updating a Flash site is a major pain, and having a site that in dynamically updated allowed me to focus more on my work, and less on making my site work. After teaching myself a bit about CSS and getting on the Wordpress train, I found that using Wordpress as a CMS would work really well for me.

So after working with several ideas of what I wanted my site to look like, I revisted some of the earlier versions of my site for inspiration (what did I like then, and what looked good). I was happy with my last update because I really enjoyed having a semi-abstract decorative element (i.e. the dark patterned texture), and with some of my earlier work I was using a lot of woodgrain, for the organic, natural beauty. With the newest version of the site I was able to keep an organic, modern feel, that I feel serves well for the kind of work I like to do. From here on out I think that I’m going to primarily focus on print and web work, and stop showcasing my video work. I had at one time a podcast where you could download pretty much all of my video work, but feel that because I’m focusing more on graphic design now, and less on motion work, I can present my cababilities in the best possible light, and more importantly, focus on the kind of work I hope to get more of.

I’m excited to revisit some of my older work and improve some sketched-out ideas I’ve developed, to be able to improve the overall quality of all the work I turn out. I’ve learned a lot in the last year about who I am as a designer and what I’d like to bring to the design world, but feel I can always learn more. Check back in a few weeks, as I’m always developing work. Thanks for reading.

I suppose the strangest thing about this film is the fact that it’s actually kind of good. It’s good in the way that “hey I can see the aspects of this film that are really very clever” or “I really like the way that shot looks”. But overall this film will be very disappointing for many people, mainly huge fans of Donnie Darko who expected this film to be like that. I’d heard from a friend that Richard Kelly said after making Donnie Darko that he wouldn’t be making another film because he’d made the perfect film. This kind of director egotism is usually reserved for directors like David Lynch, whom can pretty much make whatever film he or she wants to make and not care if their fans actually like it. This is quite evident in this film, that is overtly complex, and unabashedly vague on what’s actually going on. I think that Richard Kelly figured that if he understood what was going on, it would be clear to the audience, but overall I can’t believe this to be true.

Another aspect that made this film so unusual for me was seeing a ton of actors who usually do comedy work in a serious roles (i.e. Will Sasso from Mad TV, or even Cheri Oteri from SNL). Essentially Southland Tales is about a post-apocalyptic/post-9.11 world where we are running out of natural energy sources and a scientist who develops what they refer to as a perpetual motion machine which takes waves from the ocean, gathers the energy and sends giant pulses of energy toward land, powering anything from cars to factory buildings infinitely.

So that’s one aspect of the film, second, because of the energy crisis and other political factors including a fictitious bill that was passed for heightened public security, there are essentially watch towers throughout the city where Justin Timberlake’s character (an ex-marine) will sit and monitor the city for public violence through the scopes of their guns and shoot to kill any individuals causing disturbances. This part of the film is important to understand because the overall political theme of the film is that the country is divided in two, and that the Republican party is trying to win over California and gain power so they can run the country ruthlessly (sound familiar?).

So on top of all that Dwayne Johnson’s character (yeah, that’s right, the Rock is the main character in this film) is a movie star who was abducted and drove into the desert and returns with amnesia and a screenplay that pretty much details this dystopian future in which the film takes place. I won’t bore you with the details, but essentially everyone in the film is double-crossing one another to try and enhance the chance that the Republican party will win the political race by using Dwayne Johnson’s character as blackmail. So why was he abducted into the desert? Because a giant vortex exists where if someone drives through it they go back in time and come out with a twin copy of themselves that is from 69 minutes in the future.

Doesn’t this film sound crazy? Well it is, it’s like there are 5 different films rolled into one. Not to mention the part of the movie where Justin Timberlake lip syncs to a Killers song for no apparent reason. So why did I say earlier that this film is actually kind of good? Well more than anything the film is good because even though there is all this crazy stuff happening that doesn’t really make sense until the end, you’re drawn into it, and you can’t look away (kind of like a car wreck). Also, even though I wouldn’t ever say I like most of the actors in the film, they all did well. Usually the actors in the film do cheesy roles that don’t amount to anything in the scope of Hollywood reality, but I honestly feel that all of them can really say they did a real movie, something that even though it won’t be received well, will be a testament to form of film as art.

So if you’ve got an open mind and low expectations I think you’ll at least be able to admire Richard Kelly’s attempt to make an artistically complex film. It has that uncomfortable atmosphere to it that makes you feel like you’re watching a David Lynch film, yet it has all these really popular actors so you feel that familiarity. Also, the music is quite good with lots of props to dissonant Radiohead songs and other moody aspects of the score that add to the film, rather than distract. At least watch the film for the fact that you can appreciate what’s trying to happen, rather than what it actually is.

Daft Punk never ceases to amaze me with their music / performance / production value. I’d seen about a million clips of their 2006 Coachella performance on the web, and I’d been anxiously awaiting my copy of Alive 2007 to come in at the library. Finally this weekend I received it, and I was blown away. I’d been very familiar with their music for many years and enjoyed all of their albums (yes I even really like Human After All, despite many glaring critiques).I had read online that there was talk of them releasing a DVD version of Alive 2007 so that everyone who couldn’t get to one of their live shows could see how amazing of a spectacle it really was, however the band decided not to release it simply because there were a million copies of their live performances online and that they couldn’t possibly please fans who’d seen their performance from so many different angles. So for those of you out there who must see a live performance they have a pretty great little Flash site that shows a live video or you can just look on YouTube.

As for the Alive 2007 album, it’s amazing. It really is the perfect album for Daft Punk fans who have all their other albums and want something new. Basically the album is divided into 12 tracks (or 13 if you get the bonus edition), each track is a mash-up of two or more of their songs (i.e. Television Rules the Nation/Crescendolls). So basically you get new interpretations of all their older songs, which in my opinion is the only way to experience Daft Punk after having listened to all their albums religiously for many years.

I suppose after having given the album a thorough listen my most poignant question is how do they do it? By that I mean how much of the actual performance is pre-recorded and how much is mixed as a live set? I mean they are up there pushing buttons the whole time, but do these buttons actually do anything? Who knows, but all I have to say is if you want to listen to all of your favorite Daft Punk songs in a new way, Alive 2007 is the best way to do it, now I only have to wait a few more months for Electroma.

So I’ve been reading Smashing Magazine (a web magazine about web design, and other generally cool things) for about 6 months now and I’m always amazed at the things they find on or about the web. I’ve learned a lot about CSS and how to make cool stuff happen with websites through various tutorials / links on the site. I think this is an amazing source for any aspiring designer for web or graphic work, simply because it’s a site made for designers by designers. Amongst other really great things I’ve found on the site are links to people’s blogs / portfolios that are extremely inspiring. Below are a few people’s sites you should check out:

Ten Thousand Things — the blog and portfolio of Juanma Teixidó

Design Bum — the blog and portfolio of Issara Willenskomer. One aspect of his site that is completely amazing is that he offers the actual work files for most of his projects (i.e. Illustrator and Photoshop Files) because he believes that because he gained a lot of knowledge from other designers he ought to be sharing his experience and work for other designers to learn from. If you’re looking for extremely fantastic work and a true expression of process, look at his work.

Aside from links to people’s portfolios and blogs, Smashing Magazine also showcases “Best of the Month” features which if you’ve missed a few days are a great way to catch up with exciting things they’ve posted on.

All and all Smashing Magazine is an amazing resource for those of us out there who don’t have the time to scour the internet for interesting stuff, and need daily/weekly/monthly inspiration on all things design related.