Pared Down

Bachelor film project from The Animation Workshop, Viborg,...

Sun, 27 Jan 2013 16:28:34 -0500

Bachelor film project from The Animation Workshop, Viborg, Denmark.

Aaron Draplin’s The DDC 50 Point Plan To Ruin Yer Career...

Sun, 23 Dec 2012 18:21:24 -0500

Aaron Draplin’s The DDC 50 Point Plan To Ruin Yer Career presented at the Portland/CreativeMornings event in March 2012.

How Designers Destroyed the WorldYou are directly responsible...

Sun, 16 Dec 2012 17:06:50 -0500

How Designers Destroyed the World
You are directly responsible for what you put into the world. Yet every day designers all over the world work on projects without giving any thought or consideration to the impact that work has on the world around them. This needs to change.

Mike Monteiro’s talk from Paris-Web 2012.

Some lovely paper art and photography from David Reeves.

Tue, 02 Oct 2012 16:39:21 -0400

Samurai Duel

Zombie Battles

Some lovely paper art and photography from David Reeves.

Phosphorescent: Tiny Desk Concert — Phosphorescent’s...

Tue, 04 Sep 2012 20:05:38 -0400

Phosphorescent: Tiny Desk Concert — Phosphorescent’s Matthew Houck specializes in a sort of free-wheeling weariness, with songs and characters that work extremely hard at taking it easy. Watch Houck play a stirring, road-ragged solo Tiny Desk Concert at the NPR Music offices.

"I’m just glad to be working, but I have to ask if there’s a smarter way to apply the bullshit I’ve..."

Sun, 05 Aug 2012 16:56:30 -0400

“I’m just glad to be working, but I have to ask if there’s a smarter way to apply the bullshit I’ve learned? I think there might be. I won’t be getting interviewed about it and shit, but who cares? I could sleep at night knowing that I helped someone and that I defied some fuckin’ model of “more, more, more; bigger, bigger, bigger”. When I die, I am gonna die so broke; I wanna go out helping somebody and not with a big fuckin’ bank account and a mountain of work that’s gonna end up in some landfill.”

- Aaron Draplin, via The Great Discontent.

Fleet Foxes performing Mykonos from their self-titled album.

Thu, 19 Jan 2012 22:58:51 -0500

Fleet Foxes performing Mykonos from their self-titled album.

I’ve been working on some cereal packaging and it’s...

Sat, 26 Nov 2011 10:42:38 -0500

Eat your damn oats.

Had fun with these slogans.

I’ve been working on some cereal packaging and it’s almost locked down. Just a couple tweaks left to make.

The Pine Hill Haints performing Walkin Talkin Deadman from their...

Mon, 31 Oct 2011 19:59:22 -0400

The Pine Hill Haints performing Walkin Talkin Deadman from their album Ghost Dance.

A little Alabama ghost music for you on Halloween.

Yet another in the Making Tea series. The rest of the...

Mon, 03 Oct 2011 18:30:58 -0400

Yet another in the Making Tea series. The rest of the illustrations can be found in this blog post.

First draft of an illustration for a series of instructional...

Sun, 18 Sep 2011 19:27:01 -0400

First draft of an illustration for a series of instructional graphics about making a cup of tea.

This little guy sits on my desk. My friends Anne and Ben got him...

Sat, 17 Sep 2011 02:50:01 -0400

"Terrible weather we've been havin'!"

"Snow, and ice!"

This little guy sits on my desk. My friends Anne and Ben got him for me as a Christmas gift because they think I look like him. It’s true, of course. He’s as much a ‘Winter Action Ryan’ toy as I am a walkin’ and talkin’ Yukon Cornelius.

Photographing him has been on the agenda for a while now. Figured it was time I got around to it!

The Head and the Heart performing Cats and Dogs and Coeur...

Mon, 12 Sep 2011 17:44:58 -0400

The Head and the Heart performing Cats and Dogs and Coeur D’Alene from their self-titled album.

The Ruby Spirit performing Caligari from their album Born Under...

Sun, 21 Aug 2011 17:15:57 -0400

The Ruby Spirit performing Caligari from their album Born Under A Veil — I saw these folks rock a little venue in Brooklyn last night. They had a lot of energy and a great stage presence.

Hitting Home

Sun, 07 Aug 2011 03:01:00 -0400

For months, I have been paralyzed. When I sit down to write, nothing comes out. When I start to design, I stare at a blank canvas. My ability to create things does not meet my own ridiculously high standards of quality, so I get stuck in endless loops of making decent things, throwing them away, and then starting over from scratch. I’ve been floating around in despair, in a creativity limbo, which has nearly destroyed me. I stopped working. I became depressed.

[…] and while I now feel more inspired and energized than ever, the paralytic gap between my actual ability to create and my sense of what is “good enough” remains. I cannot make things good enough for myself. The problem is festering in my thoughts, and I doubt myself at every turn.

The truth is that perfection is impossible and “good enough” is good enough. I need to lower the standards I have for my own work. But as a designer, this task is insurmountably difficult. It feels like defeat. It’s a tacit admission that I am not good enough to create things that meet the same level of quality that I demand from others when I evaluate creative work. My “taste” exceeds my own ability.

— excerpted from The Gap by Dustin Curtis

Being a designer often feels like volunteering to roll a rock up a hill while a committee flogs you and complains about your lack of “pizzazz.” Those blows may wound but they rarely cut as deep as the criticism we inflict upon our self.

Coming to terms with that is an entirely separate Sisyphean task.

To see someone else acknowledge this struggle allows for a much needed catharsis. They say “I’m scared shitless.” And we, momentarily relieved of the need to be stoically watertight, can say “You and me both, pal.”

Sam Beam a.k.a Iron & Wine performing Tree By The River,...

Mon, 18 Jul 2011 15:20:00 -0400

Sam Beam a.k.a Iron & Wine performing Tree By The River, Biting Your Tail, Big Burned Hand, and Half Moon from his latest album Kiss Each Other Clean. I’d love to get a copy of that album with these pared down acoustic versions.

Also played is Upwards Over The Mountain from the album The Creek Drank The Cradle. That’s the first Iron & Wine song I heard and one of my favorites.

Deer Tick performing When She Comes Home from The Black Dirt...

Tue, 12 Jul 2011 20:09:34 -0400

Deer Tick performing When She Comes Home from The Black Dirt Sessions.

It took me a while to warm up to this album. Love their first two albums, War Elephant and Born On Flag Day.

Vector’d some sketches of R’s I did earlier. Super...

Sun, 10 Jul 2011 20:51:41 -0400

Vector’d some sketches of R’s I did earlier. Super exciting summer fun times, y’all.

Valve strikes again with Meet the Medic, another class...

Thu, 23 Jun 2011 22:29:22 -0400

Valve strikes again with Meet the Medic, another class introduction video for the game Team Fortress 2. (Which is now free to play by the way.)

Drawin’ fancy type and listening to the Wu-Tang Clan.

Mon, 20 Jun 2011 17:14:20 -0400

Drawin’ fancy type and listening to the Wu-Tang Clan.