and I now declare you, discontinued!

this blog, alas, is now discontinued since the semester is at its close. however, I have revived my cirtome.com domain, and will be posting over here:

http://cirtome.com/b/

already imported all of the entries from this blog, since I liked 'em so much!

twittering around

if anyone cares to keep up over the summer - I'm on twitter - http://www.twitter.com/prodmod

if you're not familiar, twitter is an awesome little update service that's basically just the status updates of facebook - it was a nice little replacement for my lack of facebooking...although, I have to tell you, I've gotten more done in the last month without fbook than in a long time.

feeling like a surrealist kind of day...inspiration

some good, creepy, delightful inspiration for some cool work today, compliments of Xiu Xiu and Blonde Redhead -

Royksopp, motion graphics, animation, cool stuff

book arts type-based conceptual book

book arts type-based conceptual book
Originally uploaded by cirtome

this is my conceptual type-based book for book arts. the text block is a simple pamphlet style, stitch bound, with a hard cover.

see if you can figure out what the book says...:)

hint: it's lyrics to a song

Designers needing to print!

I am opening up my Epson R1800 for portfolio printing (not whole portfolios - we're talking last minute prints here) if anyone needs to take advantage. I'm stocked on Inkpress Luster Finish (single and duo sided).

I'm located about two miles east of campus just down Dekalb Ave in Cabbagetown.

Pricing for Print Only (you provide paper):

8.5" x 11" - $1.00
11" x 17" - $2.25
13" x 19" - $3.75

Pricing for Paper:

Inkpress Luster 11" x 17" Single Sided - $1.25
Inkpress Luster 13" x 19" Single Sided - $2.25
Inkpress Luster 13" x 19" Duo Sided - $4.25

Not necessarily cheap...but the convenience charge...and I'll let you print a test 11" x 17" (on copy paper, economy resolution) for each document for free.

Give me a call 678-933-1798. My doors are open for business until 12 am (midnight) Wednesday morning.

book arts visual book crit

book arts visual book crit
Originally uploaded by cirtome

Go to my flickr page for a set of photos for the conceptual visual book I just finished working on for book arts today. I'm really pleased with the visuals on the inside. I just used a simple signature style book, saddle stitched.

The front cover is printable acetate (with a mylar-type weight). The main visuals are on a printable vellum against patterned, speckled paper.

book arts visual book

book arts visual book
Originally uploaded by cirtome

a page out of my second to last project for book arts

self portrait

selfportraitcolor
Originally uploaded by cirtome

just exploring more things...trying to find new ways to make design and art.

getting there

one aspect of design that really fascinates me is currency design. if you look at a one dollar bill, like, intently stare at it, you see all of these little teeny tiny etchings that took someone hours and hours to meticulously put in by hand. it's really beautiful. I want t capture some of that tiny aspect, with a little real feel along side, with a clean legibility on the important type. this is a concept for a book cover/web splash/et al.

more personal projects

utilizing the kind of destructive nature, this time juxtaposed with some cleanliness. I like this more than my website concept.

and no rubine red c!

new personal portfolio test concept

I swear...I will stop using Pantone Rubine Red C. I just love the hell out of it, though. It's wonderful. Here's the general mood for my next revision of my portfolio site.

the test link - nothing works yet, just static images - http://sqroo.com/jkh

Sqroo.com placeholder identity and tag line

Buena Vista Park, SF

IMG_8896
Originally uploaded by cirtome

Flickkkkkr

I immediately needed something new to catalogue my photos on, after my demise on Facebook.com...and I chose Flickr (instead of Picasa).

Anywho - here I am - creative things on here.

True Peace is...

...killing the world's most notorious time wasting website, one deleted status update and profile photo at a time. I've had my facebook profile for over two years, and well, no longer. Deactivated, and requested official deletion. I encourage others to do the same if they think they could - time to reconnect IRL (in real life!).

C-mon Guys, "It's Just Design"

So, I had a sober awakening this morning as I stumbled, weary and tired into my graphic design history class. We were greeted with news that a junior level student in the program had died, specifically, as they told us (which is why I'm writing and assuming it is common knowledge) committed suicide.

I didn't know this student, didn't know his story, or anything else relating to him - or why he would do such a thing - but it really, as detached as I was from the situation, still sent a shock wave through my ideas of the morning, and the week. We worry about portfolio review, we worry about work-ups, and ideas, and thoughts and evidence of process, and kitsche and wit and all of these things relating to design - how to communicate - and somewhere, weeks, months, years back - we forgot to communicate or failed to communicate effectively with this one life and person.

Not to say that this is the blame of anyone, at all, period - sometimes no amount or form of commucation is effective with anyone - but it just reiterates the idea of what our business is...and the antithesis of something in this system breaking down to bring this person to do this...

I didn't know him, never met him (as far as I can recall), but I am very, truly sad for him and his family - and I'm sorry I (not in a sense of regret or remorse) couldn't have the opportunity to have met and experienced another creative person.

I will admit - I hate railing onto something that I have no personal attachment to, namely because I never feel like I really have the right or place to do so, but I just...I dunno - always have something to say. Just my nature...and this does hit closer to home, especially as a peer.

Doubleplusthefun - final ad

And doubleplusthepartyhat, for your viewing pleasure.

Hand Draw Thy Type, then Scan Thy Type In, Then Live Trace Thy Type, Then Apply A Stroke to Thy Type... - Thou Art Almost There!

For those of you just joining us...please direct yourself to the archives on the right hand side...as they have more posts listed than are visible on the main page.

Also...I don't want to "rip myself off" but...I think this style really says a lot about me.

Thoughts?

Thin Thy Chunkiness, and Remove Thy Superfluous Dots, again.

And remove thy word mark, and change thy color! Alas!

EDIT: Why is this so hard? To make a logo for yourself - it's more difficult that making a logo for anyone else. I'm not confused - there are just about 100,000,000 different directions I could go with this. I need to sit back down and make some lists and do some brain storms. Designing a logo is expressing exactly who you are, in a mark - I mean, duh..., but when it's personal, it's different. Hah - I'm not sure why?

Must...do...more...sketches.

EDIT 2: Bear with me, I think I may have a better direction.

The Subtle Dot / In the Futura / Step Out There / The Sharper Edges / No Dot / Embed Thy Dot

The Garamond Connection

refined crisscross and new colors

And for your reference...old logo is below.

Still working on it, for sure...

New logo

So I lied. My logo board wasn't quite ready. I decided to go ahead and redo the logo since I pretty much hated it, and I debated if I should turn it in as the original - but no!

Take a look at the new iteration - I think it speaks much more of me as a designer.

Silly me...wrong book cover board

Here's the real deal -

Spiderella

This is a pretty nifty and very involved stop motion from my friend Mike's boyfriend Paul in British Columbia.

It's worth the 10 minute watch.

Book Boards!

So...I've been at Java Monkey for about six hours now retouching and putting boards together for portfolio review. I'm also learning the inadequacies of my file organization...goodness. Here's what's ready for printing so far! I still have about 15 more to compose - that includes the rest from Intermediate. I think it's 15...I'll have to keep checking my boards...!

Call me finished, right now.

Ford's New, Weaker, Logo

Well, this is sad. They replaced a relatively unique, albeit not my favorite, but unique and strong logo with...well, water. Light beer. Fat free ice cream.

I'm not a fan, but, you know, who am I?

The original article on Brand New

This was an April fools post on Brand New. Bah.

It was the best of times/call me

Copy changed to be consistent through both pieces so far. The third is on its way!

So Why Don't We Cut it In Half? (Salvaged blog post from a year ago)

I just found this blog post from a now defunct personal blog. Something I'd written and forgotten about relating to art and relationships. I went back and read it, and thought how appropriate it was for the design process and point of the study of art that I'm now in - it reminded me that there are points in time when I even have the time to sit down and rationally examine things. Hah.

Paul Rodecker has just made me reexamine my life, and he doesn’t even realize it.

My friend Kate and I were having a discussion on relationships and the exacting nature of planning out your life. Her issue stemmed from planning out her future before even making in to the level of having to be that serious and determined about her standing in her relationships. We started talking about how it had become stagnant and predictable and monotonous. Their relationship was enduring, but was is genuinely a relationship worth having?

And then it hit me.

I’ve recently finished a drawing two class with Paul Rodecker, probably one of the most enthusiastic professors at Georgia State that I’ve yet to have (and probably one of the most fulfilling classroom experiences I’ve had) and he consistently was chalk full of cheesy goodness and wit. But among the thorns of corn, there was so much more profound wisdom.

Some of the greatest things I learned from his class was the importance of pushing back something that didn’t work, spending time on something even if you start to hate it, and then, when you do hate it, cut it in half and push it back again until you make something beautiful.

I was thinking about this wisdom as we were talking, and it wasn’t as though this consciously made sense to me at the time we were talking so much as it all fell into place - but a drawing is a multistep experience - so much like the things we encounter in life.

Hardly anything is cut and dry.

You start with furious strokes, the gesture. One hand moving swiftly across a page, sketching out the full experience of the visual representations in front of you. The gesture catches the life and essence. It’s fast and furious and emotional and - well, fantastic.

Then you move to detail. Detail adds significance to a drawing. You can spend hours upon hours upon days upon weeks upon months on detail. Detail can make or break a drawing. The drawing is often in the many intricate details that you stop and see and look deeply into. To appreciate a drawing that took hours upon hours you have to stop and look, and stare, and get close and examine the detail. Detail takes thought and planning.

Then, there’s protection. You’ve spent so much time on a drawing and accumulated so much detail that you can’t help but protect your investment.

But there’s still so much more to add, and you don’t even realize that.

Paul explained all of this - and it never became so clear until I tried to apply that to a relationship.

You start a relationship with emotion. Raw emotion - and excitement. Each step you take is a pen stroke - swift, straight down the page - catching every plausible, conceivable emotion at that moment in that moment. You can’t get enough of the other person and do whatever you can to get as much of that person around you as possible - like a gesture - to get as much information on the page in a short amount of time.

Then you move to romance, and forethought. You’ve attracted the other person and caught them up. And they’ve caught you. The details of the relationship fall into place. What is this person’s view on such-and-such issue? How do they like their eggs? Where is it that they like to be nibbled on the ear? How do our emotions intersect? How can we make this work? How can we make this work even better? How do I tell this person that I love them? These questions beckon like the thousands of concentric circles on a days long sketch. Or the shading of a face that looks so photorealistic, you can’t believe it’s really a drawing - but appreciate it even more when you know it is. The details make the relationship work - they make it worthwhile and prove that there is so much good in the interactions of just two people.

Then you move to complacency. The daily grind sets in. Relationships move slower, there isn’t as much interest in know the other person so much as retaining the information you already know and hoping so much that they don’t change from the person you learned about - the person that you grew to like. You put all of your effort into making a vested interest in protecting your relationship rather than doing your best to make it better and innovate. Like a drawing, you spray fixative all over it, thinking that you’re done - when really, you can’t see the potential that’s lying just around the corner. You grow bored, but want things to stay the same, not realizing the intense damage that you’re doing. Not realizing that things never are the same - they are constantly and forever moving.

So cut it in half.

When we would become too attached to a drawing, Paul would tell us to cut it in half.

And we all looked at him like he was crazy. And then we would do it just to see if he was right.

And we discovered something so profoundly enriching when we would do this, that it became our habit to cut drawings in half, add paper - et al.

We need to cut our relationships in half - we need to cut our lives in half sometimes. The metaphor can be entirely applied to life as a whole (which I later realized as we were talking even further). Life is in the gestures, and the details, and sometimes in the protection.

But sometimes you have to push life back, and cut it in half for the true meaning to come out.

Tighter kerning, some text moved

Finally, Underwater!

Really cool animation for airplane safety

Way to go Virgin Airlines.

We're not keen -

Only the Unexpected

Not what you expected

no wave transparency

better bottom text contrast

Keep in mind, with these it's converting from CMYK to RGB, so the colors aren't nearly as rich as they really are, and the white (as in, on the bottom text) isn't as visible against the washed out web conversion. Looks much better in print...which, is good!

Explore the Unexpected

So much more...

Explorations in Illustration, more work-ups

Print Ad, Rough Work-up, v. 3, no explanation

So, keeping with the whimsical aesthetic I'm trying to create, I decided to go with something more humorous to start. I wanted to play off a classic that everyone would understand, but I also wanted to make it a game of reader intellect (to be fair, I've never read Moby-Dick, but I know the base story, character's names, etc - however, the ad is kind of the "behind the scenes"). I want to do a series involving a Tale of Two Cities, and Jane Eyre, or some other classic. A Capella has a lot of unknowns, but I don't want the message to be lost in obscurity. Even if people have little interest in the classics, hopefully the tinge of humor will make them rethink "book store" and at least get them in the door so they can discover other titles.

Well, that's the idea at least. A new spin on old stories will hopefully at least get them in the door.

The above iteration is rull, rull rough. Rull rough. But, there's a concept.