Memorial Day Weekend in LBI

A great time was had by all this weekend at the Kamish shore house. There were feasts with fresh fish, leisurely lighthouse bike rides, ball-busting billiards games and a very very sketchy skatepark, but the most relaxing part by far was laying on the beach. I haven't been skating because of my ankle so I had lots of time to film. Here's the montage that I edited together.

Lacoste Live

Lacoste, another one of our big clients at RJW, recently came out with a new line of clothing called LACOSTE L!VE. Today I did a couple type infographics to show the success that we have been bringing Lacoste Live. These will be incorporated into a "Recap Reel" that will be presented to the client.




I love my co-op.

Twister

Last night I was in White Plains with my fellow Peruvian, Diego, and we were having so much fun skating for over 3 hours, until this:



My leg doesn't usually bend that way... so when it did, I felt my tibia and fibula smack each other, causing great pain. I was able to walk okay after a couple minutes on the ground, but this morning, hell no. I called out of work, and have been icing it all day and now it's feeling much better. I will be able to go to work tomorrow, but skating this weekend, forget about it. I will just have to relax and soak up the rays at LBI and not tear up the miniramp across from Cole's beach house. I will definitely be bringing my camera. Photos and videos next week!

Product Photography

So my dad works for a HERCUT, a company that makes hair products for specific hair cuts. He asked me to print out the artwork for two types of hairspray, mount the labels to the bottle, and photograph them. I thought it wouldn't come out that well because I don't have any studio lighting equipment. I ended up shooting it outside my house around 4pm in the shade, against a mini-seamless background (a piece of layout paper). I was lucky that it was a nice day. It's amazing what you can do with natural light.





They look pretty similar. Almost too similar...



These photos will be used online, in catalogues and salons in 7 different countries! Not bad for my first commercial photo.

Caricature

TOWN is a real estate company that sells multi-million dollar properties. They happen to be one of our clients at RJW. Last week I made my advertisement that will be printed in a reputable magazine. It was an ad for the New York Times HOMES magazine. I will post a picture next week when the magazine is printed.

Today I worked on a new campaign for TOWN. I was asked to illustrate a young couple in the Upper West side rolling a stroller down the street. I had a lot of fun with the caricature style. If the client likes it, I might be illustrating for the entire ad campaign! Here's the product, sketch and illustration.







Practicing the process of sketching and illustrating from start to finish is something I rarely do in one day. I realized that I have so many drawings that could also be cleaned up in Illustrator and maDe into ILLUSTRATIONS!

I'm definitely going to illustrate some STUFF soon, here's a SNEAK PEAK.

Weekender

Another relaxing LONG weekend. Lots of nature walks around Irvington. The weather has been tough lately though, one minute it will be sunny and the nxt it will be crashing thunder. I've also been taking photos around Irvington and towns around it, that will hopefully soon be prints on sale at some gallery/gift shop. Here's one I took on Main St in the eye of the storm, but I haven't editted it yet so it looks a little crazy.



Yesterday I went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The exhibit I went to see had an hour and a half wait so we didn't even bother. We saw some other exhibits ad checked out the roof garden. Great view of the city.

This image was also taken on my roof under the stars. It's amazing how much color a camera can pick up when the shutter is left open for 20 seconds.




Both of these images (above and below) were taken taken around midnight.

Nark

A couple weekends ago I went to a house show at 35th and Haverford and brought my camera out. Here's a clip I filmed of Nark's song, "In Transit".

Lucas Kozinski - Guitar/Vox
Ben Mink - Guitar/Vox
Ryan Hall - Bass
Sean Donaghy - Drums

watch in HD

Gnip Gnop

After work last Thursday some co-workers and I went downtown and played some ping ping at our venue, the photo studio. A good time was had by all, so I shot a little video for the RJW blog. After I threw this edit together, they said they didn't want to use it because it made us look like we were terrible at ping pong and that we love beer. Both true, but I suppose it's not what we want to portray about the company.

The Friedenhandle

A couple days of planning/sketching with my brother, Josh, and a strategic trip to Lowe's led to this.



Now ready to film more than ever!

Pay Day

After a few months of working on and off with Lorenzo Errico from Formation Skateboards, we have finally produced a new logo and business card design for the company. Fortunately for me, he was willing to pay me in skateboards. Check out the new beauties.




PHISH STICKS!

Type with Teeth

Last night after work I went to an event down the street at The Type Directors Club called Type With Teeth. Craig Ward, an experimental typographer originally from the rural parts of England spoke about his life, work and process.

I thought it might be a little weird since it was an organization for type lovers, and it definitely was a little weird, but I liked it, haha. I learned a lot from him. One of the main things he emphasized was that design is supposed to be fun, and to keep it loose for a while until the project is developed enough to . Here is a definition that I will probably repeat in the future:

"Graphic design is the communication of information in an appropriate visual manner."

Ward mostly does commissions for advertisements and for publications, but a lot of these projects develop from his personal work that people see and want to use (or a similar application of that technique). They all have some sort of surprise element that comes from the weird, hand-done techniques he uses. Here's some of my favorites from his work:







Some of them might look computer-generated, but that's only because we are so accustomed to seeing that type of work. Another interesting thing I learned was the difference between legibility and readability. Legibility is whether you can read what's there, but readability is whether you want to read what's there. Ward favors legibility over readability because to him, words are pictures, and half of the fun is trying to see find the letters.

Check out more of Craig Ward's work at www.wordsarepictures.co.uk.

Thanks to TDC for hosting the event and thanks 8daysaweek.org for notifying the design community about great events like this going on in New York.

Cecil Throwaway Edit (HD)

Philly Free

I shared a lovely Spring weekend with some great people in a great city.




Spent some much needed quality time with Pocket.



Skated a around Cecil and got some fun clips. Here's CJ's ollie to fakie:



Went to a house show on Haverford, celebrated Mike's birthday.



Today was Mother's Day, so Grandma came over and watched Street League Skateboarding with me. She claimed that she shredded way harder back in her day.

Woooooooooobilly!

Cinco

Yesterday, I did not do the Macarena while singing Guantanamera. Instead I fell on my face in the middle of the street.



Yesterday, I did not go surfing. Instead I surfed the sidewalks with two true Cinco de Mayans, Fig and Diego. We skated the IHS courtyard and caught up with Ishamel.



We bombed Main St and explored new spots on the way up. I usually look for spots on the way down Main St. But on the way up, it was like a whole different point of view! So many spots! Rosa and Fig were baffled.



On Cinco de Mayo, I did not eat Mexican food. Instead I ate sushi and Matzos brie. I know that can't be the correct spelling of matzah but that's what the box said. It was good.

A Word A Day

Today I came across the online portfolio of Brandon W. Oxendine, a designer based in Charleston, SC. Last year he did something amazing: For the whole year of 2010, he drew one word a day and at the end of the year he compiled them into a portfolio piece. Not only does it show the immense typography/illustration skills he has, but it forced him to be expressive with type, in a new way each day. Check the full project out here.

I want to do something similar starting today. From today on, every day I will draw some kind of word/image combination. When I was in Europe this past summer, I wanted to draw something every day, but I wasn't able to keep up with it. So I am going to set an reminder for every day at 2pm so I can make sure to remember to do draw. Hopefully by the end of the year I will have at least a drawing for every two days.

Spring Jam TSHIRTS

After some very long and very hard negotiation, the Spring Jam T-shirts are finally in!

If you're around Drexel today, be sure to stop by the Spring Jam Tie-Dye Event on Tuesday, May 10th in the Korman Quad. From 12-3 PM They will be giving away free white t-shirts with my design with all of the tie-dye supplies for you right there. Here's a sneak preview:



If you can't make it out today, there will be plenty of blue and purple shirts flying around on Friday at the main event. Which color is your favorite?

A day in New York with Philly homies CJ and Cole.

Went to Astoria park in Queens during the Belief Contest. It was pretty tough to get tricks in with all the mayhem, but Cole managed to snag a front feeble on the quarter.


Then we treked to the new Triboro park on the water.



Found this nug in Battery Park City, and managed to get a couple clips, but I'll be saving those. Here's Cole's booster shot.