Twelve

As I posted before - Zago has been exceptionally inspirational...

Thu, 16 May 2013 14:00:08 -0400

As I posted before - Zago has been exceptionally inspirational for my work and personal projects in the last few weeks. We began a redesign project for our website (which you can follow here) that has allowed all of the teams (UX, design, social impact) to organically collaborate. A lot of our meetings have been presenting process work and half-baked ideas, a exercise that has allowed us to reveal a little more of ourselves and our skill sets to each other. When the client is yourself it’s interesting how hierarchy loosens a bit and end goals shift.

I’ve been generating content and managing the blog for the project, which I hope will continue on well after we publish our new site. Give it a look.
Above is a short video from our continual exploration of the “Z bar” as a stand alone/functional element in our logo. More importantly, I was allowed to indulge a little in chiptune.

Took ten minutes on break for the boys over at DuckDuck...

Wed, 15 May 2013 17:57:00 -0400

Took ten minutes on break for the boys over at DuckDuck Collective to make a quick gif in light of the launch of their new blog DuckDuck Rogue. If you follow the link, you’ll find plenty of things (no more mystery behind what they do in their off-hours) but what I’m most psyched for is their weekly radio show on Thursday afternoons. Tune in tomorrow at noon (link on their blog) for live streaming of the show.

A quick color study on a few of my Instagram photos from early...

Tue, 14 May 2013 12:12:11 -0400

A quick color study on a few of my Instagram photos from early this spring. I divided each of the photos into six equal parts and took the hue of their exact center point along with the center point of the whole photo. I arranged those hues in order of their shades and then allowed for three more hues to represent the photo that weren’t pulled from the original center points - those are tacked on the end.

Another short intro animation I developed for one of our...

Mon, 13 May 2013 17:43:07 -0400

Another short intro animation I developed for one of our clients.

The Salzburg Global Seminar organizes thinkers from cultures and institutions around the world to encourage discussion and urge leaders to find solutions to issues of global concern.
The seminars are held in Salzburg, Austria in the Schloss Leopoldskron. In my animation, the use and repetition of rectangular shapes is based on both the Schloss as a historical, robust structure and the form that houses the type in their identity. Though the personality of the Salzburg Global Seminar is quite reserved, what they represent is the opportunity for radical change across nations and modes of thought. In light of this, I explored using the burst of colors from the black rectangle in order to illustrate the life and discussion behind the doors of the Schloss.

John and I took a trip to the Brooklyn Flea.

Sun, 12 May 2013 14:17:48 -0400

John and I took a trip to the Brooklyn Flea.

zagolovesyou: We’re exploring a few ways to incorporate the...

Fri, 10 May 2013 18:04:55 -0400

zagolovesyou:

We’re exploring a few ways to incorporate the Zago personality into our redesign. One of our recent meetings brought a little funk to the Z bar.

Operation Make It Nice has been a breath of fresh air for my work at Zago. The ratios of gifs per day has skyrocketed. Above is a short animation that literally came out of “What can do with the Z-bar?” at our last meeting.

Follow our process on our blog, our Twitter or our Facebook.

I’m EXTREMELY excited about what’s going on at...

Thu, 09 May 2013 15:40:10 -0400

I’m EXTREMELY excited about what’s going on at Zago.
We’ve just launched an internal redesign of our company website and with it we’ve decided to track the process with a Tumblr. Over the last week and into this week I’ve been capturing our research, brainstorming sessions, presentations, discussions and debate in each phase of the project. I’ll be putting together audio, video, and photos that help portray who Zago is and how we work collaboratively.

You can follow the project via our Tumblr here, along with our Twitter and Facebook!

Above are a few photos from our kick-off meeting on the first day of the project.

Spuni. My first project in my new life in New York and at Zago....

Thu, 09 May 2013 13:20:17 -0400

Spuni.
My first project in my new life in New York and at Zago. Spuni, simply, is an ergonomic baby spoon designed specifically for the transition between breast and bottle feeding an infant.
The project began with designing an identity for the spoon (still only an idea at this point) and evolved into a successful IndieGoGo campaign where I had the chance to work with 3D printers to prototypes. Spuni welcomed me into the future and to the within-reach possibilities of tech and design.

Now in its production phase, Spuni is seeking investors and is plowing on toward making it to the shelves of stores like Wal*Mart and Toys-R-Us.

Above are a few photos I took for a special batch of wooden Spunis produced right here in New York by our friends over at Tietz-Baccon. You can see videos I did on Spuni’s YouTube page and follow Spuni’s progress on their Facebook.

One of the projects I’ve worked on for one of our clients...

Wed, 08 May 2013 15:40:09 -0400

One of the projects I’ve worked on for one of our clients consisted of several illustrations to use as cover designs for booklets distributed at their conferences. These session cover topics like transparent government, new ideas in climate change, photography in the digital age and human rights in the debate of LGBT issues.
Fast, fun and occasionally frustrating - I had to try several different styles and color schemes in order to satisfy each speaker with an illustration that properly conveyed their topic.

Above are a few screen shots of the designs.

I love to brag about my job at Zago, and one of the biggest...

Wed, 08 May 2013 13:20:00 -0400

I love to brag about my job at Zago, and one of the biggest reasons is because of the type of design-thinking we do. We design strategically - always with the aim of producing solid, perspective shifting work.

In short: there is a reason behind what we make.
It sounds simple enough, but many of my peers who graduated from our program have gone off to produce more white noise in a time where our culture bursting at the seams with purposeless design. To be fair, I know the opportunities to do what I do aren’t as easy to find but they are out there. And I believe they are multiplying.

In light of that, there are still some weeks I find myself working to pay the rent. Irritating clients will always exist and there will always be dull work to be done. In those weeks, I find myself needing a reminder of why I chose to be where I am. And that I am good at what I do.

(Above is a little gif of some hand drawn type animated as a break from one of those weeks.)

Several weeks ago, I attended my first Instameet here in New...

Tue, 07 May 2013 15:40:22 -0400

Several weeks ago, I attended my first Instameet here in New York City. It’s always bound to be a wild experience when you find yourself all of a sudden surrounded by insta- and internet-famous people acting like, well, normal people.

It was definitely a worthwhile experience, above are some of the photos I snapped during the afternoon save the portrait of myself and my bike - thanks to StudioJohnny.

The following as they appear in order:
HokayTokay
ShahKashani
HokayTokay and JimmyMarble
SimonAsher

Super quick brainstorm done in an afternoon. We needed a design...

Tue, 07 May 2013 13:20:02 -0400

Super quick brainstorm done in an afternoon. We needed a design for a t-shirt as a going-away gift for our wonderful Danish intern, Nicolai.

Nicolai ate a lot of bagels during his stint in New York. Pair that fact with one of my favorite things about Nicolai: every statement he made sounded like an ultimatum. The combination of English not being his first language and his general finite demeanor yielded small talk and simple conversations that were infinitely more humorous than the majority of my other daily interactions.

This is it, Nicolai. All good things come to an end. I sincerely appreciate everything all of the conversation and advice we exchanged. Finish what you started in Denmark and come back soon.

We miss you and of course: Zago loves you.

I made this simple animation about two months ago but neglected...

Mon, 06 May 2013 20:59:00 -0400

I made this simple animation about two months ago but neglected to post it until now because it showed just how rusty I was having not used After Effects in half a year.
Of course, that’s not fair, and goes against what I’ve been trying to change about myself since I moved to New York: vulnerability. And this represents that two-fold, in sharing my personal life and personal work.

So in a couple of hours I pulled a few photos of the New York and Chicago skylines, montaged them together and illustrated their outlines into vectors. From there, I exported the layers from Illustrator to After Effects and added a few type elements. It was made for my boyfriend, who at the time was in Chicago for a job. The references in the skyline of Chicago are historical events and landmarks and the references in New York are memories between the two of us.

The solution at the moment is TWO pieces.The first more heavily...

Mon, 15 Apr 2013 23:33:01 -0400

The solution at the moment is TWO pieces.
The first more heavily based on actual geography and the second based on figurative spread, content of comments and identity of commenters.

I can’t decide if I’m waving a white flag by not making one cohesive piece, by cutting out a good bit of data that was more difficult to visualize and by creating something that is arguably only understandable to me.
At least it’s a nice draft - because if i’m honest, I never finish anything.

We are…slowly making it. I was really beginning to think...

Sun, 14 Apr 2013 20:07:00 -0400

We are…slowly making it.

I was really beginning to think that the weeks it took me to make the main graphic was going to be the most difficult part. In fact, trying to find a way to compile all of the information together is just as complicated.
To add as another supportive visual, I’ve also created a map-based graphic that represents the locations in the United States and abroad for each category (commenter locale, geographic relevance and where I met the commenter) all of which share New York as an “axis point” because that’s where I am as the receiver. You can see I’ve mostly sorted out the main piece and supporting text filler but the map-based graphic and another I am working on showing the gender of the commenters are messing with the feng shui. I’m also giving these colors a try - the others were a little too soft for me and for the idea being based around Facebook.

The final photo is what the current state of my desk is - my head buried in data vis books for anything from spacing to legend references. Work smarter, not harder.

After exploring my data through the visualization from the last...

Wed, 10 Apr 2013 20:53:21 -0400

After exploring my data through the visualization from the last post, I decided to try and find a way to focus on creating something that could live statically instead of depending on interactivity to tell a story.
One of these ideas is to take the simple approach of using time as the x axis and distance as the y axis. The greater concept is that one could generate these graphs with their data and compare it to their friend’s data (ie: via Facebook) and see how the spread of their conversations look.
I quickly graphed a portion of the data (the commenter’s locale compared to where I met them and where I met them compared to the comment’s geographical reference) which you can see in the first graph. Then, I suspend the data on an invisible x axis to create the shapes that you see in the second graph.
Here I ran into an issue. As you can see, the second graph plots the x axis evenly even though the comments didn’t roll onto my Facebook wall in even increments. The only way to get around this is to enter ever minute of the day individually (that’s 1,440 minutes) - which exhausted me just thinking about it but I wanted my story to accurate and have form can follow function in this version. So my spread sheet went from 120 cells to 5,772. You can see a version of the ‘big data’ graphed in the third photo.
The fourth photo is what I’ve sussed out from the third graph after tearing it apart and making the data result easier to swallow for the viewer. It’s not exactly glamorous, but it tells a truer story.

One of the most frustrating things that I’m learning through designing data is that I have become keenly aware of the desire to hurry up and make things look beautiful. It doesn’t sound to be too much of an issue if that’s your job - right? The problem is that in the process of making things beautiful the meaning and the story take a backseat. We as designers begin to care less what people take away from our work and more about the immediate visual impression it makes on the viewer.
I don’t think I want to be a part of that anymore.

It’s actually been a while since I last posted some of my...

Thu, 28 Mar 2013 18:05:00 -0400

It’s actually been a while since I last posted some of my own work without a weird philosophical description that I arrived at through one of my many life “transitions.” So here we go.
Currently, I’m taking a class on Designing Data (lucrative and fun!) after work. Not only has it reminded me how much I love structured learning settings, I get to make some pretty awesome stuff that helps me get out of my work-client-creative-block.

Above is a data visualization I’m currently working on. This visualization is based on 14 days of tracked comments on my Facebook. I compiled several categories including: identity of the commenter, time, date and location in which the comment was posted, and what the content of the comment was. From there I added the location in which I met the commenter, created a geographical context for their comment and calculated the distance in miles between all of these locational-based stats.

The colors are based on a piece of JavaScript my friend Brooks helped me with that generated a hex color for each hour of the day. The orientation of the locations around the inner and outer circles are based on their cardinal directions in comparison to each other.
My ultimate goal is to create an interactive piece that will allow you to choose what you want the graph to compare (ie: Commenter’s Location and Comment’s Geographical Context) You will then be able to hover over pieces of the resulting visual and find out the nested information about the comment.

Above are a few initial visual drafts of the content.

After quite a bit of on-and-off work with John Sheridan,...

Fri, 22 Mar 2013 17:24:00 -0400

After quite a bit of on-and-off work with John Sheridan, we’re finally putting something out. Alongside our two other talented friends, Brooks and Michael, we bring you HoopDrills.

HoopDrills aims to be a resource base for tools to help make better basketball players. Coaches, parents and players can all benefit from what HoopDrills will offer.

We’re still working, but once we’re fully operational we’ll let you know! Just hop over to our page and shoot us your email address. We won’t spam you or give your information away - we just want you to be as excited as we are. Plus when we’re clinking champagne glasses we want you to be a part of that.

Share with your family and friends - oh and isn’t this just in time for March Madness?

I’ve never subscribed to horoscopes, personality tests or...

Sun, 17 Mar 2013 23:25:00 -0400

I’ve never subscribed to horoscopes, personality tests or any of those methods designed to reveal characters type/psychological make up. However, after a bit of pushing I finally gave in and took the Myer’s Briggs and was categorized as an INTJ.
There’s a number of things that delving deeper into what being “the rarest of the sixteen personality types” has helped me learn about myself. One thing in particular that has been crucial to figuring out how to love better is the amount of energy I expel in the Thinking, analytical, part of my personality. Along with the low tolerance for rampant emotionalism.

Camus addresses in The Myth of Sisyphus that there is a human need to analyze in hopes to gain knowledge about feelings and emotion. The caveat here is that true knowledge (in terms of quantification and qualification) of deep feelings is impossible. Deep feelings always mean more than they are conscious of saying. Great feelings take with them their own universe, splendid or unpleasant. They light up an exclusive world.

Genuine love is rarely an emotional space where needs are instantly gratified. Such an irrational feeling, offering no purchase to analysis. So to an impulsive analyzer, to a system builder, to someone whose Achilles’ heel is personal relationships, here I find the demand of defining myself by both the sincerity of what I know and the make-believe.

(Above: Snowy day near the Williamsburg Bridge with John Carl)

Knowing how to be solitary is central to the art of loving. When...

Mon, 11 Mar 2013 17:40:54 -0400

Knowing how to be solitary is central to the art of loving. When we can be alone, we can be with others without using them as an escape.

Learning this was essential to my first five months in New York. I knew being (relatively) miserable was supposed to teach me something but if you would have asked me then I wouldn’t have been able to pin point what it was exactly. Now, I bottom-of-my-heart believe that feeling sparse connections, if any, with people in New York was to set me up for what I feel now. And maybe for the first time will I stop projecting another version of myself, drop fear and maintain commitment.