Sunday, February 28, 2010

Bye, Bye, February!

Out with the old (Feb) and in with the new(Mar)! I can't believe it's March 2010 already! Where have the years gone? Just yesterday some friends and I were recalling songs and movies from the year 2000...then we realized that was ten years ago. I was 11! WOW.

Anyway, just one week of classes before SB2010! Off to Cape Canaveral for a week of warm(er) weather. At least there won't be snow there! It might not be swimsuit weather, but darnit, we're going to be wearing them! Just three days to study hard for my first marketing test...and that's pretty much it. OH, and pack! Maybe I'll put up a post from Florida...we shall see....

Monday, February 15, 2010

Hi, President's Day!

Alright, so I'm not really excited about President's Day. I should be, but I tried to mail a package (which is over a week late getting sent anyway), and couldn't because, oh, it's President's Day. I guess Scott's g/f will get her Truman shirt 3 weeks after her birthday and 2 after Valentine's Day. It no longer serves as a gift for any certain holiday - just a package in the middle of the week now.

Anyway, I just (somewhat) finished my first Flash movie ever (just a few things to change). It's choppy and took forever to make, but I think it's pretty cool either way! I think I just like the idea of it finally being finished and the fact that I had to do everything in it, and it actually moves somewhat like I intended. Maybe tomorrow I'll learn how to upload it to Flickr and I can come back and post the link for you to watch and make fun of. :)

In other recent news, Jason was here for Valentine's Day, which was fun. He arrived in Kirksville on Thursday and stayed until Sunday. We saw that Valentine's Day movie. It wasn't horrible - but not amazing either. Some 'cute' parts, some serious parts. We also played a solid game of basketball with my roommates and their "significant others", haha. A "couples game", if you will. It was interesting. I made three 3-pointers, and still bought dinner, which was not the agreement in the first place. Lame. However, the new sweet chili sauce at Mickey D's is A-mazing. I definitely recommend it.

Soon I'll post some stuff I've been doing for my high school - a few t-shirts for different things. For now, off to bed before Motion Graphics in the morning!

Sunday, February 7, 2010

AIGA Does Minneapolis

AIGA has done it again! We headed to Minneapolis this time to visit design firms for the spring semester's design trip. We visited the following companies and events (I stole the list from Truman's VisCom blog):

  • Larsen Design -- Large design firm. One of the region's oldest and most well-respected firms.
  • Baker -- Very large firm, almost exclusively focused on designing CPG (consumer packaged goods), mostly for big-brand supermarket labels like Nabisco, Dole, General Mills, etc.
  • Duffy & Partners -- Small/medium design firm. They're the gold standard.
  • Cocktails with Creatives -- An opportunity to network with professional designers and view the design exhibit "17 Designers" at the American Swedish Institute.
  • Target -- Large retail chain. Meet with in-house design team to learn about what goes on behind the scenes at the national headquarters.
  • Little & Company -- Large design firm. Been around Minneapolis for 25 years; one of our town's most reputable and well-known design agencies.
  • Clockwork -- Large interactive firm, bedrock of the Minneapolis interactive community.
  • Periscope -- Large design firm. Largest independently-owned design/ad firm in the midwest. Unique in that they do nearly all of their production in-house (photography, printing, etc.)
  • Walker Art Center -- Arts center which features contemporary visual and performing art exhibits and programs.
  • Mall of America -- alright, I added that one to the list. It's not exactly a design firm or an attended event, but we did go for about 2.5 hours and visited maybe, oh, 5 stores. A lot going on there!
All of the places were very helpful in forcing me to get my butt in gear for finding an internship. I'm still looking, so if anyone has ideas, send them my way! I started tweeting again; I can't promise it will last long, but I realized that most companies are tweeting about blogs and inspirational things they find for their design needs, so I might be able to find something helpful there. Why not, right?

Oh yeah! And I went snowboarding yesterday for the first time! It was AMAZING, although I am sorer (word?) than I think I've ever been in my life. I will definitely go back sometime!

Currently I'm in the process of making a website to hold, hopefully, my future online portfolio. I'm thinking that shortly I'm going to have to buy some of my own online space so I can maintain my own website. For now, I'm just going to attempt to understand Flash and Dreamweaver...gotta have that web to get an internship it seems like! Back to work...