(25) Portfolio

Here’s the link to my portfolio. Enjoy.

(24) The New Dresscode

When you’re first beginning to interview for jobs in the advertising world, your head is probably filled with thoughts of interview questions, your portfolio, and demonstrating your ability to think on your feet. There is also the issue of dress. Your interviewer is probably trying to figure out, first and foremost, if you are a good fit personality-wise and professionally. How you present yourself visually, not just on paper, is going to be important, especially in a visually-dominated working environment like advertising.

So, does that mean suit and tie? Black pencil skirt and baby blue blouse? I don’t know. You tell me. What company do you want to work for? The agencies you’re applying to have a culture all their own, and they aren’t shy about showing it. Through their work, their website, even their location can give you an indication of what kind of place this is. Doing this kind of research is not just helpful. It’s mandatory. If you don’t know the culture of the agency you’re applying to, how do you even know you want to work there? Or that they will find a good spot for you? Maybe you hate the city and you’ll be miserable. Find out as much as you can about the agency, its history, its work, and the area its in. Find out about its competition and what it does to stand out. All these things can build your confidence for that interview and also let you know how to dress for the occasion. 

Rachel Hom, a junior planner at 72andsunny, was asked in class about a certain tweet a 72 employee wrote about a too-dressed-up interviewee. She just laughed. It was obvious that the person didn’t fit with the company, which also showed they didn’t pick up on the brand of 72andsunny itself. Not a good first impression. 

It’s important to have your own style. I will advocate this to my dying day. But know that the interview process is one of signals. While you’re busy signaling that you’re smart, funny, and knowledgeable about the industry, signal to your interviewer that you can figure out the culture of the place you want to work through the clothes you wear. Make sure you want to work somewhere before you get ready for that interview. Do your research.

(23) Five Classic Female Film Stars (you just have to see)

Old Hollywood has been an endless source of inspiration to me. From the clothing to the fake sets to the cheesy lines made real, 1930’s cinema has been a passion of mine for years. Though rampant sexism abounds in these old films, strong female leads were to be found. Here’s a list of the five top badass women in the Golden Era of cinema. 

Bette Davis: Probably my favorite actress, Davis was a true artist who took her career seriously. Whatever it took to play a part, she would do it, regardless of whether it was glamorous or not. She played roles ranging from Elizabeth I to a spinster shut-in, never afraid to show an unmade-up face to reveal the vulnerable inner side to the character, and herself. She also fought the big studios (Warner) for better scripts at a time when the studios practically owned their stars. See Now, Voyager (1942), Dark Victory(1950), and The Letter (1940).

Barbara Stanwyck: A close second to Davis, Barbara Stanwyck was prolific in the pre-code era (1930-1934), playing prostitutes, gangsters’ girlfriends, and ex-cons. Most famous for her film noir work, she behaves as a perfect, dangerous and delectable trap, similar to Lauren Bacall, but with a sensitivity and vulnerability that made her characters full and real. See Double Indemnity (1944), Baby Face (1933), and Night Nurse (1931).

Joan Crawford: With a long and illustrious career, Joan was a striking figure in 1930’s cinema. Often paired with Clark Gable, before his Gone With the Wind days, she, like Stanwyic, played prostitutes and ex-cons making it to the top. Often in rags-to-riches stories, Crawford, while not a great actress, showed a determination and willpower that gave her an undeniable onscreen energy. Later in her career she made many kitchy b-movies as well, which are amazing in their own right. See Sadie McKee (1934), Mildred Pierce (1945), Torch Song (1953).

Ingrid Bergman: Most famous for her role in Casablanca, Ingrid Bergman is probably the softest and most vulnerable of the bunch. But this was no accident and done with an incredible control. Bergman was able to create immense empathy from her audiences, as she must have had for the characters she played. Always sincere, Bergman stood out in her time as a dramatic actress that didn’t play up drama. She was very understated, and this gave her a mystery all her own. See Intermezzo (1936), Casablanca (1942), Notorious (1946).

Greta Garbo: My favorite silent film actress by far, Garbo, like Bergman, was from Sweden. And also like Bergman, Garbo had an understated drama to her that was particularly remarkable in her silent films. An incredible beauty, Garbo’s films from the mid to late 1920’s feature stunning photography and rich plots. Her first speaking film, which recorded her deep, woeful voice for the first time, is a story of a seaman’s daughter caught in a romance gone bad. Garbo became a recluse in later life, refusing to have photographs or do interviews, and this, in a way, added to her timelessness. I also share a birthday with her. See The Divine Woman (1928), Anna Christie (1930), Camille (1933).

(22) Killing your big fat fucking ego: Tracy Wong visits U of O

In a spirited and inspired speech yesterday, Tracy Wong imparted some wisdom on our asses. Wong, co-founder and creative director at Wong, Doodle, Crandall, Wiener (Given the spontaneous silliest name for an agency award by myself, right now) came to talk to our Creative Strategist class about the democracy of good ideas, Jeff Goodby/Benjamin Franklin, and being an Asian with glasses.

He made a list to share with us about being successful in the advertising world, since his boss and mentor, Jeff Goodby (creative genious) wouldn’t do so for him. Here it is:

Get rid of your big fat fucking ego. One of the biggest impediments to a creative’s growth in the industry was their ego. Sometimes the hardest thing can be to separate yourself from your ideas. You are not your ideas. Once they’re out in the open, they are “community property.” He stressed the importance of collaboration, saying “ego hides opportunities.”

A great idea is 99% strategy. He worked on Tully’s, a smoothie and coffee shop much like Starbucks, in which the team had to figure out a way to distinguish it from its monolith competitor and get people to try something new. They came up with the “3:21 wake up call,” where a high school band would play at 3:21 each day by Tully’s locations and hand out coupons that had to be redeemed in a half-hour. Behind that idea was a lot of great strategic thinking. Figuring out people’s routines, including when they get tired, their traffic patterns and so on, all had to happen first before Tully’s could be recognized against its competition.

Greatest creative weapon: Ears! You have to listen. To each other. To your mentors. To your client. “Knowledge talks. Wisdom listens.”

Secret to successful career in advertising: Embrace compromise. Being part of a team means compromising between ideas. Being part of a business means ultimately working towards business goals rather than personal artistic ones. Wong stressed the importance of creatives learning when to give up on an idea.

Engage in the democracy of good ideas. At Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, Wong discussed an idea session for a ski company in which each member of the team, everyone, was involved in pitching ideas. He was impressed by this mutual respect the agency had. “Anything is possible as long as no one cares who gets the credit.” Again with the ego, just because you’re not a “creative” by title, doesn’t mean you don’t have something to say. At Goodby they understood that.

Love your client like you love your dog. Your client is not the enemy. At the end of the day, you are working for them to meet their business’ goals. Again, teamwork is key. “Listening creates trust which kills fear.” Both sides are coming from completely different directions and different ways of thinking. Come in to meetings with open ears, a willingness to learn, and they will respond better.

So, there it is. Overall, some really great stuff happened. The takeaway?

We > Me.

Until next time,

Keep it silly

(21) All Things Turquoise

For a design for media project I am creating a video all about that beloved color of colors: turquoise. I’m in the initial think-of-everything phase, but I keep coming back to the 1950’s kitchen. Here’s a few ideas so far:

1980’s exercise video. Featuring all turquoise, all the time. Too much, really. 

Distressed housewife murders in her 1950’s turquoise kitchen. Will she strike again?

Turquoise blanket wrapped over random things: street sign. car. fence. parking meter.

Swimming pools? Fake underwater sequence. This could be animated.

Turquoise Man. ‘Nuff said.

Stop motion: using a conglomeration of turquoise objects, paper, fabric, so on, create a collage story

(20) Designer seeks other half

Almost-fully-college educated lonely graphic design artist seeks copy writer partner in crime. Enjoys walks on the beach kitten calendars (the 365 day kind) movies catholic church quiet evenings. playful, grammatically correct a must. Must have sense of humor and not opposed to llama farming. I’ll send pic if you send some words. Let’s collaborate.

(19) It’s time for me to get out of the stone age: A crash course on Twitter

I did MySpace in high school. I did Facebook in college. And now I get, “You really don’t have a Twitter?” One disbelieving friend told me she was just surprised because she thought I’d have lots of little things to say. Apparently, 40% of tweets are “pointless babble,” so I don’t know where that puts me. “Pointless babble” is probably subjective. At least Twitter’s concise. I may babble here for a 600-word post, but it takes effort to achieve babbling in 140 characters.

So, Twitter, here I am. Going to learn all about you and use you for the “tool” Professor Deb Morrison always understatedly touts you to be.

After signing up and going through the “find everyone/everything” intro, I’m immediately impressed by the sheer volume of quick communication and interaction darting about. Links! Look at this! Click on this! Little tiny pictures (what is that?)! On #uocreativestrat a bunch of you silly strategists are tweeting away about a number of interesting things…I’ve been missing a lot.

So for all of you who are like me, don’t be shy.  It’s no crime to join the conversation late in the game as long as you do it, and get it done. Here’s a short tutorial to get started:

Twitter is a microblogging site, which differs from traditional blogging in that, in this case, it limits the size of the posts to 140 characters. But beyond being a “blog,” Twitter is a social networking site that invites conversation. By limiting the length of the posts, users are forced into a call and response pattern, sharing links, photos, and videos within specific groups or with a specific person. All tweets are public by default. You can subscribe to a specific person or account to receive their tweets, and this is called following. People who subscribe to you are called your followers.

Using the @ symbol on Twitter will send a message to specific person, for example:

SigneTronson @SigneTronson

Hey @SoandSo, make me a sandwich

The hashtag (#) is a way for Twitter users to get connected to a certain topic. For example:

SigneTronson @SigneTronson

#UOcreativeStrat WOW, it’s week eight?!

Hashtags, like tags on blogs, help guide Twitter searches. If someone types in a popular hashtag, they will receive a whole list of matching results all about the same topic. This helps your Tweets from getting lost in the masses.

To link to a website, you can use the shortened version of the website’s address, so as not to go over 140 characters. Some websites like YouTube have built in shortened addresses on their webpages, but Google has a shortener for any URL at http://goo.gl. Just type in the address, and it will shorten it for you.

He’s not dead. He’s just sleeping.

So, those are the Twitter basics. I’ve just started, and it seems pretty intuitive. Like anything, you just gotta do it. Then you’ll learn.

Like always,

Keep it silly.

(18) Make Something: Couch Covers

Being a college student means going through a lot of furniture, whether it’s picking up your parent’s leftovers or picking something up off the street. Summertime in Eugene can be like furniture shopping. Just drive around, find a new couch someone left on the street, and bring it home. This resulted in a warehouse-style stackage at one point in our little apartment. 

The unfortunate thing about free furniture is that it’s usually pretty ugly. You’d be surprised at how new, clean, and functional it is – it’s just ugly. So, to combat this, I decided that I was going to cover this one little couch my roommate and I got from our next-door neighbors when we were moving. How do you do this? Fabric and a glue gun.

Now, you may scoff at this idea. But, really, it is very effective, simple, and much cheaper and versatile than buying a couch or chair cover. The first thing you need is to pick a LOT of fabric. My couch took about 25 yards and it is a small loveseat, probably 50 inches across. Fabric can be really expensive, but fortunately, fabric stores like Joann’s regularly have 40 – 50% off sales. This is where I got the fabric for my couch, and I got the fabric at $2.99 a yard at 40% off the full price. If you live in the Portland area, Fabric Depot has an enormous outdoor sale section that sometimes sells fabric by the bolt, which is ideal for a big project like this.

it’s good to start with a smaller-scale glue gun project like this office chair.

When choosing your fabric, make sure you get something 100% cotton. Cotton, versus poly, spandex or blends, doesn’t stretch while you’re gluing, which optimizes control over the shape of the fabric. It also won’t burn when mixed with hot glue. Regardless, you should try to get the thickest fabric possible. If you feel like splurging, Joann’s has some beautiful upholstery fabric, as well. 

When picking a pattern in the store, make sure to pull the bolt out and unroll it so you can see a large chunk of the fabric. Drape it over a cart or other bolts to get a sense of how the pattern will look. Sometimes small or very repetitious patterns can look good on a small scale, but on something big like a couch they become obnoxious. 

Next, make sure you have the right size and shape glue sticks for your glue gun. You want a gun that is in good shape, too, since things are going to get messy really soon. Also, buy some rubber kitchen gloves to protect your hands because when used over a long period of time, glue guns get REALLY hot.

When you’re gluing your couch or chair, cut pieces out according to the size and shape of each individual surface, like you would clothing. I actually sewed the cushions covers, but if you don’t have a sewing machine, you can fold the fabric and glue it like the rest of the couch. 

Good luck, and happy gluing!

(17) Cheap and Lazy: the Collegiate’s cookbook

Over a piddly dinner of rice, soy sauce, and not a lot else, I got to thinking: What do most college students eat? There are the clichés of college student cuisine, mostly consisting of macaroni and cheese, Top Ramen, Thanksgiving leftovers, and pizza. But I myself love to cook (because I love to eat), and I often hear talk of dishes someone made or hoped to make, and I wonder about the reality of college eating habits.

Perusing the endless number of college food blogs reveals a wide variety of foodies-in-training. From vegan to Kentucky fried to peanut-butter-themed, pretty much everything has been done, and done, and then done again.

USA Today posted preliminary results from the Tufts Longitudinal Health Study of 1,800 students. Here’s an infographic I put together showing the results:

According to this study done at Oregon State University, students aren’t eating enough fruits and vegetables (surprise, surprise), totaling 5 servings in a week when they should be getting that in a day.

Interesting.

While college foodsters country-wide are touting new leek soup recipes and calling themselves “almost vegan,” most skip meals, eat leftover pizza and call it a day. Hey, I’m guilty. The stress of a new independent lifestyle where I have little time and even less money has made me slip into food slumps on more than just midterm week.

So, my idea is to create a food blog that caters to the non-foodie, non-gourmet, time- and money-tight, cheap and lazy collegiate who knows their diet has gone downhill since they left mom and dad but don’t know what to do about it. If this sounds like you, let’s collaborate. I want to hear experiences, stories, recipes. I think this could be really funny, not serious calorie-counting or guilt-tripping diet-style, but a shared conglomeration of successes and food-fails about a part of our lives too often swept under the rug.

Until next time,

keep it silly