4/24/09

Checkin my pulse...

Alright, so its been a while but I have a brief moment of downtime so I figured I would update you all on what is going on here in the ATL. I just began my 3rd quarter, which is just crazy. Feels like I was just a 1st quarter. I will be doing my grad sign off and hunting for a job in the real world before I know it. Here is my schedule and a brief description of what I am doing in the classes:

Monday - 6pm-10pm - Logos • I have 3 separate companies I am rebranding. I am doing Tommyknocker Brewery, a beer company from Idaho Springs, Colorado. The Tampa Bay Lightening, NHL team. I am also doing Fox Vineyards and Winery from Social Circle, GA. Lots and lots of sketches for this class. By Monday I have to have 100 separate logo sketches for each project, so that is 300!

Tuesday - 6pm-10pm - TV/Viral Video • An ad class focusing mainly on the television broadcasting of advertising, and the viral video phase.

Wednesday - 9:30am - 12pm - Buzz • An ad class focusing on non-traditional advertising (guerilla). Basically in your face off the wall style advertising. Similar to the truth.com campaigns if you have ever seen those.

Thursday - 6pm-10pm - Content Branding • I basically pick a neighborhood in Atlanta in which I will rebrand. I have been spending most of my time walking the streets of Virginia Highlands, capturing the overall essence and personality of life there.

All in all, I am basically now starting to produce work that could be put into my portfolio, as the first 2 quarters were foundational courses for the most part.

But great news! As you enter the school, you get to see all types of student work all around, just representing what the students can truly produce here and the way we think. As you first come into the school, there are 2 glass cases facing each other, that are the first impression pieces. When I visited the school a year ago for the first time, I remember looking at these projects and just being in awe of what students could do, and how far my skill was from that. But guess what. I made it there now!






I got a chance to design a wine bottle set in representation of Renzo Piano, my assigned architect. I also redesigned the book covers for the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Trilogy. I was really excited about all of this and really am on my way to building a great book that will eventually get me a great job, hopefully in New York City. But we'll see, maybe even the west coast for a bit.

On a more depressing note, I got to get my eyes checked. I have been having headaches and find myself squinting. Thanks to the wonderful science of genetics, I can already tell I will be there eventually, as Mom, Dad, and now Ellen all use glasses some or all of the time. Oh well, maybe it will be a good look for me if it does work out that way.

Yesterday, I got to get out to Social Circle, Georgia, to visit the Fox Vineyards and Winery there. What a small, quiet country town it was, but nice to get out of the city for a few hours. I got to sample all of the muscadine and scuppernong based wines for free and learned quite a bit about the company. I am rebranding them after all, so I need to be able to understand the full personality of the business. Here are some pictures of my visit:






That is about all I got going on at the moment. Broke, busy, exhausted, and absolutely loving being a student and just warping myself into the designer I want to be.

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