First Talk - Information Graphics Class at ACU

Recently I was asked by my former professor Ryan Feerer to give a talk to his information graphics class at my Alma Mater – ACU. I was hesitant at first to accept, but what was there to lose (besides making a fool of myself). I took Ryan up on it as long as he would take blame if the talk sucked. He asked me to speak on working and living in Santa Fe, current projects I'm designing, and what my plans are for the future. I decided to put up the slides from that talk below. Of course they don't make much sense without the talking included, but they are divided into the 3 main speaking points – What Up (working and living in Santa Fe), Current Projects, and Plans For The Future (Reading University MATD). Maybe you can follow the progression and talk without the words ;)

I thoroughly enjoyed speaking to the class and was surprised at how many great questions they had at the end. A few questions were along the lines of: "How would you suggest to prepare for a job like what you had at Cisneros Design?" or "What do you wish you had learned or studied more of while you were in school at ACU?". Another student asked me about the books or magazines I'm reading currently to prepare for Reading and my future in design. An open discussion on these resources will be covered in my next post.  

 

Slides from the presentation

 

Norman Ives

This Friday I was given a fantastic going-away present by my good friend and co-worker Sarah Ives. Her grandfather Norman Ives was a brilliant artist and designer. He created beautiful designs by layering, fragmenting, and cropping letterforms. Sarah and her family have many Ives originals and it saddens me that I never was able to purchase one while living close to the family in Santa Fe. Norman Ives and his contemporaries are truly an inspiration to me. 

The Ives still have a huge collection of the original wood type he frequently used. Sarah dug up all the characters in my name and gave them to me. Letterpress wood type from the collection of one of my idols?! Such a fitting and well thought out gift. Especially since I am off to Reading to study type and design.

Again, thank you Sarah. Amazing. 

A few of Ives' designs are below along with a short bio from MidCenturia –

American artist, designer and teacher Norman Ives (1923-1978) studied under Josef Albers and Herbert Matter as a member of the inaugural class of Yale University's Graphic Design program. Upon his graduation from the program in 1952 he was invited to become a member of its faculty, eventually becoming a full professor in 1972. During the 1950's he worked with Herbert Matter on various design projects including those for the New Haven Railroad and Knoll International. Ives' artistic works included paintings, collages, prints and bas-reliefs which often incorporated fragmented letterforms.

 

Last day at Cisneros :[

My last day at Cisneros Design here in sunny Santa Fe was this past Friday. I will miss these dudes and the Santa Fe community immensely. However it wasn't all tears and goodbyes! Cisneros knows how to throw epic parties. My good friend and co-worker Louis created his "famous" margaritas at work and then afterwards, we all went to Kelly Cancios' house for football, ribs, and classic tailgatin' games. Loads of fun. Pics from my last couple of weeks are below. Goodbye Santa Fe. you are an enchanting, beautiful, and weird place.

 

Thank you Cisneros and Santa Fe

I am extremely excited to travel to England and learn at Reading! But before that I had to make some difficult decisions. Unfortunately today, I turned in my two weeks notice. It was not an easy task. I have loved working at Cisneros Design and I have learned an incredible amount since starting here. So without any further ado, shout out time!

Fred Cisneros, the owner of the firm, gave me a wonderful opportunity at a job directly out of college. I cannot thank him enough for this experience. He also allowed us all to play darts, foosball, and "peach schnapps" (don't ask), at work. He also gave us a fridge full of brews to which I believe no amount of thanks can repay. All of these things gave Cisneros Design a really chill workplace environment. I cannot ever expect to have such wonderful coworkers or such an amazing office space. Truly an experience I will never forget. 

My creative director Eddie is one of the nicest and funniest designers I have ever met. She encouraged and inspired me on all of my projects and made every scenario fun and unique. My projects only became better with her guidance and direction. She also forced me to learn InDesign to which I am ultimately grateful.

My last shout-out is to a fellow Wacoan – Randy Stewart. Randy was the one that brought me to Cisneros. His mother ironically works in the space underneath my buddies Deuxtone at an art gallery in Waco. She told my friend Tanner about a job opening here at Cisneros. Fortunately, Tanner let me in on the job and told me to apply. The rest is history. Randy is a wonderful designer and friend. I've shared many a laugh with the Wacoan and wish they could continue. He is an excellent artist, creator, thinker, gamer, competitor, and dart-thrower. I will truly miss our nerdy discussions and his epic beard.

The employees of Cisneros are absolutely wonderful and I will miss them. To all of Cisneros Design I say, thank you. You have truly inspired me. Rock on. 

 

Graduate School

As my recent tweets suggest, I will be attending Reading University's Masters in Typeface Design program this fall. I have only recently secured this position and obviously I am very excited. I have known about Reading (30 minutes west of London) for a while now, but my interest grew whenever I attended the Pencil to Pixel exhibit in NYC this summer. Dan Rhatigan, James Montalbano, and many other designers convinced me that this was a fantastic career opportunity and that I should take it. I also reached out to many professors, alumni, family members, and of course, my girlfriend for advice. We all decided this was the perfect time in my life to pursue such a crazy endeavor. 

The program will last for one year and will cover the history, practice and creation of fine typography both Latin, and Non-Latin. Some activities will include handwriting, calligraphy, etching, stone carving, letterpress printing, drawing, and of course, typeface design. The course will also award me with a Masters of Arts which I will use to teach many typography hungry students someday in the distant future. More information on the course is here. 

I will be using this blog as a weekly update on what I have been doing at the Reading MATD. I will be posting articles and pictures of my travels, sketches, assignments and probably a few selfies. Hope you enjoy!

Pencil > Pixel

Recently I have been reading more blogs/texts relating to typography and type design. The subject has always fascinated me, but the spark was reignited earlier this summer when I went to Monotype's "Pencil to Pixel" exhibit in NYC.

It was the week before I left for New York and I stumbled across the event – probably via one of the great designers I follow on twitter. The exhibit was free so I decided to check it out. Monotype (the global leaders on typography) and Dan Rhatigan put on a great presentation over the history of modern typography. They had it all. There were original printed books by Firmin Didot and John Baskerville, drawings by Eric Gill, and even a spectacular hands-on presentation over responsive design with web typography. It was truly a type nerds paradise.

I was very impressed by not only the typographic materials and near artifacts in the Monotype archive, but also the amount of knowledge and history that Dan was able to share with us. It was a great learning experience for someone invested in type. Maybe next year they will show the exhibit again! You will not want to miss it.  

 

* First picture from Monotype .

 

dan-at-tour.jpg

Shout out!

Throughout college and high school I have had many people inspire me and encourage me to pursue graphic design as a profession. One epic dude comes to mind first - my former boss and professor, Mike Wiggins. Mike is the department chair of the Art & Design Department at Abilene Christian University. He was the first person that told me I could draw letters for a living. I owe my career to this man. He showed me the basics and fundamentals in type and also prepared me for a career devoted to the graphic arts! He is also a nice guy and a rad skateboarder. Mike and the gang at ACU (future posts on my other mentors are being written ASAP!) have definitely inspired me and without them I would not be where I am today. A thousand times, thank you!

 

Welcome

Hello and welcome to my blog! I will be using this as an outlet to showcase work or inspiration that I would not publish onto my portfolio website. I want to post process work and sketches mostly, but there will be the ocasional photo, commentary, or video. I plan on updating this blog often. Probably not everyday though since I'm not a crazy person. All typos are on obvusily on purpose.