Atl. 22-26.
Thursday I finalized the design for the 8’x4’ posters. Jeff had some new words to be added into the typographic composition of the logo, so I reworked the image all in Illustrator (note to self: it is infinitely easier to make huge documents in Illustrator than Photoshop). That took a long time, but came out looking great. Separate note, got the shirts designed and ordered for UPC Carnival already. Found a great new apparel distributor here in Atlanta. One thing I’m learning about printers: constantly work to form good relationships with them. Don’t just be another client; make them remember you, value you, and want to work with you to make all of your orders work. It’s really helpful.
Friday morning I went with Jeff to a Christian dance program in Adair Park for inner-city kids to learn to tell the gospel through dance. It was a powerful visit. All of those kids were so passionate about what they were doing, and so deep in their insight behind it all. I was so inspired by them (though I did feel like I was on “So You Think You Can Dance?” when they would all start crying and talking about how emotional it all was, haha). It was moving. Then, I worked on the Flash concept all afternoon. Of course, this meant starting over from scratch. I finally started to understand something: making a project work for someone isn’t about working within the limits of what you know how to do; the applications should never be your limit. A project should be conceptualized first, and if you can’t do it yourself, hire out. I kept limiting my ideas for the Flash design to the confines of what I can do in Flash instead of imagining a better design. On Friday I finally came up with something simple, that granted I will have to get someone else to program, but it communicates the message attractively. Am I super proud of it? Nope. But it works. And Jeff approved. So it’s good to go. That night, we watched Henry Poole is Here. Terrific movie; wonderfully depressing. My favorite kind
Saturday I slept in. Imagine that. That night Andre cooked grilled veggies and ravioli that we bought at the international market (a building bigger than wal-mart with every kind of food imaginable - no really. I walked out with some of my favorite fruits from Honduras). We went to the Mid-Summer Music Fest in Candler Park that night with a bunch of their friends. It was a sea of thousands of people, and I got to be front and center for Guster. I got some great pictures I might post sometime soon. It was a ton of fun.
Sunday morning I went to All Souls with Jeff and Andre. It was by far my favorite service to have gone to yet. The worship was low-key, but uplifting, and the message was very rich and deep in Hebrew understandings of the Messiah (I was very, very pleased by this).
And today, Monday, I went in to MetroMerge to run the office for a bit this morning. I actually didn’t have design projects related specifically to Gift Card Giver today, so I got to finish some contract projects I’ve been doing on the side. At lunch I left to meet Jeff, Dowd, Brian, and James for lunch in Glenwood Park. They were all working on a short film for GCG that day. Dowd apparently used to be a model, and she is kind of an up-and-coming actress in LA right now, and Brian is a great photographer who was shooting all of the stuff to turn the film into a stop-motion later. I spent the rest of the day with them. It was great to be around the creativity that goes into making a film instead of print design. I think the film will come out great.
Future projects that I’ve got coming: once the Flash thing is completed and we take some of my projects to print finally, Jeff is taking me off GCG work for a bit (hallelujah, space to work on other brands for a while!). One project that I’m getting put on is called, “Green My Hood” - a project that gets suburban churches to sponsor the Lakewood/South ATL community in making it a more sustainable/efficient community, environmentally speaking, I think. This is a project I definitely can get behind, plus, I’m helping create the brand, instead of working within it, so the logo design will really let me break loose for a bit. Still working around Catalyst some too; going to make a shirt design for them soon, maybe? I’ll actually be at the Catalyst offices all day tomorrow.
