t off

Nice try, but those T's just aren't working.

 

snooktastic

Funny take on Dove's Evolution.

Alyssa Milano's Evolution: Jersey Shore from Alyssa Milano

national geographic photography contest 2009

Ughhhh, I've always loved National Geographic photos and own some of the photography collection books. They're always just so breath-taking and awe-inspiring. There's so much of the world I need to see!

i guess it's a return of the creepy babies

I can't say I agree with most of these except for the Career Builder and American Express spots.

TIME Top 10 TV Ads of 2009

And in case you missed any of theses Top 10 Virals

creepy babies

I know it's supposed to be cute but something about this just really creeps me out.

yarn

I think I finally found the inspiration I need and the right way to showcase the font that I designed... A wonderfully kitschy and crafty book on how to knit. This kind of illustrative texture would be perfect and the fluidity of the type I designed brings to mind the concept of yarn.

I guess it's true that everything you do can enrich your design sensibilities. I'm definitely glad that I decided to learn how to crochet this week.

give it a ponder

I never knew texting was such an issue. Makes me glad that I'm not in middle school any more. Thirteen year old girls are horrible creatures that use technology for evil. I remember when we were young the issue was getting trapped in a 3 way phone call or having someone save your AIM conversations...If you don't have anything nice to say then don't say anything at all.

Anyways, these are funny.

free shipping

why i need to go to thailand and other interesting places

http://yvanrodic.blogspot.com/

Owoooooooooo

I think I am late in finding this, but hysterical non the less.

what's new?

Got this in an email blast from Urban Outfitters.

love love love

Ohh, Tim Walker and Tim Burton...need I say more?

funny packaging

Found on Dieline

wild things

I saw Where The Wild Things Are this past weekend. I don't know how much children can really understand the more metaphorical aspects of the movie but either way, it is visually stunning. One of the things that I love the most about the movie is the kitschy handmade feel created by all the wooden elements and scribbly lettering. It's unusual for a director to really care about the extraneous materials outside of the film but Spike Jonze worked closely with Geoff McFetridge
to set up a style-guide for marketing materials and it definitely payed off.

"...this is a handmade film, make everything feel handmade.' Things that are handmade are made with love, they're made with care, they're made by groups of individuals."

typetastic

Typophile Film Festival 5 Opening Titles from Brent Barson on Vimeo.

This gave me a very strong desire to make type out of Jell-O.

you were so talented

Speaking of doing things that are hands-on, I've been having the urge to start painting again. I ran into a girl from my high school art class two weeks ago and she was shocked and disappointed that I didn't become an illustrator or painter, she said, "you're were so talented!" It's always nice to get some praise every now and then. I don't know why I've always believed compliments and felt confident about my painting/drawing abilities but not my design skills. I guess I've always thought that being able to draw something you either can or can't do. It's definitely a bit harder to teach than the rules of typography. My plan was always to take up painting seriously when I was retired or something along those lines... I'm kind of glad in a way that I didn't make it my career. It's always been such a relaxing and fulfilling experience for me that I think adding all of the stress of deadlines and criticism would have ruined it for me. Here's a golden oldie, a self-portrait from my junior year of high school. Wow, five years ago!

the glory of photoshop

I stumbled upon this fun blog today, Photoshop Disasters. It's pretty funny that out there are some people with such a dismal understanding of perspective and human anatomy. But, I'm ashamed to admit there were also some posts on there where I still couldn't figure out what was wrong with them.

In other news, I need to start working on things outside of the office. I had a plan to have about three new campaigns finished by the end of the summer. What a joke that was. My position right now doesn't allow for the most creative design and as miserable as sitting down in front of a computer is when I finally get home after sitting at a computer all day... it needs to get done. All the more reason to focus on getting some more hand-done type in the mix. I like the unique calligraphy style of Neither Snow.















And just because, these super different wine bottles:

Life-Size Lego House!

Life-Size Lego House Built...and Demolished - Shelterpop

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Gold Clover Ring - Alex Monroe - Accessories - Shop - StyleCaster

Gold Clover Ring - Alex Monroe - Accessories - Shop - StyleCaster

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sooooooo COOL!

Danielle showed me this cool website today. Love it!

still trying to get where i'm going

"But the truth is, being successful is hard. You won’t love every subject you study. You won’t click with every teacher. Not every homework assignment will seem completely relevant to your life right this minute. And you won’t necessarily succeed at everything the first time you try.
That’s OK. Some of the most successful people in the world are the ones who’ve had the most failures. JK Rowling’s first Harry Potter book was rejected twelve times before it was finally published. Michael Jordan was cut from his high school basketball team, and he lost hundreds of games and missed thousands of shots during his career. But he once said, "I have failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed." These people succeeded because they understand that you can’t let your failures define you – you have to let them teach you. You have to let them show you what to do differently next time...
Don’t be afraid to ask questions. Don’t be afraid to ask for help when you need it. I do that every day. Asking for help isn’t a sign of weakness, it’s a sign of strength. It shows you have the courage to admit when you don’t know something, and to learn something new."

-Obama

Animal Calendars

I love these! I should buy them or steal the idea for some new self promos.

MoMA Store - 2010 Animal Calendar

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even worse than i thought

Turns out it is a mix of a mix. I guess the singing version is a little better.

another rip off

I heard this on the radio this morning and couldn't believe it. Are there any rappers/mixers out there who every now and then can write their own melodies/music to sample? I can appreciate the creativity of pieces that are mixed well and written well but that isn't the case in this situation. The thing that bothers me the most is all of the people out there that are fed music on top 40 stations and think that all of these pop artists/rappers are totally original and write the entirety of the song including the pieces that they sample. Most people won't know that a great song from Imogen Heap was ruined.

just cause its awesome

The Hamburger Bed

dirty

Found these photos bySolve Sundsbo in the same H&M magazine I mentioned earlier. I've been indulging my weakness for fashion photography lately. It's crazy how he can making blurry night shots look so polished and cool.

In other news I'm putting the job hunt on hold for this weekend (sorta) and heading down to dirty jerz/AC to see my roommates!

britain's got talent

Another gemstone from Britain's Got Talent.

in honor of the sunshine

We finally had some sunshine here on LI the past week. It was very re-energizing. In honor of that here's some work by Camilla Akrans. I found these in an H&M Magazine and looooove the sun bleached look. Beautiful.

gee thanks!

I finished up my final screenprinting project last night. I figured it made sense to make a series of thank you cards to give to people that reviewed my work and people who will interview me in the future. It's more personal than a store bought card and shows off another skill set that I have. Hope people appreciate them!

neato photography

i would love to mess around with something like this if i have the time, more here.

mesmerizing song, cool video, maybe my new favourite band.

M83 - We Own the Sky from David Altobelli on Vimeo.

i ♥ susan boyle

this makes me really happy

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxPZh4AnWyk

it also makes me want to watch les miz again. it reminded me how obsessed i was as a kid. i still know every word.

overload

The semester is winding down for us. To say that I am beginning to feel overwhelmed by everything would be an understatement. My plan of taking one day at a time was working pretty well... until today when I found out that I am scheduled at work 5 days a week, during the busiest, two most important weeks of any semester EVER. Today I let myself freak out but tomorrow it is back to my one day at a time plan. I will get through this. 

On a positive note, I got picked to go to the Art Directors club advertising review! It's nice to know that my teachers believe in me even if I don't. 

correspondence

I thought this could maybe be helpful to someone next year. Here's all the emails that it took back and forth to get my internship:

Nov. 11, 2008

Hi Nancy,

I always seem to get tongue-tied when I see you. How about that party for Ray? Ellen Steinberg and I decided that we, of the small state of Delaware, are simply the "us-iest." No one else has the same degree of us-ness that us has. Or we-ness, if you prefer. Anyhoo, I am vouching herein for my absolute favorite student of the year, maybe of the last two years, Ms. Briana Higgins. She just keeps surprising me with her work. I do wish she would talk more - maybe even dare to smile now and then. She is so damn serious about it all, but then, I understand why. Anyway, I don't know how your agency works in terms of interns, but we rarely send anyone to you and I think this young woman really deserves to go somewhere GREAT like, with you, or with one of your young proteges up north there. So let us know if it is feasible at all. And we STILL must make arrangements for you to come down to Delaware. Maybe in beach weather?
Thanks for your time,
Ann Lemon
U of D
(us)

Nov. 11, 2008
Hi Ann---yeah that was some shindig. So glad I went. I know it was the highlight of Ray's career...at least I sure never saw him cry before. It was great to see you and to meet Ellen in person. That was a treat. I'd love to see your student's work. We do have internships although with the recent financial meltdown that may be interrupted, will have to see. In any case I always like seeing terrific talent. So encourage her to contact me.
I will hope to get down to DE one of these days. Yes the "us-ness" has
great appeal.
xoNancy

Nov. 12, 2008
Dear Ms. Vonk,
I’ve wanted to work in advertising since I was ten years old when I realized that people actually make ads. I was watching an episode of Rugrats and the family dog, Spike, starred in a dog food commercial. Currently, I am a senior studying Visual Communications at your alma mater, the University of Delaware. Like you, I was lucky enough to stumble upon the great design program available here and as part of my education I am seeking out an internship. I would love to have the opportunity to discuss with you the possibility of fulfilling my internship at Ogilvy & Mather’s Toronto location. Our internships are conducted during the University’s Winter Session in the month of January. I would like to send you my portfolio but wanted to know if you would prefer a pdf or a physical version. Also, do you prefer to be contacted by phone or email?
Thank You,
Briana Higgins

Nov. 14, 2008

Hi Briana---I'd love to see your work. You can send pdfs no problem. As for a January internship, we'd have to see how you might be able to cross the border. Would you have a place to stay for that month? Let's start with seeing your work and take it from there. If you prefer to send hard copy we're at 33 Yonge St., toronto ON, M5E 1X6. ---Nancy

Nov. 19, 2008

Nancy-
I attached a zip file of my portfolio and resume. I hope what you see is up to your standards for an internship. I would love to intern at Ogilvy Toronto because I want to be mentored by people who create work that I greatly admire. I understand the business objectives of clients seeking advertising and the role that it plays in the economy but I also believe that advertising can serve other purposes, and on occasion have a positive affect on society. Your work for Dove, Campaign for Real Beauty, is truly inspirational and an shining example of the good that advertising can do. It is rare to see advertisements that are uplifting and I would be so grateful for the chance to learn from people that combine two things that I love about advertising, a constructive message and wonderful use of interactivity. Thank you for considering me.
-Briana Higgins  

Dec. 2, 2008

Nancy-
I just wanted to send you a follow up email. Thank you for taking time to speak with me last week. I am thrilled about the possibility of coming to Toronto and having an amazing learning experience at Ogilvy as well as meeting you. I can’t believe that I might have the chance to intern at an agency that produces such great work. It really would be a dream come true. I’ve been speaking to my professors non-stop about it. Bill Deering wanted me to say hello for him.
-Briana Higgins

Dec. 3, 2008

Hi there. I know you're eager to know if this is happening for the obvious reasons. I am checking on any issues with immigration as we decide if we'll bring you in as an exception. As I told you we don't do this kind of internship normally. It's because you're from UD that I'd consider it. Which is not to say we wouldn't appreciate your help. Hopefully I can give you an answer in the next few days. Sorry to keep you waiting. ---Nancy

Dec. 3 2008

Hi Briana. Just heard back from our head of HR. It turns out even unpaid interns from abroad need a work permit to enter Canada. She suggested that you go onto the government of Canada's website to see what steps are required. We could provide a letter of an official offer of the internship (likely required). If you're up for going to the trouble to do this, we will be happy to host you for a month.
Lorie Manley will be happy to take your call or emails if you have questions after checking out what's needed through the government. Here's her email to me from earlier today:

Hey Nancy,
Here is what I received this morning from our immigration counsel regarding the question of the young lady coming to do a one month internship with us in Toronto from your alma mater:
First, the definition of "work" under the Immigration rules:
Examples of “work” include, but are not limited to:
• unpaid employment undertaken for the purpose of obtaining work experience, such as an internship or practicum normally done by a student. Seems this lady's situation fits this definition as an internship would require a work permit.
Secondly, he's suggested the following:
There are a number of programs out there which do allow for short term work permits for students and new graduates so she should explore that and if she can obtain one then she can do your internship. Perhaps she can look into this and let us know what she finds out???
Your thoughts?
Lorie

Dec 3, 2008

Nancy-
I am definitely up to the trouble of filling out the paperwork. I am truly ecstatic! Thank you for this amazing opportunity. I realize that it is a lot of effort on your part and the agency to take on an intern, especially someone like me who is not following the regular program. I deeply appreciate what you have done for me.
I've been looking through the information on the Canadian Government's website and it looks as if I need to fill out forms for an internship/co-op working permit. The site said processing takes around two weeks so I am trying to get the forms out hopefully tomorrow. I will definitely need a letter stating the internship offer so maybe someone can possibly send an attachment of some kind? Once again, thank you so much.
-Briana Higgins

Dec. 3, 2008

Ms. Manley-
Hi, I'm Briana Higgins, the intern trying to come to Ogilvy for January. Nancy Vonk gave me your email so that I can contact you if I have any questions while I am trying to find out what kinda of immigration paperwork I need to fill out. I've been trying to figure out what I need to do from the Canadian Government's website and what I have gathered so far is that I don't need a Visa because I am a US citizen. I don't believe that I need to get a Study Permit because I found this:
"You do not need a study permit if you plan to take a course or program in Canada that lasts six months or less. You must complete the course or program within the period authorized for your stay in Canada."
I also found information on Co-op and internship programs that said:
"For some academic programs, work experience is part of the curriculum. Foreign students who wish to participate in a co-op or internship program must apply for a work permit as well as a study permit."
I'm assuming that I need to fill out the Co-op internship program forms and study permit forms? I tried contacting immigration offices and the Study Abroad Office of my school but neither was very much help. Is there someone that normally handles interns or foreign employees at Ogilvy? I found information on the normal processing time for these types of forms which is around two weeks so I'm trying to get everything figured out as soon as possible.
Thank You,
Briana Higgins

Dec. 3, 2008

Hi there. We are open Monday jan. 5 after the holidays. What are the exact dates of the internship so we can put that in the letter?

Dec. 3, 2008

The dates of the internship would be from Jan. 5th - Feb. 6th.
-Briana

Dec. 5 2008

Hi Briana---I've written a letter (attached) and thought you should read it and let me know if in your understanding of what immigration needs, it has covered the bases. We'll get this on letterhead and emailed to you
today.---Nancy

Dec. 5 2008

Nancy-
I've been doing a lot of research on what I need to get a work permit. There are  many different kinds and right now I'm trying to figure out if I need a Short Term/Temporary Work Permit or a Working Holiday Permit. Either way, I do need the job offer letter and I found this information about what content is needed:

What should be contained in the job offer?
The job offer should contain the details of the position being offered, including: the title of the position being sought in Canada; the responsibilities associated with that position; remuneration for employment; the duration of the position; and the location of employment. Depending on the specific category of the work permit application, additional details or supporting documentation may have to be included. If I get the regular Short Term Work Permit I might need a Labor Market Opinion although I may fall under exceptions from NAFTA. I am currently having my situation assessed so I can figure out what the correct paper work to fill out is. I've tried to contact Lorie Manely several times but haven't heard back from her. Thanks again for all your trouble.
-Briana

Dec. 8, 2008

Hi Briana,
I'm trying to get you some clarification on what is required/needed from Immigration Canada to come here for an internship in January. I'll send you a note as soon as I have more information.
cheers,
Lorie

Dec. 8. 2008

Hi Lorie. Based on what Briana wrote, the letter I drafted answers her questions (pay: nothing. Job: intern. Location, duration, all answered through letter and letterhead. Any other thoughts let me know. This may be more trouble for her than it's worth. Please drop her an email as she says she's been trying to ask you questions but not connecting. Thanks----Nancy

Dec. 9, 2008

Hi Briana,
You've indicated below that you are having your situaiton assessed. Please let us know what the recommendation is that you receive.
thanks,
Lorie

Dec. 9, 2008

Lorie-
I got the results back from my assessment and they recommended that I just fill out the normal Work Permit papers. This requires you to get an LMO (Labor Market Opinion). Unfortunately, it appears that I don't qualify for concurrent processing so I can't fill out the permit application until I get a Positive Labor Market opinion back. From what I understand the LMO is the responsibility of the employer. I don't know if you have ever dealt with getting an LMO before and if so do you know how long it takes to get a decision? I'm starting to wonder if it realistic for me to be able to get this permit before Jan. 5. If necessary would I still be able to start while the permit is being processed, or just putting this out there, since I am not being paid if my status could be changed from an intern to a visiting or "shadowing" student that does
not require work papers. Thanks for any help or advice you can give.
-Briana Higgins 

Dec. 9, 2008

Hey Nancy-
I officially need to fill out papers for a regular working permit. This requires an LMO (Labor Market Opinion) that I believe the employer must obtain. I sent an email to Lorie about all of this. I'm not sure how long all of the paper work will take and if necessary would I be able to start before it comes through? Also, I'm just putting this out there, is there anyway for me to come to Ogilvy as a "shadowing"or observing student rather than an unpaid intern?
-Briana 

Dec. 9, 2008

Yes you can call it shadowing. But no, you can't cross the border without your papers. It's ok with us if you do the internship later if it's ok with school. Soundslike this won't get processed in time. Sorry it's never simple to deal with immigration. You can see why we rarely have Americans come up.---N

Dec. 9, 2008

Nancy-
I am going to the consulate in New York on Monday. A classmate of mine is in a similar situation with Brazil and he went to their consulate and they actually processed his paper work that day. I am still going to try to see if I can get this to work out, but I will need that letter from you on a letterhead, maybe you can send a scanned version that I can print out to speed up the process. 

Thanks.
-Briana

Dec. 9, 2008

Be sure to tell me the exact changes you want to be made to what I sent so it's lined up with what you learned. Then we'll fire it off. Hope all this trouble is worth it for you!---N

Dec. 9, 2008

Nancy-
The original letter seems pretty good but you might be able to include a few more details about my responsibilities. Assuming it is on a letterhead like you said then the location is taken care of. I'm not sure whether it will help or hurt the situation with the LMO if you mention that the position is being created specifically for me because you need to prove that the position cannot be filled by a Canadian worker. It's definitely worth it for me if it pulls through. :)
-Briana 

Dec. 9, 2008

Considering it isn't a "position", I don't know why we'd have to prove we couldn't fill it with a Canadian. We'll do our best.---N

Dec. 10, 2008

I think I may have found a solution. The SWAP Program gives me a work permit valid for 6 months at any job anywhere in Canada and only takes one week to process.

Dec. 10, 2009

Hi Briana,
Do you need anything else from us, aside from the letter that Nancy provided, in order to apply for this? And where exactly will you apply for it (ie at the Consulate or locally)?
Lorie

Dec. 18, 2009

I received my Working Visa in the mail today so I am all set to go. They will hand
me all of the other official documents at Customs when I arrive in Canada. I have a
flight booked for Jan. 3rd. I am so glad that everything finally got worked out. Are
there any other particular things that need to be discussed before I get there? Until
I hear from you, Happy Holidays!

-Briana

Dec. 18, 2008

Way to go. We'll see you Jan. 5. It will be fun. ---Nancy

Dec. 18, 2008

Hi Briana, 

Good news. Can you please scan me a copy of what you received - or fax it to me at 416-363-5943? We'll need to provide you with an internship agreement, which we'll send shortly. If you can sign one copy and bring it with you when you arrive, that would be great.
cheers,
Lorie

the end

I can't believe the day has come. May last day at Ogilvy. Although I'm super excited to go home and get back to school I will be sad to leave here. It kinda sucks not to be able to see the final results of a lot of the things that I worked on here. Especially Crystal Light. I've learned an incredible amount through this experience and I only hope that translates into newer and better work. I'm eager to get back to school and work my ass off to get a book that I'm actually proud of.

Monday I made the mistake of thinking that I would actually get out of work at a normal hour. Haha. I'm not even sure what I worked on at this point. I think we needed to come up with different transitions for parts of the Crystal Light storyboards and I had to redraw some frames. It ended up being another late night and I didn't get home until after 1am.

Tuesday was much more laid back for once. I just had to make a few copy changes to my Shreddies files and kinda hung out for the most part. Wed. I felt really bad because everyone was freaking out over the workload that they had. I kept offering to help people out but it wasn't really stuff that I could help with. The only thing that I ended up doing was laying out the two remaining print ads for Winners and got them ready to be sent off to the studio. Later in the day I got brought in to help work on Carnation. So we ended up staying late brainstorming again until 11. I guess it was worth it because Janet liked most of our ideas. She liked more than she killed and today we have a meeting with media planners for that.

Yesterday was pretty relaxed too and I actually left work at 5. I planned on going to the Paperchase that claimed that it was like 3 blocks from my office building on google maps but ended up walking around for 45 minutes in the 10 degree weather before I gave up and sought shelter. It was painfully cold to be outside for that long. I ended up going to the mall and picked up nice sketchbooks and some thank you cards for Cara, Bee and Mike. I'm planning on letterpressing some stuff for Nancy and sending her a UD thing or two as a thank you. After my shopping fiasco I had to head back down near the office and I met my aunt to see Dirty Dancing on the Canadian version of Broadway. It wasn't totally what I expected but still fun to watch. Whoever did the casting did an awesome job at getting people that look like actors in the movie.

last monday

This morning started off pretty interesting. I got to the subway and realized that my monthly TCC card had expired because its now February. I was short 10 cents to buy a token and had to run down the street to the nearest bank and back to the station and then the teller said they were out of tokens and let me through for free. Oy. Somehow I still made it to work on time.

The interestingness continued when I got to work and Mike was like the Winners layouts are due TODAY. At 12. He only found out on Sun. from Nancy that they were due to the client so we scrambled to get that done for the first few hours of work. Nancy really liked one of my designs, too bad the client didn't. :( They basically turned the whole thing into a design monstrosity. Maybe I'll post my layouts once it goes to print. I also got stuck shrinking down those Shreddies files to under 1MB and then the guy asked me to make the two pdfs the exact same file size. Not exactly sure how one does that when the pdfs are made of dozens of different files. That would require a lot of math and time. So I'm not sure what's gong on with that.

The rest of today I spent catching up on my Super Bowl commercials. Canadian Super Bowl commercials are light-years away from American commercials. In a bad way. A very bad way. I went to a Super Bowl party with Cara yesterday, ate lots of food, and watched the game which got pretty interesting near the end.

super sunday

So Thirtsy Thursday at work wasn't too eventful for us because we had to get a lot together for the Crystal Light client meeting the next morning. We just grabbed a couple of beers and went back to work. I finished up putting together the first part of the downloadable Shreddies swag stuff I was working on and sent that off to Ivan for approval. I also worked on some more Winners designs and helped with the story boards some. They were pretty nervous about them because they were pretty crazy and included mermaids and unicorns which actually turned out to be the client's favorite part. Go figure. So the meeting went really well.

The rest of Friday was pretty laid back for a change and I didn't get assigned any work for the weekend! I spent most of Fri. trying to shrink down the Shreddies pdfs that I made so that they could go online. I really don't know why the interactive part of the agency was making me attempt to do that when they would know better than anyone else how to make things the best quality at the smallest file size. My files were 3MB and they were demanding that they be under 1MB which just wasn't happening so finally the account person persauded someone in interactive to deal with it.

I left work probably the earliest ever a little ater 5. Cara took me to the Distillery district to walk around. It kinda reminded me of Delaware with all the red brick. Toronto isn't a very old city so this area was old by their standards. After that we did some shopping and then headed to Globe for our Winterlicious dinner. The city has two events each year set up called Winterlicious and Summerlicious where the higher end restaurants offer preset 3 course meals for $35. Kinda like Restaurant Week in NYC. I had vegetable lasagna very interesting and delicious! Our meals ended up being welllll over $35 with all the booze that we ordered but well worth it for a treat. Yesterday was pretty uneventful except my cousin came over for our belated birthday (his is the day after mine) Indian feast. yum.

end of week 4

I am extremely distracted right now. For the life of me I can't concentrate on the design in front of me. I guess one of the things I'll have to get more used to when I'm working is having the discipline to concentrate on one thing for hours and hours at a time. The speed at which people work here is much faster than school. I feel like I'm starting to pick up my pace a bit which is great. At this point I can design a lot of decently tight comps in a variety of styles in one day. I also feel like my eye has developed massively and I think that I'm finally starting to come to a decision about wether I would like to be an art director or a copywriter. I'm definitely leaning towards art direction. As much as I enjoy writing headlines I really don't think I would have that much fun dealing with scripts.

This week has been pretty busy again and I've been super tired. I didn't do very much over the weekend but it was really nice just to relax and do nothing. On Sunday, though, I had to spend the whole day designing stuff for Shreddies and ended up staying up until 2 working on that. When I got in Monday morning I had to show what I designed to Ivan and he approved most of them and told me a couple of things to change and by the end of the day I sent it to the account person. I'm not really sure what's going on with all of that. I'm supposed to design desktop wallpaper to go along with the rest of the stuff that I made but I don't know what's going on with client approval from the first things that they saw. I guess I'll find out sooner or later but in the mean time I've been working on the desktop but is pretty hard to make a piece of cereal look interesting enough to want it for your desktop background. At some point during the day Noreel asked me to help him find images for the deck he was putting together for the Coke fountain project that I mentioned earlier so that consumed most of my Tuesday.

Tuesday ended up being a crazy day. Not at work but back at home. My dad took my uncle who has brain cancer to his doctor because he couldn't walk any more so they had to hospitalize him and in the midst of all that I got a IM from my cousin asking if my sister was ok. Turns out Ali was 2 blocks from our house when she hit a patch of ice, fish-tailed, hit the curb and flipped the car into somebody's yard. Thank god she is perfectly fine, just a little sore. The EMTs told her that wearing her seatbelt saved her life. She was stuck in the car upside down until the EMTs showed up and had to cut her out. They took her to the hospital and did all the routine tests and she just has a few bumps and bruises. As for the car... it's totaled. Oh, and did I mention who's car she was driving? Mine of course. Sooooo as of now I am carless. The insurance company is going to evaluate the damage tomorrow and see if can be saved, but let's face it, the thing flipped upside down, broke its windows, and had a hole cut into the side of it. So after hearing all that from my parents I was kinda shook up and done for the day so I went home around 8ish.

Yesterday when I got into work Bee asked me to help her with an emergency rush job for Cogeco because she was busy all day. It wasn't anything particularly interesting. Just a print ad for a trade magazine and convention but that ate up the whole day. I ended up staying until 11 working on it and then some of this morning. The rest of the day has been pretty laid back for the most part and today is the office's monthly Thirsty Thursday.

half way home

I can't believe that I am three weeks done with my internship. I only have two left. Time seems to go really quickly and slowly at work at the same time. I've been working really long hours but as usual there never seems to be enough time in the day. I think by the end of my time here I will be really sad to leave Ogilvy but so excited to go back to school, and my friends, and my boyfriend.

So last night I made some pretty crappy comps for Winners because I was so tired. This morning we had a meeting with Nancy for Nabob and we have a lot of changing to make on that, mostly because we didn't have any copy to work with. After that I spent the rest of the day working on Shreddies stuff. I had this massive and annoying Illustrator file to work with and it kept crashing constantly. By the end of the day I was ready to drop my computer down the atrium all 13 floors. grrrr. So I have to work on that this weekend. We have to send it to the client around 12ish on Mon. and Ivan (and probably Nancy) has to see it before then. We also found out today that our campaign for Crystal Light got approved by the client for testing. :) They said that it has the most "legs" and the biggest idea. It would be really nice if I could be here to see the whole thing through if it survives testing.

I left work today around 6 (finally a normal time) and went to Urban Outfitters with Cara. I splurged as a birthday present to myself and got a skirt and top. Tomorrow we might go to the "Distillery" which sounds to me like an Iron Hill type place. Canadians and their beer. As for right now I am SO looking forward to going to bed.

its a blessed miracle!

It's a miracle. I have 21st century speed internet at my relative's house. I finally picked up some wireless from one of the neighbors.  A nifty 4 bars and all. I really should be getting in bed butttt I've been meaning to update for awhile.

So, Tuesday was the inauguration. It was interesting to watch it in a foreign country (such a different culture in Canada haha). I swear they pay a lot more attention to American politics than Americans do. To the point where they don't know what's going on in their own country. Everyone stopped around 11:30 to go watch in the inauguration in one of the conference rooms. I'm sure it would have been a lot more exciting and emotional to watch it at home in a room full of Ameicans. As the resident American in the room I was asked a lot of questions about what I though of the whole thing and how it is to see how much our politics affect other countries. Its really true. You know the whole world was watching yet how many of us can even name the heads of Canada and Mexico let alone what forms of government they have? They were a little freaked out by the prayers and kept saying it was "so American to make such a big deal out of it and waste so much money." They were also laughing at the fact that the amount of people who went to DC just for the day was greater than the amount of people in Toronto.

After the inauguration it was back to work. We had to show our ideas to Nancy again around 5ish and she approved us to move forward with two of them. So for the rest of the night I did a lot of researching for facts and visuals styles. We left after 10.

Yesterday was the big crunch day. When we first got in Nancy told us that she was killing one of the ideas that we had been working on, which of course was the one that we had scripts written for. For most of the day we brainstormed for ambient media for our other surviving idea while Cara wrote up new scripts. At the end of the day all the there was a huge meeting with all the CD's and account heads and our idea was approved for presentation to the clients. They also chose the visual style of animation that I picked out for the commercial which is awesome because if it actually gets produced it means that I made one of the biggest art direction decisions for the spot. :) So by the time the meeting was over it was like 7 and we still had to polish scripts and make a storyboard that Nancy later said she didn't want to use. oy. All in all I got home by 1am.

This morning was the pitch, which I really wish I could have went to but I guess they can't have that many people there. It would be nice to get to see a pitch before I leave Ogilvy but they're pretty serious business especially when you're dealing with a mega-company like Kraft. Nancy said it all went very well and the client will let us know which ideas they are going to put into testing (ugh dreaded testing). They liked the Senior's idea the best but they said that our idea is large enough that they could see it running for as long as 3 years whereas the other idea would have a much shorter life span. So this morning Mike and I got assigned to do a rush job to make point-of-purchase posters etc. for Nabob Coffee which is due tomorrow. So that was most of today. Then near the end of the day I got assigned to make downloadable "campaign swag" like buttons, flags, stickers, etc for Shreddies. They're supposed to launch the new vote website on Mon. so all the freebies could be due sometime this weekend. They didn't tell me yet. And then at 5 today Ivan (who I am told is an incredible, incredible designer) asked me if I would like to do a "typography exercise" for him. He gave me a photo from the shoot he just got back from in Barbados for Winners (aka Canada's nicer version of TJ Maxx) and told me to just mess around with the type and crops but that I should have a really clean style like Gucci. So I'm showing them to him like first thing tomorrow so I don't know how serious or not it is. I think he just wants a head start on some ideas for his own layouts. I wish I had some more time tonight to do more of a variety of layouts but my eyes are closing and if he wants a Gucci look than there isn't all that much you can do.

I'm so excited for it to be the weekend. This week was exhausting but here are some of the SUPER important things that I learned:

1. If you aren't excited about your idea, if you don't get that little butterfly in your stomach then it probably isn't a good idea.

2. If you don't show confidence and enthusiasm about your idea then you will never be able to sell it to a client, let alone your CD.

3. You really, really, really have to sell the client on your idea. Presentation is unbelievably important. You basically have to put on a play and the more theatrical (voices, costumes, props) the better. You have to remember that these people are business people. They aren't creatives and they lack imagination. So, the more you can bring your ideas to life the better outcome you will have.

one day weekend

So Sunday I got up and came to work around 2. I finally figured out how to get here by the warmer and shorter underground route since I wasn't rushing. I couldn't figure out why the elevators weren't working and I called Bee who was upstairs and she was like, ohhh you need a security card so she just came down and got me. Since half the office was dark we decided to go brainstorm for Crystal light in one of the conference rooms and thought that we were getting a lot of good ideas down. We ordered in sushi for dinner and left around 9ish.

Yesterday, it was snowing again! Which I didn't realize until after I left my house in heels. Needless to say I almost fell and killed myself about 1000 times yesterday. For the morning I worked on finishing the goodbye card for Maxwell House and I need to send it to the studio to be printed today. We send off our Motorola layouts to the NYC office for approval from their CD because its really their project that they farmed out to us. Around lunch time Nerelle and Heather brought me in to help them brainstorm for the the new Coke fountain that is coming out. It's pretty neato. And it's another instance where I was told, "if you can crack this you can get a job anywhere." For the rest of the afternoon it was more Crystal Light. We met with Nancy again and she still wants more ideas. So we grabbed some dinner across the street and then went to brainstorm in Starbucks until 9. Everyone is afraid that we might end up pulling an all-nighter or two because the client pitch is on Thurs.

Obama time!

blackout

Surprise! It's snowing again here. Well this week was certainly was jam packed. I can't remember too much of what happened on Wed. except that I got asked to do image searches for Olivieri for their in-company presentations. They wanted images that showed "teamwork". bleh. So it was one giant day of image searching. Mike, Cara and I ended up staying late to work on more ideas for Crystal Light. We ordered in Thai food and left around 10. I got another free cab ride which was awesome because it was still absurdly cold out.

Thursday morning I had to restart my image search for Motorola because we finally found out the budget and could only afford royalty-free photos. It really narrowed down our selection when we already have very specific criteria. I helped Cara work on copy for Moto and Siobhan one of the senior CWs looked over it with us. I got stuck in a pretty awkward situation for the rest of the day. Basically, Bee and Cara who are partners have very different creative processes that don't mesh very well and they have been trying to make it work for ten months. Bee called Cara out on something in front of Siobhan and once we were out of the room it turned into a huge screaming match. They basically decided that they can't work as partners any more and went to Nancy&Janet about it. There hasn't been any decision made but now there is the possibility of one or both of them being fired. I guess I'm learning a lot about the kind of things they don't tell you about in class like the realities of dealing with co-workers, bosses, account people, and clients.

So for the rest of the day I was very awkwardly put in the middle of this feud. Of course they would each take their turn throughout the day to complain to me about the other. There was some fun mixed in because the office sang a happy belated birthday to me and we had a really delicious cake. I also got assigned by the account people to make a goodbye card for one of their favorite clients for Maxwell House who is moving away. We ended up staying late again to brainstorm for Crystal Light and got nowhere. Things started to get ugly between Bee and Cara again so we just decided to all go home. I got home a little after 9:30 and ate dinner and then all of a sudden, absolute darkness.

The power went out on the southwest side of Toronto and stayed out for 24 hours. So since I had no other options I bundled myself up for bed and went to sleep. When I woke up Fri morning the power was still out and the house was FREEZING because it still has been below 10 degrees everyday. It was so cold in the house that we had to turn water on and leave it running all day so that the pipes wouldn't freeze and my relatives had to leave. It turns out that the extreme cold temperatures had caused a pipe to burst at the hydro plant and they had to turn off the electricity while they dried up the flood. I wasn't sure what to do so I started to get ready for work but then my uncle found out that the subways and streetcars weren't working and he didn't want to drive because the street lights were out. Long story short, once I found out that there was power at work I ended up taking a cab into work and got there an hour late.

When I got there Bee and Cara were in a meeting with Janet about Moto so I joined them. She liked the lines that we had but she thought the layouts needed a lot of work. So for the rest of the day I worked on layouts. At the end of the day I showed Janet what I had and she thought they still needed work. At 4 we had a meeting with Nancy to go over our ideas for Crystal Light and she wasn't amazed by anything so it's back to the drawing board. She told us that this is one of those rare oppurtunites to do something amazing and become famous. Which is why tomorrow (Sun) we're gonna have to go in and work. I'm so jealous that everyone else has off on Mon. I totally forgot about that.

After work on Fri. Cara's friend Jen came to pick us up from work and then we stopped by my house so I could grab some clothes and we went to Jen's house. I decided the easiest thing for me to do would be to stay over there with everyone since we had no idea when the power would be turned back on. We had some sushi for dinner and got ready to go out and headed back downtown. We went to this really cool club called Circa. It had four floors and these really cool installation windows with live models doing weird stuff. There were so many bars so you never had to wait for a drink and the bars were touch sensitive and would light up in circles around your hands when you touch them. They had a lot really cool interactive stuff like that all over the place. It turns out some rapper was performing that night called Clipse so it got a little crazy on the main dance floor for awhile. We went to a different dance floor where we witnessed the hillarity of a 40 year old couple in jazz shoes acting like the club was their very own private dance studio/bedroom where they could makeout. They were doing some serious Saturday Night Fever/ballet moves. The club had one of the most eclectic crowds that I've ever seen. Typically, back in NY you would probably only see guidos in a club but every kind of sub-culture was equally represented at this place from hipsters to ganstas. I actually saw a person with a legit grill on his teeth. It was awesome. We ended up getting out of there at 4 after waiting on the coat-check line which was pretty much an angry mob.

One of the live installations.

happy birthday to me

Sooooo, yesterday was my birthday and I'm old now. I still get confused when I think about people who are like 23/24 because my automatic reaction is still wow, they are so much older than me. It still takes me a second to remember that I'm in my early 20's too. I swear in my head I am still 17.

So uh yeah, my weather widget says, its -6 right now. With the windchill it feels like -11. Unbelievably cold. I am wearing leggings under my jeans, super thick socks, boots, a turtle neck and a sweater and tomorrow its supposed to be even colder. I guess if you dress properly its bearable to be outside for short amounts of time. The horrifying thing is that Toronto has a homeless population around the size of NYC. I saw a man this morning sleeping in a sleeping bag over a steam vent on the sidewalk. I hope he was okay. Mike says they city tries to round them up when it gets this bad but a lot of them resist. One of my best friends from home is going skiing in Montreal this week. He's nuts. The forecast is -17 there.

So yesterday was kinda uneventful during work. It was snowing again all morning. Cara brought me a balloon for my birthday. :) On my first day they said something about the department having cake for my bday. Yesterday most people were busy so maybe Friday. We had a brainstorming session on Crystal Light for most of the the morning and then in the afternoon I did a lot image searching for Motorola.

After work I went out for dinner with Cara and her friend Jen. We went to Little Korea and had Korean food which I've never had before. It was good and different. Toronto has one of the largest Asian populations any where in North America. There's a "little" everything here of pretty much any nationality you can think of. After dinner we went and browsed around in a used book store. They had a lot of good deals but I didn't get anything. When I got home my relatives gave me and card and some money so that was really nice of them. And there were flowers and a teddy from Tom <3.

someone has a case of the mondays

Each day that I'm spending here seems to be getting better than the last. Although this morning started off with some frustration it was still a very good day. When we first got into work this morning we heard from our account person on Motorola that they killed the first part of the campaign that we were supposed to work on for their rugged line which of course we all spent the weekend working on. It didn't bother me too much but everyone else was pretty pissed. I felt especially bad for Bee who is really sick and only came into work because we were supposed to present our ideas to Nancy. So Bee left half way through the day. The other half of the campaign is still in the works and we have to show Nancy what we have on Fri.

I had butternut squash soup for lunch. One of my recent food obsessions so that made the day pretty good on its own. After lunch Cara brought Mike and I in on the work she had been doing for Crystal Light before Christmas. I think there are a few senior teams working on it as well because Kraft is making it one of the major products they are trying to push in 2009. They had some pretty great ideas that almost got approved before the break which somehow got squashed. Clients again. The Crystal Light stuff is for TV so that's pretty new and exciting to work on. I had my first real brainstorming session with them after the meeting and then Mike left too because he's pretty sick as well.

Cara and I decided that we were going to stay and work late which actually turned into us going shopping and getting Vietnamese/Thai for dinner (at expense of Ogilvy of course and another free cab ride home). It was really nice to have someone to finally talk to up here. She was telling me about going to Cannes last year among other things. It sounds like a pretty crazy experience. There was talk about us going out this weekend for my birthday so that would be pretty awesome.

So the two things I've learned thus far this week:
1. Clients really do in actual reality truly suck.
2. Enter EVERY competition you can. They are super important.

bilbo?

Ok, I think I'm listening to the weirdest song I've ever heard. It's about Bilbo Baggins???? Why was this playing on the radio in a coffee shop?

everybody's working for the weekend

I am currently in an internet cafe down the street from my aunt&uncle's doing work on a Saturday night. We just got breifed on project Fri. and its due Mon. It's snowing for the 3rd time this week and FREEZING. Next week it's supposed to be under 10 degrees for most of the week. Brrrrr. Good thing I love snow.

So yesterday was definitely the best day so far. First thing in the morning Cara, Bee and I got briefed on a project for Motorola and their new line of "rugged" phones. The main concept was taken care of Ogilvy Global but we have to adapt it for these specific phones and a Canadian market. The idea is really fun. So I think it will be some good work when it is done and it is something that I will actually be here to see until the very end because of the super short deadline. The first ads are due at the publishers on the 22nd and the second ads on Feb 4th. So after the meeting I had to immediately begin image searching which is what I am still doing now. After that Mike and I had to present our layouts to Nancy and she chose mine!!! Wooo! I was so excited. So if it gets final approval from the clients then it will be a real life print ad. I don't think I can really use it in my book though because I only designed the extra back page of the ad and had nothing to do with the actual concepting but still, I'm excited! 

So the rest of the day was more image searching and I will most likely have to go into work tomorrow so we can really brainstorm because we need to show multiple finished products to Nancy on Mon. at 5. After work I decided to go do some shopping and stumbled into a giant underground mall with all the favs like Urban and Forever.  The weekend has been pretty uneventful because uhh... I basically know no one in this city.

Day 4

Today wasn't busy until later on in the day but things should be picking up next week. During the morning since I didn't have any assignments I figured I might as well make use of my time and work on somethings for my book and I tried to write some more lines for mine and Garrett's Long's campaign. We're just gonna enter them in the One Club Competition and see what happens.

A bunch of us went for McDonalds for lunch today (yuck) so I met some more people and I'm doing a decent job of remembering names. Everyone's been dealing with finishing up projects from before Christmas so I haven't been involved with too much yet but tomorrow B, Kara and I are getting briefed on Motorola I think we just won the account from BBDO. Everyone seemed kinda confused about it but it looks like it will be really fun to work on. I'm excited. Kara also mentioned that she wants me to help out with some Crystal Light stuff. It would be nice to be here long enough to actually see something go through all the steps from the brief to the finished product.

Today we were talking about how they don't have as much for me to do because most companies cut their singles due to the economy. Blah. It really doesn't make much sense for companies in trouble to cut their spending on advertising because people really don't buy things that aren't right up in their face all the time. You don't want what you don't know about. I'm really curious to see how Dave&Emily are doing at the New York office because Nancy told me that they laid off a lot of people on Tuesday. My Dad seriously jynxed everything. For the past four years all he's been saying is "Gee I really hope the economy doesn't get bad, you might be graduating right into a recession. Things could get pretty bad real fast." But I guess its more like he actually knows what he's talking about.

During lunch I got made fun of for my American accent and my lack of knowledge "aboot" Canadian food chains like Tim Horton's and Swiss Chalet. I was told that I need to try Swiss Chalet sauce although they didn't make it sound too appetizing. I was told it is brown, spicy, gravy water??? For most of the afternoon Mike and I worked on revising the Shedded Wheat advertorial and we're showing them to Nancy for approval. It sounds like she's a Tricia/Ashley because she's not crazy about all the crazy type that Ivan loves. Well at least its aligned-left. I left around quater to 8 today. The latest so far.

Days 2 & 3

So yesterday the morning was pretty slow. Mike was still waiting to hear what was going on with the Shredded Wheat brief because people were going in and out of the office all day. The art director on the campaign is Ivan Pols. In the afternoon we finally knew what was going on so we worked on creating layouts for an advertorial. Ivan liked the one direction we were heading in so we just made different variations on that. I didn't get to hear anything else about it because both Mike and I were out of the office today and Ivan is on a shoot in Barbados anyway. Lucky. I found out from my Dad that I finally have cell service up here even though its pretty pricey but its nearly impossible to live without one these days.

Today Toronto got a snow storm. We were supposed to get 10cm which I think is around 7in. Which as a result caused most of the city to decide not to drive to work today so the subway was complete insanity. Thankfully I left early this morning because I was hoping to be allowed to go to the editing of the Quiznos spot that Mike&Cara are working on if one of the other creatives decided not to go. That didn't end up happening anyway but at each of my two stops this morning I had to wait for FOUR trains to go by before I could squeeze onto one and ended up beign 15mins late. Not that anyone honestly cares.

I finally got to meet Nancy Vonk this morning and she is SO incredibly nice and funny. She even gave me a hug. awww. Since nobody left me anything to work on she took me with her to the editing session of Shreddie's Campaign at School Editing. Their office was awesome. It was kinda like Radical Media's with the whole industrial feel but a lot swankier with chandliers instead of regular lights. Two of the other creatives working on the final cuts were Ken Rogers and Schvonge. I learned so much today about making a TV Spot and there's a lot that I wanted to write about but can't remember right now. One of the things is how incredibly annoying clients are and you really have to use pyscology to sell things to them because no matter how good the idea is if you don't convince them then it doesn't matter. The other is that advertising really is awesome. I just love how you get to dabble in a little bit of everything.

We eneded up being there until 7:15 and went through 9 cuts of two commericals. The editior Brian was amazingly fast at what he does. They would suggest changing something and in two clicks he would have it done. During lunch which was free (yay) Nancy talked to me about Delaware and how to get a job in this economy all you have to do is be the best (easy to say not so easy to do) and that we would talk a lot about how I could become that person. I also got a free cab ride home today and didn't have to wade through the slush!