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The Ad Lounge, what it is, and why you want to go:
A little while ago a speaker came into our class to discuss an interesting yearly event that is happening quite soon. The purpose of the event is to bring together competent students and big-name agencies to meld ideas, network, and possibly receive job offers. The event is called The Ad Lounge.
Now this event sounds almost too good to be true, and with all things of such a nature, there are some catches.
1. You can only apply if you are a student graduating that same year. They want everyone attending to have relevant education, but they also want to give students just coming into the job market the advantage, so if you’re out of school you’re out of luck.
2. There is an interview process that you have to go through. If your resume gets through, you can move on to the in-person meeting. If you pass that, you've made it to the Ad Lounge.
3. There is a limited number of spots available, as to keep the student-to-Advertiser ratio even. Ad Lounge is an exclusive event, so everyone should bring their ‘A’ Game.
More information can be found here: http://adlounge.ca/
Now, as far as my personal opinion goes on this, I think the event is a pretty genius idea. Students can get a glimpse into the “real world” as It were, and advertising/marketing businesses can get a grasp on the newest members of the media world. The only nay-saying thing I will mention though is…. Why does it have to be so soon? I would love to go, but with everything else happening right now there is no way my portfolio or anything will be up to snuff in time. No, I think if I’m ever going to get into the Ad lounge it’ll probably have to be from the other end. (being in the mentor position that is.) One can always hope at least.
There is no other way to begin this post than to say that.
Grip is cool. And they're cool in a way that feels genuine, rather than feeling gimmicky. As part of our AGO trip, we visited the Grip Headquarters in Toronto. They're located in a large building, about 3/4 floors. When we first entered we went up to the second floor via the elevator. As soon as we walked out, the first things that we noticed were
1. A big while mobile sphere tent... thing. (Which was populated by plush chairs and a table. Supposedly for meetings.)
2. A big orange slide. A slide. That ran from the second floor down to the first. (And yes, the slide goes as fast as the colour implies. I tried it.)
Like I said, cool.
Appearances weren't the only cool thing about this building though, we got to walk through and snoop on the employees working, and learned a lot about the projects Grip had covered in the past. (like Honda, Budweiser Maynard, etc)
Grip takes on a number of different projects, including TV commercials, print campaigns, voice overs, and web. We briefly stopped to talk in the recording studio where all the voice overs and sound effects were done, and talked about what goes into an audio project like a radio spot.
Exploring their homepage (http://www.griplimited.com/) is almost as fun as walking around their HQ. If you're looking for an idea of what the culture is at Grip, definitely check out their site.
My Final Project: (Alias: Why am I doing this to myself)
Similarly to pretty much every other college program, Webdesign has a final project.
I am not unfamiliar with the concept of a final project, I've done quite a few, in more stressful situations. (My final Advertising Project involved re-branding an actual local business and presenting the final information to them. Talk about stress.)
Now I thought I was being clever by deciding my topic. I wanted to pick a subject that I was interested in, but also something I could come up with all the images and content for, to avoid having to pay for stock photography/take photos myself.
Seeing as I like video games, and love to draw, the logical conclusion would be to make a video game.
And boy am I ever having fun with creating the characters/the world/the story...... but not so much the actual.... you know, useful content for the website. I know what I WANT to do, but applying those ideas is becoming somewhat of an obstacle for me. I wasn't overly worried about it until our teachers mentioned that there was only 6 weeks until the end of the program.
Now the panic has settled in most comfortably, and I'm sitting here typing up blog posts rather than working on it. (My fault for leaving them so late. Ah well) I'm going over to a friend's house later this afternoon (He works in the industry, doing back end coding and such) and I'm going to toss some ideas off him, hoping he'll know a simpler solution to the issues I'm having. Fingers crossed!
At the beginning of this semester our class took a day trip to the AGO. The justification behind it being that we'd visit media hubs in the area to fill the education obligations. But the real reason for the visit was to see the new Kahlo & Rivera (or viceversa) exhibit.
I was aware of these artists before hand, since art history is mandatory in all high school art classes, but I never really did any deep research into their careers/lives.
In my honest opinion, I can see why they both were so influential, but their painting styles just weren't my cup of tea. A lot of Kahlo's works made me uncomfortable, which I assume was the intention, so I toured through the pieces rather quickly, which I kind of regret now. I don't imagine the AGO is going to have the collection again for a while yet, so I should have taken my time. Hindsight is 20/20 and all that.
The rest of our time spent in the AGO was rather uneventful, though I did take a detour to look at the Lawren Harris landscapes they had on display.
(Every mountain he painted looks like chocolate ice cream to me. Love them.)
After we went to the AGO we had a little break and then headed out to the various media-related businesses in the area.
First we started at Much Music, where we toured the building, saw two television anchor-persons doing the news, and talked about how business was conducted in Much Studios.
We also headed to Grip LTD (which you can read more about here) And John St. (The stairs there nearly killed me.)
It was interesting to walk around these big media companies, and recognize thier work from television/internet & the likes. Since I am an advertising kid at heart it was a really eye-opening trip. It'd be neat to see how I can mix my marketing/advertising with my webdesign in the future to see where I can end up.
This is just a quick little post about my constant struggle with organization, and a nifty little tool I found to help me cope.
I've never been what you would call organized.
Messiness is my original state. It's my nature to just throw things everywhere and in that clutter, have my own inefficient system of knowing where things are.
This obviously has caused me trouble ever since the beginning of my academic career. (Kindergarten if you were wondering.) I always completed the work, but after I completed it I stopped caring about it, and thus lost it and never handed it in.
I went through reams of TA's and tutors and special ed classes, that all tried to teach me to be organized, but none of those skills ever really stuck.
So here I am, now in my (hopefully) final year of college and I have NO coping mechanisms for my crap-organizational skills...
I knew this would be a difficult year for me already, with the heinously long bus ride, and I was not looking forward to having to budget time and create a system so I wasn't failing out in the first month of classes.
Then a rather small and inconsequential event happened, our tech class presentations. I volunteered with my partner to go first, just to get it out of the way. Our tech teacher recommended we look at two different online tools. One was called Freshbooks, the other was my out-of-the-blue saviour, Trello.
Now, Trello is supposed to be a group-project workspace. They give you a set up that allows you to assign work, add due dates and upload files into a multi-person board.
I took advantage of these tools both in group projects, but more importantly, for my individual work.
Using Trello is FUN, and I'm not just saying that sarcastically at all. I don't know if it's just the smooth look and feel, or the neat way everything instantly updates, or heck, even the cute little puppy they have as the mascot (it's the puppy. Definitely the puppy) but I've actually used it consistently.
(my last typography project)
You can sort projects by What needs to be started, what's in progress, and completed work.
If you give work due dates, you'll get alerts when those dates come up.
Uploading files is super-simple, and you can access it from pretty much everywhere.
Now it's not a huge contribution to my overall organizational skills, but it definitely is a life-saver for more than one project this year.
> Works at the largest ad agency in Canada, Maclaren McCann , as VP Group Creative Director
>Supervises web-related content
>Studied at Ryerson before starting his career
Past clients
>GM CANADA:
VOLT: interactive features to the Volt website using Google maps, Allows users to plan their routes and calculate gas mileage
SONIC: An interactive game that allowed users to mix music depending on the colour and make/model of the car. Allowed users to share the songs with friends.
ORLANDO: Used a forced-viral tactic to get mothers to blog about their product.
Getting A Job
RESEARCH
>FInd out who it is you want to work for
>Show them you know their business personally and you are really interested in the way they work specifically
Portfolio:
>Showcase the breadth of skills and experiences
>Don't show all of your work, just the really impressive ones.
>State objectives on projects, show your problem solving skills
>Have it in multiple formats
>Tailor your portfolio depending on what kind of business you're interviewing at
After the interview:
You have two possible outcomes:
Get the job
Do not get the job
If it's the latter, see step one. If you do happen to get the job, what happens next?
TIPS
>Show off your diverse skills as to not get pigeon holed into a particular skillset. (Don't be "the photoshop wizard")
>Sit with other teams and show that you can do a number of things well
> Be confident in the work assigned to you / that you take on. It makes your boss feel relaxed and can bring more work your way.
>Don't take critiques as a personal attack. Grow thick skin
Catherine Baird, Creative Director at Dashboard.ca
[email protected]
Topic: Her Experience & Your work environment
Introduction:
Graduate of Sheridan College
Got a job at Ecentricarts 3 weeks after graduating
Worked for
o Henderson Bas
o 5emeguache Paris
o Dashboard
What is Dashboard?
“A Digital Engagement Agency”
A marketing group that is as creative as it is cute. They deal with a number of brands including ING Direct, Hellman’s Mayo, and Dairy Farmers of Canada
The four different work environments you may encounter
Large:
BIG COMPANIES.
Big support groups
Learn at your own pace
You’d be doing a lot of production work, so very little items for your portfolio
Medium:
MEDIUM COMPANIES.
Big & Small name clients
Personable feel
Bigger slice of the portfolio pie
Small:
SMALL COMPANIES.
More responsibility, no one can cover for your mistakes,
BUT also more credit goes to you for your work, and is great for portfolios
Small companies are like a small family, very close-knit.
Mini:
FREELANCING IT.
Super flexible work schedule, you get to decide what projects you take on or turn down
You can potentially roll in the dough so long as you’re well organized and keep track of your expenses/income
No interpersonal skills as far as coworkers go! More creative freedom
You have to deal directly with clients. This can be a pro or a con?
DESIGNER PROTIPS
Use your resources, compare portfolios, expand on ideas!
Love your gadgets. Technology is the future and you need to show you’re on top of it all
Learn some sort of animation like flash or after effects, it makes you versatile and therefore more appealing as an employee!
Don’t be afraid to charge what your worth. Be assertive!
Why a proposed book-burning party was a Very Good Thing Indeed.
(PLEASE Watch this. Be proud of your libraries. And remember, it’s not about taxes. It’s about knowledge, and humanity, and access to the internet, and what libraries are and represent, and what librarians do.)
