Design Federation

I was browsing through the blog of Melbourne based studio ‘Igloo’ and came across this interesting post about the general lack of creativity within the branding of design studios. So thought i’d share it

“It has always amazed me that, as designers, I think we are generally a pretty average mob at branding ourselves.I’ll wipe the slate clean here and admit our ‘logo’ was created a good 12 years ago. It’s Hevletiva Ultra Compressed. It’s boring, dated and I am kinda tired of looking at it but we have stubbornly hung on to it.”
read on

Be sure to check out their work here.

Those interested in packaging design will find TheDieLine.com a treat. Pictured above is a delicious packaging concept by Eric Rodriguez.

Some nice paintings over at Alex ‘it’s time to’ Pardee’s folio site.

Check it.

As a preface, click the image below to read this article from the Sunday Telegrapahs May 18th edition.

What a week(end) it has been for the art community in Australia. We haven’t had this much publicity since Ken Done was declared bankrupt, and all for the wrong reasons. It all started when what promised to be rather low key affair at the Roslyn Oxley Gallery, instead turned into the mother of all publicity juntas.
An Artist that (quite sadly) the general public would know next to nothing about (Internationally renowned Photographer Bill Henson) has turned into Australia’s answer to Guillermo Habacuc Vargas because of his latest photographic exhibition. Now the previous article on this site by Sy Rogers has created some excellent articulate discussion for both sides of the argument, but I wanted to come at this from a different angle.

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Do you feel loved?

Yes I am talking to you designers, you must feel really warm and fuzzy right now, because every corporation and their attack dog are launching some form of design competition. It was only last week, that I wrote a (rather poor) article here about a certain alcohol companies effort to cash in on the funky bunch that we designers are, and now I find out that none other than Hugo Boss have launched one for their Parfam “Hugo”

The spiel is this “HUGO Create is an international search for creativity and originality. HUGO Create is a great opportunity to show your talent.” and the premise is simple enough, take an image of their bottle, make a sexy design out of it, and “See your work published in the most iconic urban magazine, in the i-D magazine or even potentially used as a worldwide HUGO Fragrance advertising!”

That’s right kids, give us some FREE designs you slaved hours over, which will save us thousands of dollars in advertising fees, give us massive exposure / brand awareness with the youth market and you get….

…Well not much really.. You do get some “potentially” though.

Is there anything wrong with entering these comps?
Not at all as long as you are aware of why they are doing it, so you can go on and make millions too.

- David Goldberg

Intersting site I came across today which is for “… Showcasing good looking Australian web design …”. Not too much more information on it, but some nice looking sites there for you to check out.

Recently an “Australian” alcohol brand created a project in which artists are asked to submit designs for a paper bag, (The type of paperbags used to cover their bottles of wine). The project is to promote a new drink the company has, which one could assume will be aimed at the youth market.

How does it work? Well, you submit your designs and they are judged, then you win all sorts of sexy prizes if you come out the other side on top.

This seems to be a bit of a trend recently with big corporations such as Piza Hut and Nikee are both doing similiar art related competitions, which makes you wonder who was first, and who jumped on the wagon.

Anyhow,  we know Australia is a small country, but we are very talented in many fields here, and you often wonder why we need to pull in a big international star to make something seem exciting (think of that actor from friends at the logies a few years ago, he “rocked”)

Ok, if we cant make something like this happen on our own so lets pull the big star to get the kids excited, and who do they decide to pull in? None other than this person, and there is no need to tell you anything about him, you can read it all yourself on that page.

The question is this, why couldn’t they have chosen another local artist? If they wanted one with a political edge we have more than enough here doing Fantastic work, one only need think of the likes of Ben Frost etc.

- David Goldberg

Our good friends at Two Flat Whites have a nice little interview with Luke Feldman creator of SKAFFS and you can read it here

Our good friend Tiger at Two Flat Whites is celebrating his first birthday with giveaways all month long.
The first is 12 cd giveaways of the new albums from The paper Scissors, and one of my favourite bands bLuejuice, so click the link and enter!

http://www.twoflatwhites.com/?p=387

Our good friend Tiger has relaunched his site with a sexy new look, check it out and get drinking

www.twoflatwhites.com