Featured Illustrator: Chris Bishop
I’m sure you’ve noticed, but it’s a new year. A shiny new decade even. Publications love this sort of thing as we can hem and haw about the past ad nauseum. But we at FullBleed officially relinquish this power and put it into your hands. Tell us about your decade! We asked the following question to three randomly selected ADCMW members:
What are you doing now that is different than what you were doing ten years ago?
Ten years ago I was using Quark and Freehand… Today it’s InDesign and Illustrator.
Ten years ago I was using spray mount… Today it’s PDFs.
Ten years ago I worked for an agency… Today I am the agency.
Ten years ago I designed for local clients… Today my clients are global.What hasn’t changed… I still love design… the process, the challenges and the solutions.
Ten years ago to the day I was a 16 year old high school jock serving slices of pizza pie on the weekends to earn a few bucks for those ever so important movie dates with the ladies. You know, the one’s where the two of you share a back seat while catching sly peeks from mom in the rear view mirror. I eventually moved on to Longwood University where I earned a degree in Graphic Design, a passion of mine throughout my life, still coming home on breaks to work in the restaurant. I graduated just over a year ago, applying for job after job, submitting resume after resume and making phone call after phone call before finally, just two days ago being offered a management position in the same old restaurant that I’ve worked in since those old high school days! I’ve been offered the perfect position, incorporating my passion for graphic design in my newly designed menu and finer touches in the restaurant while serving good food to good people right in my home town. I couldn’t be happier!
Working for the corporate world, we tend to create designs that reflect the general mood in the marketplace and stock markets. Ten years ago, talk was of Y2K, the dot-com mania and big mergers—it was an optimistic view of the future and people were generally satisfied with the way things were going. We were producing beautiful print pieces with inventive designs and strategic messages. Today, corporations have retreated and are in survivor mode. Although positive signs have been reported in the media, most businesses seem to expect things to recover very slowly from the recent downturn. Everyone is being very cautious about what they say and how they are spending their communications dollars. Corporate communications now reflect a quiet, subdued tone, both in message and overall look and feel. There even seems to be a reluctance for meaningful online communications to stakeholders. Will we return to the elaborate print pieces and bold corporate statements of the not-to-distant past? Check back in 2020.
Where were you ten years ago? Let us know in the comments!
Just to put in my $.02… ten years ago I was two years out of college working at a tiny multimedia shop.
And ten years ago, “multimedia” meant that when I wasn’t writing Lingo and building out CD-ROM projects in Director, I was creating Powerpoint presentations and shooting/processing/mounting 35mm slides for clients. If I never see another slide carousel again, I’ll be a happy person.
I remember using HTML frames, animated flames and hearing about a new version of Dreamweaver that would make web development a lot easier.
Everyone should be past that by now… RIGHT?!?
10 years ago, I was just a freshman in college. At that point, I’d never seen HTML code but had perfected the perfect fake I.D. using a little something called Photoshop.
10 years ago I was entering the second semester of my junior year at Syracuse. I had recently broken up with a boyfriend and was having the time of my life, spending every second in studio with all the seniors stressing about their portfolios. I believe I was working on a design concept for a tasteful smut magazine I called YES.
Ten years ago I drove a car to work. Now I take a hovercraft, George Jetson-style!