Im Moving!!

This blogger is feeling a little cramped, so I'm moving on up...
You can find me here- nicoletlaursen.com

Golf Cart

We wrapped a golf cart:

What do the mountains think?

There is a small, microscopic, bruise on the skin below my eye. It is the remnants of a life that tragically ended this evening. I have heard that looks can kill. I never thought that the soft, fragile skin that cradles my eyes was capable of such a heinous act. The ground echoed through my shoes with each pounding step, creating a rhythm inside me that set the cadence of my rambling thoughts. The sting caught me off guard and interrupted my meditation. The insects tiny body bounced off my eye and quickly to the ground. I shook it off and kept on running.
It amazes me how many insects have ended their short lives by flying into me while I was running. I have inhaled them, stepped on them, swatted them, & swallowed them (one time a large insect flew into my mouth- I was disgusted, but having such a good run. So I swallowed it— felt it squirm and fight for life in my throat until it finally gave up and accepted it's fate). I don't really understand why they don't fly around me. Although, I bet mountains think the same thing when an airplane crashes into their snowy caps.

I almost ran over a cat today

Spunk and fearlessness drove her to do it.
She eyed the other side of the road. Adrenaline built inside her like mercury. She could see the car approaching fast. She lowered her head and raised her tail in the air. She knew she was the one with the heart and the drive. She was fearless. An eternity of safe crossing time came and passed. Aware of the time skipping her by, she chose to wait.
wait.....wait......wait........for it to be dangerous.
She has spent her life waiting for it to get interesting. Safety bored her. She preferred a short exciting life to a long boring one. The car was dangerously close now. Without hesitation, she darted across the road.

additive animation

My first encounter with William Kentridge's work was in the winter of 2005. I was at the Met in New York for the opening of the gates and as I walked through the museum I caught a glimpse of this beautiful film flickering on the wall. Kentridge's animations are composed of a single charcoal drawing that is altered in each frame, leaving behind ghosts of past drawings and creating a sense of motion. I was infatuated by this work- look him up if you get the chance!

Okay, so I'm not really going to do this, but someone should

Frustrated and annoyed, I decided earlier today that I am going to start caring a horn around with me when I go shopping for groceries. When I find myself stuck behind two girls gossiping about Britney Spears, instead of politely asking them to move, I will hold my horn in the air and honk it loud. Later tonight after the last stock boy empties his last palette, I will break into the grocery store armed with yellow and white road paint. Tomorrow patrons will find dotted white lines on one way aisles and yellow lines for those aisles wide enough to support two way shopping cart traffic. Customers will no longer stand in the way of my mac & cheese and the store will move like a well oiled machine. There will be stop signs installed and customers will be required to use proper turning signals with their arms. If customers need to back up, they will be required to loudly announce this with a "BEEP BEEP BEEP" noise. The deli will work as a drive-through with two windows (one for ordering your deli items and a second to pick up). The check stands will work like a toll at a bridge or turnpike. Customers will push their cart though a large scanner that will scan all the items at once. Then they will quickly pay with prepaid shopping passes and be on their way. This will revolutionize the grocery store industry, or get me arrested. Either way, it sounds like a good adventure!

Si Scott

Im going to do it

Yes, I have been thinking about it for quite a while now. Today I decided that I am in a perfect situation to go for it. What is it?
An MFA in Alternative Media. Wish me luck!

Insomnia

I went and got some chinese food to help me feel better. Yes, something about that orange chicken and greasy egg roll helped to ease my haunted mind. I feel somewhat uneasy about even posting this blog because it disturbs me so. So, there is a chance I will not post it. A chance it will be saved on my hard drive and never published.
I don't remember the course of events that lead to the situation I found myself in. I knew I was dreaming, but I couldn't wake myself. There was a woman in my apartment. She rummaged through my things and occasionally ran to my bed to try to wake me. I knew she was there. She was looking for something. She has been here before. The first time was about 6 months ago. I had just moved into my apartment. I was laying in my bed and having some crazy nightmares...happens often. I thought my eyes were open, but I knew I was still asleep. She held a cell phone up to my ear. I tried to move but my body felt paralyzed. There was a voice yelling to me through the phone. No matter how I tried, I could not understand. It was either a foreign language or she spoke too fast to comprehend. Then I caught the sound of velcro. You know the ripping sound it makes when you tear it apart. It was that sound I could hear coming from my living room. It sounded like there was someone fiercely tearing velcro—or doing something with a similar sound.
Then I woke up.
Last night my restless brain kept me awake until 3am. Then I went to work this morning at 10:30am. Once I got home from work, I found myself exhausted. My eyes shut. My brain sucked me into a strange world of fast talkers and indescribable landscapes. I wish I could remember my dream's storyline—or lack thereof. The only part I remember was pretty gruesome. I woke up this evening. Now I'm screwed as far as sleep goes tonight. I may just stay up all night.

Boom

I am pleased to announce that nico is being featured on Designers who blog. If you are not familiar with designers-who-blog.com you should really check it out. It's a fantastic collection of inspirational writing about design. I also want to thank cat for the complement on my blog. It's funny, sometimes I feel like my soul is drying up. Actually I think my soul did dry up. It morphed into a pile of gun powder. All I need is the occasional spark. Thanks for the spark!

iran

I think that apple and nike should team up to create a new ipod designed for runners. It would work just as any other ipod works. What would make this ipod so amazing would be the addition of the random sound of footsteps closing in from behind. I noticed today while I was jogging that I ran twice as fast when I could hear another jogger behind me. I'm not sure how they would pull it off without it just being annoying- but the folks at nike and apple are pretty smart, I'll let them figure out the details.

Jacob Two-Two

Jacob Two-Two

Everyone should slow down for a half hour on a Saturday morning and watch this show. The animation is fresh and the story lines are actually quite interesting—even for adults. Well, for me at least and I'm often easily amused...
Jacob Two-Two is based off of a series written by Mordecai Richler.

Richler is a Canadian writer—born in Montréal.

"C"

I was always a super star student in college. However, I did not do well in every subject. English Lit was one of them. I don't remember where I read this quote- all I remember was reading it my English Lit class (one of the few things that stuck with me):

Well I am certainly wiser than this man. It is only too likely that neither of us has any knowledge to boast of; but he thinks that he knows something which he does not know, whereas I am quite conscious of my ignorance. At any rate it seems that I am wiser than he is to this small extent, that I do not think that I know what I do not know.

~ Socrates

i'm flashing you

So I finally got my new site up! It still has a couple things I need to work on— but it is getting there. Take a gander if you dare... lettodesign

the google guys said it all with this one.

Ben Wilson- he's local and ridiculously talented. Check out these posters

I love my Jean

BIRDFLU

The Good Citizen's Alphabet

Make mine black- no wait throw in some sugar & ink

A couple weeks ago I designed stickers to promote a concert. These stickers were then stuck on thousands of coffee cup lids. They are now literally under the noses of many consumers who only really wanted their morning coffee. Today I watched this video.

Watch people get stressed out about relaxing

Food for thought.... damn it now I am hungry

Lascaux- the first graphic designers



Saul Bass- found a new medium in which to create art.

"My initial thoughts about what a title can do was to set mood and the prime underlying core of the film's story, to express the story in some metaphorical way. I saw the title as a way of conditioning the audience, so that when the film actually began, viewers would already have an emotional resonance with it." -Saul Bass

Paula Scher

I like umbrellas and logos that do more than just look pretty. Plus this would be really easy to put up on a readerboard which is my personal test for strong logos.

Nouveau Salon des cent, Hommage a Toulouse-Lautrec.

Paula brings us back in history to this guy:

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec

Jane Avril Leaving the Moulin Rouge

Someone once told me that he was the founder or maybe the father of graphic design. Toulouse-Lautrec struggled with alcoholism and a crippled body due to the inbreeding of his family. It seems all the great artists had their demons. Van Gogh struggled all his life only to sell one painting and commit suicide before he could ever know of his impact on art.

It's getting late and my brain is getting lame. Good night

Old Man by the River

The second time I tried to paint him, I couldn't. Maybe I need new paint. I carry my paint in a large yellow home depot tool box. Maybe I need a new tool box. Or perhaps its the surface. Yes, the surface is all wrong. I need a new surface to paint his portrait. The photo reference is old and the detail was lacking. I should fly back to Quebec and take another photo. I will need a new camera to really capture his essence. I will also need to wait for a sunny day in March—so that the lighting will be exactly as it was. I will need 6 feet of snow on the ground, deep enough that it nearly buries the parking meters in the nearby parking lot. The St. Lawrence River will need to be partially frozen as well. The ambiance must be perfect. I will wait for everything to be perfect and then I will try a third time.

So I just discovered something absolutely fantastic. I can type faster when I drink! Or maybe it's that my brain moves slower and that makes the words look like they are being typed faster. Either way its kinda fun. It makes me wanna write. I just watched the movie "The Night Listener". I am still digesting it. I don't know.
So now the Wallflowers are playing on my itunes and I just had the realization that I cannot go out tonight. Wait, wait- switch that to Brighteyes. He is fantastic. Especially when mixed with a bottle of Cabernet. There is this really good winery called Blackstone. I have loved everything they make. "Your the yellow bird that I have been waiting for.... now I'm drunk as hell on a piano bench... the sound of loneliness makes me happier..." oh yeah and Paolo Nutini is absolutely amazing- fantastic!

sing, dance, play, learn!

I knew he could see my reflection in the window. So I really tried hard not to laugh, but the combination of his vibrato and erroneous U2 lyrics were just too much for me to handle. His ipod was turned up loud enough for me to sing along—but I was too busy trying not to laugh. He was working out on the elliptical next to me and we both faced a large reflective window. I really do think he was just trying to make me laugh. I should have called him out on it.

So I have two requests for the rec center:
1) Allow me to wear sleeveless shirts—it's no longer 1950.
2) Bring in louder elliptical machines so they drown out the sound of the overweight self proclaimed american idol using the machine next to me.—although that was pretty funny!

He is tall and thin. His long white beard is as long as his mane of white hair that hangs long out the back of his beanie stocking cap. He comes here often. Almost everyday. I know this because I do the same. Today I saw him sleeping in his car. It looked cold and uncomfortable. Now I know why he comes here so often.

It's not you, it's business

tick tick tick
The sound of heated metal. It goes tick, tick, tick. Usually at 2am—when my apartment drops a few degrees and the thermostat kicks on those damned baseboard heaters. It is this very sound that awoke me from a deep sleep this morning. A long deep sleep at that. It's not uncommon for me to sleep for long periods of time after being emotionally drained. I passed out around 7:30pm last night. I slept a full 12 hours through the night, only to wake up this morning still fired up about my week. I can't shake it off.
Growing up, I remember finding myself in lots of childish fights with my younger brother. No matter the situation, he would not let up. I would storm out of the room, slamming the door behind me and he would open the door and slam it again—stealing my thunder. I always thought that as I grew older, this would not happen. I would have my thunder and those around me would admit their defeat. One thing I have learned is that some people can not see when they are wrong. Their blurry eyes see the world in a tunnel where they are always correct. If something goes wrong, there is always someone they can blame.
For the last few months, I have been working part time at a design studio. Every morning I went to work at the studio until noon and then went to my other design job in the afternoon. Although I was a graphic designer at both of my jobs, I had a completely different experience at both. The studio job was a very controlled micromanaged environment in which I was given very few responsibilities and no independence. Then in the afternoons I was basically my own boss. I had complete responsibility and total freedom. I was trusted and respected and worked on a large variety of projects. Although both jobs were like night and day, I really enjoyed the variety. I felt I was doing well at both and doing so much made me feel like superwoman. I like to conquer challenges and feel invincible. Plus I felt I was learning so much.
My mornings where usually very tedious. I spent my time dropping copy into a template another designer had designed. Then I would go through the copy and make adjustments. Superscript the ®'s, the %'s, and the TM's. Kern that lower case "l". Italicize where needed. Change dashes to em or en dashes as needed. Find and replace extra spaces at the beginning of a sentence. Apply the appropriate styles to the text. Remove widows and hanging words. Read through it one last time. Hit print. I would then take the print to my boss and he would look it over. He always found mistakes no matter how hard I tried to make it perfect. It actually seemed like the harder I tried to make it perfect, the more mistakes he found. There were other projects as well as the copy heavy books. I really enjoyed working on print samples and flash animations. Somehow I always found myself anticipating the moment I could leave. Leave to go be free and do what I love.
So this week I was faced with a decision. My afternoon job offered me a full time position. This meant I would have to quit my morning job. I was hoping to continue at both positions for another 6 months or so. I wanted to have that studio experience under my belt and I still had not proved myself there. I didn't want to leave until I had proven my talents. So the next day I went into my morning job to discuss this with my boss. He offered me a full time job. I was a little shocked by this offer because I was under the impression that he didn't really like my work. So I told him that I would think about it.
At some point during my last semester in college, I went to speak to one of my instructors. I wanted some advice to help me decide what I was going to do with the rest of my life. At the time I was working as an intern at the job that is currently my afternoon job (in house designer). She asked me what I wanted to do as a designer. I told her I didn't know. I remember she looked back at me a little surprised and said, "I think you do know, because I think your already doing it." I thought about this while I was deciding between these two jobs. I have always loved my afternoon job. Although they could not pay me as much, its a better environment for me and I promised myself I would never make decisions based off money—as long as I was paying rent and not living on the streets. Suddenly the choice was easy.
The next day I went into my morning job and told my boss my decision. I told him I would finish all my projects and work until the end of the month. He told me that he understood my decision. Then he asked if I knew anyone who would want that job. Then something unexpected happened. He sat down and looked at me through the corner of his eye. Then he said,"I want someone with experience, at least three years."
I cocked my head to the side a little surprised— in my head I counted back the nearly three years of experience I have had.
He continued,"Your just too inexperienced. I have to watch everything you do. You don't know what to look for."
I starred blankly back at him, unsure how to respond to this attack, It was only a day ago that he told me he liked my work and offered me a full time position. So I just said "okay..." . Then I turned around and went to my desk. Still stunned, I watched as he called his partner into his office and closed the door behind him. I could hear his voice was angry and I knew I was the focus of the conversation. The office was old, long and narrow. I pretended to print something and walked down the hallway to the very back where the printer was located. I leaned my body against the printer and starred out the window. Tears began to form in my eyes. I felt as though I had failed. I wondered if I had it in me to be a designer. My boss has ten times the experience that I have had and he had just told me I didn't have it in me.
I left the office sad and defeated. I went to my afternoon job and my mood was obvious. Everyone was concerned about me and I couldn't even talk without my quivering voice and teary eyes getting in the way. I felt like I had just been kicked out of a bad episode of the twilight zone. I talked to my afternoon boss and she reassured me. I began to feel better and found comfort in the good experiences I have had as a designer.
Then I did something amazing.
The next morning I got up and went to my morning office. I walked up the stairs and straight into my boss's office. I told him I wanted to talk. Then I said:
"I really admire the work you do here, and the opportunity you have given me. When I took this job, I was so excited. I wanted to work with other designers and learn as much as I could. I think that it turned out a little different than what I expected. I was always top of my class and I have always done very well with everything I have done. I am a good designer. What you said to me yesterday was uncalled for. The only thing I did wrong was not having enough confidence in myself to tell you to let me do my job."
My eyes were turning red and my voice was shaky at this point. He disagreed with what I said and told me again that he thought I was inexperience and had an inability to work with deadlines.
I then told him I had no reason to finish off the month and I went to get my things off my desk—only to remember that the only thing I had brought was my umbrella. I grabbed my umbrella and turned around and faced him. Then he said, "It's not you, it's business. You'll be fine." I turned around and walked out the door.

I love em —

I may be new to all of this, but I do know this is a battle every designer faces. We go to school, earn fancy degrees, become amazingly talented—and for what? Maybe it's fame, fortune, passion... blah blah blah. I just want to add a little beauty to our world. I want to cut down the number of ugly ads and billboards and make art out of them. I want to create stunning works that not only get noticed— but also work with their surroundings to make our world a little nicer. For some reason, unbeknownst to me, I want to change the world. Maybe this is why I am always so dissatisfied.
I feel confused. As a designer, I should be creating pieces that work for my client. I should make them happy. On the flip side—I am the one with the design education. Where is the line between simply doing a task and providing a service and being a skilled intelligent professional who already knows what works best for the client. This might be something that comes with time. I'm not sure. I am unhappy with a lot of my current work. I don't think it was designed as well as it could have been. However, I was told to do what the client asked— I felt my hands were tied.
Should I have thrown myself on the fire?
Should I have refused and said, "No, I will not stand for this!"?

So now I face an imaginary fork in the road. It's imaginary because it may not be my choice to make.

Sure when one door closes, a window opens... is that how that goes?

We'll anyways. I have two appointments with destiny tomorrow.

For some reason, I feel this may determine the course of my entire career.

—However, I have been know to exaggerate

communication norms of the future...

Our society is evolving into a strange socially awkward existence. I can see it in my own behaviors. I would much rather email or text message than have an actual conversation on the phone. It's not that I don't like to talk to people— it's that I don't like to initiate conversations in the real world. Don't ask me why, I don't know.
In this very coffee shop there are at least 20 people with their eyes glued to their computers. I am sitting here among all these interesting (and yes, real life) people— all of which I ignore because I would rather talk to my friends on messenger.
I have heard that there have been cases of people born without tonsils or wisdom teeth because they are no longer needed. It's a form of evolution. Is it possible that in the future there will be babies born without vocal cords for this very reason? Maybe the children of the future will also develop long fingers and highly toned thumb muscles to better operate these new forms of communication and entertainment. I suppose time can only tell...

Al Gore

what do you think?
everyone here cannot stop talking about it-
Al Gore

yesterday

I was sitting in my car.
Waiting for the light to turn green.
I looked ahead of me and felt a tinge of panic when I saw the car on the other side of the intersection. I looked around fearful that I was either on the wrong side or going the wrong way down a one way street. The driver of the other car appeared to panic as well. I felt relieved when I realized it wasn't me. The other car was going the wrong way down the one way street.
Then I wondered...
...what will happen when the light turns green?

hello there 2007

I can't believe it.
I'm not one to endorse new years resolutions. I think that we should always be trying to better ourselves year round. However, this year I have many. None of which I will share with the world, but I must say– I am very excited about this new year. It started with a bang and I can feel all the pieces coming together and they are going to make something amazing.
Happy New Year!