Author Archives: Mike Winder

In Case You Missed It

Ana Serrano's "Salon of Beauty" installation at Houston's Rice Gallery. Photo: Nash Baker.

There’s always something happening when it comes to Art Center alumni, students and faculty. Sometimes there’s almost too much happening!

If you have any Art Center-related news items you’d like to share with the community, send us an email at editorial at artcenter dot edu.

Keepin’ It “Real Steel” with Tim Flattery’s Robots

Tim Flattery's Midas robot in Dreamworks' "Real Steel."

With all the negative attention that concussions in boxing, football and hockey have been getting lately, the scenario presented in Dreamworks’ film Real Steel, out in theaters today, doesn’t seem too far-fetched: In the year 2020, eight-feet-tall, 2,000 lb. robots have replaced humans as the pugilists du jour.

The film tells the story of a washed-up-boxer-turned-small-time-promoter (X-Men’s Hugh Jackman) who teams up with his estranged son (Resurrecting the Champ’s Dakota Goyo) to build and train a World Robot Boxing championship contender.

Tim Flattery, the chair of Art Center’s Entertainment Design program whom we interviewed in the most recent issue of Dot, designed several of the robotic brawlers featured in the film–Spitfire, Albino, Axelrod, Twin Cities and Midas.

“These aren’t your typical robots,” said Flattery of the characters he designed while working in close collaboration with Tom Meyer, the film’s production designer, and three other concept artists, including fellow Art Center faculty member Daren Dochterman. “They’re all very stylized and ridiculous, yet somehow, in the world of the movie they make sense.”

Head past the break for the trailer and an exclusive slideshow of designs by Flattery.

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R.I.P. Steve Jobs; You Helped Us All Think Different

The unaired version of the very first “Think Different” television ad below is unique in that it’s not the version narrated by actor Richard Dreyfuss that we all saw in 1997.

Rather it’s narrated by Steve Jobs, the co-founder of Apple and the visionary pioneer behind the company’s now ubiquitious products, who passed away yesterday.

Art Center alumna Jessica Schulman Edelstein ADVT 91, then the lead art director on the Apple Computer account at Chiat Day, established the look and feel of the highly successful “Think Different” campaign, which featured historical figures–physicist Albert Einstein, civil rights pioneer Martin Luther King Jr. and “Sesame Street” creator Jim Henson to name a few–who changed the world through their out-of-the-box thinking.

Rest in Peace, Mr. Jobs. Your vision touched as all and you left the world a better place.

Got an Idea? Need a Job? Get Moving!

Things are always in motion at Idealab's Pasadena offices

A little bird just told us that startup incubator Idealab is holding a job fair next Wednesday from 6:00 to 9:30 p.m. at their Pasadena offices.

Idealab founder and Art Center trustee Bill Gross will offer some welcoming remarks and executives from a number of Idealab’s startup companies–UberMedia, Evolution Robotics, GO Interactive and more–will be on hand to pitch their companies to the fair’s attendees.

Here’s the message we were sent:

Idealab is hosting a job fair at their offices for 10 of their startups companies. They are looking for coders, roboticists, marketing managers and community managers to fill the areas of their Green Tech, Social Media, Big Data, and Enterprise companies.  If you are a super star you are pretty much guaranteed to find a job here.

For those that may be unfamiliar with Idealab, it was founded in 1996 by entrepreneur Bill Gross. Idealab provides a broad range of operational support to its companies, allowing the company management teams to focus on getting to market quickly and cost effectively and to take advantage of the serial start-up experience of the Idealab team. Bill Gross and Idealab have founded or advanced development of more than 75 companies including Overture Services, eSolar, UberMedia, CitySearch, Picasa and Internet Brands. Current operating companies are providing innovative technology solutions in industries such as software, search, robotics, Internet media and services and alternative energy fields.

So do yourself a favor this month and come explore a variety of tech opportunities and network with some of LA’s top startups at the offices of Idealab, the Pasadena-based technology incubator.  Bill Gross will be on site to give a special welcome, and executives from Idealab’s companies will pitch their businesses to attendees. Come have a good time and enjoy the Idealab hospitality. You can be sure that food, beer and wine will be served.

The event will max out at 200 attendees. Registration is required and if you are an outside tech recruiter you’re going to have to sit this one out.  REGISTER HERE.

The Deets
When: Wednesday, October 12, 2011
6:00pm – 9:30pm
Where: Idealab
130 W. Union Street, Pasadena, CA 91103
Participating Companies

Want to learn more about how Idealab works? Watch This Week in Venture Capital’s Mark Suster interview Bill Gross after the break.

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Drew Struzan: The Man Behind the Poster [UPDATE]

Struzan's "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom" (1984)

Do you like movies? Did you grow up in the ’80s?

If you answered “yes” to either of those questions, then you’re probably already intimately familiar with the work of Art Center alumnus Drew Struzan ILLU ’70.

In the ’80s, Struzan created iconic movie posters for films like Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, Back to the Future, Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi, Big Trouble in Little China and The Thing.

More recently, he has leant his deft touch to posters for Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, Hellboy, Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith and AMC’s The Walking Dead.

At next week’s New York Comic Con, a portion of the nearly completed documentary Drew: The Man Behind the Poster, which features interviews with Struzan and the Hollywood talent with whom he’s worked, will be screened on Thursday, October 15 at 9 p.m. at the Jacob Javitz Center, Room 1A24.

UPDATE: The Los Angeles Times‘ “Hero Complex” blog recently ran a story on Struzan’s forthcoming 250-page retrospective Drew Struzan: Oeuvre from Titan Books. (10/20/11)

Film trailer after the break.

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When Apple Talks iPhone, the World Listens

Recent Graphic Design graduate Megan Potter presents her iPad magazine "Abyss."

Whether they’re augmenting reality, designing interactive magazines and newspapers, or creating apps that blur the distinction between games and art, many of Art Center’s students and alumni will be paying close attention to Apple’s iPhone announcement this morning.

What changes are in store for the ubiquitous smartphone? Rumors swirling around the Internet suggest Apple’s new CEO Tim Cook will unveil everything from a larger screen size to voice control software to compatibility with the latest LTE networks.

Regardless of what surprises emerge from Cupertino during today’s event, one things for certain: people will notice.

What are you hoping to see from Apple today?

And for those of you who can’t wait for today’s announcement, there’s a video after the break to keep you busy until 10 a.m. rolls around.

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Tarsem Singh helped R.E.M. Lose its Religion (video)

Still from R.E.M.'s "Losing My Religion" video

After 31 years together, rock band R.E.M.–composed of founding members singer Michael Stipe, guitarist Peter Buck and bassist Mike Mills–recently surprised their fans by calling it quits.

Though the group crafted a number of songs that entered the zeitgeist, including “It’s the End of the World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine),” “Everybody Hurts” and “What’s the Frequency, Kenneth?” they are perhaps best known for “Losing My Religion” from their 1991 album Out of Time.

The song became a cultural juggernaut despite the fact that it was built around a mandolin riff and featured lyrics that some misinterpreted as being a critique of organized religion (in fact, the phrase “I’m losing my religion” is a Southern expression whose meaning is akin to “I’m at the end of my rope” or “I’m at my wit’s end”). Regardless of the reasons behind the song becoming a hit, it would be impossible to separate the importance that the song’s video, directed by Art Center alumnus Tarsem Singh FILM ’90, had in propelling it into the stratosphere.

See the video after the break.

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Inspired Designs: Meet Saturday High Instructor Jeffrey Jones

Jones at Angkor Wat in Cambodia

Jeffrey Jones, a senior designer for Samsung Design America’s mobile unit, spends his days designing smartphones like the Galaxy Mini and the Corby II, but on Saturdays he teaches Introduction to Product Design at Saturday High, Art Center College of Design’s program for high school students (grades 9 through 12).

Jones—who studied at Art Center at Night and went on to earn a B.S. in Product Design at the College in 2007—was first turned on to the field of Product Design at Pasadena City College, where he took a class taught by Art Center instructor and alumnus Stan Kong PROD ‘83. While at Art Center, Jones interned at Vans, where he designed skateboarding equipment for the Vans Equipment Group, under the leadership of Art Center alumnus, Safir Bellali TRANS ‘01.

Before being hired by Samsung, Jones freelanced for Boombang, a creative think tank led by another Art Center alumnus, Tylor Garland PROD ‘94, where he worked on the design of two video game accessories—a fishing rod for The Strike and a rifle for The Hunt—for outdoor retailer Bass Pro Shops.

We recently caught up with Jones to learn more about his Saturday High class.

Dotted Line: Tell me about Introduction to Product Design.
Jeffrey Jones: Last term was the first time I taught the class, so I’m still fine-tuning it, but essentially it’s a 10-week course that I’ve broken up into three phases: the research phase, where students figure out what kind of product to design and for whom they’re designing; the ideation phase, where students develop their ideas, push the envelope, and select their very best concepts; and the refinement phase, where they further develop their best idea and present to the class exactly what their product is and how it works. I invited Joonsuh “Justin” Kim, the director of Samsung Design America to attend the final, and he sat in as a guest crit.

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Students Spend Their Summer Augmenting Reality

Still from the promotional video for Juju, a student-created augmented reality application.

This past summer term, Art Center welcomed back its first visionary-in-residence, science fiction author Bruce Sterling (Schismatrix, Islands in the Net, The Caryatids) to co-teach an augmented reality (AR) transdisciplinary design studio with Graphic Design instructor Guillaume Wolf called Augmenting Reality.

Not certain what AR is exactly? You’re not alone. For the studio, Sterling and Wolf defined AR as a software program that must: 1) mix the virtual with the real, 2) be interactive in real time and 3) register in three dimensions.

AR is an industry still on the cusp, and applications are only now starting to sneak out of the labs and into consumers’ hands. “It may even be a bit before the cusp,” Sterling says of the AR industry. “It’s an old technology, but it’s a baby industry.”

In the course—hosted by the College’s Graphic Design Department and sponsored by Amsterdam-based Layar, a company whose AR platform claims more than one million active users—teams of students designed both concepts and prototype AR apps that ranged from virtual pets to an augmented “spiritual reality” experience.

Layar's Maarten Lens-FitzGerald gets some FaceTime with Graphic Design student Shi Jie Lim and Graphic Design Department chair Nik Hafermaas. Photo: Alex Arestei, Layar.

“I was impressed by the student’s concepts, execution and their presentation,” says Maarten Lens-FitzGerald, general manager and co-founder of Layar, who watched the teams’ final presentations virtually (during the final he was “passed” around the classroom on an instructor’s smartphone). “Even with innovative media, it’s still important to be able to tell the story using mainstream media. Not all AR people know this; but the students did.”

Words, no doubt, that are music to instructor Wolf’s ears, who wanted to make sure the students were designing based on something people can actually connect with.

“Why are people interested in anything? It’s not just about design, it’s about the psychology behind it,” says Wolf of what he tries to impart to his students. “Why is a product sexy? Why do we want it? How does a designer create that desire?”

(Read more, and view videos of the work, after the jump.)

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Ideas that Stick: Meet Saturday High Student Lana Vong

Saturday High student Lana Vong

Every one of us has stared in frustration at a poorly designed product and boldly declared, “I could design something better than this!”

But how many of us actually get to work on doing just that?

This past summer, San Gabriel High School junior Lana Vong took Introduction to Product Design through Saturday High—Art Center College of Design’s program that helps high school students become better artists, designers and thinkers—and created the concept for Stikitti, a cat-shaped foam sticker maker.

“Lana’s foam sticker maker project is a classic example of how product designers have the power to improve the things they love to do,” says instructor Jeffrey B. Jones. “On the first day of class, I simply asked her what she liked to do. She pulled out one of her foam stickers and said, ‘Well, I like to make these.’ I asked her how she could improve the way kids make stickers, and the rest was history.”

We caught up with Vong to learn more about the story behind Stikitti.

Dotted Line: How did you find out about Saturday High?
Lana Vong: I joined my high school’s art club, and the club’s president was going to enter Art Center’s Graphic Design program this year after graduation. I was interested in product design so I started asking her for advice and she suggested Saturday High.

Dotted Line: How long have you been interested in product design?
Vong: For about a year. Joining the art club made me more open to creative careers, and I thought product design was a good balance between creative and critical thinking.

An image from Vong's class presentation

An image from Vong's class presentation

Dotted Line: Tell us about your Introduction to Product Design course.
Vong: Our instructor, Jeffrey Jones, had us do one major project throughout the course. There were three stages to it. The first stage was the research stage, where we planned out our project based on the idea we had in mind. Next was the exploration stage, which is where we started drawing and testing out different ways to approach the project. And the last stage was the refinement stage and the making of the final product.

Dotted Line: Had you ever been involved in a similar three-step creative process?
Vong: No, it was all new to me. When I first heard of Introduction to Product Design, I thought we’d be learning about marker techniques. But we ended up focusing more on the thinking and reasoning behind our products. It was almost like solving a math problem. I really liked it.

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