If there is a better way to spend Labor Day than archiving files in preparation of a new iMac…well…ugh, I’m a nerd. But! Thanks to a day of file organizing, I was able to trudge through the depths of my website files to bring you a very special treat: Every Version of My Portfolio Website That Has Ever Existed. A few (all) are terrifically embarrassing, but I think it’s interesting to see how in a few short years the internet and how we use it has completely changed. Remember splash pages??? Wow. And Flash! Good lord. I think this was the first time I opened Flash since 2007. A screenshot of the sites are pictured and the titles link to complete websites. Without further ado:
My Very First Website! <--- Click for full site
Note the completely weird “Life-Saving Design” theme. Full disclosure: I was interning at Headcase Design at the time and thought they were the bee’s knees. Their website was and still is themed around medicating yourself with good design. This gem is from 2006 and my first interactive class. Flash was The Next Big Thing and all websites were 800px wide. And popups. lots of them. Also: IMPACT. I spared you the over two minute long Flash animation intro set to Explosions in the Sky’s “First Breath After Coma”…you’re welcome.
My Very First HTML (porfolio) Website! <--- Click for full site
I’m shocked at how not-horrible this one actually is. Compared to that last one, this one is pretty good! I did another html site as a part of a project in the class but this was the first time I attempted to make a portfolio site in Dreamweaver. So you can guess from this site that 2006-7 is when I really started getting into doing type and illustration stuff. And way too into 1950s kitch.
My First Site after I Graduated! <--- Click for full site
I think this one and the previous one actually co-existed for a bit…But as you can tell from the resumé and about page, this was my site when I was first hired to work for Louise Fili. At the time I thought Flash was easier to update (what??) which is why I moved my whole portfolio into Flash instead of expanding on the last html illustration site. Of course I was terribly wrong and Flash sucks. But hey, this was good enough that Louise didn’t laugh at me when she met me.
The Last Website I Will Ever Build Without the Help of Others <--- Click for full site
What a step up this site was. Flash Be Gone! It took me forever to put this together and in the end it was totally annoying to update. When I was building this site, the whole “make your site out of blog CMS” was just baaaarely starting to catch on and about 5 months after I released this one that’s what EVERYONE was doing. I felt so lame having to go into Dreamweaver and change all of my roll-overs (roll-overs!) every time I updated so this site only lasted an update or two (a.k.a. one year).
My Current Site! <--- Click for full site (or don’t because you’re already on it)
In the fall of 2009, I left Louise Fili Ltd. and knew my site needed a major overhaul. I had a TON of new work to post and the previous Dreamweaver site was just too difficult to update. I was sharing a studio at the time with a bunch of AWESOME folks, who happened to be web genii (plural genius) so we collaborated to make my new site. I designed it, they programmed the heck out of it, giving me a crazy custom CMS for updating my portfolios (pictured) and links, mirroring the design in Wordpress for the blog, and adapting a Big Cartel store to perfectly match the rest of the site. I think this one should last a while but I’m already taking some steps to make sure it evolves as our web use needs evolve (like making a quick-view scrolling portfolio for art directors to see a lot of stuff in a very short amount of time).
So, wow. That was quite a journey. I feel like an archeologist. Except dinosaurs are way more exciting.
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Embarrassing Previous Versions of My Website!
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Things that Bother Me More than They Should
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Scale of Annoyance
It’s one of those days. Here is the .ai file if you feel like making one of your own! -
Steal My Idea: “Forwarded Emails from Mom”
a weekly emailed newsletter containing “forwarded mom content”. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
-You know what I’m talking about. All those “animals being friends”, “Look at these crazy animals!“, “WOW! Nature Photos!!” and “CRAZY 3D SIDEWALK CHALK ART!!!” emails that your Mom or crazy Aunt or internet savvy Grandma sends you. I personally have the fortune of receiving the “creative” emails—you know, because I’m an Artist—and they never cease to elicit a smile and an “oh, mom” eye-roll. I think those without the fortune of a google-happy parent should have access to these internet gems in the way that it is most natural: In emails disguised as forwards from Mom (rather than as a blog, which just wouldn’t feel as natural). Actual mom-content emails can be submitted by subscribers for inclusion in the newsletter. The site Postcards from Yo Momma is a great read for personalized letters and instant messages from people’s moms, but this would be strictly for the for the relatively generic (and oftentimes kind of gross) forwarded emails from the ones you love.
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-1. The email subject should always be prefaced with “Fwd:” even though it will be original content
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2. LOL’s and emoticons should be sprinkled throughout when appropriate
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3. Exclamation points should be used liberally
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4. Clip-art and comic sans encouraged
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5. All emails should end with some sort of inspirational quote even if it has nothing to do with the content of the email (e.g. “Life is like a coin. You can spend it anyway you wish, but you can only spend it once.”)) Here is a source for inspirational quotes.
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6. The email should be sent from an AOL account
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7. And on a serious note: no hyper-patriotic / borderline racist content (though I feel like these are usually sent by Dads and Uncles anyway)
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Pictured above: Hand Paintings by Guido Daniel. See other glorious examples here.
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Steal My Idea is a new addition to my blog in which I share ideas I have that I am unable to bring to life on my own. Some will be silly, some will be for the greater good, all are free for the taking if you have the desire and means to execute them.
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mom, this is how twitter works:
I made this handy jpg explanation of twitter for all of you that need to explain it to your parents / friends. Twitter pats itself on the back quite a bit for being “easy” but there is a lot of nuance to understand that they don’t really explain well. Click here for the full size image which is much more legible.
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A Proposal for the English Language
he more I communicate online, the more I realize how difficult it can be to really express tone / emotion through typing. As an avid exclamation mark user and semi-anti-emoticon person, I have a proposal: Let’s appropriate the upside down exclamation point, “¡”, for the English language to use for things that are extremely bad. This character is currently for Spanish speakers only, but there is no reason why we can’t give it a new life in English. Because it is so ubiquitous in Spanish, every font (save for some crazy display typefaces) will have this character, which means it could very seamlessly integrate into English writing. “What if it is mistaken for a lowercase ‘i’?”, you might ask. The character usually drops below the baseline, making it easy to see it isn’t an “i” or if it does not drop below the baseline, it is usually tapered as an exclamation point is.Why a new character? Exclamation points are great for things that are exciting and fun, but I’ve always felt they fell a little short when I wanted to express real anger, frustration, or panic. The only current option is a mix of question marks and exclamation points, e.g. “what!!?!?!?!” or some sort of emoticon, and we all know the only acceptable emoticon is the happy face and the very seldom wink. This new mark, “the panic mark” is a single character solution which will solve all of these problems (and is very twitter friendly).
I realize that most people will continue expressing themselves through whatever means they feel the most comfortable, but because people do more communicating online now than in person, it’s fun to think of ways to tweak the way we type without destroying the English language. I certainly don’t think vast debaucheries of language like “text speak”, or whatever you want to call it, communicate anything other than “I am lazy” or “I am a 14 year old girl”, but small smart changes (or proposals like the left slanting font for sarcasm) might help us better express ourselves online.
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My Evolution of Type Taste from Grade School to Present
A catalog of my evolving typography likes through time. I didn’t include all of the crappy display fonts I liked in college because it’s just way too embarrassing.
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Glamour Magic
‘ve had a few inquiries about the provenance of my last “about” picture, so here is the story of my (now) most prized possession: When I was 12 years old, glamour shots were all the rage. As popular as the old-timey saloon pictures you could get at amusement parks, but more accessible. All of the popular girls were getting glammed-up headshots done for fun or as birthday presents and I wanted to join in the craze. I begged my mother for glamour shots for my birthday and glamour shots I got. Apparently not all glamour shots are created equal. Instead of an in-studio professional experience, my glamour shots, “glamour magic” shots rather, were taken in a Best Western hotel room by a husband and wife team, a “photographer” and “makeup and hair artist”. I confess, I had frosted hair at the time which certainly contributed to the outcome of the shots, but they dolled me up a la 1988 and I was absolutely mortified by the result. I think I threw away all of the wallet sized photos and hid the “portfolio” of shots for years. In college, I was digging through the attic and lo and behold there they were—a suppressed memory, a time capsule of embarrassment. Of course now they are probably the only thing I would save in a fire, I love them that much.
Favorites include: Top left (with my mom, instructed to make what looks like a gang sign by popping her collar), bottom left, and the insanely inappropriate bottom middle.
