business matters

Everyone around me is a total stranger.

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Non-trad ad for The Yoga Center.

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In Non-traditional Advertising, ads are strategically positioned in the most unexpected places e.g. the sidewalk, a manhole cover, and as in the brilliant1 example above, a straw. The trick is in fusing your big idea with the 3D properties of the medium without making the proposition seem contrived2. On that note, I stumbled upon this really cool collection of Creative Ads Around The World I thought you might enjoy!

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UPDATE: Mr. Katana of Hemmy.net is the real creator of the Creative Ads list, and not the webmaster of Eglobe1 like I originally linked to. Apparently Onion82 of Eglobe stole Mr. Katana’s entry and is passing it off as his3. Read more about it here.

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Heyheyhey, why don’t you deck out your windows with these dooper-cute Halloweenie windsocks our good friends Nina and Carlo designed4 :

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They’re available in Maxitoylab Alabang Town Center and Maxiworks Powerplant Mall in Rockwell. They’re made of nylon, are 2.5 feet in length and 18 inches in diameter, and cost P150 each. Grab one now, yes?
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It’s been said time and again that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Last July, our 2-year old magazine Wedding Essentials came out with a Special Issue called WE Beautiful Weddings featuring 25 real wedding stories and photos submitted and written by actual brides. We even included a “supplier box” listing down all the vendors each couple worked with.

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Remember?

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Fast forward to this month: look what our more-than-5-year-old rival mag did. For their, um, version, they also asked brides to write the stories themselves — something WE has been doing since the very first issue. At least the art direction is different but the overall concept and format was copied right down to the supplier box.5) Well, well, well, how utterly flattering! 😉
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So if you love WE, pretty please wait for our next issue and do feel free to take a peek at the behind-the-scenes action via my phlog.

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Arn and I will be away from home6 for a couple of weeks but I’ll see if I can post from where we’ll be. Seeya. 🙂

  1. It’s so simple, it makes you go “why didn’t I think of that?”[ back]
  2. I’ve actually seen it employed locally, some better executed than others though, but it’s good to know that the brand people are becoming more open to the non-conventional approach.[ back]
  3. Sigh, aren’t we all victims of intellectual property thievery lately.[ back]
  4. They’re sooo cute! I’m guessing that sock #s 1, 3, 4, and 5 are by Nina and #s 2 and 6 are by Carlo, correct?[ back]
  5. The only difference is that ours was a true labor of love and not something borne out of marketing warfare. ;[ back]
  6. …and our dear little Abbas 🙁[ back]
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That day will come, when everybody is a number one.

One of the questions I often get asked is “who are the graphic designers you admire?” It’s quite a list actually so I hope you have time because I’m gonna take you through it right now.

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David Carson. He was the Nirvana and Pearl Jam of the visual movement in the 90s. His work on Raygun changed the way I looked at graphic design forever — now here was someone who came up with attention-grabbing work by tossing the rulebook out the window. If you’ve seen the Pillbox magazines and a lot of the local Pepsi ads in the 90s, you’ll see how heavy his influence was on the art director.1

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Neville Brody. Consistent use of loud colors, big and bold type, and striking graphic elements make his work distinct and memorable. It was also through studying his work that I learned the proper use of typography2 as a design element. His designs seem to have a life of their own, they leap out of the pages containing them, just like the designer himself — he didn’t stop at print and has branched out to motion and space design as well.3

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Saul Bass. This man is a legend, just take a look at the work he’s done — they include iconic posters and logos that have stood the test of time. The use of flat colors, blocky hand-lettered type, and simple shapes define his minimalist style. It’s most likely a testament to the limitations in printing during his time but I’ve always believed that when it comes to visual communication, the simpler and the more straight to the point, the better. Right? 😀

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Milton Glaser. You’ve seen his “I *heart* NY” logo a million times, but the body of work he’s produced speaks volumes about his range as a designer. I can’t say he has a particular style because when you look at his designs, they don’t look like they came from just one person. But the randomness is good in that it shows versatility. Of his work, I like the ones that have illustrations the most. His psychedelic, free-flowing drawings seem to take us back to a time when producing art actually meant freedom of expression (and didn’t involve deadlines).

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Locally, I have my design heroes as well and fortunately I’ve had a chance to work with them.

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Robert Alejandro. Sir Robert is best known for his whimsical and stylish artworks for Papemelroti and the Ayala Malls. He was my Figure Drawing and Advertising 101 teacher in 3rd year college4 at the UPCFA and he just blew everyone away with his art and out-of-the-box way of thinking. Ask anyone in my class and they’ll tell you that he was the one who inspired them to be (a) an advertising art director; (b) a children’s book illustrator; or (c) a graphic designer — all of which he was.5 How cosmic is it that we formed and now belong to the same design group?

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Raymond Legaspi. He’s not as publicly known as Robert but he’s a force to be reckoned with in the Direct Marketing world, having won a ton of awards locally and internationally. Mr. Ray was my very first boss — I had my OJT at J. Walter Thompson in 1991 and was assigned to be his trainee. A few years later, we worked in the same company, Ogilvy & Mather, as colleagues where he was certainly one of the few art-based Creative Directors I had huge respect for because he always stressed on the importance of a big idea in visual thinking, unlike some who focused primarily on execution.6 Incidentally, he retired from the corporate world just a few weeks ago to pursue his first love, painting.

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And of course,

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Arnold Arre. I know, I know, he’s my husband but to be honest, I’ve admired him and his work waaay before we even met. The first time I ever saw his paintings for Mythos, my mind just reeled at the detail he put into all of them — intricate brush and pen work, the stories behind them7 — the overall distinct style and theme of the entire exhibit was just so well thought of that I knew this guy was an intense and very passionate artist. The same goes for every piece of work he churns out, everything has a story. Everything has a reason. And isn’t that what good design should have? Reason. To matter.

  1. Oh wait a minute, that’s me hehe.[ back]
  2. My ultimate pet peeve: “designers” who stretch, squash and distort type. Ugh, I see it here all the time.[ back]
  3. By the way I have a copy of the Propaganda album, 1234, which is one of his earlier designs. I swear I’ll have it autographed someday.[ back]
  4. In 1990. That was the ONLY year he ever taught, lucky us.[ back]
  5. I guess I’m guilty on all three counts.[ back]
  6. I think the ultimate compliment was when he recommended that I be part of the Design Jury for last year’s Ad congress Araw Awards. I knew then that I’ve somehow earned his nod.[ back]
  7. Yes can you believe it? Ask him about a character in his painting and he’ll tell you the back story he thought up for it.[ back]
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Everyone keeps asking, what’s it all about?

Yahoo, the Wedding Essentials team’s newest baby, Beautiful Weddings 2006, will be available at all leading bookstores and mag stands starting this week.

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So, just what is Beautiful Weddings? It’s a collection of wonderfully inspiring stories celebrating beautiful beginnings by real brides and will be sold for only Php 120.00 – a real steal for something almost as good as love!
It’s been a little over two years now since our EIC Marbee called me to discuss the possibility of building1 a wedding magazine together. From scratch! It’s been her wish to come out with something like it and I guess it took her by surprise that it was a dream project for me too. And whaddya know, since then, we’ve released four thick volumes and I can wholeheartedly say that yes, with equal parts passion and determination, and a whole lot of crazy logic, it can be done.
Every WE issue is as exciting to work on as the last one. How is that possible, you ask? I guess it’s because (1) both Marbee and I have a love affair with weddings (well you can tell by how I obsessively lovingly planned mine); (2) I can’t ask for a nicer team of girls to work with – Marbs, Charlene and Ria are always full of fresh ideas and are a ton of fun to be with. More importantly, we share the same vision about what we want to convey through the mag: that “beautiful weddings” are not restricted to celebrities and people in high society. That no matter what budget you have, you can have the wedding of your dreams.; and (3) I get to flex my dormant – now – that – I’m – out – of – advertising creative muscles. Planning the design and layout of 250+ pages ain’t no picnic, my friend, but it’s a great big challenge each time.
That said, I know you’ve heard this enough from me but please, please support Wedding Essentials and WE Beautiful Weddings. We may be novices in the field but you can be sure that everything we do comes straight from the heart.
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So how have you been? After I finished working on the magazines, I wanted to be away from the computer as much as possible so I took the chance to catch up on Veronica and the gang at Neptune2 and it’s official: I’m hooked. The following video is for Lia and Neva and everyone else who loves the show: Go, watch, and sing-along.
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By the way, I’ve somewhat been busy at the Phlog and in Multiply.

  1. Yep, the task daunted us very much since both of us are from advertising and have had no experience in the world of magazine publishing, ever.[ back]
  2. I finished watching both seasons already! I want more! More, I tell you![ back]
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I'm Cynthia Bauzon-Arre, a Filipino watercolor artist & graphic designer. I live in QC with my graphic novelist husband Arnold and our friendly marmalade tabby Abbas. This blog has been chronicling my life, likes, and loves since 2001. [ more ]

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