How to Talk to a Graphic Designer in Six Easy Steps: Part One

All design projects have different needs, and individual clients and designers are very different people and have different ways of working, thinking and talking about their work. But having a general framework for interaction can help prevent people coming across as, say, a “nightmare client” or a stubborn artist unwilling to stray from their “vision.” With permission, I’m going to use a small design project I did recently for a workshop performance of Kevin Clark‘s opera Summer’s Twilight as an example. This is a long piece, and it may sound like a complicated process, but it is far less scary and involved that it seems — the example project only took a few hours over a couple of days.

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Help My Friend Start a Farm!

Mihail is starting a farm in upstate NY, and he needs your help!

A quick blurb:

“We are a group of passionate horticulturalists who want to experiment with a new way of life and commerce. We are starting an organic farm on 110 acres of land and developing a collective of Earth-friendly cottage industries that will bring prosperity and food security to our local community.

Anyway, IdeaBlob has a contest where he can win $10,000 to help him get started. And all you have to do is vote for him.

You can read more about his plans (and buy seeds!) here.

Happy Constitution Day!

You can now watch a bunch of the Constitution Project films online! Click here.

China Inside Out Emmy Nomination

China Inside Out, the ABC News Primetime special I worked on last year about China’s global economic impact, has been nominated for the Emmy for “Outstanding Continuing Coverage of a News Story – Long Form.” Most of my coworkers have a ton of the pointy gold statues, but this is the first project I’ve worked on that’s been nominated. I’m excited! We find out who wins Sept. 21.

DocGroup Needs Interns!

Going to be in NYC this summer? We need a motion graphics/graphic design intern here at The Documentary Group. If you’re interested, shoot me an email and I’ll give you the details.

Korematsu Trailer

The opening few minutes of our Constitution Project film about Japanese internment during WWII and Korematsu, the court case that upheld it. The graphics for this one were subtler and more subdued than the ones we created for the Yick Wo film.

Yick Wo Trailer

Check out the trailer for one of our recent Constitution Project films:

The Yick Wo v. Hopkins case happened long enough ago that there is very little related visual material, so we had to create lots of puppets and sets in order to tell the story. The graphics in the trailer are mine but Hiro did a lot of really amazing work on this one and it’s worth watching the long form of the film to see it.

Watch “Ten Trillion and Counting” online!

Our new documentary, FRONTLINE: Ten Trillion and Counting premiered Tuesday. You can watch the full show online, though:

I designed the graphs and animated all the photos and documents. This was a BIG PROJECT and I’m really happy with how it turned out. I’m also looking forward to getting a good night’s sleep again.

It’s been funny seeing the comments on the Frontline site. Several people have said we should have represented the debt as percentage of GDP. WE DID. There’s only one spot where we point out the actual number, and even that’s on the GDP graph. The numbers are just that big. Also interesting to me is how many things people said we should have included that were originally in the cut, but were dropped because it’s such a complex story to fit into an hour show.

FRONTLINE: “Ten Trillion and Counting” on PBS starting today!

Our new film airs tonight! “Ten Trillion and Counting” is DocGroup’s first FRONTLINE documentary, and explores the history and issues surrounding the national debt and the challenge it poses to the nation’s future.

“This is a program everyone needs to watch if the search for solutions is ever going to get beyond the simplistic, accusatory catchphrases that sometimes seem to pass for economic-policy debate in Washington.”
— Neil Genzlinger, New York Times

Here’s the blurb from PBS’ website:
All of the federal government’s efforts to stem the tide in the financial meltdown that began with the subprime mortgage crisis have added hundreds of billions of dollars to our national debt. FRONTLINE reports on how this debt will constrain and challenge the new Obama administration, and on the growing chorus on both sides of the aisle that without fiscal reform, the United States government may face a debt crisis of its own which makes the current financial situation pale in comparison. Through interviews with leading experts and insiders in government finance, the film investigates the causes and potential outcomes of — and possible solutions to — America’s $10 trillion debt.

It’s over $11 trillion as of last week, actually, but it was too late to change the title. Oops.

Check your local listings. It’s on at 9 on Thirteen here in NYC, but PBS schedules vary by station. “Ten Trillion and Counting” will also be viewable online starting soon.

Many non-visible updates.

Finally have the site working properly again behind the scenes. (Thanks David!) Please let me know if you find any issues!