Reluctant Designer

I Am Super Grad + Where's my team leader?

Um, where to start? Ah, right, right. First of all, after two weeks of nervous hand-wringing...

*I am now a sure graduate*

Is it cause for a celebration? Most definitely. I'm not the party type, mind, so a glass of Midori and some patatas bravas would suffice. The only thing missing, though, is my normally good health -_-. Mother nature's been finicky of late; this year's summer has been both hot and cold. The shift can even happen overnight! I've developed these dry coughs that won't go away even after more than a week's passed...

Anyway, graduation - yayyy! Now what? Oh, yes... The Billy Blue School of Graphic Arts: 2006 Graduation Exhibition. More precisely, the making of it which means that, naturally, there would be casualties.

Prologue: "Bags of rice as far as the eye(s) can see"

I arrived at exactly 9.05AM (followed by Gita 5 minutes later) expecting to see hustle and bustle of activities, unity in teamwork - you know, people. After the school went through the trouble of texting everyone about their designated schedules and team leaders, you'd expect a somewhat coordinated event preparation. But, no. What awaited us upstairs was this desert:

A desert of tiles and milk crates, that is, plus six or so volunteers. Volunteers. I thought coming here was compulsory. My team leader wasn't even in and Matt (Supervisor #1) sounded as enthusiastic as a bored bat when he asked if you want something to do and you can inspect the display poles to see if there's unevenness and, um, yes. We hanged around doing random little jobs until the actual work started and more *volunteers* came.

How to build an exhibition column/pole/stand - Billy Blue Style
1 Stack 4 empty milk crates together. For assured intactness while standing, tipping or flipping, tie together with a strong thread or anything of similar function, really. iPod earphones (lots of them) will do just beautifully.
2 Grab three 1kg bags of rice - no, five bags - no, SIX bags - NO errr ummmm (by now, two guys from another class will be sent to IGA to buy a trolleyload more and they'll come back with an actual trolley 15 minutes later). Anyway, put them anywhere you like since the balance will be right, er, right?
3 After getting your extra rice, push two bags into the third crate and three into the top. Forget about the "anywhere you like" bit because, according to someone, this is the surefire way to strike the perfect balance. Wait, wait. Why not flip the stack over for easy chucking in and out? Get them out and put them inside the second and bottom crates. Hmm, it's harder to put them in now, is it? Why not flip it back on its bottom and start over, because it'll be less hassle that way? D'you think it's sturdy?
4 Once your supervisor is happy with the crates and their collective balance, you may now get a pre-cut-and-stickytaped uhhh plasticthingamajig from the plasticthingamajig team to cover your crates' dignity with.
5 However, the plasticthingamajig team sometimes confuse the measurements. When mismatched heights happen, you may be required to trim off the wonkiness with a knife. No, no cutting mat so, yes, on the floor. Tiled floor. Be wary of ensuing screechy sounds and involuntary shivering sensations.

How to build an exhibition stand Part II - Multimedia version
1 Follow the abovementioned instructions up to Step 3 only. This time, group together four stacks of crates.
2 Amass Mac and the necessary cords and extensions and power plugs. Scout someone with small hands and thin arms to arrange them inside a designated crate. (If you're deemed to have small hands and thin arms, you're bound to be scouted by someone.)
3 Get the platicthingamajig team to cut and measure... Actually, measure the stand first and then cut second and then fold last. Make the measurements extra tight-fitting, yesyes?
4 Ensure that you top it off with an accurately-cut-and-measured, er, top. Top off the stand, I mean.
5 Finally, top it all off with four Macs facing to all (four) directions of the wind. Get a Multimedia student to run the display and to make sure it's working.
6 Maybe there's a last step, but as I was tired and hungry and missing home, I didn't hang around long enough to find out.

Chapter One: "Divvying up war booty, eh?"

What's happening in this scene? As Carol Yuen and I were stepping out of the Graphic school with twenty portfolios of similar shapes but varied masses, Gita barged in, a full-fedged grocery trolley in tow. Naturally, we'd start filling it up with portfolios and Andrew Barnum, Head of School, couldn't help but ask a little if we weren't attempting open burglary. As I said before, two guys who were supposed to buy the extra bags of rice from IGA came back with a trolley. This proved to be very handy in transporting off a year's worth of blood, sweat and tears (and hermitism and sleep deprivation and lots of junk food). The destination...

...is William Blue School of Hospitality. Their brasserie, I mean. Here's a nice wide space where business executives like to spend their lunchtimes in. The hospitality school offers something like a fine dining experience. I longed for a three-course lunch at the brasserie in times of blood, sweat, tears, hermitism, sleep deprivation and lots of junk food. Now that it's a "been there, done that" deal, my lunch plan's conveniently abandoned. The brasserie reopens next year in March...

From the way they laid out the folios in neat rows (title pages first) it looks like I was mistaken about the folios being displayed under our respective banners. But I wonder where the finger food and cocktails will be served?

Chapter Two: "That's my blood, sweat and tears on the wall"

Banners. Displaying the student's face, his or her nominated folio pieces and a brief rationale. Matte front and glossy back. Pretty things, they are. I asked Matt if we could steal them after next week. He said no, well, maybe after 5 months. I asked what's happening in 5 months. Apparently, in 5 months they'd make arrive back at Billy Blue after a trip round the world (!!). Well, maybe only the third-world portion. What are the odds of my banner getting soiled and greasy by the time I get my hands on it? Can't believe I'll be seeing it again in my hometown and can't take it home!

So it was up to Kiki and I to put the banners up on the poles and no one could help us since there was only one ruler to work with. We pitied the guy whose banner we tried putting up first and foremost.

Who would've thought to use velcro instead of the now standard double-sided tape? It's smart. As a result, not many banners got hurt in the process. Of course, being in charge of mounting the banners meant hogging all the good, front-facing, sunlit spots for ourselves ^^. At the end of the day, though, other volunteers who'll remain nameless saw fit to remove and rotate the poles. Their banners will be the first batch you see upon entering the exhibition site tomorrow.

I remember, before leaving the school, seeing mine now facing away from the general walking area. I don't mind it facing the iMacs, but I thought Matt specifically said to reserve the poles close to the iMacs for Multimedia students?

(Above) Took this shot while we were velcroing a banner (I crouched down with a ruler). As you can see, there's text for the rationale and the student's photograph strategically hidden behind Kiki's arm on the top-left corner. We were given six layout choices, but they nary fit my folio pieces.

[Edit: Images aren't showing under this chapter! Will try to fix soon =(]

On the topic of photographs, I didn't know you could even use someone else's face and jokingly claim it as yours. As long as the joke remains obvious anyhow. One guy even submitted an overhead shot of his toes (I asked Fernanda who he was; she asked me back if I didn't recognise those feet).

Chapter Three: "The hardworking Ruler-san"

People came, people went (home). At the end, I was working steadily alongside five other girls. By 4pm, the poles were hardly finished. Meanwhile, Matt kept snapping with his camera left, right and center - even while we were having our Bondi burgers (the school's treat!). I fear his efforts will end up on the big screen at the graduation ceremony.

The picture on the left is of our trustee one-meter ruler who's taking a breather while no one's putting up any banner for the moment. It also has the worst balance and would topple any given second. When it does, it emits the loudest crashing noise and makes the girls' hearts leap, in a most painful way.

Chapter Four: "My right arm's numb"

The crazy, crazy events commitee or whoever it was that came up with the brilliant idea of using a 1.5cm-thick foamcore board for name tags. WATCH my hand: it's THIS thick. Apparently, they're to be placed beside the laid out folios. Gita did most of the work: printing, laminating, sticking. We shared the cutting bit. In all, there were 50-odd names to be cut out in rectangles.

Imagine having to do this with three blunt knives, one of which is very short, and two metal rulers, one of which is very heavy and chained to your work table on top of that. I don't remember how we eventually got to the pile that you see on my left as the task almost literally cost us two arms and one-and-a-half sanities.

Upon setting down the pile, Matt asked if we had fun. You bet we did. The boys could do with some foamcore-cutting, too.

Chapter Five: "Feck all this, let's just go home"

Go up the escalator? Upstairs is still under construction, so please come back tomorrow at 6pm to see the exhibition in all its finished glory.

Epilogue: "I'll take the back entrance... Oh?"

In case you don't know, this year's graduation theme is I Am Super Grad, graphics produced by fellow graduates Daniel DePierre and Christian Blencke whose posters can be viewed at the front office and outside the building. I love the high contrast between primary red, black and white, don't you? ^__^

-B

YEAHHH! What now? + An all-nighter guide - Billy Blue style

As of today, I am no longer a student, that is to say, it marks the end of 16 years of schooling. 12pm today (absolute deadline for the portfolios) I set down my folio bag - a year's worth of tears and sweat and lost sleep and living in recluse - at the foremost in a row of my fellow would-be graduates' folios. Each of the three classes was reserved a row and, surprisingly, ours had been the longest despite it being ten minutes to midday. Where were the rest of the other classes' folios? As Kiki and I started for the door, one of the admin ladies came up and locked the folios in by the time we were out. I imagined the late ones screaming foul play when they got there at quarter past, the poor dears.

Last night, last week, three weeks ago, six months ago, a year ago, I'd expected overwhelming, overbrimming... um... joy when the time came. The kind that brings you on your feet, takes you to the streets and makes you jump up and down in front of the office-working public. Now, the time's really come and the one prodding sensation I gained from it was great fatigue. Really. It came over me as soon as I got home (very luckily) and kept me down on the floor like an invisible weight. Even though I had a box of Pocky and newly purchased copies of Gohou Drug 2-3 next to me.

Pulling an all-nighter at Billy Blue (in hindsight)

Thinking of studying here? In North Sydney? Any prospective student should prepare for a minimum of five all-nighters a month and eight by end-of-semesters. They should also be wary of bad/no time management, printers with job overloads (or jammed or out of ink/paper or, remember - no sending A5s or Letters!), and be sure to get the materials you need for your mock-ups from Eckersley's before 5pm. If you commute to Town Hall, be sure to leave Billy Blue by 12am or the trains will have stopped running and your only choice will be the Nightride bus which is coming in 55 minutes. If your deadline is next morning at 8.30am and you think you'll get home at 2am and you haven't printed, by all means go back to Billy Blue provided it's still open and crash there if you need to.

If you don't want to spend the night at school, when working at your laptop in a classroom all on your own, take those iPod earphones out of your ears and listen for signs of the lecturer-in-charge getting ready to leave. When the lights go out, dash like hell and get behind the opaque glass doors before the lecturer-in-charge is done locking you in. Otherwise, the printers and the computers are yours and you may resume working. However, no food will be provided (I've poked around the staff room for biscuits) and water is available from the toilet taps.
A tip for reluctant detainees: Make sure the lecturer-in-charge knows that you're in one of the classrooms or taking a toilet break. No amount of ruckus or loud conversation can signal you and your friends' presence. Believe me on this one.

Kiki (left) is building a mock-up and Gita (right) is making copies of her workbook.

Above will be your regular scene the night before a deadline. Working at night is good in that there's no one else besides you, your fellow Year mates and a handful of students you don't know spread out over seven computer labs. Oh, and one lecturer-in-charge who's usually either Lionel or Ken (both of whom are nice, one of whom has offered me biscuits, and the other of whom has unknowingly locked me in).

In any packaging-related and print production project, you will most certainly be asked to build mock-ups. If you're printing your graphics the night before deadline, which means you're pulling a last-minute, bring with you an ample roll of double-sided tape, a sharp scalpel/knife, and a long metal ruler (though metal rulers are provided in the printers area).

Because your lecturers will tell you to take photos of your mock-ups and stick them in your communication folios, be sure to take your Sony Cybershot AND the charger AND firewire with you. When taking photos, make sure you do it in a room that's bathed in white light. The recommended rooms are Cream and 00ff00. Kiki (left) is trying out potentially good angles in Cream. Clear an area on a desk and install blank A3 papers you just stole from the black-and-white printers as a base and a backdrop for the mock-up. This way, cleaning up the shots on Photoshop will be a cinch. Make it stand up if it's a pamphlet, a concertina, or a paperbag. Elevate it with an unseen support (eg. marker, remote control, pencil case) if it's a book, a CD or a magazine to produce drop shadows.

And here's what $150 can turn into (not all-nighter related)

I'm so happy to receive my L'Illusion!! The paper it's drawn on is slightly smaller than A4 and the presentation comes with a clean cover (which I suspect to be paper from one of our black-and-white printers, but anyway). It also comes with Lionel's signature and a "Pour Bunga" in pencil (I told him to write it in French, haha). Here's Lionel in the middle of writing down the date (November 21st) and pausing for this shot. Ahh, we'll all miss Lionel in all his endearing bohemian- uh, -ness.

Happening at the same time next door was Kuen and Carol Hudson marking our communication plans. I fear for my results. The dreaded business plan deterred any decent efforts on the dreaded communication plan. And, my online portfolio for Paul's class that he dubbed as "taking a gamble," and which I thought was pretty decent myself. Jeez, having paid for academic transcripts, prepared for student exhibition night, ordered the correct graduation robe size and basically going through the necessary process for graduation night, and then being told suddenly to resit a class... Hahahaha, good heavens, the prospect is just... NO.

Two weeks until results.

I hereby thank the following songs...

...for having accompanied me through rough all-nighters, through daily commute, through the creative booms and slumps of the second half of 2006. My lime green iPod Mini Spineless whole-heartedly approves!

Blue Rose - Lizz Wright
Oyasumi Nasai - Kinmokusei
A.S.A.P; Deep River; Letters - Utada Hikaru
No Such Thing; Vultures; Stop This Train; '83; I Don't Trust Myself (With Loving You); Clarity - John Mayer
Avant Garde - COIL feat. Kyouko
Believe; Ready - Folder5
Four Seasons - Namie Amuro
Ouran Koukou Host Club OST 1&2 - Hirano Yoshihisa
COLORS - FLOW
Waltz - Suneohair
Jolly Jolly - Jill-Decoy association
Mushishi OST - Masuda Toshio
Be Allright - Sakurai Takahiro
Dancin' in the Babylon - Matsuda Seiko
My Lover - Grass Valley
Be My Cinderella - Minnie
Solid Gold - Takashima Masahiro
Vision - Matsuoka Hideaki
Brand New Breeze - Kanon
Saikou no Kataomoi - Tainaka Sachi
Aquarela do Brasil; Falsa Baiana - Paulinho Moska
ALUMINA; the World - Nightmare
Bach a la Jazz; Les Triplettes de Belleville - Benoit Charest
Le Soldat Tufaiev Se Marie - Zelwer
Dancing in the Dark - Diana Krall
Shouchi no Suke - Suitei Shoujo
Watashi ga iru yo - Tomato Cube
Bartender - Natural High
Ashita he no Melody - CHAKA
Dreaming on the Radio - Minagawa Junko
Asobi ni Ikanai ka? - Kawamoto Naru
GUILTY BEAUTY LOVE - Miyano Mamoru
Bokura no Love Style - Suzumura Kenichi & Fujita Yoshinori
Show Me Your Style - w-inds.
READY STEADY GO - L'Arc~en~Ciel
Off the Wall; Who's looking for a lover - Michael Jackson
OVER NIGHT - Aya
Shining - Shirai Yuuki
Mata Ashita! - Host Club
Dress (Bloody Trinity Mix) - BUCK-TICK
Mameshiba/Hikari Are/Kingfisher Girl - Sakamoto Maaya
Watashi Rashiku - Kuwashima Houko
Bouken desho desho?; Lost My Music; God Knows - Hirano Aya
Ohayou - Keno
Reason - Fonogenico
19 Sai; Natsukage; Sanagi - Suga Shikao
Secret World - Akiyama Miki
Houki Boshi; Te wo Tsunaide - Younha
The Sore Feet - Ally Kerr
Shissou - LAST ALLIANCE
Astrosexy - m-flo. v CHEMISTRY
Hands - m-flo.
O Ultimo Por do Sol - Lenine
YES; Break Chance; Ichinichi Dake no Vacance - Kusuda Toshiyuki
Monster Farm (Bandneon Version) - Uematsu Nobuo et al
Bubbly Girl - Gwinko
Life is Like a Boat - Rie Fu
Colors of the Heart - UVERworld
SEASON'S CALL - HYDE

-B

"ILLUSION!!" + Business Plan Blues

Today... was the longest day of the week. Today... was supposed to see my last Billy Blue projects ever and ever and ever, but shite happens whenever it feels like it (shite = Management project). Since a lot of things happened today, I'm going to divide the, ah, shall I say special happenings up into Arcs. Here I go:

12.45pm, Thursday - The Your Bus Is Coming in 55 Mins Arc

Doing a business plan was certainly no ball. I tried to bullcrap my way through the financial parts, but I suppose even that takes a lot of time and brain power. So that was that for Thursday's night plan to zip through my Design Comm. project aka. I got nothing done. Yes, my school can sometimes open until 2am depending on the mood of the lecturer in charge, and it's good at nighttime as all the printers are yours!

After eight hours of diligent bullcrapping (and being offered Arnotts biscuits by Ken) I took off from school at 12.15pm. I was almost there with the Plan but it still needed editing, spellchecking, printing, binding... The other project (also due the next day) needed two outcomes, one mandatory thousand-words, one mock-up, one partially functional website, one communication plan... printed and bound.

I had six hours to do it all before leaving for school again. Jolly good. I was going down to my usual train platform when I was told by an officer that "No train is running, your Nightride bus to Town Hall just left 14 minutes ago" and "Where are you from? Indonesia? Apa kabar." When I asked when the next one was coming, he said in 55 minutes. Double jolly good. By then, Tiffany SMS-ed to inform that she'd managed to lock herself out of the apartment AGAIN that day and so had to crash at a friend's. Triple jolly nice. The only saving grace of the dreaded all-nighter was this:

This circular space is what I see everyday upon entering and leaving the school. At midnight, they were secretly erecting a giant Christmas Tree! When I got to Town Hall by 1am, there were also people prettying up Galeries Victoria with Christmas bells and drapes.

By the way, gummi snakes were the only meal I had that day.

9am, Friday - The Dividend? Arc

Imagine having only three hours of sleep and having to do this in the morning. JJ, our Management group's resident graphic designer was late AGAIN. If Carol Hudson - the Management lecturer - wasn't so flexible with tardiness I would've flambe-d him right after he arrived saying how sorry he was and bowing thrice. So in the end our group went up last. Now...

I should tell you that this business plan project had been trouble from start to finish (the climax of which will be covered in the next Arc). We didn't even practice presenting. I didn't have time to check the file properly, so I wasn't really expecting spelling errors, missing punctuations, missing break spaces, missing second halves of cashflow/profit&loss spreadsheets... I gotta hand it to the group, though, for having a go at pronouncing a lot of tongue twisters - if you're an international anyway. My bit, naturally, was the financial section. I explained our innovation's financial start-up and two-year projections like a pro.  For that, I received help from Carol Yusman; she also explained the hows and whys of cashflow/profit&loss but I'm sorry to say that most of it sailed over my head. My lack of enthusiasm (and trying to cover it) in accounting yielded an interesting discussion with Carol Hudson during my presentation bit:

"Those look very thorough." Yes, I had an accountant help us out. "Did you also do it?" We did it together. "Okay, so how are you partners going to get paid?" Um... "Dividend?" Yes, dividend (whatever it is) "Ooh, how nice! When are you getting the dividends and at what percentage?" Um, um, whenever we get the profit, I guess. "...Huh?"

My failing to stop pronouncing $48,646 as "Forty-eight thousand dollars and six hundre... Ahuh? Forty-eight.... Forty-eight hundred... Forty-eight thousand dollars sixty hun..." also didn't help. It helped that she was being good natured about it, though. She probably needed her coffee break.

3pm - The Distressed One Face Arc

I don't know what it is that makes JJ so confident and... carefree. Missed deadlines? Cool. Reprimanding lecturers? Ordinary. Scoring the sort of attendance mark that damn near warrants a deportation back to Korea? Same old, same old. Printing comes out not quite the way he wants? ACKItstheendoftheworldoafhobhvhe!!!! XD

After four hours of fixing the business plan PDF, we finally took off to Officeworks. By the way, in my three years of going back and forth between home and Billy Blue, I haven't really explored the complex floorplan that is North Sydney. I had no idea the furthest end of the fancy Italian-style foodcourt across the road led to a small door which started a set of stairs sheltered under a spacious yellow arch. Ho! It almost felt like Eastern Europe!

I was leery of JJ's choice of square-shaped back-to-back pages, but he reassured everyone that he'd done it before and there was nothing to worry about. How wrong he was. The printer spat them out in all the wrong order, which entailed going back to the school Mac and rearranging the pages because, apparently, he'd made one mistake. By the way, only he went back to school, so Hye Min and I had to look at charity pens and cookies to kill the fifteen minutes until he got back. We were served by a more senior assistant who misunderstood the request and printed out 15 out-of-order pages. An even more senior assistant came to our rescue, but even she was stumped by consistent string of technical errors that followed. Pages turned up blank and back-to-backs were upside-down to one another.

I asked JJ if it wasn't due to the virus in his USB drive (yes, a virus has taken residence in his USB and he refuses to quarantine it) and he told me it had nothing to do with it like a protective big brother. By now, it was 4pm and Hye Min had left for a special occasion, so it was just us wringing our hands and drumming our fingers and generally trying not to accidentally look at the time. By now, also, the senior assistant had dubbed it "the most difficult job in my Officeworks career." By 4.30pm, the assistants decided that it would be easier albeit time and energy consuming to colour-photocopy the wrong pages one by one. That method was well at first, until I held up the print-outs against the light and found all the registration marks disalign...
Note to self: make a bleed area for registration marks in the future; it's an innovation.

Eventually, we settled for anything they gave us, even that cover page with the text that the senior assistant accidentally cut off... Wait, that one we asked to redo. At 5.30pm, Officeworks heaved an exahusted sigh and we paid for our printouts. They told us they'd never experienced any grand error of this sort. Ever. Well, at least we could pride our business plan on that one aspect. We'd never go back to Officeworks, and Officeworks are glad not to have us back.

Unfortunately, we hadn't seen the end of the business plan curse. Back at school, Na Bin tasked herself wth the job of sticky-taping the cover page onto the bound pages, yet messed up along the way, thus resulting in a troublesome (aka. pretty bad, majorly bad) air bubble. JJ took it upon himself to pry the sheets apart and rrrrrip it went. Nothing fazed me anymore. After the business plan was FINALLY good to go, I flung it into Carol Hudson's dropbox like one of those pebbles you throw if you want to make it skip across water.
Finally!!!! Oh, Lord! Oh, Moses! Oh, Abraham and your freaking population of Abraham Juniors! Finally!! Sing a thousand praises and Alleluiahs! Deo gracias, indeed.

Overall, I've never seen JJ the One Face(TM) look so panicky (and therefore making other faces except the One), so despite being such an annoying happenstance it was something to laugh at. Actually, we did nothing but laugh in Officeworks if only out of desperation because the deadline was in five minutes and nothing today was going well dammit.

6pm - The Lionel Is Le Bomb Part Deux Arc

At the end of Management class, I ran up to Lionel and yelled "ILLUSION!!" while he acknowledged it with a karate swish and stance. No casual bystander would have a clue what crack we were on, unless provided with a backstory, which I'm about to provide:

The night before (moments before the Dreaded All-Nighter) I came up to him asking if he had more cartoons than the ones in the PDF he gave me, since I was looking for one that suited my personality but, nice as they all were, "chatterbox" or "subservient" or "backstabber" don't usually do much if you're going to display it in your bedroom to tell droppers-by the nature of its occupant.

So he ran me through the rest of his collection and, by chance, I spotted a piece of Sunday paper cartoon (in the making!) in one corner of the desk under a fude pen, a black colour pencil (maybe) and some other thing which I can't recall for the life of me. I thought, so this is what Lionel's process looks like. So he reviewed his cartoons on a Mac and did a brief explaining for each one like a proud father would. I can honestly say I was amused by many of them; especially the one with a politician on a podium, speaking, as hinted by a drifting blank speech bubble overhead, and the press are gathered round poised to snipe the speech bubble ^_^.

The piece titled L'Illusion intrigued me. It has Lionel's trademark human caricature crouched down by a puddle of water which bears the reflection of a star overhead and which the caricature tries to fish out. I found it sweet if a tad bittersweet in its underlying meaning, and it really struck a sentimental chord in me. Actually, I was torn between that and Asphyxia - the crescent moon with a gas mask facing the stinking earth, haha. I don't know what it is about the outer space and its cellestial bodies that render me nostalgic. I'm probably missing home... eh?

I asked, since you're a professional illustrator, how much do you get paid for a black and white job? "Around $500" Wow-whee! "That's in France. Here, I get $350." Conversion... rate? "No, no! Here, they just don't appreciate those kinds of things as much..." How long does each one take? You know, on average. "The thinking part or the drawing?" Um... drawing. Seven hours? Five hours? Thirty minutes? "Less than that. It's the idea that takes the longest time." That's true. So you still work for Le Monde? "I do, yes. I don't have to be in France to do a job for them." But how do you send your pictures over? By telegram? By fax? "Uh, there's this thing called email." ...Of course (this is the same guy who I tried giving a 1.44mb floppy disk to on my first class - on a Mac Powerbook, no less! I should've given him one of those huge flat floppies LOL and see how he facefaulted). "If you can tell me which one you want by tomorrow, I can give it to you on Monday..."

The next day, as you've probably figured, I yelled it to him ^^. If all goes well, I would get my cartoon by Monday, unframed and unmounted, but it had better come with a signature and a message that reads "To Amanda, one of my best students." Only then would it be worth $150, hohoho.

The Quickie=Kiki Arc

Coincidentally, I was heading home just as Lionel stepped out the door, so I ended up striding with him as far as Greenwood Plaza's intersection to Walker St. There was small talk, which included:

"Where are you going after graduation?" San Fransisco maybe. Internship. "San Fransisco! I was there for a while and I also went to LA..." Yeah, isn't your wife in America? "...No? Who said that?" Kiki did. "Quickie?" Kiki. My friend Kiki. "Kiki! Oh, yes, yes." But son is in Switzerland, right? "He was, but he's now here. You saw him, right?" He speaks five languages? "Three. Spanish, French, English." I've heard you speak Spanish, too. Being multilinguistic is nice, yeah? "How about you? English, Indonesian..." Two. Just two (sigh).

The Vaudevillian Oboist Arc

Listen, on the train...

Starting from Milsons Point station, I think, I heard music over the engine. At first, I thought it was a trumpet, but I found this particular instrument much more bearable. I thought it was just music leaking out of someone's iPod earphones. Granted, it was louder than your average iPod leak-out, but someone could just be very deaf or is being nagged by his girlfriend.

Only after a schoolgirl who sat on a lower ground than me looked behind her shoulder towards the other end of the car did I realise, it was live music! On the train! Sweet!! It was oboe accompanied by a percussion. The musicians were skillful - no hiccups, as far as I could tell, and they were playing a lively, exotic tune which I first thought was Mediterranean but then decided it to be Vaudevillian. The oboe finished with a belting out, gathering an enthusiastic round of applause from the top car. A good scene to end a long day, yes?

-B

Lionel is le bomb + Landor bombs

Came up to Lionel the other day after a Management all-nighter asking if he was still selling his original prints (black and white, mind, as I can't afford the coloured ones yet). He said yes, are you interested? This is the guy who's done illustration work for Mambo, Le Monde and BRW among others - I just *have* to leech as many student-only priviledges out of Billy Blue before I graduate. I didn't have any particular print in mind but I'm a fan of his work. Anyway, he told me see the prints on his website, but they don't come with pricetags so another question pertaining that followed. Upon being asked about a pricelist of some sort, he had that "umm... well" smile on his face as many people do in that situation (money is such an awkward topic *_*). He just had an exhibition in which visitors could buy his originals for $300 apiece (eek!) but he's willing to give me a student discount of 50%. Yay! Iroiro merci beaucoup, sensei, c'est subarashii! LOL

Anyway, so yesterday was Landor's Shine Program day... Pictures? Sure, but I only have a few, and they're not that informative of the exhibition:

Gita - yes, you, the Asian girl who's looking amused over something - is not supposed to be in the photo. She was in the viewfinder 3 seconds ago but she's walked out by the time the shutter went snap. So why is she there? Answer: It's no paranormal occurence - it's Photoshop. Haha, I should make it a slogan.

And my fellow Beckster of two years with his display. Since his camera-comfy antics are asking for it, I could've blown these photos up to 400%, but my poor PC can't handle it. I wonder how he went with the interview.

Yes, it's a pity we didn't take up this rare opportunity of getting the fruits of our creativity reviewed by a big name like Landor. But that day wasn't a comfortable date for most of us facing so many deadlines in the following week. If I have to choose between a) going up against 13 very competent designers for one 1 of 4 offered positions, and b) a sure graduation, I would pick b). Isobelle, our year coordinator was furious that one girl pulled out of the competition in the last minute. Much pressure, little time?

But, you know, the what-ifs are endless... Did she think she wasn't competent? Do I think I'm not competent? What if they're looking for a particular kind of designer? What if they're looking for my particular kind of design? What if I could've won a place but didn't? What if yesterday was my only chance in life?

And, my fellow reluctant designer friends, I don't know why you're all so frustrated and stretched out of shape and are asking me how I manage to be optimistic. Sure, our last design class ever (maybe) is only a week away, the first presentation + 2 resubmission folios + 1 project is 2 days away, the second presentation + 1 project in 3 days, the third and fourth presentations + 2 projects in 5 days, and the graduation portfolio in less than two weeks. But I know what I'm doing and you know what you're doing so why the constant worrying that you wouldn't meet the deadlines? You know you would, as you always did. I find that complaining and dreading deter the brain from thinking and the hands from producing, so please stop telling yourselves that you're sick of it or lacking sleep or feeling scared. If you don't do well, it's not the end of the world. Just aim for graduation night. If you do so bad that you don't merit a graduation, then yes, it will be the end of your world ^_~

-B

Very, very soon means 2 minutes in my book.

As the title said *nodnod*. Well, today... today I spent 12 hours at school. Nothing new right? I mean, myself and four other equally sorry girls did spend close to 24 hours there. Dear darling French lecturer - whose name you might find on www.lionelportier.com if you're lucky - apparently forgot to check all the classrooms and locked us in for a night of design work work work (since there was nothing to do and the computers and printers were free... so...). Anyway, I missed a presentation again. Tiffany even dubbed skipping presentations as "doing a Bunga" ^^' since apparently it's my thing now and all isn't right as rain if I don't skip a presentation.

To make up for all my procrastination the week before (and because an extra day of late submission meant an extra 10% off my marks) I fired up Spineless (my PC laptop) with both Penniless and Jobless (my external HD and thumb drive, respectively) firmly plugged in the USBs. That was around one o'clock if I recall correctly. Around midday, I said to Kiki how I was so enthusiastic I would wrap it up in three hours. At the end of the day, though, I corrected it to three hours times three. That makes nine hours. Nine hours of solid keypad-and-touchpad bashing yielded the following slogans for my six outcomes. You have to see the images in order to know what the slogans are about:

1. Client: NSW Health Dept. Outcome: 1 x booklet. Slogan: "Wear or Be Worn. Overachieving by means of fatigue and 101 reasons why it isn't recommended." Truth be told, I can't even think of five reasons. 101 just sounded cool. And it reminded me of dalmatians...

2. Client:  TIMES Magazine. Outcome: 1 x singlespread cover. Headline: "Hideo Yamamoto on 'cracking' the Modern Homunculi." It's not meant to be funny but surely there must be people out there who either think "...Homunculi?" or "Why does this guy?girl?sorrydontknowjapnamesteehee want to crack a Homunculus?"

3. Client: BRW Magazine. Outcome: 1 x singlespread cover. Headline: "How To Make a Million-Dollar Business in Two Years." No, not even I believed what I wrote myself.

4. Client: Bloomsbury Australia (didn't put logo and Isobelle will wonder where on earth does it say 'Bloomsbury'). Outcome: 1 x book cover. Title & slogan: "But I Didn't Do It! - The Art of Cold Reading Behavioural Cues and How To Find Just Who It Was That Ate Your Tim Tams." I like this one the best due to the Arnotts plug.

5. Client: SEIKO Australia. Outcome: 1 x e-card (Isobelle will be looking for the corresponding swf file, too, so I'll have to make the e-card for real before she realises that's a fake storyboard!). Slogan: "Only For Your Very Punctual Loved One." Boring, right? Speaking of punctual, speaking of Carol Hudson...

6. Client: UNSW School of Psychiatry. Outcome: 1 x poster. Headline: "Non-Verbal Communication - A Seminar On How Not To Offend People By Recognising Behavioural Cues." I was going to make it "How to tell when you just made the waiter spit on your meal." but it seemed rather issue-specific...

Goes to sleep before cranky old lady nags,

-B