Alison Garnett

Alison Garnett, another grad of the Web Design program at Sheridan College came in to speak with us today. Before taking on her newest role as Creative Director at Critical Mass, she worked as a Creative Brand Lead at TAXI Canada, Associate Creative Director at Henderson Bas, and Creative Director at Supercapacity (Self-employed) among other endeavours. Check her out on LinkedIn, follow her on Twitter @supercapacity, or have a look at her work, alisongarnett.com, flickr, my lalaland, hello blog, land of sparkalot, and the valigirls blog.

Alison also balances a family life with her husband (a photographer), two children, and three dogs. She is a Designer, Art Director, Project Manager, Account Manager, Stylist, Photographer, Blogger, Writer, Illustrator, good cop and bad cop. I think I can safely say we are talking about a prolific artist here.


Alison made the move to Critical Mass because, after six years at Taxi she was becoming too comfortable. She was eager to work on big websites, and learn more about pure interactivity and mobile.


A complete identity and website re-design at Theodore Alexander, a high-end furniture company. This involved convincing the company to re-shoot, and re-touch 4000 pieces of furniture. Power of the pitch! At CM they refer to it as the 'ask plus'. Always do more than what the client asks for in a pitch. If they want to see three mock-up pages, do five. Then show them how it will work on mobile and present it all in a video.


At Taxi Alison was able to work on great brands like Mini, Town Shoes, Cadillac Fairview and Telus. Taxi ran the entire interactive campaign for Telus, an exciting opportunity that opened the doors for lots of creativity. Getting to work on photo shoots with pigmy goats was just one of the perks! Telus does a great job finding fun songs for this campaign. Think I remember my mom turning this one up in the car more than a couple times. Just Hall and Oates killing it back in the 80's.


Branding is really important. Alison's advice is to have a great business card and some kind of leave behind. Remember that it's all about the work. Look for fun ways to share your art, like instagram magnets, check out moo.com, and don't forget to send urls.



From Alison's Flickr. What I took most from this presentation was the importance of personal work. Alison stressed that you can't rely on your job to satisfy your creativity. Although you're working in a creative field, there may be only 3 or 4 projects a year that are really rewarding as an artist. It's obvious that Alison also takes care to find balance and prioritize her family life. That was really cool to hear about.

And remember, it's only advertising. So have fun and make cool shit!

SapientNitro

Today we got teamed up on by the good folks at SapientNitro. Very cool to get so much insight and to hear directly about the hiring process. From left to right, Kim Welch- Studio Manager, Gail Leija- Marketing and Strategy Analysis: User Experience Research, Sonia Janovjak- Creative Recruiter, and Norma Penner- Interactive Art Director and a grad of the Web Design program at Sheridan.

SapientNitro is one of the bigger agencies in Toronto with 240 employees in the city and over 10,000 worldwide. Some of their bread and butter clients include Chrysler, Jeep, Dodge, and RBC. Part of their philosophy is to take on the personality of the clients' target user when designing. Gail talked to us about the process of creating personas and designing with these users in mind.

"The definition of great is entirely defined by the client you're working for and the problem you're trying to solve."

Microsite created for the Jeep Wrangler using HTML5 and some really cool depth of field affects.

Kim gave us some really great insights and let us in on what she's looking for when hiring. As the Studio Manager she needs to make sure that potential employees will fit in with the culture.

1) Can you work in a team?

2) Will you embrace feedback?

3) Are you committed to learning, mentorship and mentoring?

4) Are you flexible/able to switch gears quickly?

New employees are sent on a one week bootcamp at one of the North American offices to learn about the company and immerse themselves in the culture. Employees choose their own supervisor and informal mentorship plays a big part in a system of internal growth. Lots of opportunity for promotion.

Abercrombie & Fitch is a newer client and Norma talked about working with their team down in Ohio to help them reach customers on mobile.


Photo of the Abercrombie & Fitch main offices in Ohio taken by Norma while working with the team down there.

Norma talked about what SapientNitro expects from applicants.

1) Forward thinking design. Are your ideas innovative and current?

2) Fluency in digital channels.

3) Great typography.

4) Good presentation skills. Can you sell your ideas?

5) Eagerness. Know why you want to be there and how you will fit.

6) COMPASSION & DRIVE. The common quality of every SapientNitro employee.


Vail Resorts is another big client that is really embracing the potential of social media. Check out snow.com, or their facebook page to see how social media is being used to enhance the ski/snowboard experience. Cool ways to keep track of your runs, see how long each took, download free photos from your day, and basically document the experience. Lots of opportunity with geo location and gamification for these resorts. Snowcial is a conference in Lake Tahoe bringing the worlds of ski/snow boarding and social media together.

Young the Giant is headlining Snowcial 2012.



Woah! Nice pics taken in Cuba from Norma's Flickr.

Holiday Break

Some additions to the point & shoot project from Havana. Wish we could've stayed longer.