I am really looking forward to January’s edition of LosAngeles/CreativeMornings with National Forest. I’ve been an admirer of their work for years now and I have a few pieces of Steven Harrington’s work in my “collection.” I stopped by their studio the other day to take some pics and chat with them up the upcoming event. They really couldn’t have been nicer guys and anyone who is coming to see them speak on the 20th is in for a treat. RSVPs open up on 1/16 at 11am.

Most of the work I’ve been doing at Media Temple will be under wraps until early March, however, this little logo for our SXSWi Party is now out there. Typographically, it makes me happy. Did I mention I love my job?

I love this app called Color Stream. It’s exactly the kind of fun and useful tool that makes having an iPhone a great plus for designers. There used to be a website where you could upload a photo and it would render out the various RGB, HEX and CMYK colors for you. Color Stream works the same way, but you can customize what colors you want to include in your palette. You either take a photo or upload one you’ve taken and then, using an eye-dropper tool, you select five colors from the image to create your palette. It’s simple and it works flawlessly. It’s fun and quick. Above is the palette I created from a photo of a 50lb bucket of lard I photographed at the Rose Bowl Flea Market months ago. I am sort of obsessed with making palettes from photos. Also, uploading instagram pics to Color Stream gives you some softer, vintage looking palettes. Nice work by the guys at Little Big Things.

I was featured on Herman Miller’s Lifework site. I was profiled for their “The Playlist” column where they speak to various designers/artists about what music they listen to while they work and what music influences them. I love everything Herman Miller is all about and it really was a huge honor for me to be featured on their site.

Are you using dribbble? If so, let’s follow each other. You can find me here.

front cover

front, back and spine

insider and disc

canoe

me (far right), harris (#12) circa 1983

Harris Eisenstadt was my best friend when I was growing up in Toronto. When I moved to San Francisco when I was 10 I started to lose touch with him and I hadn’t really spoken to him in about 20 years when I reconnected with him last December. My dad sent me a link to a write-up in the NY Times about Harris’ jazz band. Turns out my old friend is a highly accomplished and extremely talented jazz drummer and composer. Harris had finished a new album, Canada II, and asked me to design the artwork. The album is inspired by his Summers spent in the woods outside of Toronto. He sent me old photos from the camp he went to and, combined with my memories of that part of the World, we came up with some imagery that worked with the music. It’s been a dream of mine to design a jazz record since I was in junior high and it was such an honor to be able to work on this for Harris. I also found out he lived in Silverlake then moved to Brooklyn where he lives now. Next time I’m out in NYC I look forward to spending some time with he and his family. Check out his website for some music samples, tour dates and more information. Watch the video above to get a glimpse into his process.

rolls and rolls and rolls

Look at all those tubes!

Blik's Co-Founder Scott Flora

stacks and stacks of decals ready to go

custom decals on the conference room walls

Today, I had the pleasure of getting to visit Blik in Venice. Scott Flora, one of Blik’s Co-Founders is our March 2011 speaker at LosAngeles/CreativeMornings. Scott gave me a little tour of their space which was really interesting to see. They do so much right here in Venice. Aside from their office space they have two production rooms – one where they pack and ship and one where they print. The place is floor to ceiling full of eye candy. Scott showed me a bunch of kid-friendly animal alphabet prints by A Modern Eden which were like modern day Charley Harper – geometric and beautiful! I loved the custom decals they worked on for their conference room which reminded me Charles Wilkin. Scott, Heather and everyone else there were amazingly nice and down to Earth. It’s nice to see someone’s idea flourishing. Scott started printing Blik decals in his apartment and look at them now! If you’re in LA definitely come check out Scott’s talk at next Friday’s LosAngeles/CreativeMornings. Get your tickets on Monday morning.

Thanks to Nate Ryan from Proxart for inviting me to do a little interview for their fantastic website. I love that Proxart is made by a few rad kids in a converted garage. It’s like making zines all over again. They interview great bands, talented designer and give a voice to a lot of young designers. I am honored to be included in Proxart. Thanks guys!

I can’t think of a single designer I know who doesn’t read The Dieline – the world’s leading site for packaging design. It was so great to have Andrew Gibbs, Founder/CEO/Editor, of the The Dieline speak at this month’s LosAngeles/CreativeMornings. I loved his energy, his optimism, his humor and the fact that this dude is 25. It’s amazing. I can’t imagine where he’ll be when he’s old like me (35). I posted a few pics of above – in order: Andrew Gibbs talk about his first computer, the crowd (another packed house at Ford & Ching), the clever Proxart kids with their digital mags on the sponsor table and finally…Willard Ford of Ford & Ching. No one realizes the transformation this place goes through to get it ready for LACM. It’s all Willard. The guy is climbing ladders, getting on roofs, sewing stuff, wrestling pit bulls, moving cars, putting away turtles, throwing out the trash, etc. etc. Thank you Willard. Here’s a really excellent write-up about the event by Heather Parlato for LAist.

8mm Video from Griffith Park from jon setzen on Vimeo.

Have you tried the 8mm Vintage Video Camera App for the iPhone? It’s kind of brilliant. Here’s a short video I took of my son (dinosaur cape and all) and I riding the little train in Griffith Park. The filter I used is called “70′s.” There are about four or five options ranging from old 1920s black and white to super saturated kodahcrome looking film. With all these different photographic apps which allow you to age and treat images it seems like a no-brainer that someone would come up with a cool vintage video app. This is it. I had a super 8 camera in college which I rarely used, but the few times I did it made the most mundane shots look incredible. I’d ride my bike around the thriving metropolis of Eugene, Oregon snapping quick three second shots of cars, birds, rivers, trees, hippies, etc. as I didn’t want to run through the film too fast. Somewhere in a box there is about 30 seconds of The Pastels performing at KWVA. I really need to find that. Anyway, the processing was so expensive so I never really did much with all that stuff. Of course, these apps don’t do the actual film processes justice, but it’s still fun to mess around with them.