Director/animator Kakeru Mizui has created an animated short for the Nippon Paint Automotive Coatings division that develops new paint colors for the company. I’m not going to claim to understand the logic behind this. It’s titled “Loop” and is being presented as a “brand film”. I don’t get the brand part of it, and that’s OK. Maybe it’s something that is getting lost in cultural translation between my American Brain, and his Japanese creativity. None the less it is a wonderful animated short that feels heavily influenced by the late illustrator Charlie Harper. It also has some 1980s color pallets and gradients going on which pair nicely with the illustrative style of the animals and other nature elements. Does it make me want to buy paint from Nippon Paint Automotive Coatings? No. It does however have me watching this for the third time now.
Illustration
Adobe “Honor the Heroes”
A few weeks back Adobe, the graphic design software giant launched a new microsite that honors the frontline workers fighting the Covid-19 pandemic. Along with the video below, the site contains 120 illustrations created using their software. There s a link out to the Instagram site where additional images (not all are in the original vein that Adobe started with) are being uploaded with the hashtag #honorheroes. Each of the images is a CTA to the illustrator’s Instagram account where you can get the back story on the individual that the illustrator chose to feature.
The microsite is simple but could have done one thing that would have made it better. A link to a location where you could donate to the cause. I say this because Adobe has this at the top of the page.
“Adobe is supporting the COVID-19 efforts with over $3 million in donations to organizations that provide vital assistance to our communities across the globe.”
Failing to add a url to a donation site from both the microsite and the Instagram accounts was a missed opportunity. to do more.
The illustrations are great though.
Lose Your Corona Virus Cabin Fever With the Drummer
It’s Friday. We’re all working from home and starting to get Covid-19 cabin fever. The stress level is building because we aren’t supposed to leave the house. You can’t touch your face or other people. Everyone is paranoid society is going to break down and the world will end.
Well, I’m here to help you take your mind off of all of that with a tasty little animated short by PODENCO.
This has such a great look and the animation is so solid. It’s a nice blend of illustration and classic photos of Art Blakey. Take a minute out of your day, turn up the volume, and enjoy the show.
Sometimes You Have To Toot Your Own Horn A Little.
I have been maintaining this blog site for more than 10 years now, and it has also been a place to showcase my portfolio and resume for freelance and contract opportunities. For the last 5 of the 10 ten years, I’ve been posting to Modular 4, I’ve been saying to myself I really need to create a separate site that is exclusively focused on the work I’ve been doing and remove the portfolio and resume form here. Unfortunately, life just always got in the way. I’d think about it, procrastinate, fiddle around with a new site layout, get caught up in something else, forget about it, try to come back to it and never actually get anything done.
Well, guess what? I finally got off my butt and got something done. The new site for Wade Johnston Graphic Design features projects that I have worked on over the last 10 plus years, and services offered. It took me long enough, but the site is finally live. So I’m tooting my own horn and saying I’m open for business. That’s a bit of a lie though, I’ve been open and doing design business for the last 30 years. That doesn’t mean I’m not open to new opportunities though, so if you need design and advertising help give me a shout. I’ll be updating the new site regularly with new featured projects and projects that showcase specific skills, so if you are interested check back every so often. I’m also in the process of connecting the new SquareSpace site to my social media accounts so new pages and posts should start populating publically soon.
I’ll continue to post here but within the next few weeks, the menu items for my portfolio and resume will be removed. This website will continue to be what it has been for the last decade, a place where I can sound off about whatever I want, however, I want. If you have been one of the people that have read my posts here over the last 10 years, thanks. I really appreciate it.
If you hop over to the new site, I hope you like what you see.
Modular 4 