Summer Break 2009

June 15th, 2009 § comments 31

summer-break-2009

Sunday afternoon I completed one of the most rewarding projects this year. A Gap Ad-like art project featuring all of my son’s second grade classmates. A couple of weeks ago, my brother-in-law and I photographed the children in the classroom. I explained my job as an art director for advertising, and told them that they were all “Talent” or “Models” for my project.

Today I went back to unveil the final product via a big screen projection complete with music. I described the “client presentation” process, and told them they were the clients. They were very good clients, since they liked everything. I gave them each “leave behinds” of an 13 x 19 archival giclee (poster print suitable for framing) and a DVD rom with images and the presentation movie. They were soooo happy, it left me with a stupid grin on my face all day.

This is part II of a 4-part series. Last school year I did a winter scene titled “Snow Day 2007″. Only two seasons left!

Right click the image above and choose “Save link as…” or “Open link in new window” to download a copy of the large version.

What do you think? (make a comment below)

Melissa Etheridge Holiday CD Design

October 4th, 2008 § comments 5

I was pretty excited for a few weeks at the beginning of the summer. I had an opportunity to do some comps for Melissa Etheridge’s upcoming holiday release, A New Thought For Christmas (released 9/30/08). The theme was global peace and tolerance. I came up with an iconic solution, which I can’t say I’ve seen before. A simple, graphic Christmas tree made out of peace signs. Melissa saw my comps and was thrilled to choose this one for the cover. I was psyched to think that I could add this to my collection of rocking holiday CDs!

About six weeks later, I got the unfortunate news from the Island Records representative that they decided to go with something else. C’est la vie.

While I admit their design is quite nice, I think my design would have looked way cooler featured in the iTunes music store. What do you think?

L Studio Beta

September 30th, 2008 § comments 0

L Studio, the broadband entertainment community that I designed for Lexus, launched its beta last week. What is L Studio? Here’s what Reuters news agency had to say…

“The carmaker is launching an Internet-only branded channel Tuesday (September 23) stocked with a full slate of original programing headlined by [Lisa] Kudrow [from Friends] in a shortform comedy series in which she plays a nutty shrink.

In an effort to keep the buzz going for the project, Lexus plans to recruit more celebrity contributors in the coming months. For now, the rest of L Studio is an eclectic mix of high-toned nonfiction programing that concerns everything from art to architecture to science. Some notable figures who are profiled on the site include the Doors’ Ray Manzarek and designer Patricia Field.

Taken together, the connective thread between the programing mix and the Lexus brand, Blanchard said, is the theme of innovation. “We kind of look at ourselves as a broadband HBO,” she said. “Being on broadband in and of itself is innovative for a lot of these artists.”

I can’t wait until it’s finished, and everything is running smoothly. Lisa Kudrow’s “Web Therapy” series is pretty damn funny! And so is Starlee and Arthur Review. Go check it out.

—– here’s a positive review of the content.

—– here’s an article from the Hollywood Reporter.

Creative Director, Speedshape

September 7th, 2008 § comments 0

From the press release…

“Speedshape, Inc, with offices in Birmingham, MI and Venice, CA and providing services including CGI 3D/2d modeling, animation, virtual environments, VFX, motion, film, multimedia design, pre/post production, retouching, web design, digital asset management, distribution, closed captioning, and tagging has hired Nels Dielman as Sr. Creative Director.”

Wow. That is a mouthful. Stay tuned for updates.

Lexus Innovation Site

June 18th, 2008 § comments 1

Lexus vehicles have a well-deserved reputation for quality, dependability, and reliability. We needed to excite prospects by redefining the brand, so we introduced the concept of technological innovation inherent in each and every new Lexus vehicle.

While there are several ways to entice consumers to purchase a new vehicle, we had to identify attributes that would influence the user to choose a Lexus based on the features related to their world.

The new innovation section of Lexus.com uses a minimal, block world, with futuristic red toy cars in a fun and interactive demo environment to simplify the concept of some complex, innovative features.

What do you think about the Lexus Innovation Site?

If you have a very small monitor, please click here.

http://lexus.com/innovation

L Studio Preview

June 3rd, 2008 § comments 1

This image of two HTML emails I designed for L Studio was published as a teaser in the April 2008 issue of Lexus Magazine. So now I tease you in much the same way! L Studio is coming…

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

And a little bit of my band Urban Family Dog as soundtrack: “Pelham” from 3-Finger Charlie.

Slideflow Hacking

May 23rd, 2008 § comments 0

I’ve been hacking away at the Slideflow demo by Christian Becker at Beckr.org and using images from my favorite fractal designer Blatte at ExotericRoach.org. Pretty cool stuff, eh?

Lexus Innovation Site Preview

May 19th, 2008 § comments 1

A friend alerted me today that there is a promo for the upcoming Lexus Innovation Website on the Imaginary Forces homepage (where I snaked this video).

Happy Mother's Day

May 11th, 2008 § comments 30

The Beach Boys song came on the radio during dinner, and Lars surprised me by jumping up and doing this routine that he was rehearsing for a school show. So I grabbed my laptop and camera. We looked up the lyrics, so I could sing the song, and Lars performed so we could show it to mommy – who was out of town on business. Miles just wanted in on the action.

What did you think of the show?

Lexus Innovation Expanding Banner

April 23rd, 2008 § comments 1

parking1.png

In these stylized expanding banners for Lexus Innovation, you can attempt to park the car. Good luck with that! (nod, nod, wink, wink).

Don’t forget to mouseover to expand.