Allison Garnett, Critical Mass

About Critical Mass

Critical Mass is an international Marketing firm that specializes in:

- Insight & planning

- Experience Design

- Experience Distribution

- Social Media

- Technology Services

- Marketing Science

Client List:

Nissan, Adidas, Theodore Alexander, Best Buy, Clorox, Humana, Budweiser, United, Moen, hp, Nasa, at&t, Nestle, Harley Davidson, peanuts, Infiniti

About Allison Garnett

Allison Garnett is a Creative Director with Critical Mass. Before coming to Critical Mass, Allison started her own business (SuperCapacity) and worked at Taxi.

Lecture Notes

"as much as I love what I do, work comes second, and family and personal life comes first."

Creative Director = a jack of all trades

designer/art director/project manager/account manag
er/new business/stylist/
photographer/creative direction...etc

-She started her own business (supercapacity) after she had adopted a child. Moved to Taxi and then after having another child moved to Critical Mass.

-Her first stepping stone were landing the accounts: Molson Canadian, Levi's and Nike.

"When you're looking for that first job, for me it's not about the company, it's trying to get as much experience as you can and getting some work into your book to be able to move onto a better position." - Garnett

Taxi
-She was there for 6 years, and finally left because it was getting too comfortable, and not feeling challenged.

Clients: MINI, Town Shoes, LCBO Microsites, Cadillac Fairview (vertical movement website, the great thing about the building was that it was sustainable), Taxi packaging, Westjet (identity design), Telus (digital, was definitely one of the hardest years of her career)

"sometimes you don't have a large budget to hire all the extra people, so you just have to do it yourself, be innovative." - Garnett

"Internal projects are part of what makes going to work really fun."
"The great thing about being on a digital team of an agency that owns the whole brand, you don't have to rely on the assets they send you, it gives you the opportunity to push your work further."

Moving on to Critical Mass

-She moved because she wanted to focus and become really good at one thing. She wanted to work on a big website, something with an IA, a planner and a tech team.

-At Taxi they could not compete and pitch for interactive work because of their limited development team.

- Her first project: Luxury furniture site by Theodore Alexander. "It was really complicated. I pretended I knew what I was doing, and within a few months I really did know what I was doing." They really treated the furniture almost like a Rolex watch or a High end car. Most clients, you end up having to use all the assets they have, but they pitched the idea of re-shooting the furniture with their style guide. They really wanted people to perceive them as high end, so they opened up their own studio on Vietnam, hire
d a team and reshot all of their furniture.

Ensuing projects

- Brita USA site.
- Nestle small-budget projects(facebook apps etc)
- Sears

"I do a lot of pitching to land a business. What critical mass is good at doing, is creating great videos for their pitches to make their ideas come to life. These are the things you have to do these days to win business. Everyone is after the same piece of pie, and this is what you have to do to win business." - Garnett

"You can't look to your job necessarily to fulfill you. I like to things on the side that make me happy. I still always have projects on the go and I have my book of ideas." - Garnett


Other Pursuits

-She designs Identities in her spare time.
-Pro-Bono work is good.
-SuperCapacity - business card - won awards, in her top 5 pieces of all time.
- Biotherm
"Contests are a great way to also have some fun." - Garnett

http://www.canneslions.com/ ($125 entry fee)

- Land of Sparkalot (her tumblr blog)
it's important to take note of things that are taking off on the web (aka tumblr).
- Valigirls blog
- Hello blog (photo blog) - started this blog when she went to China to adopt a child.

"when you put yourself out there you open yourself up to a lot of opportunities." - Garnett

- my lalaland - her portal that links to her other projects

It's just advertising
"we don't save lives, so have fun, and make cool shit."
"when you have kids you realize if you have an hour of free time you have to use it up, you have to make use of each hour."

- make stickers, cool business cards, mailer....to get them to keep your information. moodcard: mood.com.
- open house- don't be afraid to ask for cards, and email your portfolio, info to them. It doesn't hurt to follow up, because there's nothing to lose.


Contact

Alison LinkedIn

Twitter @supercapacity

Portfolio mylalaland.com

Sapient Nitro

About Sapient

The Sapient Team thinks of themselves as "idea engineers", blending together their skills in communication, branding and transactional expertise to "spark the relationship between consumers and brands" for their clients.

Clients

- abercrombie & fitch

- vail

- bmo

- chrysler

- jeep

- dodge

- rbc

- harley davidson

- sportchek

Lecture Notes

-Kim: Studio Manager. Matching People with the Right work.

-Gael: Started as an info architect. Her background is digital and interactive. 2 years ago made change from information architecture to experience research.

- Norma: graduate from the program. Since graduation has worked at quite a few agencies and has for a year worked at Sapient. Sapient allows her to grow and utilizes all of her strengths. Senior art director at Sapient.

About Sapient

- really international

- 240 people in their office and still growing

Creative Team

- creative team consists of 25 just on the visual side of things

- a good environment for mentorship because there is a lot of senor staff

- it is a great platform to learn

Work

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

- Norma

"We take on the personalities of our clients instead of expecting our clients to be like us"

- Norma

"Our creative is the expression of a strategy based on an emotional or practical empathy"

-Norma

Jeep:

the task:

create a jeep wrangler microsite for international markets. browser and device compatibility. Language and cultural considerations.

the answer:

take cues from the TV ad, we set the wrangler in different environments, each with its own personality. Created a scrolling site. Site is about an emotional experience, and has little clutter. Powerful imagery, impacting typography. Most of the shots were composited.

Paralaxing: using a depth of field. the images cut into three layers: background, mid ground and foreground, and the layers move at a different speed to give the illusion of depth. The client loved it because they could do this without going into the world of flash. This was done with HTML5.

Chrysler:

The ask:

-taking cues from the TV ad, build an experience that ties together the nostalgia from the past, the feeling of your first car with the luxuries of the present, the grand voyager. showcase the features of the van in terms of how they enrich the character's life.

How tight is a tight time limit: she created that site in 1 night. the initial design happened in the evening, but the rest of it she was able to take a week and a half to finish. uses HTML5 to do the special effects.

Q: what is the life cycle of a microsite like that: 8 months.

Q: why was the timeline so quick: a lot of times a client will hold onto a brief for too long, realize they need to get it out, and brief the creative too late. But as a creative she has realized that her best work originates from a tight timeline.

Abercrombie and Fitch:

It was about working in tandem with Abercrombie and Fitch at their head office. Abercrombie and Fitch: 1) photography 2) print 3) web. It was time to re-prioritize.

The ask:

A&F fit guide and A&F mobile experience.

The answer:

good design is not enough. embed creative team with the client to translate the experience of their stores into digital channels. apply digital intelligence to their creative brand.

-She has never worked with a team so stringent on their brand, especially their brand typography.

- Designed a fit-guy site to show off styles

- designed for their mobile experience, that needs minimal changes.

Vail:

Epic Mix Program - Sapient developed the online experience.

The Ask: engage mountain athletes through Snocial

The Anwer: A facebook app Scavenger hunt that acts as a tutorial for people who are new to the program. "Epic Mix Snowcial Scavenger Hunt"

User centered approach

persona: a customer archetype. Personas are based on primary research (original).

"when you involve your client, they feel a sense of ownership over the project. They have to follow you through the steps, and have buy-in." - Gael

Sapient's strength: "One company that does everything". - Gael

"Our culture is like this. We argue. People challenge me all the time and I welcome that." - Gael

Information Architecture

"In olden times, people would just open up photoshop and make something. But you can build a building without a plan." - Gael

- "being a good IA is so rare. It is rare to have a combination of planning, creative thinking, and skill."

Studio Manager Kim Speaks

Attributes:

- What she is looking at is culture and fit. Attributes are a huge part of hiring.

-What they are looking for is not necessarily tangible. They want to see people that can work within a team, they want people who embrace the attitude of feedback.

- A commitment to ongoing learning, initiative, flexibility, mentoring and being mentored.

- Flexibility: things change drastically. You need to be able to switch gears quickly.

What you can expect from Us:

-Environment for learning

-Big clients

-Variation

- Opportunity for promotion

- Mentorship

- An amazing culture

What we Expect from You

- forward thinking design

-fluency in digital channels

-typography

- presentation skills

- eagerness

- compassion & drive

Contact

Sapient Nitro Contact Form link: http://www.sapient.com/en-us/sapientnitro/contact-us.html

Genco and Jon Cebecioglu, Studio Vitamin C

About Studio Vitamin C

Specialization

-web design

- print design

- Brand I.D.

Client List:

Rev Kitchens and baths, Sacred Craft, Metrix Group

About Genco and Jon Cebecioglue

Genco: After working over 6 years in Toronto’s leading digital design studios, Genco co-founded Studio Vitamin C.

Jon: Jon is a graphic designer who has been working in the design field for 3 years. Jon is the co-founder of Studio Vitamin C.

Lecture Notes

- you should work at a small studio when you start out

- recommended that you work for an agency for at least 1 year

- You should be receptive to criticism, and open to suggestions

- Networking is an important strategy for success

Job types:

A small studio:

- you can get a lot of experience out of a smaller studio

- there isn't much opportunity for "moving up the ladder"

- there is a limited budget at a small studio, limited what you can do for your clients, your wage

An Angency:

- there are a lot of opportunities to get promoted

- you will be taken advantage of in terms of hours, workload, end up sleeping under your desk

Freelance:

- you have a lot of freedom, can set your own schedule, your own wage

Contact

Studio Vitamin C

376 Bathhurst Street

Toronto, ON. M5T 2S6

Genco 416.388.8849

genco@studiovitaminc.com

Jon 416.824.0328

jon@studiovitaminc.com