Smile :)

This makes me smile from the depths of my soul... And reminds me that we could be a little more like kids: uninhibited, silly and make the world smile from the inside out. Don't worry about what people think and put goodness out into the world.

The Typographer's one essential task

“The typographer’s one essential task is to interpret and communicate the text. Its tone, its tempo, its logical structure, its physical size, all determine the possibilities of its typographic form. The typographer is to the text as the theatrical director to the script, or the musician to the score.”

— The Elements of Typographic Style by Robert Bringhurst

Goodies

InDesign Grid Templates
I've been working with InDesign lately experimenting with magazine layouts for a client. I used it a few years ago and I remember how much I love working with layout and typography and compositions. In my experiments and research I found this helpful resource to get you setup with different document sizes and your grids and guides. It has several templates that you can download.

Breaking the Perfectionism-Procrastination Infinite Loop
Denise Jacobs wrote this excellent article for those who are perfectionists and procrastinate as a result. As you get further along in your career and work you learn a lot more about how you work best and what barriers stop you from working well. I've always been good at creating client work and meeting deadlines for paid work. But in my personal work, I find it hard to get my work out because I wait for it to be 'perfect'. I'd like to change that and just show my process and unfinished work as I go, not worrying and waiting for the final 'ta-da' moment to reveal it. This article is really insightful and if you struggle with this, it's a great read.

A Formula for Speaking Fees by Jenn Lukas
This is a helpful guide for anyone interested in speaking in the web industry. Jenn breaks down the costs associated with preparing and speaking at a conference and what that means for you and your business and how to make it worthwhile for both you and your audience. More than anything, I think it helps to remember your value as a speaker and make sure you're getting properly compensated for putting yourself out there and sharing your knowledge with a paying audience.

Father and Son Shaving Set
I love great design and I think Harry's has done such a fantastic job creating and designing their products and the brand. This particular campaign is amazingly awesome and just in time for Father's Day! Order a set for your guy and his little guy.
(I have no affiliation with Harry's, I just think great products are worth supporting)

Image source: https://www.harrys.com/products/fathers-day-set

World Cup 2014 is just around the corner!
I'm not a fan of McDonald's (though I'm guilty of eating a Big Mac and/or fries a few times a year) but in preparation for World Cup 2014, here's an awesome little video commercial to get you pumped for the games this week...

Check out the McDonald's GOL! trick shots! Want to score yourself? Download our free app http://gol.mcd.com GET THE APP, GET THE FRIES, PLAY FOR GLORY SUBSCRIBE: http://bit.ly/XSyXBU In honor of the FIFA World Cup™, we've searched the globe for the most talented trick shot heroes. And now you can show us what you've got.

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FITC 2014 post-mortem

I had the pleasure of attending FITC Toronto 2014 thanks to the kind folks at FITC through their Women's Initiative (free tickets are reserved each year for women to encourage and welcome more women to attend tech conferences - to get a ticket, you must submit something to showcase why you should go). See my submission here.

FITC is a 3-day multi-track conference focused on web technology, design and creativity. The theme for this year was 'storytelling'. They had 5 rooms which more or less, determined the type of talks that they held: 1. Inspirational, 2. Web development, 3. Creative coding and hardware, 4. Business, and 5. Unplugged storytelling (this was a smaller room so it made for more intimate, unplugged talks and discussions).

I'd been to FITC before in 2012 but I knew very few people in the community and was more observant than involved. This year I knew a lot more people which meant a lot more time spent with friends, talking over beers and food and taking in all the knowledge and inspiration.

I spent most of my time in room #1 for the more inspirational storytelling or talks that discussed process and lessons learned. I'd been to a couple of the web dev talks and creative coding talks and didn't feel like it was for me, perhaps because I'm more design focused. Plus I tend to want to learn by doing when it comes to development and coding.

There were a few people that I was really looking forward to hearing and they did not disappoint! There were also a couple of speakers that I met and they are as gracious and kind as you would think they are. Here's a list of my favorites this year:

1. Stefan Sagmeister

Image credit: http://todesignoffsite.com/events-2/dx-the-happy-show/

Half of the design firm Sagmeister & Walsh Inc. (with Jessica Walsh), Stefan has had a wealth of experience and is a world-renowned designer. As a designer I was excited to hear him speak. If you don't know him, look him up!

Stefan walked us through his journey of creating The Happy Show - and exhibition that draws on his experiments of finding what makes us happy. He delivered his talk with substance, wit, and humor and was extremely approachable. On the last day of the conference he humored us with some random, very funny stories. It was a nice end to the conference.

2. Sara Blake

Image credit: http://daily.designcollector.net/post/27927272300/sara-blake-at-work-hellozso-by-designcollector

Sara Blake a.k.a. ZSO is an incredible illustrator! Her course was the first one I took on Skillshare. Her artwork is absolutely brilliant and unique and I was really interested to hear about her journey and process as a designer and illustrator.

She's able to successfully work as a designer and illustrator, like many, through sheer hard work, determination, a commitment to her work and practice. It was incredible to get to see the evolution of her illustration and walk through her process through a project. It was very insightful and I am grateful to have heard it.

Image credit: http://yukoart.com/work/mother-jones-under-water/

3. Yuko Shimizu

Yuko's talk was a standout and completely unexpected. I have to admit that I didn't know much about Yuko, in fact I had only been introduced to her work very recently. But boy oh boy is she ever talented. Not only that she was genuinely nice and approachable.

After 11 years in the corporate PR world, Yuko quit her job and moved to New York City to go to school for illustration. She graduated from the School of Visual Arts in NYC with an MFA in the Illustration as Visual Essay Program in 2003 and has been illustrating since. She is also an instructor at SVA.

Yuko's story was so unbelievably inspirational. Having realized my true love for illustration and being a bit confused as to where I fit in the Designer/Developer/Illustrator circle, I gravitated to her story and was moved by her talk because I'm struggling to find my identity as a designer and illustrator. But it's not just her story that is amazing, Yuko is a brilliant natural speaker. She speaks as if she's talking to you alone and injects natural humor making her one of the most likable personalities I've met in a long while.

Not to go on and on about her, but let me just end this off by saying I had the pleasure of talking to Yuko at the after party on the last day and to ask her some questions and she took time to talk to me and share more insights and I greatly appreciated that.

If you haven't seen her work - check out her portfolio.

4. Anton Repponen and Irene Pereyra

Anton and Irene are a design duo working together at Fi. Their talk discussed how they work together focusing on the UX and design and working on them in tandem at Fi and more particularly their process using the Wacom site redesign as a case study. This was an extremely interesting talk for me. It was fantastic to see someone's process through UX and design for a major brand. Everyone in this industry works differently but it was great to have a look into the nitty gritty of their process from site maps to wireframes to full blown design.

On the last day, Anton and Irene did another more intimate talk about some of their bad client experiences and lessons learned. For anyone working in client-services, this is a gem. It's nice to be able to relate and commiserate with other designers, especially the ones you think have it all figured out, because let's face it, no one has it figured out. We're all just learning as we go.

There were plenty more speakers that I truly enjoyed listening to including

• James White of SignalNoise - I saw him speak in 2012 and his talk gave us a more in depth view of the evolution of his work from a small-nerdy-drawing-kid to a big-nerdy-drawing-adult. I loved geeking out with him on all his inspirations from 80s toys and comics to movies. I also met him briefly at the after party and he's also one of the nicest guys you'll ever meet.
• Jason White of Leviathan (not to be confused with James White above) - Leviathan is a design studio that does incredible work in visual experiences. Jason took us through their process of working on some of the most elaborate, visually stimulating, stage set designs I've ever seen.
• Robert Wong of Google - You know those tear-jerking google commercials? Well Robert and his team of designers at Google is behind all that. They're behind Google's design (including the Google Doodles) which wasn't much of anything until they carved out a space and a voice for themselves not only in Google's marketing efforts but also in their product design. Robert is also a fellow Canadian and hails from Scarborough, Toronto - and you know how we're always proud of our own :) Though he really has a career to be proud of - Canadian or not.

Well that's a bit of my take on FITC Toronto 2014. Aside from the speakers, I also met a bunch of people in and around the community here in Toronto which is always a bonus! I am thankful to the organizers of FITC for allowing me to attend and hope to direct the inspiration that I gained into something worthwhile in my work.

Goodies

• I've loved The Great Discontent and have read almost every interview that they churn out. It amazes me how Tina and Ryan do all of this. They've been releasing an interview every week since 2011 and they do this because they admire these people and because these stories inspire so many of us. But it's a lot of work to do for a side project. This week they've taken the leap and are dedicating their time to TGD full time. I think the community is happy to support them. I know I am and I wish them well. Check out their kickstarter campaign and if you love TGD as much as I do, consider supporting them. Also, follow Ryan as he documents their journey here.

(image: The Great Discontent)

• I love swissmiss' (Tina Roth Eisenberg) friday link pack posts and every now and then I'll check in and see what's she's got in store. This post is inspired by her link pack as it helps me share what I've found this week and keep a record of all these great links, projects, resources, etc. for later reference. If you've never checked out www.swiss-miss.com, check it out. Now. Go.
• Today I found this wonderful video via swissmiss...

• I went to a talk earlier this week at OCADU and was introduced to Jaymie McAmmond's work. I've actually seen her work but didn't know much about her. How have I not known about this local Toronto talent? I have no idea. But if you don't know, now you know. Here's some of her illustration work:

Starbucks Typographic Mural (image: Jamie McAmmond)

Mountain Mural (image: Jaymie McAmmond)

• If you're looking into using SVG graphics for your site–really great for responsive sites and scaling simple graphics–Daniel Mall's post on how to create SVG graphics will help you. Also helpful is Chris Coyier's post on how to use SVG.

• I've recently discovered Type Camp. Where have I been? I dunno, but I was ecstatic to find it! I've been looking for ways to learn more about typography and lettering and this is one fantastic way to learn from some incredible people, in a fun setting, with like minded people. It's also in Toronto. I've found it difficult to find opportunities to learn about type in Toronto, but if you dig, you'll find it! I'm signed up for the Toronto single day camp in April. They're offering the camp on two days and I'm signed up for Friday April 25th. If you're interested sign up soon to get the early bird pricing–hope to see you there!