The Line Between Genius and Insomnia

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2009-01-19T12:27:00.004Z

Digging through the archives of my Mac, I stumbled upon a project Bruce set us at some point of the latter half of the first year, to write a one page story about the picture he had put on the wall.

I also found the picture in question, not the best photo I've ever taken, but it was on my phone. We'd started by having to ad-lib a really quick story about it for five minutes with a partner.

For once I was the last one to our gathering. I offered a nod for an apology and took my usual place at the table. As the door swung closed behind me the last of the sunlight fled the room, leaving the solitary lightbulb covered by smoky haze from a single cigar. We couldn’t really be called friends, we only meet once a year in this small shack, just for our game. Yet it’s something more than that.

I’ve never had much interest in the game, or the spoils, just the people. I remember when we found this place two years ago. It was an accident for all of us, a single event uniting us here at this beach. A storm struck, and struck is the right word indeed. I was hit by a bolt of lightning, which left me with extensive burns and loss of hearing. I lost a lot more after that, friends, job, but more than that, you see I lost my memory as well, and it took a while to regain. That’s what I get for not carrying ID huh?

Oh? They’re waving at me, it’s my turn to deal now. I get distracted with the past, and I’m afraid it’s harder to get the attention of a deaf man. Seems I’m all apologies tonight, but that’s no matter. They smile as if it’s no big deal. Oh yes, dealing.

To my left, John Winters. A rather heavyset and greying man. He was the one who brought me to this shack, along with his ex-wife, Caroline, somewhat tall and regal, it was she who called the ambulance. They were a married couple at the time, but that changed as time went by, yet they still both come here. For me. He’s the one smoking, despite the amount of doctors in the room.
Heh, he always was a bit of a rogue. Maybe that’s why they separated? Hm.

Then to their left, Edward Walton, a rather spritely blond fellow, he’s the paramedic who I’m told kept me alive, and took me to the hospital that did the rest. He always was a charming fellow, but in his line of work I should think he would have to be. He has a child on the way this year, he’s a lucky man, you can see it in his smile.

Clara Jennings, ah, Clara. A lovely vision, she was part of the program to deal with deaf patients at the hospital, she was my guide for a long time when I was in there. These meetings were her idea, I think she has certain youthful ideas of romance about meeting here. I wish I had that outlook on life, maybe I did?

Finally, to my right is Kevin Miller, one of the doctors at the burns clinic. Needless to say he did all he could for me, so perhaps he is the most adjusted to my appearance. He’s a very serious man, particularly about his job. Normally he is the last here, obligations you see.

Well the cards are all down, and the Winters’ have folded, along with Clara. I can’t see Kevin giving up, he usually stays in till the end regardless of his hand, but Edward has the ability to bluff well. My hand is pretty strong, three of a kind- Kings, I might as well raise. Oh, Edward just folded.

Kevin stares at me, and scratches the back of his neck. Time seems to pass very slowly before he sets down his cards, and laughs heartily. A rare occasion. Two pair- Ace and Queen. A good hand.

“You beat me boy.” I read on his lips, “A first. Clara said you’d be able to.” I glanced at her and saw her smile. “Now come, I know you’ve been dying to these past two years. Just ask her on a date and get it over and done with whilst you’re still young.”

I smile for the first in a long time, as does the rest of the table. They motion for me to close my eyes, and I do. A tap on the shoulder moments later, and a cake is on the table, with candles. It’s no surprise they remembered it’s my 21st birthday. I turn, to the person who tapped me, Clara, and she leans in for a kiss.

“Happy Birthday Nick” she signs. And I think, she’s right.
We should do this more often.

Afterwards we had to edit it down to the length of a text message, without using abbreviations. Unfortunately that has disappeared into the ether, so I can't quite remember what I put, but it was an interesting exercise nonetheless!

Keep Sleeping

2008-11-17T21:31:00.002Z

Everyday is like Sunday

2008-11-17T03:09:00.004Z

Sunday is my total lazy day. In theory. Inevitably end up doing work one way or another though. It's all about looking back at what you have done in the week. What I do, is consume. Caffeine is my poison, that's about a week's worth not including what I buy whilst in Beats. :x
Also, dig our pot pourri, it looks like tumble weed.

Another good record of consumption for me is books, I will practically devour anything in print, and usually keep a stack of books I have read, am in the state of reading, or am about to read by my bed. Lately I've been into a lot of philosophical texts, so this week I've been reading 'The Art of War', 'Tao te Ching' and 'The Complete Book of Zen'. One day I aim to sit and read the whole of 'The Bible', but I've never quite managed it...

Saturday Night

2008-11-17T03:01:00.004Z

If ever there was an eventful night of the week, it would be Saturday. It seemed innocent enough, going to a local pub we all love, for the good drinks and great service. For some reason, the dart board was calling to us this time, and let me tell you, it has been a long time since I have thrown any darts. Fi and I had an epic game of 301, which she narrowly beat me at, on the last double. If anything it has made me miss archery sorely.

It was not until we moved onto another pub, a rather hardcore metal pub, that things took a turn for the worse. One of the great things about the pub is the live acts, if you're into that kind of music. We were trying to get photos, and Fi got knocked about, which sparked a friend off into a fight with the careless drunk. They were separated, but spotted each other again soon after and ended up brawling again, I was slightly trampled, but unscathed. Can't quite say that for my friend though. This is one of the few shots Fi got before the action all began:

Friday on my Mind

2008-11-17T02:33:00.006Z

Fridays are full of joy. They signify freedom, fun times, frolicking and many other things beginning with F. Things are looking up, and I know what day it is now.

There also happened to be a Halloween celebration on a Friday. Which gave an opportunity for house parties, and so we went to Morgan's.
I hadn't visited her house yet, or seen much of my old friends from F2, so it was a good opportunity to spend some time with them before heading out to the union, where we ran into a lot of advertising students, yay. :D
Admittedly a bit cramped for my taste, but enjoyable all the same.

Outlook for Thursday

2008-11-17T02:18:00.004Z

The songs for these blog titles are getting sketchier and sketchier as the week progresses, hurrah!
Thursday is VMC day, but as there was no session this week, I spent the day trying to be productive in other ways. First stop was the doctor's, finally getting some cream for my hand.
E-45 can only go so far. Medical things always have such great names. Fucibet!

I have also spent a considerable amount of down time this week, playing Tetris... mostly on Facebook. Originally I added it when I was bored and killing time, and forgot about it, until Jaicie beat my lame high score. That was war! I took it upon myself to beat her, and to aim for the number one slot of my friends, Noz. I have achieved that goal, and aim to knock my score into the top 5% of players. Stay tuned.

Wednesday Mayday

2008-11-17T02:03:00.004Z

Good old hump day. Wednesday's are about rejoicing in the fact you have made it halfway through the working week. I don't usually do much on this day, as it is for private study. Still usually end up coming into University for one thing or another though, usually living in Beats like the good caffeine addicted, Wi-Fi stealing student bum I am.

I find Wednesday is also a good day to do online shopping. We don't like having to carry lots of stuff back home if it's bulky, so we tend to stock up in batches of two or three weeks worth of food. I seem to spend most of that money on Coke Zero, whereas Fi spends it on bacon.

Ruby Tuesday

2008-11-17T01:33:00.005Z

This post is ironically titled, considering Tuesday was a cold day. Although our house tries to limit the amount of heating on throughout the day, when the boiler breaks and you can't have it at all, things can get a bit heated. Conveniently, housemate Steph is an Accommodation Support Officer, and can often fix things. Or get someone more skilled to do it.

I meditate regularly, every day if I have time, but sometimes there is need to do so more often, particularly if I'm stressed, tired too early, or in this case, freezing cold. Zafus are really comfy.
My room is a bit of a tip :x

Monday Monday Monday

2008-11-17T01:15:00.005Z

Considering Monday's are possibly the most depressing day of the week, it's the day of the most fun. As aforementioned, much bacon related fun with my housemates, and a couple of friends after the start to graphics week:

The next photo was a romp through Gotham City with Fi. She makes a very good sidekick. No homo-eroticism here, much to my dismay.

The Digital Age

2008-11-07T19:09:00.002Z

Today I was thinking about how integral technology is to our lives, particularly with the internet.
This is probably more applicable to the younger generation, along with people who do a lot of networking; but imagine you have fallen out with a close friend or romantic partner and no longer wish to talk.

Just how much deleting could this involve?
From various communities and social networking sites I am or have been involved with, depending on the person I'd have to look at editing my accounts:

DeviantArt
Facebook
Myspace
Blogs (Blogspot/Livejournal)
MSN
Steam

I'd imagine there are a few more examples I haven't remembered. Other examples people could use are Twitter, AIM, as well as other things such as potentially blocking e-mails and phone numbers. It was so much simpler to just be able to physically not see a person.

Highly worrying. In our quest to be able to talk to whomever, wherever, whenever, we've lost touch with them in the process. Besides, you can't have a proper falling out unless it's in person. You just can't slam a mobile phone, or get sufficiently angry through e-mail.

Where do we go from here?

A trip to M&C Saatchi

2008-11-06T20:02:00.002Z

So last week we were invited to M&C Saatchi, courtesy of Graham Fink.
Naturally some research was required before going, and I felt a wee bit intimidated.

It was my first time going to the Golden Square, which was a big thing, and the London office of M&C Saatchi was really impressive.

We were led into a room with turf as the floor, and two walls were comprised of blackboard and whiteboard. It was rather cool. We'd been preparing some work on anti-drinking, about when you are drunk your mates think you are a twat, but wont tell you this to your face.

I don't agree with that in a way, it's an interesting slant, but I don't think people will take note and change something so integrated into culture. If anything, Katie's anti-drinking culture rant was more effective. The irony was that there were a selection of beverages when we took a break, and yes, most people were drinking the alcoholic ones.

Not much of the work was good, but hey, we're newbies. I think we learned more this way.
The examples of good posters were quite illuminating, and all of the Dave Trott bits were really useful.

Afterwards some of us had an exploration of that floor of the agency, there were some really random but cool things, like an igloo made of plastic air bag type things woven together.
There were a lot of sheds with inflatable people in them. Weeeeird.

Flying Lessons

2008-11-06T18:05:00.003Z

Last week we had three intensive days with Dave Morris.
We were worked so hard, but it was very worthwhile.

On the first day we were given a product and a tagline, then had to scamp up some adverts that were 90% image, 10% copy. We had only a few hours to come up with something that would be graded as "good", "average" or "crap". Pressure!

I had Raid, and the line "The best insect repellent".
After much brain storming, I came up with the ideas to do spoofs of films that involved insects, looking at how they would have been different if the insects weren't involved:

Spiderman- if Peter Parker had used Raid to get rid of the radioactive spider.
The Fly- if Seth Brundle had used Raid to get rid of the fly.
Jurassic Park- if they'd used Raid to get rid of the prehistoric insect in the amber.

I chose to scamp up the version of The Fly, as it was the easiest to get across visually, along with the idea that things wouldn't have turned into a disaster if Raid had been used. People probably would have recognised Spiderman more, as it's more recent, but arguably if Raid had been used the outcome would be bad.
It is ironic to note that as I am typing this, the Simpson's spoof of The Fly is on television.

On the second day we had to compose an argument for a nightmare product, such as why you should buy second hand cars, why men should wear make up, or why you should get cosmetic surgery.

I had to convince the room to buy cheap tires. After a lot of research, I realised I was going to struggle. Whenever I asked anyone about tires (as naturally, I know nothing, not being a driver), all I could get was "Don't buy cheap tires". :/

My argument wasn't that convincing, but I did try to tack of there not being much significant difference due to all tires having to go through the same safety tests.

The third day consisted of having to come up with ideas to rent Supercars more effectively than those who were on the Apprentice this year. We tried to come up with some advertising for it, mostly ambient things, but again, not overly successful.

However we did learn a lot from Dave Morris, particularly about visual connections and approaches to things. So I'm really happy with the week. Definitely have to do some proper versions of his work.

Bacon related fun

2008-11-06T17:48:00.004Z

At the moment we are on the amusingly titled Intercourse week, where we are doing Graphic-y things. I am enjoying that it is all about words, hurrah.

The tasks set out for us on the first day were threefold:

To create a new word, or a new definition for an existing word.
To create an acronym for your hometown or nearby towns.
To turn your hometown/nearby town into a word, giving it a definition and usage.

After doing all these we then had to create something graphically for it.

Although I had a few words for the first task, they weren't that great.

Appull- The desire for Macintosh products.
Hyperbolic- An over excited evil genius.
Slummy- Chav money.

It's no wonder I chose another task, right? For the second one, I was struggling, after all I come from Ellesmere Port. That's a wee bit long. In the end I got the following:

Chester- Curly haired Europeans spend their euros rashly. (Thank Bean for that one)
Blacon- Bit loud and chavvy, obscene nightly.

Again, no wonder I chose the last task. To make a definition for a place, I figured Blacon was easiest for this one, as it evokes images of bacon. We know from the beauty brief that everyone loves bacon.

Blacon- A burnt, black bacon sandwich.

So here's the first version of the graphical version of this:

Obviously it needs a bit of improvement, like trying to get a single letter on a single slice of bread. I figure I might have to cheat and find the largest loaf of bread possible, I figure the freshly baked ones with amazing crusts are probably my best bet.
Another thought is to get it on a decent backdrop, as I was struggling to find room in the house, thus the three chopping boards it's laid out on. I plan to make it more like a café atmosphere, perhaps even have each slice on a plate.
I do like the ketchup lettering though. :D The random capital B annoys me though. What was I thinking?

I could quite happily go without ever seeing bacon again though. I don't even eat it.
Everyone else seemed to enjoy it though! :)

A retrospective look at the Summer

2008-10-21T13:14:00.004+01:00

Over the summer, we picked up three briefs,

1. To make a typographical piece based on a quotation that sums up our life philosophy.
2. To make some form of image from the following films:

Spellbound- Hitchcock
8 1/2- Fellini
Brazil- Gilliam
The Third Man- Reed
Moulin Rouge- Luhrmann

3. A series of snapshots based on the following:

Fade away and radiate
Life is a minestrone
The road to nowhere
You're so vain

For the first brief I applied the quotation "Good friends, good books and a sleepy conscience: This is the ideal life" across the spines of books I selected, some being my favourites, some being my friends' favourites, and some just being "literary classics".

For the second brief I modified and rewired an old radio to give it a more steampunkish feel to fit with the general look of Brazil. I liked the clash of the wood and the silver metallic parts, and of course the valves. Gotta love valves. If I had more time and expertise, I would have liked to have added more mechanical parts.

For the third brief I created a series of snapshots on a Polaroid camera for "Fade away and radiate" trying to show the amount technology has invaded our lives. We moved into a new house this year, and were without luxuries like the internet for quite a while, and our behaviour changed a lot, always going to the library or pubs with free wi-fi, having to travel quite far to get our laundry done etc.

The snapshots I used were:

My housemate playing solitaire with proper playing cards
My housemate writing out notes and filling in forms in a big folder
My housemate using a public payphone
My housemate listening to my radio
My housemate using a computer in the library
A shot of an analogue TV showing static

I wanted to add another for the public laundromat, but we didn't need to do any washing until after the project was due. Oh well.

I found the second brief the most fun, but the hardest to actualise, as it took me quite a while to find my radio.

Tea or not to Tea

2008-10-21T12:07:00.002+01:00

One of the most frustrating briefs so far this year is over.
We had to form a campaign to make tea the Nation's favourite drink again.

As a coffee drinker, I was not impressed. Caffeine is the way forwards!
My partner in arms (a fellow coffee drinker), Sian was great to work with.

Our campaign revolved around the idea that "Tea makes everything better", and included posters about different biscuits/cups as we're all different. We also wanted to create a teatime weekly television chat show, originally revolving around tea culture, but after the critique, it was a better idea to just have it sponsored by the Tea Council.

We also had storyboards for two ads:

1. A girl brings her new boyfriend home to meet her family, he's confused and terrified so doesn't understand a word they're saying, he looks to her for support, but she's happily chatting away with her parents, just as the mother offers him a cup of tea- which he happily accepts and breaks the tension.

2. A woman is on the phone calling the police as there is a fight outside; cut to the fight, with lots of jeering etc. The police are on their way to the scene, where they break up the fight by separating the fighters, and giving them cups of tea.

Not the strongest ideas, but it was enough to earn us a C. More cohesion was necessary to make it stronger, as well as the aforementioned change from a tea centric programme to a generic chat show.

Blogging with Scissors

2008-10-21T11:20:00.003+01:00

Greetings and welcome to my blog,

This is going to be a bit of a mishmash of what I'm doing, thinking and experiencing whilst at Buckinghamshire New University, studying Advertising and Graphic design.

Other topics may crop up from time to time, including current affairs and any other pressing issues at the time. As may some personal design projects.

I hope you enjoy reading.