Archive for June, 2009

This father’s day my mom bought me the Legend of Zelda at a flea market. Zelda was one of my favorite games growing up, and I loved playing it again on my old NES.

Naturally I searched for maps online, and there are plenty. But I was disappointed — the first map I saw had every secret, every level, every door… OK, I know that’s what a map is for, but I immediately realized it took the fun out of the game. The process is half the fun – more than half. Add my natural fascination with maps, diagrams and information design, and you get this. I realize it grades me as a Class A nerd, but I don’t care.

No one I’ve shown it to has been particularly interested (not good criteria for a blog post, right?), but then I ask, “Did you play Zelda much?” The answer is inevitably “no”.

I’m pretty sure as a kid I had a map some friend tore out of Nintendo Power. I didn’t know what I was missing.

I’m was researching Chicago’s “El” train for a Chicago based logo design project I’m working on. I found this commentary by Ian Sohn on Dentyne’s “make face time” ad campaign:
Quote:
“I’m not here to critique the creative, although I do happen to like it.  Rather, I’m just a bit surprised we (or maybe it’s just me) haven’t seen more brands use popular social media cues in their marketing communications.

Again, creative aside I like a few things here:

1. It’s current (i.e. shows Dentyne is paying attention to the world around it)
2. The imagery is emotional
3. There is no URL on the ad.  That’s right, no URL.  Think about the call-to-action … “Make Face Time.”  A URL would be a conflicting message.  Glad to see this execution won out in what I can only imagine was a rigorous debate.”

I think this ad campaign is brilliant, and I would add a fourth note to Ian’s commentary: It’s an effective marketing message specifically for chewing gum. Gum is as “offline” a commodity as I can think of. Not only isn’t it bought online. All of it’s social impact is strictly face to face. Whether positive (flavored kisses, fresh breath) or negative (incessant popping, loud chewing), none of chewing gum’s effects translate over the web.

I also resonate personally with the message. My workdays are spent almost entirely online, and I love the web. Still, my most meaningful friendships are offline, only augmented by e-contact when nothing else will work. My brother and I work together, he in Chicago and me here in Detroit. We talk “face to face” over skype nearly every day. Yet, when we meet in person I inevitably comment, “In the flesh!” and give him a big hug as if I haven’t seen him in months. I haven’t.

I’m getting ready to go on the annual Kimball family week-long vacation. My parents rent a huge place for a week, and my three brothers and I (+families) come and stay for as much of the week as we can. My parents now have ten grandkids under the age of 10, so it gets pretty crazy when we all land at the same time.

I’m looking to repeat an activity I brought a couple years ago: readymechs. They’re an ongoing project by the design firm FWIS. They’re small, robot-like throw-away toys you make yourself. The beautiful little creatures come to life by printing out the 8.5×11 design sheet, cutting out the design, and following the assembly instructions.

Last time I printed and brought a bunch of them the whole family (adults included) had a blast constructing the various designs. By the end of the week they were pretty much destroyed by the kids playing with them, but that’s kind of the point. I even imported the PDFs into illustrator and deleted the color, so some of them were a coloring/constructing combo. I don’t have time for that this year, but they’ve added a whole new series of mechs since we did it last — I don’t think we’ll get bored.