Report for work – KLDW
On Saturday I went to a conference as part of the KL Design week. The company I work for though said that they would only pay towards that conference which is a shame because I really wanted to go to the following day but I guess they didn’t want to spend much money haha. Before I was allowed to ask for my 50% back from the company for the price of the ticket I had to write and a report on the day which is what follows in this post. Apologies if it is boring or bland but it was for work and they were very vague in what they wanted me to write for them. Oh and apologies if you knows these companies and I’m not giving them justice but I’m sure if it was bright enough in the place I would of taken notes and then I’d have even more to bore you with haha. If you don’t want to read what I wrote at least check out the websites =]
Super Motion at MaTiC - Conference
http://www.kldesignweek.com/#/home
Being asked to write a report on the conference that we attended is not an easy task without receiving any guidance on what information you want to know about or if you want to reference what I learnt to the company but I will give it a shot. Firstly the conference was a letdown in terms what was on offer. I went expecting critical and contextual analysis of the field in which we are in, this was barely done at all as what critical evaluation was done was shared mainly by the Europeans and Canadians. The Asian speakers tried but very little was said, they felt more of a need to just show us work which I found highly counterproductive as we already knew who they were and what their work was and if we didn’t well dam that’s what the Internet is for. I also expected there to be more of an opportunity to network and talk with others in my felid like they have in the UK but no food was provided so that was out the window. People just left at lunch and then came back for the next speaker. All that was outside the lecture theatre was a stall selling design books. There definitely should have been more stalls with advertising agencies and design companies to promote themselves and network. That is after all how you expand the awareness and quality of a field. This was more just a series of lectures for the young and uninformed of the industry i.e. first year students. There were many students there and when people were given the opportunity to speak very little of intelligence thought was shown. People instead asked questions the majority of which could have been given the answer by their own mind should they have taken more time to think.
The following are the main attendants of the conference and a short explanation of what they did:
Definitely the best speaker there. He was from Italy and the UK and dam did he have some interesting things to say. He also had a clever way of introducing the topic of his talk through a story which started out talking about him only a few years old and ended up with him explaining of his clever use of viral media to create brand awareness for himself and even a fake persona. This guy was very funny and had a lot of intelligent things to say about the media. His main message was that having time to learn and experiment with the programs that you use is very important and the more you can do that the better your chances are of becoming great. I’d definitely recommend checking this guy out through google and read about his story, he came from nothing and through hard work and the clever use of viral media created a real name for himself.
http://www.runeentertainment.com/
A group from Canada who were setting up another studio in Singapore. They probably talked the longest but I found fascinating because of their philosophy is one I highly believe in and that is team creativity combined with having story and purpose behind each element. They believe that you should not have anything in a scene without a good story and reason for having it there. Just having it there to make something have impact is rarely a good enough reason in itself. Some of my friends found these guys a little boring but I guess that was because they were wanting their luch and these guys were on just before lunch. I guess the reason they were so good at talking and explaining themselves apart from the fact they were canadian was that one of them had been a university lecturer and loved the theory of design which meant they had real purpose in their work and they could justify each element in their design.
They were like a few of the companies there believers that you should not say yes to every job that presents itself and instead you should try to find opportunities to just say no to try and keep a reputation so that agencies don’t start looking at you as a company that can only do one thing or a company that only does small rush jobs. These guys also took a lot of time to learn new techniques in their spare time and they are like most people from the UK who work hard just so they can party even harder =]
http://www.studio4c.co.jp/top.html
What can I say about this. The guy could really talk but his translator wasn’t the best. I think a lot of the audience didn’t get him by the level of questions that came out and I felt sorry for him but I got him and loved his latest work which was very abstract.
They had some breath taking work and for being the only company in Taiwan that specializes in motion graphics they really had an interesting story to tell. I definitely want to see how this company is in a few years as they seem to be growing fast and spreading the word of motion graphics in Taiwan, a market which is only starting to show iteslf.
This guy had some great 3d work but he was a simple man and about as articulated as the Asian companies. Coming from New Zealand I had higher hopes for him but nope. When it came to his lecture he spent most the time showing his work instead of saying anything intelligent. Although I give him credit in the fact he was dam funny, a true stoner for sure haha.
These guys believed strongly in connecting with other companies and spreading the word of design not only within the design community but also with the public through exhibitions and more. Again with a few of the other companies here these guys not only did motion graphics but they used screen shots from their work which had been tweaked slightly for print work.
These kids clearly were unprepared but they did have some nice concepts their two most important were create an inspiring environment in their studio and secondly they really stressed the need to fight with agencies about what you think is good design and what will look good for a piece rather than just rolling over and trying to please a client.
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