Fall Interactive Tour

This week I went on a two-day Fall Interactive Studio Tour by Oddly Studios. We explored different interactive design firms in Toronto. The tour was very rewarding and it was interesting touring different design firms. The event was also a great opportunity to network and meet some really awesome people. Both days were jam packed with activity, so I am going to focus on my favorite moments for each day of the tour.

Day One Highlights:

Amoeba St. & John St.
Phone (Amoeba): 416-599-2699 
Phone (John St.): 416-348-0048
172 John St.
Toronto, ON M5T 1X5 
 

 Highlights:

• Touring the studios (very artistic, including balloon lights, abstract art, and a Bambi painting). 
• John St.'s Vision: We are agents of positive change and we aim to discover better ways of doing things through design. It all starts with an idea.
• Case study on John St.'s Guy at Home in his Underwear.
  The Challenge: Consumer perception of the brand (Stanfield's).
  Their Goal: was to reinvigorate the brand with a younger more digitally-savvy audience.
• Case study on John St.'s work with AutoTrader.
  Client’s Objective: Increase unique visitors to AutoTrader.ca 

Mighty 
Jon Toews - Creative Director 

jon.toews@mighty.ca

Phone: 416-927-3316
420 Wellington St. W
Toronto, ON M5V1E3 

Highlights:

• Touring the studio (artistic, 24 employees, and loved the bicycle rack in the office).
• Case study on the Worst Parking Job Ever with Hyundai Canada.
• Case study on Make Me Mighty.
• To work here you need to be dangerously obsessed with the Internet.   
• Mighty is about Measurement & Analytics, Digital Strategy & Engagement. 
• Presentation on the Super Heroes website.
• Presentation on the Knowing is Better website.  

Organic 
Phone: 416-874-7000
33 Bloor Street East, 14th FL
Toronto, ON, M4W 3H1

Highlights:

• Touring the studio (artistic, moving locations so half the studio was in the process of moving, gaming area with Guitar Hero, and an amazing Lego painting).
• Advice on the interview process (they find most employees by word-of-mouth, they invite people to contact them, main point is that interviews are given mainly based on networking).
• The most important thing is passion, a good vibe that will match the team, and a unique portfolio. They can always teach skills later.
• Jobs are very specific (need exact set of skills). It is good to specialize (ex. Flash Developer). 
• Culture is very important - will you be able to fit in and work with the team?
• It is normal to jump from agency to agency (agencies can’t support or there is better opportunity elsewhere).
• Many designers get jobs on contract basis (which earns twice as much salary, but with no benefits). For example, a third of the designers at Organic are on a contract basis. These designers jump from contract to contract.
• Portfolios must be: an advertisement about you (and be able to sell yourself), be interactive, show your attitude, creativity, your ideas, and your thought process.
• You usually don’t meet with clients face to face at a digital company.
•  If you can’t make it the way you wanted, sell it anyways! Confidence is key.
• Have a strong online presence. For example, your portfolio website is sometimes the determining factor for an interview. Keep an eye on your online social networks (reputation on line).  Keep your online portfolio professional, with some personal touches (know your limits!)
• Invest money into yourself (ex. good execution of portfolio).
• Stand out (ex. video entries and do something eye catching online). You can also do something to catch the company’s attention. For example, one employee placed training bicycles outside of industries with branding on it that advertised he is fresh out of school, but willing to work hard to take off his training wheels.
• If you can’t advertise yourself, how are you doing to be good at advertising for clients, such as Nike.
        

Jalani Morgan
Phone: 647-400-4027
jalani@jalanimorgan.com
545 King St W Studio 407
Toronto, ON M5V 1M1

Highlights:

• Looking at his photography.
• His passion when he talked about photography. I felt very inspired.
• Always stick to your value system - people will notice and there will always be somebody who will relate to you.
• Favorite photo shoot is with Lights (first big celebrity and magazine cover).
• Don't make a solid 5 year plan, it may blind you to opportunities. Approach everyday to learning, adapting, changing, and being liquid. 
• Always invest time into personal work. His personal work is 20% analog (since it is so expensive) and 80% digital.
• Make sure to have blinders on since success can get to you.
• Does web on the side, but photography is his passion.  He also wants to eventually learn video.
• Some of his work includes photographs for John St., Verve Girl, and Much Music. 
• Always carry around a notepad since ideas happen at anytime.
• Forget the word “Pride”. 
• Personal work is just as important (ex. one of his personal projects is taking portraits of people in his old pair of glasses. The project has turned into his visual signature.)
• Social networks, such as Twitter, really helped him build up his reputation.

Pixel Gallery
Steve Di Lorenzo
Co-Founder | Creative Director | Curator
Phone: 416-889-4654

Highlights:

• Very interesting presentation on a firm that focuses on interactive displays. 
• Focuses on how inspiration can come from anywhere.   
• Does art gallery spaces, such as Nuit Blanche.
• Power of interactive displays with Sick Kids (a landscape with flowers in the waiting room that can calm people in scary situations of hearing if their child has cancer or not).
  The Challenges: The furniture in the hospital has to follow certain specs and be sanitized, the display of the sky and nature has to become brighter or darker depending on the time of the day outside, has to be calm and inspirational to help parents in a tough state while waiting to hear the news of their child.
• Graffiti project (where they painted the city with light, such as the CN Tower).
  

Day Two:

Secret Location 
Phone: 416-849-5298

 

Highlights:

• Case Study: Stanfields (The Guy at Home in his Underwear).
  • They worked with John St. on this project.
  • Live feed was donated for free.
  • Would have been over budget in two days since it is such a huge project and they needed a full-time crew at his house. 
  • Goal was 25,000 likes on Facebook in order to raise $25,000 for cancer awareness. 
  • On Day 19, 46,030 likes.
  • Half a million viewers in 8 days.
• Case Study: In Real Life Race to Finish Website (TV Show Interactive extension of YTV).
  • Children did user testing and tested early and often.
  • Challenge: had to be 3D, but still needed to be fast loading.
  • Children can make their own levels and save them on the website, along with being able to play levels made by Secret Location.
• Case Study: Storming Juno
  • No branding was done or would be complete until too late in the process, so they volunteered to create it themselves.
  • Interactive website that will be released this Remembrance day.

Digital Cement 
Phone: 1-800-354-0264
100 Liberty Street
Toronto, ON M6K 3L7 

 Highlights:

• Touring the studio (very artistic in an old building, large office space with around 70 employees).
• Life made Delicious website.
• XM Radio – iPhone app 
• The company is all about connecting:
  Connect to a customer, understand them.
  Connect communication activity.
  Connect to this business’ bottom line.
  Connect customers to potential customers.

Other Neat Design Firms visited:

Jam3 Media 

Phone: 416-531-5263 

171 East Liberty Street Suite 252
Toronto, ON 

sociMedia
Phone: 416-530-7851

171 East Liberty Street Suite 266
Toronto, ON M6K 3P6

Ryan O'Brien, Creative Director of CTV Digital Media Group at CTV Inc.

This week’s presentation was by Ryan O'Brien, Creative Director of CTV Digital Media Group at CTV Inc. The presentation was really interesting and taught us more about the world of digital broadcasting. I have always been very interested in CTV and thought their websites were very successful. As well, I have grown up watching CTV so I was so excited when I found out we were going to meet the Creative Director. 

CTV has 50 radio and various television channels, including MTV, Much Music, and Discovery (all channels in image below). Ryan is responsible for brand management, usability, and video platforms. CTV does 200% to 300% more video than their competitors. CTV also works with creative agencies, marketing sales teams, and are running over 110 websites with a staff of 70 people. The staff is very team oriented in order to get things done. There are also several different teams within the staff. Ryan works in the digital branch of CTV. There are three different structures at CTV, which include radio, television and digital.

 

The presentation opened up with an interesting video about CTV. Some of the interesting points include:

1. CTV is the #1 network for digital.
2. Some sites include TSN.com and CTV.ca.
3. CTV had the most online coverage for the 2010 Olympics.
4. Primetime is now online.
5. Much Music signed up with Vevo, which was a big contract.
6. 50 online destinations.

Ryan started within the industry 15 years ago. Ryan grew up in Niagara Falls and attended an art high school where he became interested in audio, video, and setting up stages. Ryan got an internship in a staging complex in high school. He then attended the technical theatrical program from Humber College. He ended up apprenticing at a piercing shop after 6 months into the program. Years later he had the opportunity to shoot Breakfast television. His next big opportunity was when he started a clothing company called FuMan Skeeto, Inc. with a friend where he became the VP of online marketing and development. The company went really well and relocated to Hollywood. His clothing line was sold in big companies, such as Macy’s and Eaton’s. Ryan was responsible for production, design and development of websites, brand development, strategic consultation, and apparel design consultation. When 9/11 happened the clothing company went out of business because of the economy. He relocated to Toronto and became the Senior Web Designer for Much Music. He now works as the Creative Director for CTV Digital Media Group with a very highly skilled staff. 

 

CTV was one of the first companies to have television available on the web. They knew how important it was to have the transition of television on the web because Ryan and the rest of the staff have to “Live in the Future” and be 2 to 4 years ahead of their time. One of Ryan’s jobs is to give the viewer’s content that they want, and in a way that’s legal, easy, and makes money through advertising.

 

The staff has to be aware of advances in technology and has a large research department. For example, they have to be ahead of the times and know how to design for all the different browsers and platforms, such as the Blackberry, Android, and Apple products. Also, they need to be aware of 4G networks, tablets, mobile, Google OS, and other advances that involve the web.  Examples include how Google OS will always have an updated browser, Android is a different experience since you can run multiple programs at once versus the iPhone, video on the web will be better quality, how 3D television plays a effect and incorporating it on the web, and there will be around 105 tablet releases in 2011. As well, accessibility is going to be a big issue in Canada in the future. For example, the use of tabs to fill out forms and other problems since more of the older population is using the web.

CTV has to be aware of the amount of content and what content goes on all their websites. Since there are so many websites, they have to make sure there isn’t much duplication among them. An interesting event the staff got to do was attend the 2010 Olympics in order to photograph and develop stories for their websites. Another neat thing CTV did was that they offered the most online Olympic coverage in real time for the 2010 Winter Games. Also they have to be aware of right management, such as having to license songs and blurring out t-shirts that are not licensed. Since there are so many rules and so much content the team has to always be on the ball or they will miss something important and go sideways. 

One important thing when they hire is that the person looking to work for the team really knows the fundamentals of the web, since the web is always changing and moving so fast. This includes:

1. Having knowledge of how websites work with browsers, what code means, and know the  fundamentals of coding. 
2. Usability core sets.
3. A good portfolio (website and coding). 
4. Organization (you will never be the only one who works on the website, so the site needs to be   organized so your teammates can understand it). For example, always organize your folders, write notes on PDF’s, and make the files easy to understand. 
5. Good communication skills.
6. Passion about the Internet. 
7. Being able to code a site in notepad.

To learn more about Ryan: 
LinkedIn
Twitter

Contact Information:
299 Queen Street West
Toronto, ON Canada M5V 2Z5
Phone: 416.384.2247
Fax: 416.384.3465
Cell: 416.371.4706
Email: ryan.obrien@ctv.ca

Presentation by Stephen Bennett, Creative Director of Juniper Park

This week’s speaker was Stephen Bennett, Creative Director of Juniper Park. I have been a fan of Juniper Park’s work since last spring, so I was so excited to meet Stephen and learn more about the company. Stephen loves everything digital. He tells us about some of his story, such as where he has worked. He worked in places he calls “Pure Play,” which means just digital, such as Blue Zone, Mod7, Blast Radius, Ninedots, which then changed it’s name to Henderson Bas. He also worked in “Integrated Jobs,” which involve digital and print, such as McLauren McCann, Grip Limited, and Juniper Park.

Juniper Park is a new company that is less than 3 years old. The company has 75 employees, including art directors, designers, writers, developers, producers, and strategists. Juniper Park is a place where advertising, strategy, and design come into play. The company creates broadcasts, print, out of house, digital, and statements.

 

Juniper Park uses the vendor model and they hire a lot of freelancers, which makes them different. Quaker and PepsiCo are two very big clients. Juniper Park does a lot of work for the United States, but some work for Canada as well. Their clients include:

One of my favorite brands they worked on is Woman’s World.

Stephen asked us to think about if we wake up tomorrow and a company was gone, would we care:
1.)    Companies sell products.
2.)    Brands sell ideas.
3.)    A brand narrative is the story that is shared between people
        as they gather around a brand.
4.)    Great ideas need to be embraced and be talked about.

A brand he explains as one that matters is Apple. Their secret is that they know people are creative, but lack the tools needed to set them free. Apple’s gift is making simple tools to let people become more creative. Apple focuses on humanity, while Microsoft and IBM focuses on efficiency. For example, Ipod's advertisements show a creative and free lifestyle.

He goes on to talk about the secret that SunChips knows, which is one of Juniper Park’s clients. They know each small step can make a difference. SunChips' gift to the consumer is that it is a company that brings you healthy wholegrain chips and makes small steps for a better planet. For example, SunChips use solar panels and their new packaging is the first 100% compostable chip bag.


“Create the bigger stories, so we do care.”



Another one of their client’s is Quaker. This company asks if your breakfast makes you amazing. Quaker’s secret is that amazing mornings can lead to amazing days. Their gift to the consumer is that the right breakfast leads to a great day. Juniper Park and Quaker have also worked with Bob Harper from Biggest Loser, who is the new digital coach for Quaker and has already had a big digital footprint on the web.

A few things he has learned include:

1. It's not about who you know, it's about who knows you.
   
Juniper Park is moving so fast they don’t have time to look through resumes. He selects people for freelance based on who is contacting him and letting him know they want to work for Juniper Park. He told us not to worry about feeling like you are pestering the company by sending many emails.

2. Make friends.

Stephen explained how important it is to connect to the industry since most companies don’t have time to post jobs. People always call whom they know first. A great base for this is attending industry events.

3. Be curious.

The moment you stop being curious, you should think about doing something new since the industry moves so fast.

4. It’s a creative evolution baby. Take your time.

5. Execution is everything.

Great ideas get lost when not executed right, such as spelling mistakes, not sweating the details, and not presenting yourself well.

6. What's your story? Have a story. Use your words to brand yourself, a way for anyone to remember you by.

Stephen also talks about how cultural latency is nearing zero. People don’t want to wait. The web changes constantly and you have to continually stay on top of it or your website will be quickly outdated. You have to be adaptive and ready for change.

Stephen ends the presentation by talking about how searching for things you are interested in is becoming more useful with viewzi. This website helps you find what you are interested in with a new and visually appealing approach.

One last thing we talked about includes what would your brand narrative be if explained with a chair. Below are examples he showed us. What would your chair look like?

Contact Information
2 Bloor St. W. 6th Floor, Toronto, ON, M4W 3R6
P: 416.972.5745
F: 416.972.5486
C: 416.357.8945
stephen.bennett@juniperpark.com