Things I learned from the second day at We Can Create.

Chris Graham

Film director, New Zealand

From Chris Graham, I learned that as a director (or a designer) you need to assert your vision. Even if you are working with big names and you are no-one. People will respect you for it.

He also reiterated a concept about portfolios I’ve feel strongly about: If you present the kinds of work you want to do, you won’t have to pitch to do it later. Look at your portfolio as a pitching tool.

Heat happens for a moment and then it dissipates. Pick yourself up and move on.

"Music videos are like visual poetry"

Q&A with Te Radar

Engin Celikbas from Kesselskramer

Advertising, Amsterdam

Companies are changing and becoming multi-disciplinary. Hype and a different perspective will make your project memorable.

The smallest ad campaign ever

Eric Rodenback from Stamen Design

Data visualisation, San Fransisco

Eric Rodenback from Stamen Design brought together data with interesting ways to present it. It sounds geeky and it is geeky, but it’s wildly entertaining, beautiful and educational. He works with graphs, maps, diagrams like you have never seen them before.

One thing that I found interesting: To protect their hard work, cartographers and companies add fictitious trap streets to their maps. But shouldn’t maps be available to anyone to use and distribute? The result of this is open street map which is user submitted, open source maps for anyone to use.

We are information consumers

At home talking about meteor discovery before the onstage planet-like displays.

Making something for the first time is progress. Different ways of expressing discovery.

A crowdsourced Q&A with Te Radar. Crowdsourced meaning audience members yelled out their questions.

Karin Fong from Imaginary Forces

Motion graphics, USA

Don’t be generic. Make your client’s pieces as specific as possible.

We all have a bag of tricks up our sleeve to try new projects on. When you see something you like, let it inspire you and keep it in your mind for future projects.

This is what a passionate person looks like

Still proud of her early work from student days

Eike Koenig from Hort

Graphic design, Berlin

“Always look to the future and how you want to build relationships”.

“By accepting your limitations, you gain freedom”.

"Focus on things you would like to do rather than things people think you should do".

Smooth, silk

Hort band member

The whole band