‘My Favourite …’ – Week 026

Huw – My Favourite: Predictably, my favourite for this week is the beginning of the RBS Six Nations Championship. It’s a tournament I look forward to each year. I love it! I can’t wait for Wales’ first match tomorrow against England in Twickenham. Drama and excitement of the highest order, followed by the inevitable hangover on Sunday morning. What more do you want?

Rob – My Favourite: On Wednesday I arrived at work to find this lovely-jubbly mug on my desk. Every team member of HDD has their own pantone mug so 4 months after starting my job here I am now officially part of the team. I chose Pantone 363 C, Pea Green, and this mug is sure to make others green with envy. See what I did there?

I’ll get my coat.

Graham – My Favourite: Edible typography courtesy of Beverly HSU’s Helvetica cookie cutters. The simplest ideas are often the best and in this case, the tastiest.

Designer vacancy

Huw David Design is expanding. If you are highly motivated, ambitious, possess the ability to solve problems creatively and interested in working for a young and exciting company, please read on.

We have immediate openings for a middleweight/senior designer to be based in our Llantrisant studio. The successful candidate will be heavily involved in the design and development of a wide range of projects covering branding, graphic design and digital media.

We are searching for a stand out individual, blessed with exceptional design talent and a hunger to regularly produce work of an embarrassingly high quality. Candidates must be able to demonstrate proven experience in the design industry (3 + years) either leading or being a crucial element of a strong creative team.

Candidates will also possess a positive work ethic, be able to handle a fast-paced, deadline driven environment and have a ‘can do’ attitude. Fluency in all major design packages is a given as the role will involve working on all elements of a job, from conception to delivery. Experience of website design and build, especially CSS, is a real advantage as is the ability to work with and develop creative marketing campaigns for online and offline environments.

If that’s not all, the suitable candidate will also be committed to the ongoing development of their skills and will be proactive in continually pushing the conceptual, creative and practical strength of Huw David Design.

Driven by a passion for design, any member of the Huw David Design team must have a quality pushing mindset, with a sharp eye for not only concept and execution, but also the production and practical business uses of each project.

Candidates must be ready to challenge themselves and others.

To apply: CV’s, portfolio samples (PDF or website links) and salary expectations to jobs@huwdavid.net

Unfortunately we cannot reply to every applicant. With so many people looking for jobs at the moment we can only guarantee that responses will be given to those shortlisted.

Please, no recruitment agencies.

Closing date: 01 March 2010.

‘My Favourite …’ – Week 025

Huw – My Favourite: I hate wishing my life away, but my favourite thing this week is waving goodbye to January. It’s been a horrible month. The new year started with so much promise, but that went quickly out of the window once the snow came!

Then we were hit with a fault on one of our servers that caused us no end of headaches. Thankfully we got through it all in one piece. February looks set to be a much better month, if not just for the start of the Six Nations and my birthday! Bring it on.

Andy – My Favorite: My favourite this week is this amazing title sequence for the BBC’s coverage of the Winter Olympics. Film director Marc Craste and designer Jon Klassen were briefed by agency RKCR/Y&R to create a film based around a legendary quest, where an Inuit hero retrieves a spiritual stone that has been stolen from a mystical totem by a giant bear. View it in all it’s glory here

Rob – My Favourite: Last March I went to Marrakech and experienced some delicious cuisine, tagines to be more specific. I have since invested in my own and tonight I am using it for the first time as we have guests for dinner.

In case tagines are new to you, a tagine is a Moroccan cooking pot and also refers to the food cooked within it. It has a conical shaped lid that helps preserve moisture in the food as the steam condenses in the inside of the lid. The shape of the lid also creates circulation within the dish, infusing the food with spices and flavours. The food is left to simmer for hours resulting inn tender delicious grub.

I am predicting this will be my favourite meal of the week, I hope our guests agree!

Graham – My Favourite: A website dedicated to the magical moments behind the camera of some of the most memorable movies ever made.

‘My Favourite…’ – Week 024

Huw – My Favourite: It’s been a tough week this week. After a major technical fault with one of our dedicated servers stress levels in the studio have been at an all time high. So picking a highlight is very hard. However there is one shining light for me in what was a very dark week. It is this lovely site Typo/graphic Posters. It’s full to bursting point with typographic goodness. The site features posters from over 300 designers and agencies from around the world, all featured for their strong ‘typographical and graphical content’.

Andy – My Favourite: My favourite this week are these great illustrations by Mr Bingo.  The hand silkscreened prints are available to buy, with all profits going to UNICEF’s Haiti Earthquake Children’s Appeal. Dig deep.

Rob – My Favourite: Call of Duty Modern Warfare on the Nintendo Wii. This week has been challenging, hectic, pressured and a steep learning curve (not that I’m complaining) so after a hard day’s work Call of Duty has been the perfect distraction to help me unwind of an evening. I showed the enemy who was boss … and then they killed me. It’s the taking part that counts though.

Graham – My Favourite: A text from a friend letting me know the stork is going to deliver a bundle of joy shortly.

Peugeot – new year, new identity

Branding is a big part of Huw David Design so we are always keen to see what other’s are doing in the way of rebranding and creating new identities.

We recently spotted an article on the Brand New website (a division of underconsideration.com) about Peugeot’s recent rebrand, or refresh. They unveiled a new and improved lion identity along with the new tagline, ‘Motion and Emotion’.

It is less common for such well established brands to rebrand or refresh their identity and the article on Brand New is a great insight into the Peugeot brand, their new marketing campaign and a critique of the new logo.

‘My Favourite …’ – Week 023

Andy – My Favourite: My favourite this week was the rain! For the last 2 weeks the heavy snow has been a nightmare, making simple car journeys stressful, walking an arctic expedition and generally causing havoc. Thankfully Friday’s rain has washed most of it away – I never thought I’d say it but the rain is awesome! I’m sure I’ll be sick of it by Monday…

Rob – My Favourite: I’m a sucker for packaging and despite the good advice, I always judge a book by its cover. Same applies to this new District 9 DVD. Ok so I saw the film twice in the cinema so knew it was worth buying but I bought this steel book copy rather than the standard one because frankly the case looks amazing. I may be shallow but my DVD shelf is full of packaging gems.

Huw – My Favourite: One of my favourite quotations goes ‘tough times never last, tough people do’. This week my father in-law optimised this saying as he battled against the elements to ensure that the animals on the farm were cared for. As the rest of the nation ground to a halt, Howie was out and about, sticking to his daily routine. He’s an absolute nutter! So my favourite this week is this photograph of him.

If you’re wondering it was taken on Wednesday, 13 January 2010. Not 1910 as his clothing might suggest!

Graham – My Favourite: A piece of musically inspired graffiti found in a back lane in Roath, Cardiff whilst walking my sister’s dog.

Avatar – a visual feast

As we work in a creative industry, we often turn to the work of others for inspiration and to stay informed as to trends and events in the design world.

This research is usually focused on design blogs, marketing campaigns and branding work. Occasionally though we can draw inspiration from other disciplines and that happened recently with the film Avatar.

We don’t want to discuss the film in two much detail, for those of you who haven’t seen it yet, but it is inspirational in the way that Director James Cameron pushed the boundaries of creativity, even developing the technology needed to render the largely computer generated 3D world.

Ok so Avatar isn’t without flaws but in this context they can largely be forgiven. Perhaps the characters aren’t as defined as other films and the rather simple narrative isn’t going to win any awards for originality (other than the setting for it) but good storytelling is often the result of combined elements and there are for more positive strands to this film than negative.

The film is a feast for the eyes using colour exquisitely, creating a world that despite being fictional, allows the audience to suspend their disbelief in order to become immersed in another land.

Whilst we aren’t thinking of introducing over-sized blue creatures into our next design project, witnessing a film that was clearly a passion, planned in intricate detail and clearly imagined, can only serve as inspiration for anybody. It also demonstrates that creativity is all around us and it pays to look beyond the usual blogs and resources.

If we can bring the same level of attention to detail, an equal amount of audience immersion and visuals that are simply as stunning as James Cameron’s Avatar, then we will be more than pleased with the end result and we think our clients would be too.

The official Huw David Design film review panel award Avatar the maximum five stars. An inspirational must see.

‘My Favourite …’ – Week 022

Welcome to the first ‘My Favourite …’ of 2010 and the new decade. This is a big event and the team have not disappointed in their choices.

Graham – My Favourite: A snow sculpture of a dog found in Roath Recreation Ground. You have to love the attention to detail with the bowl, bone and hat. Grrr-rrrrreat!

Rob – My Favourite: I was going to pick my new trainers (yawn) until this photo appeared on the BBC website this morning. What a fantastic image and one that clearly shows how blooming cold it is in this here United Kingdom. If you look closely enough you can see my snowman waving from Barry. Vote for him here as the best of the HDD team’s efforts!

Andy – My Favourite: My fav is my mate Nick’s new dog. It’s a cross between a terrier and something else that I can’t remember. He’s yet to be named and is pretty cool!

Huw – My Favourite: This week there is one clear favourite in my book. It’s not the snow! The big freeze has caused too much trouble this week. Snow is hard to project manage! My favourite this week is the new hat, scarf and gloves that I had as a Christmas present. Without these essential items of clothing I too would have fallen victim to the elements. Winter woollies rule!

The big freeze

Well what a chilly start to the New Year it’s been. We’ve had snow on the ground here in Llantrisant since Tuesday. Thankfully we don’t seem to be as badly hit as some parts of the UK.

Some of the HDD team haven’t been able to make it into the office at all for two days. The snow and ice has forced them to ‘work from home’ with snowball fights, sledges, snowmen, and the remainders of the Christmas chocolate.

It’s a tough life and those of us lucky enough to be able to get into the office have been thinking of their hardships.

Admittedly the snow is causing us difficulties at the moment — forcing us to run on a skeleton team and having to cancel a host of meetings. On the plus side, it is blessing us with some stunning views across the fields from the HDD office.

Hopefully we’ll be back to full strength tomorrow.

HDD Snowman build-off

As the snow sends the country spiralling into chaos, it has also ensured that the HDD team are all stranded and working from home. Despite this we were united in our latest design challenge, snowman building during lunch. Below are the results, please let us know your favourite in the comments so we can determine who the ‘best designer’ is here at HDD!

Note that Huw has been too busy manning the fort, answering the phone, rearranging meetings, and generally keeping HDD afloat in the team’s absence. If he has time to create a masterpiece this will be added next week. The other works of art are …

Andy – Here’s my snowman chilling out in the garden.

Rob – I thought less was more so my snowman is smaller than a pint bottle. I used coffee beans for the eyes, the tip of a carrot for the nose and a cloak from a vintage E.T. action figure to keep him snug.

Graham – A snowman of fortune cleaning up the wintery streets of Cardiff. If you have a winter related problem, if no Council can grit, and if you can find him, maybe you can hire Gary Gritter.