I remember in my fours years of studying, watching a few drop out of the Fine Arts program because they saw that the workload didn’t match the income potential upon graduation. The problem is that the passion followed the desire for money when in reality it should be the other way around. Designers everywhere need to first be passionate about what they do and then let the money follow.

Two weeks ago I accompanied my younger sister to Brooklyn for a college campus tour. As we walked through the campus, I began to remember my time in college although it wasn’t too long ago. One thing that stood out to me was when the tour guide made it clear to everyone that they were paying to go to school for a grade; the professor wasn’t going to treat them as they were in high school. They would have to stay on top of how well they were doing, homework, time management, etc. No professor was going to remind them of what they needed to do.

This reminded me of the mind set that young designers often have when going to college. The one where they expect the professor to teach every program to them and the latest greatest techniques when in reality its only those students who truly have the desire and motivation to push themselves to learn who end up excelling. The main problem is that students aren’t taught how to work for themselves. They are taught to create a portfolio, get a job at some big firm (where they have no creative leverage) and start off at the bottom as a grunt until they work their way up the visual communications ladder.

There is nothing wrong with this path. However, to set up the academic program as if this is the only way is ridiculous. I encourage young design students to find someone who is active in the field that you are trying to break into and learn as much as you can from them. The benefits of having a design mentor will far outweigh the the amount of information gained from a formal college education.

Today I got a lesson in Priority juggling. It began when I arrived at class without my research materials, and came to the realization that without it I couldn’t do anything but sit at my desk and stare fixatedly at that silky haired Goddess that usually sat next to me, but my grades wouldn’t appreciate that. So I was allowed leave the classroom to go to the lab to get the research material and then go to the library use the material. While in the Mac lab looking up Shovel nosed lizards I recall this conversation my Mentor Ryan and I had moments ago about research. When this thought came back to mind I got a little frustrated and felt over whelmed by the thought of having to balance a real world job and school projects. My first thought was to forget about the class work, and just focus job, but then I remembered the importance of keeping a commitment and that school was a huge life changing commitment. So I decided to multitask it is turning out well. I the end there is no doubt in my mind that 3^rd Lounge work will benefit me more but I have to learn to juggle sometime so why not start today.

Here are some sketches from The Gospel Music Lounge project. Redesigning a brand is no easy task. Every good concept starts from the mind but should hit paper before moving on to digital mediums.

Because this was a redesign, it was vital to build on what was already created rather than starting from scratch. The headphone was a prominent icon in the previous logo so the idea was enhanced to meet the new standards of The Gospel Music Lounge. Below are just some of the sample sketches.

Our newest and most engaging project for The Gospel Music Lounge is the GML website. Launched just last week, it is still undergoing quality assurance testing. It is set to be a major platform for the company and houses the company blog, a music player as well as the GML online store.

As an official Blackberry user, I was upset to see that the Blackberry Storm was getting its butt whooped by the iPhone. Needless to say, we got right to work on a new spot that would hopefully bring a new energy to the BlackBerry name. Below is our experimental piece, inspired by the BlackBerry Storm.

We were hard at work producing the latest bumper for The Gospel Music Lounge. This intro was played continuously throughout their “Live On Stage” Open Mic event. The show was great and we were happy to have contributed our motion graphics. The next part of the project will be the coming soon intro for the GML website. Stay tuned… Below is the intro from the show.

Sunday, made exactly 2 years since 3rd Lounge was founded. In celebration of two very stressful, intimidating, crazy, hectic, ridiculous, wonderful, exciting, motivating, inspiring, and productive years, we will be posting our new demo reel as well as releasing new 3rd Lounge promotional animations! We have way more to come in the next two years!

The Legal Tender piece started from an experiment to create a huge image made up of composites of different kinds of money. The final image ended being over 70 inches wide. (which can be viewed here) The next step was to animate the huge picture by scrolling it in the background of the video. Other animated elements were added to it to push the visual appeal.

I’ve been doing a lot of print work lately and in my journey through the world of CMYK, my RGB roots kept on calling me back. I recently redid a Myspace page for Pop/R&B singer T.Monique and created this motion graphics intro for her page.

T.Monique Myspace intro | (Quicktime Movie 15 MB)