Ronald Cala II’s talk at the Thinking Creatively conference was happily my second lecture of his that I have attended. Both times I have certainly found it to be completely worth my time. I was looking forward to it during the whole conference and was not let down at all.
Ronald’s lecture topic wasn’t just about showing off his work, unlike other speakers who feel this is only a forum for them to show of their work and talk and not enlighten. Ronald held my interest the entire lecture because he combined his work with the great topic of collaboration. That is the main way that he creates his work, with the exception of some very early work all projects he showed were collaborations with different artists for each project. I love knowing that by working together has added to his designs.
He spoke about how the best way to collaborate- have someone else do what you lack in. That gives you the best of both worlds, having your own design style and what it is you can improve on in your work. It is also the best way to network by making connections. If I ever get the opportunity I would love to collaborate with Ronald Cala. Overall his lecture was definitely a great experience, I love everything he has said to inspire us. If you have the opportunity to see a Ronald Cala II lecture, please do because you will not regret it and come away with a great outlook.
My first time at a Jessica Hische lecture was at the Thinking Creatively Design Conference and it was amazing. I went to the lecture already knowing some of her work and being interested in her typography. Yet I didn’t know I would come away with even more respect for her work and a hint of jealousy (wishing I was more naturally type capable.)
Jessica showed a lot of her portfolio and beyond. Since her work/style is something that I was very interested in I didn’t mind that she only spoke of her work. Which is something that I’m not usually thrilled about because I can read and look at those type of items on their websites. However with Jessica actually there to explain her work more it was much more enjoyable than I expected. Her specialty is hand lettering and illustration, which she showed us many samples of.
Unlike many designers who are very busy and don’t truly have all that much time to talk to fans or students. Jessica was different she stayed after her lecture and spoke with everyone in the room who waited around. I felt a personal touch was a great thing her fans, (including me) appreciated. The designers that actually care about talking with their fans are looked higher upon in my book. If I get another chance to attend another Jessica Hische lecture, I will be the first one there. She had a great presentation and such interesting information about her work, if you can ,you should attend also.
For the 3rd year in a row I have attended the Thinking Creative Design Conference held at Kean University. Each year I have been more and more surprised by the interesting designers who have spoken there. At my very first conference I happily enjoyed a lecture from John Langdon, the creator behind the ambigrams of the Dan Brown books “Angels and Demons” and “The DaVinci Code.” Getting one on one lectures with these designers helps to understand where they came from and how they started to work their way up in design.
This year two of my personal favorite designers were speakers at the conference; Jessica Hische and Ronald Cala, II. It was great to see Ronald in-person again and very inspirational to finally meet Miss Hische. This Thinking Creatively really gave me my money’s worth since I admire these people personally. There were of course many designers that I did enjoy but probably would not have attended the conference just for. There were two added sessions besides just designer lectures; a charrette and a portfolio review. Neither had been done before at Thinking Creatively, so I’m glad they are trying to do more than just lectures.
There are many great things about Thinking Creatively, especially how close it is to my location. However I still had my gripes about the way certain parts of it were run.
Unfortunately timing of the lectures was always an issue, since after the first one or two lectures of the morning. Having lectures run too long causing people to of course miss the beginning of the next lecture. Or people will have to leave the lecture early to get to the next one in time. I also felt that not keeping the speakers on a schedule leads to missed opportunities.
Specifically on the first day, the last lecture of the day, the keynote speaker of the first day was a Disney Imagineer. He didn’t start his speech on time, which also lead to him running over the allotted time. Unfortunately causing me to miss an entire hour more of his speech, because I had scheduled a prior engagement after reviewing the listed end time in the program. I feel as though if everything had run smoothly and on time I would have certainly left that first day much happier with the way the day ended. Needless to say I was very disappointed at the fact that I had to miss one of the most important lectures (that I was enjoying) because of their scheduling issues.
Lesson learned if attending Thinking Creatively, don’t expect it to be on schedule. I found that to be the biggest downfall of the conference.
Aside from the horrible timing this year, the Thinking Creatively conference is a great local (non NYC) design conference that definitely is running a long side with the other larger design conferences, such as How and AIGA and great competition in price. Be sure to check out the designers speaking there April 2011.
