Paz Now import: 2009

Friday, 13 November 2009

Paz now interning at Paz

My design adventure in mainland Europe has now finished. I've had some great experiences in the last nine months tasting both design education and the publishing industry in Switzerland and Germany. I've met some amazing people and learnt a lot about the industry and myself. I've learnt that I should use the three years of my degree to get the absolute most of my time as a design student. This has led me to the decision to take a year out after my exchange semester in Zurich, to gain some invaluable work experience and be better prepared for my final year at university as well as the 'real life'. After serving a three-months editorial design internship at one of Germany´s most respected newspapers, I have now returned to Bristol and will use the next few months for personal development. This basically means that I am interning at myself, trying out the life of a freelancer and making use of all the learning resources out there that I've never had time for until now. I can learn whatever I want, whenever I want and as much as I want. Something tells me that this is gonna rock!

The only thing that upsets me a little bit is that the view has changed from lovely mountains and exciting trains to victorian terraced houses and a brick wall. Ah well, can't have everything.

Sunday, 25 October 2009

Munich Toy Town

Meanwhile it´s autumn in Munich and I've already been struggling with snow storms on my way to work. To counteract the dark atmosphere here are some photos from sunnier days. A view from the Olympia tower that proves that Munich can also look like a toy town.

Monday, 5 October 2009

Interview without words

There´s still a month left with my internship at SZ-Magazin but two of my fellow interns finished their´s last week. As a 'thank you' to the team we produced a special edition of the "Sagen Sie Jetzt Nichts" interview without words, a very popular award-winning column in our magazine. Obviously it won't make a lot of sense for you if you don't speak German or are familiar with our inside jokes. I thought I'd post it anyway because we found it funny.

Sunday, 4 October 2009

Terrorists win?

Today is the last day of Oktoberfest, the most famous beer festival in the world. Before I came to Munich, I was looking forward to experiencing this curious event that is somewhat like a carnival where everybody wears the same costumes. Unfortunately it turned out that nobody wanted to go with me because a few weeks ago Al-Qaeda had the funny idea to spoil everybody´s fun by claiming that Afghanistan is no Octoberfest – which is true – but it caused both, Bavarians as well as bearded foreigners to have a hard time enjoying the beer fest. 700 policemen turned the place into a fortress and everybody who had a "funny feeling" changed their plans and let me alone with my determined plans to enjoy a Maß or two in one of the beer tents. Ironically more people died of alcohol-related incidents than suicide bombers. Funny isn't it?

Saturday, 5 September 2009

Autumn is here

As you would expect in Germany, even the weather is on time and gave us a wet start of autumn last week with the first rain on my way to and from work. You could say it´s almost English conditions with the exception that there´s less wind and Munich is flatter which makes it easier to cycle with an umbrella. The view from my office on the 9th floor is getting better too. I'm almost tempted to spend the entire day staring out of the window and watching how the clouds wrap around the mountains. And if you're now wondering if there isn't anything more exciting happening, don't worry: the beer tastes good, Munich is getting smaller, I now have flatmates and many exciting magazines are under way.

Thursday, 20 August 2009

Today at your newsagents

If you live in London, you might be able to grab a copy of the Süddeutsche Zeitung today and have a look at the new issue of the SZ-Magazin supplement. The new design becomes really obvious now, it´s very different and looks a lot younger than before. Also the content feels different after the redesign. The magazine features the iPhone paintings of UK artist David Hockney in original size.

It´s also the first issue that I was involved in during my editorial design internship in Munich. Some bits and bops that I made during my first few days include the photo montage at the cross-word page and the little illustrations decorating the story on page 20 and 22. I also spent a lot of time with the images of the Cold Water Canyan Park. It sounds little but it´s actually more than I expected I would be allowed to do in the first week. It´s great, they expect 100% from you from day 1. Nobody tells you what you have to do, you're just expected to come up with your own ideas and suggest solutions to sometimes such tricky questions like "how can we illustrate a competition where readers can win brainy audio books" and then you go and put some headphones on a philosopher´s head and they love it. The most amazing thing however is to see how such a publication gets put together by so many people. It´s surprising, it´s new, it´s different from anything you learn at uni. And it´s getting better every day.

And in case you're wondering: yes, the image at the top is a 3D boxshot. Just like the image of the book that I made for page 33.

Saturday, 15 August 2009

Week 2 in Munich

Last Thursday the SZ-Magazin had a relaunch. It´s the first issue in a new, younger design and also the first one I was involved in as an intern. Although there´s not really anything that I did myself in this issue, it´s still interesting to be able to have a look behind the scenes of such a redesign. However, a little piece of work that I did was published not in the magazine but surprisingly enough in the actual newspaper. It´s a photo montage of Bob Dylan with a santa hat that I made the other day for our music blog. Would be nicer if they had given me some credit though. Anyway, I'm still enjoying being here, I got to grips with the workflow and can now start coming out of my shell and getting more creative.

Saturday, 8 August 2009

Paz now with SZ

Some things have changed here. Instead of Quöllfrisch, there´s now Hofbräu, instead of grotesque there´s now blackletter, instead of ´ss' I now use 'ß' when I write in German. That´s all signs of my move from Switzerland to Bavaria. Not only do I write the sz ('eszet') ligature again, I can also eat the lovely 'Eszet Schnitten' on my breakfast roll and even more: I now work at the SZ, the 'Süddeutsche Zeitung' (literally South German newpaper), Germany´s largest daily broadsheet or rather at the Friday supplement, the SZ Magazin, a full colour lifestyle magazine with more than 800 000 readers every week that has won numerous awards of the Art Directors Club over the years.

Thursday, 30 July 2009

Grüß Gott not Grüezi

Some guessed it right, when I asked what city I went to for my interview. It´s a city where most words end with -erl instead of -li and where you hear "Grüß Gott" instead of "Grüezi" and "Vielen Dank, auf Wiederschauen" instead of "Merci vilmol, uf Wiederluege". It´s a place famous for beer and sausages not of cheese and chocolate and shop signs are in blackletter instead of Helvetica. It´s Munich, the bavarian capital, famous for lederhosen and pretzels and whatnot.

Here I found a lovely flat just by the English Garden, where I'm still unpacking my four bags with probably around 100kg of stuff. I have updated my contact details, so if you want to come and visit or send me a postcard, feel free; the address is here.

Tuesday, 28 July 2009

Bye Bye Switzerland

Another stage of my life draws to a close. Not only have I finished the 2nd year at university, I also experienced yet another culture, language and lifestyle. It was often difficult to explain why a German who studies in England does an exchange semester in Switzerland and it brought many interestingly entangled cultural experiences. It wasn't always easy and it certainly wasn't cheap but it was definitely worthwile. Time to look at some statistics (you know I love it) ...

The last 168 days cost me approximately 7300 Swiss Francs (£ 4150) altogether. More than expected. I spent alone £2360 for accommodation, and another £865 for travel costs. The tickets are nice pieces of design though; they feature an image of the Swiss mountains on the front. When I arrange my collected tickets in line, I can create a panoramic image of the alps in the scale of approx. 1:245000. The remaining £930 for living costs are actually quite reasonable, seeing that the living costs are higher and the cheese is seductive — which is why I invested 150 CHF in cheese and ate approx. 7.5 kilograms of it. Almost as much as I ate chocolate, probably between 5 and 7 kilograms in 24 weeks. With about £35 per week, I had a very good life in Europes most expensive city (but also the one with the highest quality of life). I'll miss the cheese and chocolate but also the Rösti, Chäschüechli, Rüblitorte, Fasnachtschüechli, Schümli, Gipfeli, Guetsli, Butterzopf, Bürli, Husbrot, Ruchbrot, Kneippbrot, Nussbrot, Kartoffelbrot, St. Gallerbrot, Silserbrot, Krustenkranz, Pulet, Trutenfleisch, Landjäger, Mini-Pics, Älplerwurst, Cervelas, the various cheeses and of course fondue. Most of these things are available in a similar form in other countries, but they don't sound so cute and I don't think they'd taste as good.

One thing that was cheap however, was extracurricular education. I spent altogether under £30 and saw about 25 exhibitions, shows and talks. At the Design Museum in Zurich I went to see the exhibitions "Good Design, Good Business - Swiss Graphic Design & Advertising by Geigy", "Irma Boom - Book Design", "EveryThing Design" and "Robots - From Motion to Emotion" as well as the premiere of Objectified and talks with Swiss as well as internationally renowned designers, artists and critics such as Gary Hustwit, Paola Antonelli, Peter Noever, Ruedi Baur, Jean Etienne Aebi, Richard Hollis, Lars Müller, Megi Zumstein, Irma Boom and Manuel Krebs discussing "Swiss Style Forever", "Authorship", "Good Design = Good Business?", "Materialize it" and "What Will We Collect Tomorrow?". Other exhibitions I saw include "Hot Spots" at the Kunsthaus Zurich, "Witzerland" at the National Museum, the Centre Dürrenmatt in Neuchatel, "Bilderrätsel" at the ETH and "Conceptual Games" at the Kunsthaus Aarau.

And because that still wasn't enough, I went to conferences like "Tag der Schrift" (typography day) with Matthias Noordzij and Gerard Unger, "Design Follows" with Tossa and Jörg Boner, "Illustrators Lunch" with Martin Hoppe from Bitrats, industry talks about proofing and rapid 3D prototyping and most notably to Tweakfest, the digital lifestyle conference.

This way I could make the most of the excellent education I got at the Zurich University of the Arts where my curriculum was filled with modules about Digital Media, Scientific Visualisation and Information Design. I attended lectures about User Experience Design, Convergence Design, the Digital and the Analogue, Iconicity, Isotype, Technical Illustrations, Mapping and Orientation and special events such as the Design Symposium with several presentations from alumni, who talked about their experiences in the industry.

To round it off I went to both a cheese and a chocolate factory and local events like the nightly carnival in Basle and Sächsilüüte, the anual Snowman burning in Zurich. Speaking of travelling, I certainly did enough of that. I've seen the North with lake constance and the rhine falls. I've seen the south an a panoramic train ride through Ticino to Milan. I've seen the North West, Lucerne, Engelberg and the Fürenalp. I went on the train along the entire North side of the alps up to Montreux and Lausanne, then the same with the South side from Chur to Fiesch, the Eggishorn, Aletsch glacier and back via Berne. I've been to the East, in Appenzell, on top of the Säntis mountain, later to Sargans and across the border to Liechtenstein. I went to Geneva in the West and finally crossed the largest rope bridge in Europe after a vertiginous mountain hike. I've been to every one of the four language regions, visited 24 of the 26 cantons and all the main cities. I haven't even travelled my home country that extensively. I travelled by train, trolley bus, post bus, car, boat, cable car, tram, gondola, cog wheel train ... probably the only thing I didn't do was riding a cow.

It all sounds a lot and yes, it was a lot. I'm surprised how much I managed to do in these 6 months. Maybe I'll make a little book out of it. But now, sadly, it´s time to say goodbye — or as the Swiss say: Uf Wiederluege — and give back my lovely violet residence permit.

It was nice and I'll surely come back.

Sunday, 26 July 2009

An alpine overdose

My Switzerland adventure is running out soon and because I start packing tomorrow, I decided to treat myself to a few mountains today so I would keep good memories of what makes this country so unique. Well, so far the theory. I picked the trift glacier and Europes largest suspension bridge, a sight that my Berlitz travel guide described very nicely to be in easy reach of Meiringen, where I've been before.

To cut things short: I learnt an important lesson today. I learnt the meaning of 'alpine' in 'alpine trail' and that a white-red-white trail marking is different to a normal yellow one. The rest of the story tell my shoes ...

... and the photographic impressions.

Wednesday, 22 July 2009

Enjoying the laziness

But that´s not actually true. Inbetween lie-ins and walks around the lake, I'm enjoying my last days in Switzerland with trips around the country. There are still a few places that I haven't seen, so I need to check them out before I leave. A few places I visited recently are the mini-state Liechtenstein and its capital Vaduz, the second largest city of Switzerland Geneva and one of the smallest capitals in Europe Bern. Below you can click on the photos to take you to the album with impressions of these three lovely holiday locations.

Tuesday, 21 July 2009

Time Out

I am currently on holiday, which means I'm doing exactly nothing. Not even writing about doing nothing as you might have noticed. I'm enjoying the sun with temperatures >30°C, crystal clear water and swimming with the swans or the rainy days by sitting at home, drinking Rivella and watching the lightning outside. It´s the perfect way to round out my Switzerland experience.

The exchange semester has taught me many things. Not only practical skills like Flash prototyping or pronouncing Chäschüechli but also things to do with my role and identity as a designer and as a design student. I visited both degree shows in Zurich and in Bristol and I can say that there are some fundamental differences between the two schools.

The Zurich University of the Arts appears to be a very traditional yet up-to-date art school. Their approach seems generally very strict and business-like. Every student starts with the same conditions. Through entrance exams the school makes sure that they get the people that are right for this kind of education. The 20 chosen students per year are talented, intelligent, creative and most of all committed. It is a requirement to bring your own computer to have access to study and many students will buy one from the in-house Apple store. An allround industry standard software package for about £30 (that´s the Adobe Creative Suite, iLife, Apple Final Cut Pro and a few extra programmes for font management etc. plus about 2000 professional fonts) allows all students to have the necessary software on their own machines and learn it not only in formal workshops but also through working with it all the time. In the first three semesters the students learn the basics of graphic design in theory and practice not through projects but through targetted lectures with exercises and workshops. After this, every student is at exactly the same level in terms of skills, knowledge and even hard- and software. The rest of the course is filled with exciting projects, always up-to-date and individually tailored to this particular year group. Throughout the course, the students attend usually every day regardless if there are lectures or not. They come to school in the morning and work around their own personal desk space, just like a real job. Work is discussed in presentations, usually weekly. These presentations are taken very seriously, they're well prepared and reminded me of professional pitches. In personal tutorials there are always at least two tutors with every group of two to four students. Sometimes there were four tutors working with a group of four students. These tutorials usually took 45 minutes. The lecturers/tutors all seem to come from an industry background. They either have their own design studio, work for well-known companies or are practicing researchers. Final presentations were hardly any different to the weekly interim presentations, except that at the end of a project there was always some kind of official celebration with free beer for instance or going out for a meal with the whole class and all lecturers/tutors. This created a really good atmosphere among the class and gave them a sense of achievement. The work is generally very much type and print based with a strong bias towards posters and corporate identity. Though the course has an interdisciplinary element in every semester i.e. there is the possibility to choose two modules from a different course every year. I have to say that the work produced looks very 'typically swiss' and professional from a very early stage of the course (i.e. first-years produce work at second or third-years standard). The different year groups mix rather well too. This is probably due to the small numbers and some collaborative projects. All in all is Zurich a no-nonsense art school. If you work hard, you'll fit in. If you let things slide, expect a bollocking.

UWE on the other hand is rather laid back. If you let things slide, either you get away with it without anybody noticing or you get reasonably good marks anyway as long as you make it look like you made an effort. The expectations are not high. The approach seems to be rather experimental, things are made up along the way. The numbers are four times as high and the entrance requirements are different. I think UWE produces a different breed of designers. Traditional skills are being talked about but not exactly taught. There is no common ground to start from. Every student is an individual and leaves as an individual. Some are very skilled and professional, and some keep producing 'amateurish' work throughout the course. Some don't even own a computer and hold a somewhat outlandish view that graphic design doesn't need to have anything to do with digital. Tutors are on the same level as students, they're not better nor more qualified. Some don't even hold a design related degree. Briefs are deliberately left open for interpretation. Students are prepared for the industry insofar that it is assumed that they will work in all sorts of jobs vaguely related to anything creative. The more 'arty' your work is and the more individual, the better your grades. Most of the work is either motion graphics or type and print based with, ironically, a funny elitist stance towards typography, which means that there is a smattering of traditional typographic terms but no solid knowledge that actually helps anyone. A lot of this work tends to copy the Swiss style of the 50s. Generally I think Graphic Design at UWE is for artist designers or designer artists. Not the good old Bauhaus concept "form follows function" seems important but other values such as individuality, personality or even quirkyness.

So last month I went to see the degree shows at UWE and in Zurich. In Zurich, I wasn't too impressed by the work of the Visual Communication (ie. Graphic Design) course, which I blame on the change from Diplomas to Bachelor degrees (don't get me started). In Bristol I had a very strange deja vu when I stepped into the exhibition. It was basically exactly the same as last year, only with a different font. What´s special about UWE´s degree show is that for them a ´show' is different from an 'exhibition'. That means that the work is put into categories (posters, books, film, etc.) and the work of every student is displayed all over the place. If you want so see the work of a particular student, you'll have to walk around and do some sort of easter egg hunt. It shows the philosophy behind the course. It´s the UWE artist collective. Even though each student works independently (and at home), they get displayed as one. This way of presenting the work doesn't take into consideration that potential employers might visit the show to look for new talent. It shows that the course is not so much aimed at preparing students for the industry but rather to let them play around creatively for 3 years and see where it takes them. Not necessarily a bad thing, but different from the traditional way.

I'm a very pragmatically thinking person. Although my work has a lot of personality and even seems very arty, I've always (perhaps unsuccessfully) looking for purposeful design. I expect a course to teach me essential skills. I want my lecturers to be knowledgeable experts that I can ask questions when I'm stuck. I want definitive answers, not some esoteric 'maybe you could try to draw with your left hand' sort of advise. The aimlessness, lack of discipline and purpose as well as the somewhat contradictory nature of the course made me grow increasingly uncomfortable with UWE before I went to Zurich. Don't get me wrong, I love UWE as a university, I love the campus and I enjoyed the two and a half years I spent there very much. I just missed the ´serious' academic part that a university is supposed to offer. But through experiencing the exact opposite in Zurich, I found out that I need more than just discipline, purpose and definitive answers. I guess I have to find a middle way. Creative freedom, a pinch of crazyness and yet a high level of usability and awesome visual design is what I'm aiming for. I guess I can't rely on a course to give me exactly what I need, even when I'm paying a lot of money for it. It´s not something you could buy, it´s something you create yourself. There´s only one more question: What do I need a design school for anyway?

Or maybe I'm just fed up with everything and need a break. Anyhow, I decided to give myself some time to think about that before I'm heading into my third year. I'll take a year out and treat myself to some work experience in various fields of graphic design that interest me. I'm not sure what I'm going to learn exactly but I hope to become clearer about what kind of designer I want to be and how I can build a career that makes me happy and satisfied ... and have some fun along the way.

Saturday, 27 June 2009

Holiday at last

The semester here in Zurich is over, all work is handed in and with view of my internship in August I figured that I won't have time to return to England in July. So I decided spontaneously to take a trip back to see the degree show and visit some friends.

In order to avoid a major culture shock and make my short return to England a pleasurable experience, I kept my schedule busy. A trip to the English Riviera in Paignton and Torquay, a visit to Plymouth to see the Wildworks open-air theatre performance, a weekend in Bristol with degree show, Banksy exhibition, Cabot Circus, walk along the harbourside, perfect pizza, yoyo burger and Bristol´s Biggest Bike Ride, and finally some relaxing time at the beach in Devon helped me to find not everything shit again really appreciate what I've got in England. I return with the good feeling that everywhere has its good and bad sides.

wirklich zu schätzen, was ich in England habe. Ich kehre zurück mit dem guten Gefühl, dass überall seine guten und schlechten Seiten hat.

Good thing I brought back my umbrella, which I didn't use during my England trip, because in Zurich it´s pouring down with rain.

And now go and enjoy my impressions.

Sunday, 14 June 2009

Switzerland in three days

Zurich is a nice city and the smallest metropolis in the world but it´s neither the capital (as many people like to think) nor very typical for Switzerland. However it is the perfect starting point for trips around the country to find out about the diverse landscape of this tetralingual, tiny country with its multiplicity of lakes, mountains and cows.

And with the fantastic rail network it is possible to reach any corner of the country within a couple of hours with a day ticket for only 52 francs (£30). So Matt and I decided to see the entire country and both sides of the alps (i.e. from East to West on the North side and on the South side) in only three days. Click on the images to see each of the albums with geotagged photos.

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Wednesday, 3 June 2009

Zurich — Milan

Because Switzerland is a rather small country conveniently located in the middle of Europe, I decided to invest 19 Euros to take a train ride to Milan over the holiday weekend (pentecost is a holiday, "bank holiday" is British, it´s never had anything to do with banks ... in case you were interested in the correct terminology). The train line goes through Ticino and the scenery is rather nice.

Milan is old, a little shabby and noisy, just like I remembered Italy. If you ever go there, be sure to check out the science and technology museum. Certainly the biggest museum of that kind I've ever been to. There´s an interesting part about communication which is actually quite similar to the communication museum in Berlin, except the interactivity is done more subtle. Leonardo DaVinci´s inventions, which they built a bunch of models from are also not bad. I always regarded Leonardo as a renaissance designer who didn't give a damn about disciplinary boundaries. Great man, we can learn so much from him.

By the way, the GoogleEarth experiment worked out neat and well (despite the road being slightly modified meanwhile). No need to print maps or write down addresses anymore. Just go on StreetView and figure out where you're going before you're heading to the place. It can certainly save some getting lost time. The only thing I'm still waiting for is "WalkView" with a human eye level and on walkways. Add a sound layer or moving image and I ain't travelling anymore.

Something that really made me laugh are some really odd signs found on the streets, in trams and shops. Looks like Italians like their pictograms really expressive and quite literal. Below are some examples of not quite unambiguous signs. Remember, no underwear, no robbery, no pole dancing in the underground, sleep on the carpark for 30 minutes max and don't run away from the diggers, they'll get you anyway.

If you want to see more weird things, some pretty buildings and really old, bright orange trams, click on the image below to see the whole album.

Friday, 29 May 2009

On holiday with GoogleEarth

As some of you might know, I'm a big GoogleEarth addict. Something I've been wanting to do for a long time is to find out how far GoogleEarth can assist or even replace a trip to an unknown city. For my little weekend experiment I picked Milan as a city where I've never been before. I checked it out in Street View etc., trying to spot some interesting places and figure out how to get to the hotel. Now I'm curious how well this prepared me for the real trip. I'm gonna report afterwards. Watch this space.

Thursday, 28 May 2009

Objectified

This week I had the pleasure to meet the Gary Hustwit, the director of 'Helvetica' who came to our school to show us his new documentary Objectified. According to Hustwit this is the 2nd part of a trilogy of design documentaries. He didn't want to disclose what the third part is going to be about but if it´s as good as the first two I'm sure it'll be worth waiting a couple of years. I'd put my money on architecture, but who knows? Objectified is definitely worth watching. If you liked Helvetica, you'll like this. And now I'm addicted to El Ten Eleven.

Saturday, 23 May 2009

Spoilt for choice

The Federal Republic of Germany celebrates 60 years of democracy this year. Although I'm there rather seldomly, I'm happy to follow my responsibilites as a German citizen at the ´super election year 2009'. Last time I found myself at the train to Berlin from where a plane was to take me abroad for the first time, when I ticked my boxes for the parliamentary elections. Today I found a large brown envelope in my post box and inside a lot of little colourful ones that again contained metre-long voting papers as well as instructions how to use them. It´s about the European parliamentary elections and the local elections and the whole super election package contains four envelopes in various colours and sizes and a phenomenal 40 inches long ballot paper as well as one in A2 and a little A4 one. I can cast my votes in an elaborate box ticking system in various different ways and then put envelopes into envelopes into envelopes. Particularly interesting though is the choice of parties for the European Parliament. It contains beside green, grey and purple parties also less known ones such as the Animal Protection Party, the Bavarian Party and even the Pirate Party of Germany. I wonder if the Anarchistic Pogo Party, that I remember from last time, was too drunk or hung over to participate this time.

OK, so I'm going to tick my boxes now, after all it doesn't happen very often that citizens are asked for their opinon. I can be glad that I'm not asked for my vote every week like in Switzerland. Perhaps I should vote blindfolded to be perfectly fair or maybe I ask the Wahl-o-Mat, a web application that compares my opinion on certain key issues with the policy of the parties. Oh before I forget: Happy birthday, democracy.

Tuesday, 19 May 2009

Mountains and more

What a weekend. First the typography day, then a hike to the Säntis and a gorgeous view from 8205 feet altitude at a day that couldn't have been more beautiful (photos here or click on the picture above). And last but not least on Monday I got up at ten to five in the morning after 4 hours of sleep, travelled about 430 miles through 3 countries, spent 4 hours in the car, 5 on the train, all that for an interview (and a proper beer) in a town where I've never been before. Where? Have a guess. Hints below.