AISFA San Fran welcomes Richard Williams

The San Franciso Chapter of AISFA is welcoming master animator Richard Williams on Sunday,  November 2 at the Balboa Theater in San Franciso.   Richard has been in the animation business for over 50 years.  He created the Oscar-winning A Christmas Carol, directed the animation in Who Framed Roger Rabit?, created the memorable opening titles for feature films like The Return of the Pink Panther, Casino Royale and has directed numerous other award winning commercials, films and animations.  

Richard Williams is the author of "The Animator's Survival Kit", which is the required textbook for GCOM 400 and 401.  He will be presenting a 2-hour lecture on the principles of animations and illustrating them with excerpts from his new DVD set, The Animators Survival Kit Animated.  

For more information on the event, please visit the AISFA San Francisco Chapter website at: www.asifa-sf.org

GC Club Greeting Card Fundraiser

The Graphic Communications Club is printing holiday greeting cards to raise money for GC Club activities including our annual Spring Show, and we're calling on all GCOM students to help us generate design ideas. This will be an excellent chance for GCOM students to have their design ideas become a finished product which can be added to their portfolio. Designs must be submitted in PDF format to gcclubscc@gmail.com no later than November 10, 2008. Students will be able to submit as many designs as they wish. Five designs will be selected to be printed.
The card dimensions will be 4 ¼" x 5 ½" single-fold.
Templates are available.

Design a Schedule Cover... NOW!!

This is an URGENT Call for Entries for all GCOM students:

Sacramento City College’s Davis, West Sac and Downtown Outreach Centers need your design and artistic skills. Using Photoshop and/or Illustrator, create a cover concept or illustration for one of the locations and submit it for consideration by Monday, NOVEMBER 3.

Each cover needs to follow a specific theme. All the important details are on THIS FLYER (click to download), which is also posted in the Mac Lab and T-100 classroom.

Any questions about this can be directed to Don at buttond@scc.losrios.edu or Tom at cappelt@scc.losrios.edu

Inspired by Kit Hinrichs exhibit at Sac State

GCOM students, go see the Kit Hinrichs exhibit in Sac State's library!

The GC Club and a few other GCOM students checked out the exhibit on Friday. Gwen Amos of Sac State's graphic design program shared Kit stories on the exhibits and his process. Kit, a partner of Pentagram (see two videos on the design agency at hillmancurtis.com or click here 1 / 2) is known for "rethinking the annual report."

The exhibit is on display until November in the Library Gallery at Sac State.

Check out Design For Obama

First of all... this blog and this posting are NOT to promote Barack Obama. The GCOM Blog is a non-partisan site. 

This IS a posting to promote the web site DesignForObama.org —not for political reasons, but because it is a great example of how you, as a designer or design student, can use your skills and talent to promote ideas and causes, instead of just products. 

And no matter which candidate you support, as a designer or student, this site can provide you with a lot of inspiration and visual ideas. And if you have your own, you can post it. So, it's also a great example of how a community of designers and artists can come together and use the internet as a way to share their ideas, free of concerns about money or copyright. 

To be fair, I Googled around for John McCain related design sites and found none. But you can find pro-McCain shirts and products at CafePress.com.

And here's the last pitch: Be sure to VOTE on Nov. 4!

CONTEST: Design a Flag for the World

Adbusters is sponsoring THE ONE FLAG competition.

Join designers from all over the world and submit your entry for flag "that embodies the idea of global citizenship."

For all the info, go to the ADBUSTERS SITE

You will also see flyers in the lab and GCOM classrooms.

Here is a snipet of the idea behind the competition:

"These are real targets, worthy of our problem-solving skills, ripe for our intervention. Yet those who have the vision to rise above national and political boundaries still have no symbol to rally under. We invite you to create a flag – free from language and well-worn clichés – that embodies the idea of global citizenship. A symbol that triggers pride and cohesion, whether worn on a backpack, displayed on a door, or flown on a flagpole. A symbol for anyone to declare membership in a growing and vital human cooperative. We invite you to prove that design has a real role to play in the fate of our world."

If you create a design to submit, please also e-mail it to me and I will feature it on the GCOM blog.

ADOBE CS4 is coming...

We don't know the exact date, but it will be released soon, and GCOM will be teaching all of our major classes in the Spring using CS4. (Although it won't be installed in the classes or lab until the holiday break)

There are a ton of fantastic new features and tools in Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Dreamweaver, Flash, and Fireworks. Even Acrobat and Bridge will have some major improvements.

But you don't have to wait until January to see the new features. Detailed info about many of the best new upgrades can be found on a variety of web sites. To take a look at some the best new stuff, check out the three sites below. They offer articles and short videos on new features in all the Creative Suite applications:

Adobe TV

Peach Pit Press

National Assoc. of Photoshop Professionals 

GCOM 's new baby!

Adjunct Instructor Heather Hogan has announced the birth of her daughter Novella Skye Van der Mei at  2:46 am on 10/7, weighing in at 6 lbs 12 oz, 19 3/4 inches long. Heather, her husband, and Novella are all doing great.

You can send your congrats to her at chiefcrazyhair@hotmail.com.

Technology Forum

This Thursday at noon in the Student Center the school will be hosting a Technology Forum to get feedback from students, faculty and staff about technology on campus. If you have anything you'd like to share come join us. If you can't make it in person, post you comments online here.

Tower of Youth - Oct 3rd

The 12th Annual Tower of Youth film festival is kicking off Friday, Oct. 3rd.  Over 650 entries were accepted this year, and 25 were selected to been shown at this year's festival.  All entries were written, directed and produced by students from across the nation.  Representatives from art schools and private film/TV companies will be on hand to discuss their work and what they can do for you! Come check out some award winning student films and meet the awesome talent that created these films! For more info check out :  Tower of Youth.org