Michael Willis is an illustrator with some really nice editorial work under his belt for several magazines that I haven’t heard of (cue self-flagellatory slap on the wrist) and a few that I definitely have (idN, Beautiful/Decay etc.). Bold use of clashing colours and geometric shapes mark Michael as a name to look out for in the future. Nice one bruv.

On the first of March a rowdy group of two-score Stockportians and four of SSZ met up in a pub in Kings Cross to start a revolution. An evening of beer, chat, strange celebrity endorsements, quickfire questions and yet more nob gags ensued.

The loose structure of the night meant that we didn’t finish until half 11, by which time most peoples eyes weren’t going in the same directions, but we managed to fit in an initial chat/ramble by us, a complex challenge involving celebrities and their endorsements and a final Q&A. We also gave everyone a dead nice screenprinted poster and managed to fill our ‘book of awesome’ with some strange scribblings.

Things we learned:

1. The students of Stockport college are an inventive lot.

2. James should never be allowed on stage after 4 pints.

3. Just because you call a book ‘The Book Of Awesome’, that doesn’t mean it will be treated with any more respect.

4. Bono could feasibly have a tie-in with Vagisil. (Ooh Bono, Aah Vagisil)

Thanks to all the students and Tutors who came along and made the night what it was, a reet laff. See all the photos on our facebook page and get your very own screenprinted A2 Radio Rebelde poster (see below) from our shop.

This post is about two things. The first is the photography above, by Kevin Bauman, two of a set of 100 photos of abandoned houses in Detroit, once the USA’s fourth largest city, which has seen a population decrease of  over 50% from its highest of 2 million. The second is a documentary that is currently sitting on iPlayer, ‘Requiem for Detroit?’, covering some of the reasons why (and set to a soundtrack of Eminem, you know cos he was from dere innit). Together they provide a bleak (but interesting) account of the collapse of the American automobile industry and ‘Motown’ and the hope for a better future in a city that was once the embodiment of the American Dream.

Mercy, a forward-thinking London/Scouse design and creative agency, has started a project this year to release an E-Zine every month along the theme of the classic 1957 film 12 Angry Men. Issue 2 (based on the central character McArdle, for those interested) features such heavyweights as illustrator Si Scott and Megapoet Luke Wright (read his contribution here) – definitely something to keep up-to-date with, especially if they keep pulling names like these out of the bag.

ps. on the subject of Mercy, keep eyes peeled for their other stuff and events.

Tis the season for “top ten” lists, falalalalala lala la la.  Brand New’s best and worst identies of 2009 is one such list which critiques some of the year’s most prominent rebrands.  A very subjective topic, perhaps what is most interesting about this article are the comments and discussion of each entry, often showing disagreement on different levels from colour and typography to imagery and symbolism.  It’s quite US-themed, so I’d be interested to see a review of more global or UK-based rebrands (please suggest links).

Via PSFK

Let’s be honest, for most of us every hour spent online looking at ‘inspirational work’ is matched by another spent dilly-dallying on a mixture of social networking sites, wandering around corners of the internet we will never visit again looking at stuff we will forget and for a few of us looking for/at porn.

Why then is it that the only part of that time we often value as culturally enhancing* is the design/illustration/advertising? Sod that, sites like b3ta, yayhooray et al have provided as much cultural reference for my fundamentally puerile giggling-schoolboy mind as anything more high-brow, and I’m not afraid to admit it.

If you spend more than ten minutes on ffffound** you start to feel like you’ve seen it all before, but it’s highly unlikely you’ll have set your eyes on things quite like this and this. Of course I’m not saying design blogs should have more gags, it’s great to have both options, but rather than sidelining these dawdling hours as fluff, maybe we should embrace tham as a valid source of inspiration. Some of the best ad ideas have come from web nonsense after all.

And who knows, it might just stop people writing something in helvetica oblique on a space picture and calling it design…

*obviously not including the porn, which is incredibly culturally enhancing.
**other image-bookmarking sites are available

Fascinating daily facts with lo-fi illustrations, from design consultancy Young.

Chris Jordan has recently been getting some press attention for his photos of albatross chicks full of plastic crap, but throughout his portfolio there’s an extraordinary subtle use of colour, apparent in this set of photos taken of a ravaged post-Katrina Louisiana. I really dislike overuse of complementary adjectives in blogs (more on that another time) but feel like hurling a whole load at this work (I won’t).

Theres loads more on his website as well as the previously mentioned albatross chicks.

Happiness This Way was a competition started by Nottingham-based designer Will – unfortunately when he sent us this a couple of months back the competition was still going on, it has since finished but you can still send in images of things that make you happy or for windows-shoppers™ theres a great selection of illustration to peruse. It’s all in aid of UNICEF UK too.

Our roundup of the ShellsuitZombie experience at New Blood is finally here. Offering a mixture of chat, live briefs, loud music, ‘itsa-bitsa’ style artwork creation and general stick-it-anywhere-we-aren’t-precious tomfoolery (oh-err) we managed to attract graduates and industry in their hundreds to our messy corner of the Kensington Olympia (helped by D&AD generously allowing us free air-time on the tannoy – apologies to anyone we disturbed). We collected cards, friends and email addresses in scenes akin to Bruce Bogtrotter and Augustus Gloop at a chocolate convention, met loads of you, got your opinions on us and the industry and had a hell of a lot of fun at the same time. There are some photos here, to see them all visit our Flickr and Facebook pages.

ShellsuitZombie Face-Offs

We held two official SSZ Faceoffs, the first was a two-way between Falmouth University and Staffs University advertising courses. In an atmosphere more ‘intense’ than a music festival (in tents…doesn’t matter) during which we had to hold back both teams from physical blows, the brief was set – come up with a 30 second advert for Lucozade. While the relative merits of the adverts are still being discussed by creative directors worldwide, on the day Staffs were declared victorious by public vote for their ‘joe bloggs beats Usain Bolt’ concept.

The second face-off was a four-way between Duncan of Jordanstone, Lincoln, DMU and the eventual Victors Nottingham Trent, all of whom were given half an hour to rebrand D&AD. For the judging not only did we have Matt Dent, recent (and youngest ever) black pencil winner for his coinage redesign, but a curiously phallic clap-ometer which induced giggles (from us at least).

The ShellsuitZombie Picnic

Our biggest event consisted of a free-for-all overnight brief to devise a campaign for a household cleaner – utilising any form of media necessary. As you can see we had nearly a hundred people taking part in 25 submissions – of which two teams were chosen for placements at BCL – a fantastic integrated agency responsible for Dove Natural Beauty and the current Lucozade Energy campaign. Reports on how they got on will follow. Thank you to everyone that did some work for this, the standard was very high.

Pecha Kucha

To top it all off, on wednesday they let us do a Pecha-Kucha, God knows why. Here is one of our slides, all of which were created in Microsoft Paint. Again, to see the rest have a look on our Flickr page. If anyone has pics of us doing it please let us know, we have none.

So Basically

We had an awesome time, we hope you enjoyed it too. Anyone who posted us your card, email address etc and hasn’t heard anything back, bear with us, you’ll be the first to know when we announce future events, and we will feature as many of you as we can over the next couple of months.

Thanks to:

Morph are a great digital agency from Shoreditch, London, who kindly sponsored the stand and print – Coming soon, a filmed interview and article with Anthony. Eyes Peeled.

Brave – Representing BCL who offered support and time, delivering a brilliant brief and giving opportunities to nearly a hundred grads through our stand at the event.

JK Keller is an artist, designer and obsessive-compulsive. Through his New York based studio practice, JK creates work that lies near the intersection of design, code, & craft. The dirty mousepad project says it all. By swapping a normal mouse pad for a plain sheet of paper, Keller has caught a print of a few months of hard work. His site is full of beautiful work and offers an insight into his OCD riddled mind. 

So, after noticing the post by SSZ here, I only bloody went didn’t I. Fighting every urge just to leave the studio and blaze home, I trudged to Southwark and found the ‘Everything Must Go’ installation. The gallery was packed full of plastic off cuts of various sizes and beauty, from giant coloured sheets with beautiful letters cut out to small random, snapped and trampled bits of tat. It was all about giving something for free, something often promised in this day and age but rarely found. So here are the spoils I clumsily left with (the big one is about 5 foot high, I’ve got big skirting boards), well worth the trip.

Superbowl adverts provide a fascinating insight into US culture. How will the corporations respond to the cultural and economic climate?  Will they get all self conscious and politically correct, or will they fire out big budget epics?

It appears that it’s business as usual for NBC, who made a record $206 million this year from 69 ad spots at $2.4 to $3 million per 30 second slot.  Notable appearances were made by car brands and the energy company GE.

You can piss away your lunchbreak by watching all the ads here at Adblitz.

Also of note is Saatchi’s “1 Second Ad” and site for Miller High Life – arguing that in the current climate, $3 million might be better spent on bacon or bulldozers.

“Shellsuitzombie is dedicated to exposing creative flair. We believe that a huge amount of untapped potential lies in the current student and graduate generation. Now, more so than ever, it takes more than a degree or raw talent to be a success and it is too difficult to find exposure as a young creative or writer. By mixing a variety of up-and-coming work with more established names we hope to bring unsung talent to the fore.”

Hello everyone and welcome to the first ever post on shellsuitzombie magazine. Above is our ‘mission statement’, the reason this project exists. We hope you enjoy using it as much as we enjoy writing it.