It’s been a while since I last posted so thought I’d just do an update of some more press. Firstly I was interviewed for an article in issue 162 of Computer Arts, so a big thank you to Garrick Webster and Tom Dennis for that. The article showcased some of DAHRA’s upcoming work – such as a film on Tibet and a project with HypeforType

Whilst this is extremely embarrassing, and I’m not sure I should feature it, I was also interviewed by Media140 whilst showing work at OFFF. You can hear the interview below:

Many thanks to Media140 for the interview and we thoroughly recommend you have a look at their website, a really worthwhile endeavour! (And apologies for sounding as eloquent as a footballer!)

The Designers Against Tibetan Abuse (DATA) Book has been featured in the output section of Computer Arts #159. We’d like to thank Nick Hard and Jeff Knowles over at Research Studios and Tom Dennis, Garrick Webster and the team at Computer Arts for the feature

Buy the Book here

Caleb Lee, a Ravensbourne MID student, was featured in Computer Arts’ Student Showcase this year. Whilst the video above is not the winning work, the winning work stills looked funny and quirky, so congratulations!

Furthermore, speaking of the graduate showcase, the design in general was extremely strong, however Graphic Design in general seems to be letting the team down! Don’t get me wrong, some of the work in the graphic design section was beautiful and deserved to be there on merit, and yet if some of the work included was the best then I fear for Graphic Design!

I’m hoping that this was just because most final year Graphic Designers did not submit their work, rather than thousands worldwide submitted their work, and these were the best chosen. Don’t get me wrong, some of the work was strong, but some of it was rather weak.

As Luke pointed out, the D&AD professional awards also saw a record low pencils for graphic design, with no one seemingly winning a yellow pencil. So this can either mean one of two things. Firstly Graphic Design has hit a period of stagnation, which I don’t necessarily believe. I’d rather see it as there is a lot of good design around, so to stand out of the crowd has become harder. Secondly, and this seems more plausible, that design judging has seriously lost any credibility is once had. The results for the awards I have seen so far have been shocking in some cases, whilst again these works are balanced by others that deserve to be their on merit. Some may argue that this is always the case with awards, and it’s subjective as to what is good and isn’t, and I accept this point.

However I am looking forward to seeing the D&AD and YCN winning work for this year to see whether my gut feeling that graphic design judging standards are becoming alarmingly shocking has any substance