#amazeltd

Amaze 20

Amaze 20

Inside Christmas 

If you want the short version of this years event : Food poisoning Refraction Rainbows Cowbell Glitch Data vis Dance

If you prefer a more detailed account, keep reading... The first tip I will give is, do not go to to this fish and chips place on Ship Street. The dodgy fish knocked two of us out for our first night in Brighton and most of the following day.

Monday: Playful From Form opening titles.

Opening Titles - 2014 - From Form from Reasons to be Creative on Vimeo.

From Form were first on the schedule for the day. They presented their analogue style of video work and showed us the making of the title sequence. The final piece that they created was displayed on stage throughout the conference.

Pic courtesy of Lisa Badrock

They took inspiration from the seaside and fairground themes of Brighton and the pier. Each speakers name is represented by a game mechanism with an element of magic in them all. 

Mike Kus, a UK based designer who has the dream job of taking over instagram accounts for big brands like Burberry, Land Rover, Red Bull. The work involves lots of travel to exotic locations and invitations to glamourous events to take pictures. The photography was stunning. He did admit that being an early adopter of instagram was one of the main reasons he can do this type of work, with over 850,000 followers. He also shared his shame he feels of holding up an iPhone to take a photograph, in the pit at the end of the catwalk, while being surrounded by photographers fully equipped. I like this because it only proves that you don't need the most expensive camera to take a great photograph. 

Frederik Vanhoutte, physicist. This was a little bit of a geekfest with lots of creative coding and a lesson in rainbows. There are no double rainbows... its just a rainbow.

James Victore is an artist based in Brooklyn. Never miss an opportunity to see what this guy has to say. He strives to do work that keeps him honest. 'Stop making shit up' is something he says a lot. He shared a project that he did with the probation services in New York and showed how he injected his honesty and frankness into a mundane environment. You can see a little of that lovely here in this interview. He's funny, intelligent and entertaining. Full of wisdom and also a lovely bloke.

Pic courtesy of Lisa Badrock

Mr Bingo ended day one with the inspiration session. Illustrator, comedian, talented man who is not to be crossed. His work for the Amy Winehouse foundation is lovely and hate mail project hilarious.

If want a taste of his presentation prowess, you can watch a clip of a talk he did for BLAB.

Tuesday: Jon Howard working at the BBC in Future Development for CBBC & CBeebies. This was the first interactive session. Audience participation is always a good thing at the conference. This was in no way as interesting as a Seb Lee-Delisle interactive session but we got to express our opinion about what technology is to us and what we think the future holds. We also got to see some interactive tools in game development.

Florian Schmitt Creative Director of Hi-ReS! A session in story telling. In a recent interview, Stefan Sagmeister boldly declared that not everyone is a storyteller.

You are not a storyteller - Stefan Sagmeister @ FITC from FITC on Vimeo.

Florian talked about helping people tell a story. He did present some of the Hi-Res! work but found the installation work he was doing outside of the agency more interesting. He did also have the most interesting outfit I have seen in a while. One year Joshua Davis treated us to a full on red ensemble -red hat, red tee, red trousers, red shoes. This year Florian was wearing shorts over leather trouser combo which was a little distracting.  

Rachel Max was a clear favourite for me over the three days. The summary of the session was as follows 'I quit my dream job at the best company in the world because I needed more ... something I can't sum up succinctly so I'm calling it, "More Cowbell".'

More Cowbell - Saturday Night Live from Dee Three on Vimeo.

Work lacked any challenge for Rachel so she quit Apple and off she went. Rachel shared her travel stories and some of the work she has been doing since leaving.

I admired her bravery and loved the T-Rex arm story. She also contributes to MaxMix on Radio Valencia which is awesome. Rachel inspired two of us to start drawing again so we bought brand new moleskins and some fine liners. You can see some of the early works here.

Brendan Dawes, artist, creator of all things Dawesome. Brendan shared his projects on data visualisation including the beautiful 3d printed tracks. We also saw the lovely work he did for phone network EE and the app he has developed called Kennedy. Always inspiring.

Kate Moross interesting session all about anti-inspiration. Her work makes me think if Haring met Miro. Its really fun and vibrant and has lots of heart. Kate shared music projects and her book as well as advice about running a studio. She also shared some pics form a recent trip to Japan. Her outifts matched everything in Tokyo. The video below is the result of an empty studio space and a fish tank. Beautiful.

Wednesday: Mario Klingemann - Eigenartig. 'In German, when you encounter something strange or peculiar that you cannot really pin down you call it "eigenartig".' Mario has been working with the British Library and has google-ified their catalogue of historic drawings. He has then arranged them by visual similarity. 

Sara Blake, the tattooed lady with the beautiful body of work.

Sara shared the story of her childhood and how it got her to where she is now. We also got to see her collaborative work with Joshua Davis which was beautiful.

Gavin Strange, crazy, crazy and more crazy with some ballroom dancing. I have seen Gavin before and he is like a Duracell Bunny, he lasts forever. If you are into the Aardman Studios work he is definitely worth seeing. 

GMUNK was asked to produce a logo remix for Adobe and made a stunning installation. Experimenting with light and a variety of materials, he shared the final product with us:

The body of work is amazing and you should go check it out. Don't be put off my the masturbating monkey.

Thats all folks...