happy baby jesus birthday cake day

Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Holidays and even Happy Baby Jesus Birthday Cake day, yes, you read correct. I can not take credit for the last one or any of the afore mentioned greetings. I hope everyone is having a great day with their friends and family. Remember not to get lost in the excess of gifts and food. hehe. Well, I will leave this post with a nice original greeting. Happy Non-denominational/Non-consumerist Day of Fun time! oh--this might be the last post for a while...i got a Wii.

portfolio website

The portfolio website is up and running, please excuse the errors and construction...watch for falling debris. If you do find errors or have concerns, please inform me as soon as possible so I can correct and update. Here is what you have all been waiting for, the website: www.ericcastorena.com

happy late turkey day

Hope everyone had a swell Turkey day with friends and family. Those are different coloured feathers, not little trees on the back of the turkey hand fellow. Don't be alarmed, this did not take a long time to compose...or did it. hehe.

Spoon - "Jealously"

As many of you may know, (the three or two, possibly just one that reads this) I am graduating next month. I am not one for excuses but pardon the lack of posts recently–you would think since I am on the computer more it would equal more posts. Not so my friends.

During the crazy hours of working on the portfolio, many tunes are played in my speakers and some of them stay in my head for hours, on non-stop rotation. This is one of them; its not a bad thing at all, its one of my favourite songs and its from one of my favourite eps, from one of my all time favourite bands--Spoon-"Love Ways-EP". Enjoy the video for "Jealousy" and if you can get a hold of the ep, I highly recommend it.


Spoon - Jealousy

Spoon
Merge Records

Alice - Jan Svankmajer

In keeping with my long stretch of other folk's work I like to introduce Jan Svankmajer's film Alice, the original absurdly amazing 1988 interpretation of Alice in Wonderland. This stop-action, animation, live action, creepy, fun, film mixes all of those afore mentioned words into a visual adventure only Svankmajer can tell. At one time the whole feature was available on youtube but thanks in part to proper copy right restricitons only bits and pieces are now streamable. If you have a netflicks or blockbuster account put it on your cue yo. Enjoy the clip below and see you down the rabbit hole.



IMDB
First Run Films
Jan Svankmajer

Helvetica - dvd release date

"Due to some unavoidable manufacturing delays, the release date of the retail DVD of Helvetica has been pushed back two weeks to November 20th. The DVD will not be available in stores worldwide until that date. If you’ve pre-ordered the DVD from our site (or the limited-edition box set) your copy will be shipped one week prior to the new date. Institutional orders are still shipping and are not affected. Our apologies on this, sorry for any inconvenience." (helveticafilm.com/blog/)

To get in the spirit of the forthcoming dvd release here are two clips that I am sure everyone has seen more than five times. Why not make it a sixth or tenth time. Did I just post a blog from a blog? Yes! Yes, I did. I also gave credit to whom deserves credit. Below are the clips of Experimental Jetset and Erik Spiekermann. If you are not familiar with their them or their work, go explore the links below.


Erik Spiekermann


Experimental Jetset

Helvetica Film
SpiekermannPartners
Experimental Jetset

2007 Design in the Fast Lane

Greetings and salutations, yesterday the AIGA Houston Chapter hosted the 2007 Design in the Fast Lane. In the Gerald D. Hines Architecture building, over 150 students, young professionals, and educators gathered for a day of lectures, school portfolio exhibition/competition, lunch, and answering the question, "What creates a spark?"

I was let down to find no dog named "sparkie," could you imagine the antics of a St. Bernard wearing a DFL t-shirt and barrel of first aid, roaming around freely and knocking over tables as he pleases? He would also aid those who are in need! I think it would have made it much more successful.

The actual event started bright and early at 8:00 am, students signed-in, grabbed their bag of free stuff, viewed fellow-student work, and made their way to the auditorium. In there they viewed this introduction...note that it was looped and was on a huge projector screen. For your viewing pleasure of those who did not attend the event as well as those who did and totally dig the clip, have at it yo.

2007 Design in the Fast Lane - Introduction

Music: Yo La Tenga "Winter A Go-Go"
Photography: Will Cunningham, Michel Damato,
Miguel Martinez, John Meyer,

After numerous loops of the clip above, the event started with a brief introduction and opening remarks. Christian Helms of The Decoder Ring Design Concern, kicked off the event with the key note speech. Christian shared his story, solutions, and "sparks." (There were no actual "sparks," that we know of, or can measure with the metric system.) If you do not know his studio, work, or who he is check out the DRDC website now! You will dig it and have fun, I promise yo.

2007 Design in the Fast Lane
Decoder Ring Design Concern

for more coverage and images from the event
check out John Meyer's blog and AIGA Houston flickr.