julyaugpreview2010

72ANDSUNNY

ODOPOD

JOHN CUNEO ENTERPRISING DESIGNERS EXHIBIT PHOTOGRAPHY ANNUAL 51

July/August 2010 Twenty-Four Dollars www.commarts.com

Odopod

Inside the Pod

by Sam McMillan

O

n the spacious sunlit second floor of the San Francisco loft they call simply, The Studio, 30 of Odopod’s production staff are quietly at work. Arrayed in three long columns, worktables are placed end-to-end and frontto-front. Each column constitutes a multidisciplinary team of graphic designers, interaction designers, programmers and art production staffers. The close quarters means the teams constantly face each other, and have no choice but to engage and interact with one another.

agencies looking to extend their resources. Recent projects include the collaboration with The Martin Agency on the Nation of Go, a social utility that enables bf Goodrich tire customers to post their favorite drives online. Goodby, Silverstein teamed up with Odopod for an extension of its White Gold milk campaign on Facebook. And Cutwater brought its client nvidia, makers of superfast video processors, to Odopod for a 3-d showcase of graphic superstars and their creations.

The physical layout of the Studio is modeled on small independent production studios that hark back to Ododopd’s genesis eight years ago. As Odopod matures and grows, co-founder and creative director Tim Barber explains that the floor plan is a way of maintaining the creative energy, jumpstarting the free-flow of ideas and sharing resources. Between the columns, the teams are matrixed to encourage cross-team communication. So a programmer can simply turn around and ask a member of another team for advice, help troubleshooting or just extend an invitation to get lunch.

Odopod is making a name for itself in the world of interface design as well, creating a new experience for Zune, a mobile app for the California Academy of Sciences and a trafficstopping touchscreen kiosk for Honda that debuted at the Los Angeles Auto Show.

Each team is led by an associate creative director and a senior producer. The arrangement is “a legacy of our training as architects,” Barber says. “We’re still fascinated by the idea of shaping spaces to help us work and interact better.”

It seems to be working.

At a time when many agencies are downsizing, Odopod is thriving, winning new clients, capturing every award in sight, generating huge industry buzz and, yes...hiring. Today, Odopod creates digital marketing for clients like Nike, Sony and Red Bull that want to reach an audience on the Web. It’s also become the go-to digital agency of choice for advertising

Then there’s Odopod’s under-the-radar work creating innovative ui design for big software companies. Often, these never see the light of day. One skunkworks project that did go public was for Sling Media. The manufacturers of Slingbox, a gadget that takes tv programming and forwards it to other devices including pcs, laptops and smart phones, needed an integrated look-and-feel across a diverse universe of platforms.

In practice that meant integrating a SlingPlayer that lets users watch video on their pc over a Web browser, a SlingGuide that provides control of video content using the mouse and keyboard (instead of a remote), and an easy-to-use controller that enables a user to program the dvr to record shows from their desktop. Odopod took SlingGuide to the mobile platform as well, creating an app with the ability to control a dvr directly from the iPhone, and watch live tv or recorded shows.

Matt Jarvis, chief strategist, supplied the caption information.

Right: “Our digital agency of record relationship with Zuffa Inc., the company behind the Ultimate Fighting Championship began in the summer of 2009. Since then, we’ve been hard at work reimagining the fight experience across all channels, fully engaged in a series of initiatives that included digital strategy, mobile, event and Web development. Beyond a full site redesign, we engaged with them at the most strategic level to help them survey and evaluate the full spectrum of possibilities in the digital landscape. With the UFC, there’s an amazing opportunity to harness the fanatical base and turn them into true brand evangelists—enlisting new fans and extending the UFC’s reach to new audiences and untapped markets.” Dave Soderberg, art director; Michael Wang, junior designer; Sean Whipps, senior designer; Shamus Grubb, associate creative director; Tim Barber, executive creative director; Tina Glengary, project director; Jennifer Phannguyen, information architect; Robert Little, interface designer; David Bliss, technical director;Christopher Berry, senior developer; Katey Martin, agency producer; Larry Johnson, strategy; Christy King/Edward Muncey/Zuffa, Inc., clients.

“Sling Media came to us with a challenge to create a simpler, more intuitive television interface for their SlingCatcher product, that first debuted at CES in 2007. We realized that the real opportunity lay not only in designing a clean, simple, easy-to-use interface, but creating an experience that would appeal to Sling’s core audience of early adopters. Additionally, we designed the interface for the SlingGuide, a core piece of the new EchoStar 922 HD Sling-loaded receiver/DVR. SlingGuide for Web lets you control, manage and watch your video content, anywhere you have a Web-connected browser.

SlingGuide for the iPhone takes the portability of the application even further. Browse your recordings and check out live programming. Then watch either, instantly, right on your iPhone’s screen.” Andy Gilliland, designer; Albert Poon, creative director; Rob Brown, interface designer; Gwinn Appleby/ Sue Boyer, senior producers; Ellen Hobbs, executive producer; Sling Media, client.

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Photography Annual 2010

www.ufc.com

Communication Arts

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Photography Annual 2010

Books 1 (series) Andrew Zuckerman, photographer/creative director David Meredith, designer Alex Vlack, producer Justin Cohen, retoucher Pilot NY, design firm Chronicle Books, publisher “Bird features portraits of over 90 species of birds. My goal was to allow a living creature to be seen and experienced for exactly what it is, as stripped from artistic imposition as possible.”

2 Jon Shireman, photographer Henry Sene Yee, Picador, creative director Henry Sene Yee, designer Picador, client Cover image for Bodies: Big Ideas/Small Books, by Susie Orbach. The author delves into the touchy subject of commercial exploitation of “the body” and explores how modern culture is eroding individual appreciation of the unaltered human form. She uses specific case studies from her own practice to show the long-term effects that can result from body dissatisfaction.

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Unpublished 1 Christopher Wilson, photographer John Doyle, art director Burj Dubai. Outtake from a series of images shot for Morgan Stanley’s global “Worldwise” campaign. © Christopher Wilson 2 Rob Murray, photographer Hero. “A hero cannot be a hero unless in a heroic world.” —Nathaniel Hawthorne © Rob Murray 3 Marc Piron, photographer/art director 80 Miles East of Reno, Nevada, an art installation in the desert. © Marc Piron 4 Adrian Lander, photographer Wetlands, QLD. © Adrian Lander

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design

The Power of Color is Everywhere Pantone® Color Predictions Fall 2010

Trends

“

Color forecasting is part science, part artistry and part alchemy.

Endive

Golden Glow

Living Coral

Lipstick Red

Purple Orchid

C11 M4 Y51 K0 GOE 1-3-2

C7 M31 Y95 K0 GOE 9-1-3

C0 M61 Y50 K0 GOE 21-1-2

C13 M100 Y65 K5 GOE 26-2-7

C34 M79 Y0 K0 GOE 37-2-6

Chocolate Truffle

Lagoon

Woodbine

Oyster Gray

Rose Dust

C53 M86 Y61 K34 GOE 26-3-7

C73 M7 Y39 K0 GOE 104-3-3

C49 M26 Y90 K10 GOE 135-4-3

C16 M14 Y24 K0 GOE 141-2-1

C17 M25 Y27 K0 GOE 16-4-1

Pantone® describes their fall palette as “...innovative takes on fundamental basics, as well as transporting, lively colors that conjure up images of travel and adventure, whether real or aspirational.”

”

—Paul Wharton, VP Creative, Larsen Design Office

The Let’s Colour Project believes a simple dash of color has the power to inspire.

Working around the world, so far in Brazil, France, the U.K. and India, they’ve joined with local communities and painted schools, streets, homes and squares.

Pentagram partner Paula Scher smashes the long-held belief that children learn best when surrounded by calm colors.

Instead she’s covered the walls at the Achievement First Endeavor Middle School with bold and colorful graphics.

letscolourproject.com

With myPantone, iPhone users can access color libraries, create custom palettes, and share with clients and colleagues. Now with the release of myPantone X-Ref, users can match any Pantone Color to any other Pantone Color Library.

CA Queries Creatives

Bob Hambly, Hambly & Woolley Inc., Toronto, Ontario.

“I am constantly on the lookout for new sources of color inspiration.

I rediscovered Dieter Rams’ product design for Braun recently. Although his objects are predominately monochromatic, it is his strategic and subtle use of orange typography and/or colored dials that give his work added sparkle. For me, however, inspirational color ideas come mostly from nature—be it the resplendent thorax of a dragonfly or the vibrant hues of Northern Ontario lichen.”

© Suzi Chang

Laurie Rosenwald, rosenworld, New York, NY. “What role does oxygen play in your life? Without red and blue, I don’t get out of bed. Red and blue together, not mixed, next to each other. The red must be tomato and the blue must be more or less cobalt. I lived with a cobalt blue floor for 26 years. Poured epoxy, shiny, covering 1,800-squarefeet of loft. I came back to crayons around 2002. Caran d’Ache is my brand—very opaque. And when I paint with oils, I add wax. The colors are never mottled, but used in a pure, flat way. I love hot pink next to orange, and emerald next to chartreuse.

Pop colors, unadulterated.”

© Chris Nicholls

What role does color play in your work?

Beatrice Santiccioli, Beatrice Santiccioli Design, San Francisco, CA. “Color has been part of my life since my childhood in Firenze, Italy, were my senses were steeped in the colors of the great masters. For the last 20 years, color has been an amazing crescendo in my work. From the beginning of a project to the end, I see color morphing and adapting with the material used and the context. Colors are entities with presence, able to communicate and capture the heart of the user. Working with color is a neverending learning process. It always brings interesting challenges, from working on small objects made to be held, to large spaces that create a total experience for the viewer.“