September 8, 2006
we rock
[Another one of my new Stormhoek wine label designs.]
Hugh MacLeod
Hi, I'm Hugh.
My life is committed to drawing little illustrations that spread messages, inspire people, help businesses kick butt & support causes.
Gapingvoid is based upon the science of how these cartoons work.
If we can help you or your business, please email us here.
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Archive for September, 2006
a story without love
[Another one of my new Stormhoek wine label designs.]
[A reworking of this cartoon from December, 2005.]
franz
My old friend Dave Mackenzie [the director of Hallam Foe] and Nick McCarthy [of the rock band, Franz Ferdinand] having a cigarette outside a recent screening of the rough edit.
Backstory: Instead of using a composer to write a filmscore, Dave’s production team made a deal with Domino Records to supply original music for the film. Franz F. is on the Domino label, so Nick was down at the screening, checking out the film for inspiration. Full story here.
From an editing standpoint, this approach is quite tricky. With a standard film score, the compser’s music is written around each and every frame. But with this approach, the director takes the music as raw material, and tries to cut it in such a way that it fits the film edit. All quite complicated.
Luckily, Dave’s done this before. When he shot “The Last Great Wilderness”, he got the guys from Pulp to write him a song for the movie, and it all worked great.
Rock on roll lifestyle, Baby, Glasgow style. Indeed.
our jobs
[Another one of my new Stormhoek wine label designs.]
I get the feeling Dave Parmet would love this one.
Bonus Link: Good interview of Parmet by Shel Israel.
my first full day in glasgow
It feels really good to be in Glasgow. It’s not like I’ve moved here or anything, but it feels like a new chapter in my life has begun. Can’t wait to get the ball rolling with Hallam Foe.
Glasgow is an interesting place. It’s got a definite vibe to it. It has all the groovy stuff of a large city– museums, bars, trendy restaurants etc, but without the heart-crunching stress of say, London or New York.
Anyway, for anyone who cares, here’s a wee video clip of my new offices, over at the Hallam Foe production offices.
Watch this space…
September 6, 2006
tony blair r.i.p.
I’m watching political meltdown, live on TV as I write this. The current British Government seems to be commiting suicide in front of our eyes for no apparent reason, other than the usual Labour Party factional self-loathing deathwish thing they pull off every couple of decades or so. Fun to watch.
I bet everyone at the BBC is running around like headless chickens.
[UPDATE:] Blair set to outline quit plans
Pressure is mounting on Mr Blair to reveal when he will resign.
Tony Blair is expected to outline his plans for leaving office, after eight junior members of the government quit in protest at his leadership.
scottish blogger’s dinner
My train made it to Glasgow safely.
Usually when I come to Glasgow, the first thing Dave and I do is hit the bars [It’s that Scottish thing]. But we’re too busy with Hallam Foe these days. Something to do with growing up. Whatever.
David is currently under a lot of pressure with the final edit. Meanwhile, I have the bloggers movie screening in London to get arranged [I’m now thinking Thursday, the 21st September, as Dave can’t make it down to London on the 14th].
Glasgow is one of my three favorite cities [the other two being Paris and New York]. Unlike Paris or New York, it doesn’t exactly have a stunning skyline. But the people are vibrant, friendly and unpretentious, with lots of interesting stuff going on. It suits me here.
[IDEA:] Scottish blogger’s dinner here in Glasgow? Anybody up for it? If so, drop me an e-mail, thanks.
off to glasgow
I’m off to Glasgow today for a while, to work on the Hallam Foe project. I’ll be there a lot for the next couple of months.
And after that? Who knows.
As the internet gets more powerful, geography gets less of an issue.
I like Dennis Howlett’s set-up. His blog drives his business; the latter he runs online from his home in a small Spainish town. Where a good meal, washed down with plenty of wine costs about $20.
The older I get, the more I like this type of “Global Microbrand” business model.
Which is why I’m so obsessed with the concept. You get to a certain age, and it’s no longer about the money. It’s about sovereignty. To paraphrase Napolean, I can always win back lost territory. But a second of time, never.
thingamy demo
[click on image to go directly to demo]
Sig has built a little 20-minute video demo for Thingamy. Rock on.
I’m not sure if it’s the best metaphor out there, but the way I describe Thingamy to the locals in my village pub is:
“Imagine your company’s enterprise software is an apple tree. Except the tree has no trunk. Or branches. Or leaves. Just apples. And all the apples are all equidistant from each other, and can all talk to each other equally easily.“
It seems to work well enough for now, especilly when I explain the “Here’s 30 Megs, now go run Germany” benefit etc.
[Disclosure: I have a small stake in Thingamy.]
$122.50
The Stormhoek Techcrunch lithograph finally sold on E-Bay for $122.50.
Wow. That’s a lot. I was excited enough when the bidding passed $50.
I was really happy when people attending the geek dinners were liking the prints. But for them to be considered valuable in commercial terms was not something I’d thought too hard about. I saw them more as like “Objects of Sociability”. So this was TOTALLY unexpected.
Wow. This is very cool. I am so happy. Seriously.
September 4, 2006
untitled pyramid
[Cartoon inspired by this doozie. Man, and you thought A-Listers were up their own ass…]
[Thanks, Kai, for the link.]
armchair quarterbacks
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc. Licensing terms here etc.]
[Cartoon dedicated to Calacanis.]
September 3, 2006
the web 2.0 thing
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc. Licensing terms here etc.]
[Cartoon related to Robert Scoble’s recent post.]
black & red 338
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc. Licensing terms here etc.]
paul graham on techcrunch
Techcrunch’s Marshall Kirkpatrick has a great interview of the highly-respected VC, Paul Graham:
Marshall: You’ve said that having a good business model is not important for startups because the good ones are liable to change models several times anyway. Yet many people believe that the absence of viable business models is one of the primary indications that we’re in a bubble. Do you disagree with that?
Paul: What I tell founders is not to sweat the business model too much at first. The most important task at first is to built something people want. If you don’t do that, it won’t matter how clever your business model is.
Of course you have to have a business model eventually. But experience so far suggests that figuring out how to make money from something popular is a lot easier than making something popular.
Great stuff.
bizcard update
[click on image to enlarge etc.]
This picture was taken last week, at my local pub in Cumbria. A few bizcard drawings, a couple of pens, a glass of beer and a pack of cigarettes. Voila! Instant travelling art studio.
I’ve been drawing a lot of the bizcards lately, I just haven’t been posting them. Maybe one day. I like keeping them more to myself these days, for some reason.
Last December in Paris I gave Shel Israel one of my bizcard drawings as a wee gift. A couple of months ago Shel tells me he was at this party in San Francisco. During a conversation, he pulled out the bizcard from his wallet to show people. Apparently somebody offered him $100.00 for it, right there on the spot.
He declined the gentleman’s offer, but still, he thought that was a pretty neat thing to happen. So did I, when I first heard the story.
$100 is a not a huge amount of money for a piece of art, compared to say, a Warhol or a Piccasso. But sure, yeah, it would be great to be able to sell my work at a brisk pace for $100 a pop.
Though frankly, I still believe there’s more money long-term in giving it way for free. Which, of course, is what I’m doing now.
poster update
My Techcrunch party poster has now passed the $50 mark on E-Bay. At time of of writing, the auction still has another 18 hours or so to go, finishing sometime in the early hours of Monday morning.
Fifty dollars. Kinda exciting, no?
redemption is elusive
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc. Licensing terms here etc.]
the difference between
[Click on image to enlarge/download/print etc. Licensing terms here etc.]
September 1, 2006
revealed: “the secret a-list”
Obviously, Nick Carr and Kent Newsome have never heard of “The Secret A-List”.
Unknown to most, there exists a secret brotherhood of 25 uber-A-List bloggers who, every year at the height of the Winter Solstice, gather at a secret chateau in France, and decide who the x-hundred or so “Public A-Listers” [aka “the A-Listers” to most people] are going to be for the next year. And these chosen Public A-Listers in turn will go on to decide who the B-List is going to be. And the B-List decides the C-List… and so forth and so on, all the way down to poor ol’ X, Y and Z. Sure, it’s a brutal system, but it works. And it’s a fun weekend, for sure. French brandy. Yum!
Hey, we’ve got a lucrative social network to protect. Right, Loic?
To my fellow Secret A-Listers [You know who you are]: Sorry for divulging our little secret to the world, but what they heck, I reckon having our existence out there in public domain isn’t going to change the writing habits of too many bloggers. Most of them just want to write about their cats, anyway.
Besides, look on the bright side. It’ll probably be good for traffic.
