Comic View
Originally uploaded by billgaspard.

Keep an eye on the SND Orlando Flickr feed. It now has somewhere just south of 700 photos (nice work, everyone!), including this from Bill Gaspard.

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bighotel
Originally uploaded by mfriesen.

Huzzah to Cassie and Bo and the rest of the Orlando crew for a fine weekend.

More photos from the last night are in the Flickr feed, including a set on the 4 a.m. 20-plus minute project to open a bottle of wine sans corkscrew.

The full list is up here (they kind of went through them quickly at the banquet):
http://www.sndies.com/winners_movie.swf
(Warning: LONG download)

Congrats to the winners and all the finalists!

Special props from me go out to Roanoke.com for their Jordan's War project. In a competition dominated by the big, big dogs, Roanoke is really rockin'.

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This got me some chuckles but that's about it, so it must've been the delivery. I'm sure Harris Siegel, Rock Star, woulda brought down the house with it. I mean, c'mon! Dogs, New York Times, Poynter jokes, National Lampoon reference. It's Newspaper Design Humor gold, Jerry! Gold! Plus I spent 40 bucks to get the fonts reasonably close. Hard to read, perhaps. So click above to get the big version in all its comedic glory.

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presenter's eye view
Originally uploaded by mfriesen.

Wow! Who was that guy with the dry mouth and the stammering and the bad eye-contact? Awesome!

With all due respect to Chris Rukan (see below), the Hero Of The Day award without doubt goes to one Kenney Marlatt, who, in our cab returning from Downtown Disney, managed to snag 72 Miller Lites from the 7/11 for the price of, oh, about six from the hotel bar.

They went quick.

And then came the pool.

For the record, the Marriott pool(s) close at 11. And yet, it's 5:20. And I've just returned from it.

So, to recap:

Best call of the night: Beer.

Second-best: Swimming (and jumping and "sliding" down the non-functional slide).

Absolute worst: Mistaking a distinguished member of a certain Florida newspaper's graphics staff for an intern. That's an unfortunate way to end the evening.

If you see him, buy Chris Rukan a beer. He gets the hero of the day award from me for hanging tough in front of a blue screen of death for more than 20 minutes and keeping a conversation going (and at least half of his audience around) at his presentation, “Improving Your Inside Game,” when there wasn’t the correct projector hook up.

The runner up hero of the day, is the guy that got the right connector for Rukan's computer.

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SND made a brilliant move bringing Matt Thompson and Robin Sloan in to kick off the conference. Some of the info may have been over the head of the print crowd but Thompson and Sloan did an exceptional job bringing it all home to with real world examples.

The gist of their presentation (for those who didn’t attend) was on how the media is changing from mass media of few to a multi-mass media of many choices. They broke it down into 10 key points (in two categories), with really great examples illustrating each:

Moments of rediscovery:
1- Audience as a co-author
2- Design a story to grow over time
3- Design a story to be understood in seconds
4- Your story as a spreadsheet.
5- Design a story to be used in different ways by different people

Not so familiar moments:
6- Just don’t design a story, design a tool
7- Make a story you can play
8- Embrace complexity
9- Embrace ugly
10- Realize the power of links

P.S. Matt and Robin get extra props from me for going through their presentation without missing a beat when a photo-happy SNDer walked up to the stage multiple times to take multiple pictures just feet away from them. I would have flipped out, but they were totally unfazed. ...And I guess I gotta give that guy props for having having the cajones to walk up multiple times during their presentation.

Check out the picture of the awesomeness going down:

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Good party thrown by the Orlando folks. The reception was moved indoors (mainly to avoid the ridiculous humidity left by Ernesto, but there was a threat of rain, too), but that didn't seem to matter to anyone.

The biggest reason for the success may have come from Houston, when Scott Goldman started thinking about a different way to do the SND Foundation fundraiser, a task that falls to the Vice President. Hence, Casino night.

Some highlights:

Some showed up in a full tux. No word on whether he was ordering his martini shaken, not stirred.

It was extremely interactive. From the craps and blackjack tables where you couldn't find a spot to the hold-em tournament where a hundred or so folks were gathered around the final table to watch, it was great fun.

A student won the big raffle prize, a new MacBook. Awesome.

As Goldman emceed the final table, there were howls when it was announced that, yes, one of the two final players was from . . . Vegas. RINGER!

No word yet on the final total raised, but I'm sure it was good.

So, despite the strongest efforts of workshop chair Cassie Armstrong, the lobby bar closed early. Again.

Which means that all of us - after watching Ched Whitney of the Las Vegas Review Journal show the society what being from Vegas really means, by winning the Texas Hold 'Em tournament - were relegated to Champions, the subpar sports bar at the Marriott.

There may or may not have been buckets of beer ordered; there may or may not have been job offers extended to various and sundry journalists; but one thing is for certain:

Pizza Hut and minibar beer at 5 a.m. is never a good idea.

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All bags are not created equal.

When you register for the Workshop, you get a bag full of handouts/stuff/swag from vendors and other newspapers. Sometimes they're great (the San Diego bag from '97 has been sturdy for a decade), other years they're not.

The Bag
This year's model is good -- a black, synthetic type with the yellow SND Orlando logo on the side. Is it usable after the conference? Maybe. Might be good hauling gear to the beach.

The Contents

8-page promo tab for next year's conference. Very Globe-Features-sectionish, which is a good thing. There's a couple of pages of Boston color, a cool subway/T-type graphic dtailing the areas they want to cover in next year's program and a few pages of things to see while in town. The best selling point? New England weather in the fall.

FontFont catalogue. It's thick (128 pages) and colorful (kind of a cool yellow/black scheme going on). Extremely well designed. It's a straight-up listing of everything they do. But it's also the 04-05 catalogue. Feels like they sent whatever was left in the closet.

FontShop catalogue. Only 44 pages, it's more of a magazine than an exhaustive list of everything they make. The front half of it is a hipper-than-you-design around a feature on graffiti artists before moving into some example pages. The last few pages are a design/article by Marian Bantjes (the text of it is here) with some really fun doodles on each character in the alphabet.

Hoeffler & Frere-Jones catalogue. More type examples from some of the best guys in the business (I think the number of newspapers licencing gotham is buying these guys summer homes out in the Hamptons). It's probably the best printing of the three.

Promotional packet from Brass Tacks Redesign. Alan Jacobson pimping the latest work from his group. It's heavy with work from the Californian and there's a press release touting increased revenue and a halt in the circulation skid there in Bakersfield (home of newly-minted AME James Bennett, formerly of the Boston Globe. Congrats, James).

CCI flyer. Pimping their session at the conference. Interestingly, the first thing they tout? InDesign integration. Way to be dragged kicking and screaming into the 21st century, guys.

Brochure from Weather Underground. Huh. I didn't know they supplied weather information to the AP.

Pen from Weather Underground. FINALLY. Something I'll use. It's a short, fat little pen with a big, rubbery grip on the end. Uhhhhhhhh, let's move on.

API seminars flyer. Pimping their 2007 design program. I know it's kinda early, but I like to see who the faculty is on these things, even if it's just their staff.

Flyer promoting Tim Harrower's new book. Billed as a companion to his "Newspaper Designer's Handbook," the new title is called "Inside Reporting - A practical guide to the craft of journalism."

Orlando Sentinel flyer. It's a prison theme. There's a page of staff mugshots -- everyone's in stripes. (But they've all got the same number -- a little photoshop guys?). Funny as hell. Plus, I love anybody that self-promotes using the Nick Nolte mugshot.

Promotion from Swarm graphics. What's Don Wittekind doing these days? Leading a life of academic luxury at UNC-Chapel Hill? Well, yes. But the former graphics guru in Ft. Lauderdale has a side business with Scott horner and Lynn Occhiuzzo doing graphics and interactive consulting.

FontBureau promo. 8-page tab pimping their newspaper work with examples from the Houston Chronicle, Rumbo, the Lexington Herald-Leader and a nice piece of information on the back: how to run an effective press test.

Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel promo. A bird tells me they're redesigning.

National Geographic flyer. They're hiring (well, it says they're "looking for talent"). They've made a couple of impressive hires the last few years with Kris Viesselman and Juan Velasco.

Sunglasses from the St. Pete Times. I'd swear they had these at their booth last year (flourescent green on the sides, Ray-Ban-ish style), but the note attached to them says they're redesigning and recently built a design desk. Cue Timbuk3.

And finally, the "**** you" of all of the bag swag . . .

San Jose's DVD. Haven't opened it up and watched it yet. I'm sure it's very good. And yes, that was the sound of 15 more people being hired by the Mercury News.

Three things stuck out when playing Hawk's Landing this morning:

1) There are actual hawks on the course. Sweet! One of them swooped down and grabbed something (a lizard, maybe?) when I was on the back nine.

2) The rental Calloway clubs are much better than the ones I play with at home. MUCH. Like 3 or 4 strokes better.

3) I hate bermuda greens.

Nice layout, though. There are a LOT of bunkers. I found a few of them from the tee.

I shot an 89 which, if this were a track meet, might be termed "wind-aided".

Ernesto is coming! Ernesto is coming! Ernesto . . . not so much.

A lot of papers chose to downplay it. Interestingly, the Tampa Tribune only made a passing reference in a teaser line, something I thought was nice, considering that Wednesday morning its minimized impact was all over TV.

The hosts

Miami

More after the break . . .

Continue reading "Thursday's papers"

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A few things that happened at the bar last night:

• Last call: 11:27 (I am assured this will not happen again).
• The Mercury News' swag budget rivals that of some small nations.
• Everyone admired Frank Mina's bare feet.
• Matt Mansfield hired three more people.
• Idiot blogger forgot to take his camera downstairs.

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Taking a bullet for the unofficial SND blog, I checked out the golf facilites today, hitting a few balls and doing a little chipping and putting at Hawks Landing Golf Course which, conveniently, wraps three sides of the resort.

It was tough, but these are the lengths I'm willing to go to.

I'll say this: it's damned beautiful . . .

. . . . unfortunately, the greens are bermuda grass. I !@*#$(!&@#( hate bermuda grass.

I believe that Robb and Ben are still looking for someone to fill out a foursome on Thursday. The layout is great. Not too long, not too much water (well, ok, there's a lot, but you can avoid it, for the most part).

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Friday's opening speakers, Robin Sloan of Current TV and Matt Thompson, the deputy editor for interactive media at the Strib (here's the blog they do together), created the successful Epic 2014 movie. You can watch it (and the updated version, 2015) here. Or you can see a lower-quality version without leaving the friendly confines of this blog by clicking below.

Apropos of nothing except that I'm waiting on a flight (yay for free airport wi-fi!), click below if you haven't seen this awesome OK Go video for "Here It Goes Again," click the clicky!

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Denise points out that the Marriott offers a couple deals that, for $14.95 a day ($2 more than daily internet access), give you:

• High-speed Internet access in your guest room.
• Free local and domestic long-distance phone calls from your guest room.
• One pre-paid Lobby PC Card (15 minutes of access).
• Wireless Internet access in the hotel's public "hot spots".
• Up to $10 in dry-cleaning services
• Complimentary use of our driving range at Hawk's Landing (including clubs).
• One liter of Evian water in your guest room.

or

• High-speed Internet access in your guest room.
• Free local and domestic long-distance phone calls from your guest room.
• Complimentary self-parking.
• Voucher for $5 in Game Room tokens.
• One liter of Evian water in your guest room.
• One pre-paid Lobby PC Card (15 minutes of access).
• Wireless Internet access in the hotel's public "hot spots".
• Complimentary use of our driving range at Hawk's Landing (including clubs).

It still bites that they charge you that much for the internets (if your average Comfort Inn can do it for free...), but I'll take the parking!

Apparently this whole SND/casino thing is becoming, er, a habit. The SND Orlando Official State Organ (that sounds dirty, doesn't it?) is reporting that SND 2008 will be in Las Vegas. Not quite as exotic as the Dublin rumor that was going around last year, but I'll double down on that. Sounds like Gaspard's already planning quite a party. They've also settled on 2009 in Buenos Aires, 2010 in Denver and 2011 in St. Louis.

This is territory for the original Newsdesigner, but I think he's in transit . . .

Romanesko links to a Toronto Star story that they will start an 8-page PM edition available as a PDF download.

Similar versions currently available from The Guardian and Financial Times.

Wondering aloud . . . How much of the same Star style will be applied to the new product? Any photos in it?

Can somebody from the Great White North drop us a line?

UPDATE: Here's the link to the El Pais edition as well. (Thanks, Dorsey.)

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It's always fun/interesting to compare the local papers when coming in from out of town, particularly when they're all focused on the same thing. Here's a selection of different front pages from around the state. (Thanks, Newseum)

Our Host

Something you can't see from this page: a good Katrina package inside with some nice photos from Hilda Perez.

Tampa

I thought this was a great page, especially in the 24-hour news cycle that is hurricane coverage. Grab readers . . . then push them to other platforms where they can get up-to-the-minute news. Interestingly, they were the only major paper in the state to ditch the traditional narrative altogether.

More after the break . . .

Continue reading "Wednesday's Papers"

Testing . . . testing.

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Testing one, two. Doing a little construction, so pardon me whilst I break some things.

By Douglas E. Jessmer
OK, so you wanted to see some Swamp photos? You've got 'em. You wanted to see some goofy photos? You've got 'em. You don't know who some of us were? You know now. And you'll know who to stay away from in Orlando. Above: Belushi's sweatshirt on the photographer, caught at a weird moment.

By Douglas E. Jessmer

OK, so in case you wondered why I've been silent (is that even possible?):

I was too cheap for that wireless Interweb at the Hilton. I was on dialup all weekend. Posting photos that way would have taken the patience of Job, all the time in the world, and the masochism only Kafka could dish out. Like Martin, I didn't do much posting during the conference. Martin's got an excuse, though -- he was in serious demand all weekend (I see he didn't make it to the Swamp, but there's always next year). My excuse? I'm cheap and don't want to support some heiress' addictions.

Oh, yeah, about the Swamp....

Continue reading "Finally! I can post more stuff!"

by martin gee

i totally suck. snd houston ended last night and here is my first entry. it was the lack of time and the lack of internet access. my apologies to the newsdesigner.com blog readers.

let me gather up my notes and thoughts, upload some pics and i'll get back to you.

m.

ps. thanks to everyone who came to my texas photoshop massacre session! xoxo

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...and would like to meet up, I'm hiding out at The Cafe in the lobby on the first floor. My flight doesn't leave until 5:20 PM. I'll be the guy typing on the iBook in the powder blue striped button down shirt.

Ernie Smith, who is waiting for his lunch

By Ernie Smith, in his last stand on NewsDesigner

And we go snake, snake go snake, oooh it's a snake (an oldie but a goodie!)

Seriously, thanks for a fun time, guys. I learned a lot and met all sorts of people from all skill levels.

By Steve Cavendish

Good crowd for Kris Viesselman's "Beyond Locators" session.

Kris may have one of the great gigs of anyone here: Design Director for National Geographic Maps. She and her folks do maps for National Geographic and its sister publications, the maps you and I can buy in the store, maps for NG clients and, how freakin cool is this, globes.

Some highlights:

-- Some beautiful maps from a recent Africa issue (it may still be on newsstands) including an impressive look at the human footprint on the continent.

-- Great reference site: shadedrelief.com - National Park Service guide to color coding relief in maps.

-- Interesting to see their work for a special Katrina edition. Their idea of breaking news is obviously different than a daily newspaper, but it's interesting to see them turn something around quickly.

-- A "map" of the Stanley Cup she worked on with Kurt Snibbe at the Orange County Register a few years ago.

-- Interesting piece also out of the OCR from this year: 6-column photo on the front of houses in the SoCal mudslides with annotated pullouts in text.

-- Note to self: flip through Conde Nast Traveller more often at the newsstand. Wow.

-- Some source books: Personal Geographies by Katharine Harman, The World Through Maps by John Rennie Short, Mapping the World by National Geographic Maps

Dispatches from the "b" team | Charles Gooch.

Quick thoughts from Viz Eds lunch: Finally met: Kristin Lenz, Bonita Burton, Mark Friesen, Matt Erickson and Josh Awtry. Do I need to say more? We had pizza, a raffle and Josh Bohling (who isn't even HERE!!!) won THREE FREAKIN' TIMES!!! It's all right, I walked off with the prize I wanted (a video game of course...)

Anyway, nice to have a lunch with Robb Montgomery and the rest of the crew.

If you haven't talked to Charles Apple yet at this convention ... what the hell is wrong with you?

Something I loved today: Stephanie Grace Lim's presentation this morning. It was funny ("The Moat of Suckyness") as well as high energy ("Rice is Yummy!" in full sumo voice). If you missed her, well, you missed the perfect morning class. She mixed equal parts high energy with soft-spoken happiness. Not to mention, she's one of my favorite illustrators ever.

Good points:

Michael Whitely says: "The lead of the front page should be the lead of the paper."
Doug Jessmer at the Viz Eds lunch: "I don't have anything intelligent to say ..."

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