Last night, I had the opportunity to watch a brilliant artistic mind go through the process of creation.....in a timed competition! Nicole Stumphauzer was one of six young designers invited to compete in the Phoenix version of Shutterstocks Pixels of Fury. The designers are split in two groups of three and the winner of the first group squares off against the winner of the second. Nicole absolutely blew my mind! I am a fan of her work to begin with because of its techno edge and understated yet dramatic quality, but to see her go from concept to completion in 20 minutes was exhilarating! Heres the concept: Its similar to an Iron Chef competition. Each designer chooses a topic to inspire, before the competition. Once they are seated at the competition, they are given a Shutterstock lightbox that contains images that are completely random. The designer puts together a poster to represent their inspiring theme, using only the materials presented in their individual lightbox. Judges critique their final piece and the audience votes on the winner in each group and then again in the final. Heres the twist: In the final round, the two competing designers switch topics and design totally off the cuff! Nicoles original topic was Disconnect to Reconnect and her completed poster was brilliant in its concept and elegant in its simplicity and sophistication! She then switched with her opponent and tackled Water Conservation. The end result was polar opposites of both her own original themed poster and the direction her competitor went with the same topic. Nicoles was edgy yet commercial with a clear message through imagery! Oh, did I mention? SHE WON!!!!!! To see what it was all about, check out the event in other cities: vimeo/102311537 vimeo/79207244 vimeo/106512873
Posted on: Sat, 18 Oct 2014 15:08:38 +0000