the end

Today I took my last train home from the city knowing that it's going to be a while before I'm back. I am thoroughly depressed that my internship at BBH is over =( I feel like we were just starting to get the hang of things and people were just starting to have extra projects we could work on!

We finally got around to taking some pics of the office and our desks:


It was such an incredible experience, and I learned so much more in just a few weeks there than I have in years of school. And I'm really happy with the Miller Lite posters that we did so I got something for my book too!

After work, Amy took us out for drinks at a cool little bar across the street and it was nice just talking to her and hearing more about her life. She's really cool so I'll definitely be keeping in touch!

Goodbye BBH...

=)

today was freaking amazing.

we spent all morning working on the posters (surprise surprise) but then around 11 one of the producers came over to us and asked if we wanted to go watch her work on a commercial, which of course we did! We took a cab over to Color, the audio post-production company that's working on the commercial, and funny story, we ran into Jake in the lobby since apparently Digital Kitchen did the graphics and he was dropping off the tape!

Color was one of the coolest places ever, a huge space with lots of pictures of dogs and random art, lots of food and drinks, and the guys who work there are totally chill. We met Jeff who showed Kat and me tons of commercials and gave us some DVDs of work...he also told us to keep in touch and let him know if we ever need anything. Kat told him giving us this freedom to call him was a bad idea haha. My favorite thing he showed us was this microsite.

We watched the guys put together the video and audio which was really interesting and the actor came in to do the voice-over. I could never do voice-overs since I wouldn't know how to say the same sentence a million times "being more assertive" and "a little less snarky"...but it was fun to watch. The agency got us sushi for lunch and we spent the rest of the afternoon watching them work on the commercial and sat in on the conference call with the client (so cool!)

Then it was back to the madness of the agency where things seem to be out of control because of the big pitch everyones working on. We ran into Amy and she told us that KEVIN RODDY (the creative director who I researched for Ann's class and makes me feel like I'm in the presence of a celebrity!) walked past our desks today and saw the posters we're working on and said they look really cool and he might be meeting with us on monday. OMG.

So basically, today was amazing. I'm so sad that I only have 1 more week at BBH. I don't want to leave =(

longggggg day

This morning my train broke down on my commute into the city. After 20 min and deciding the problem couldn't be fixed, they piled our entire FULL train onto another completely FULL train. Everyone had to stand and it was the local, not the express. Ugh. Luckily after a few stops I was able to switch trains AGAIN and get an express. The commute only ended up being 2.5 hours instead of the usual 2. woo.

Today was more drawing and designing. It's really hard to try to make a poster look screenprinted when its on the computer. And I really wish we had more markers and pens and art supplies to work with. We spent the entire day working on one poster...I'm still not happy with it but I think we're going in the right direction. At least the one we did yesterday looks fabulous =) I do however wish we could work on another project at the same time as this.. Kat and I saw some of the work the freelancers have been working on and we could TOTALLY do that...

Talked to Pat Don tonight on the phone and it was quite possibly the highlight of my week =) Time for a quick skype now with Matt and then off to bed to make up for my lost nap on the train this morning!

hours of illustration and a cafe concert...

Kat and I worked on the posters more today...I've never spent so long working on a single project...well at least not since high school when I spent 15+ hours a week drawing...but anyway, the posters are looking AWESOME and I can't wait til we finish them and I can put them in my book.

Another freelance creative team started today so between Kat and me, the new guys and everyone from the China office our little cluster of desks is getting quite crowded! Everyone is starting to look really tired from working on this big pitch, I can't imagine focusing on one project for weeks at a time, working all hours of weekends and nights. Advertising is ridiculous.

At 5, there was a mini concert in the cafe and Laura Izibor performed. She was totally amazing, very soulful and beautiful music. They passed out copies of her album but they were out by the time I got to the front of the crowd...hopefully someone will leave a copy up front so I can grab it.

I think tomorrow Kat and I get to work on a new project, it'll be a nice break from several days of posters =)

relaxing weekends are nice

Friday I took the Bolt Bus down to philly so I could spend the weekend at UD. Only $10 from NYC to Philly on a coach bus...not too shabby. Except it was late and I had to stand outside for a half hour in literally 5 degree weather...

Anywho, the weekend was pretty uneventful, spent time with Matt, had a delicious dinner at Bertuccis, watched the Eagles lose and Matt want to cry, and finally finished Kat and my Match.com ads that we started last semester. Ann wants us to enter them in the ADC competition and they look soooooo much better now than they did before:

This pic is pretty small but they're up on my website too.

Work was fun today, Kat and I spent the day working on posters for Miller Lite and they're turning out really cool. Definitely a different style than I'm used to working in but they'll be great to put in my portfolio. We watched the inauguration at noon in the lobby and it was great. wooo obama! I can't believe how many people were out there in the cold...including my housemates who were playing with UD marching band! After the inauguration it was back to work for a few more hours til we met with the rest of the creative teams working with us.

Early morning tomorrow (as usual, I can't wait til I don't have to commute 2 hours every morning...) so it's off to bed for me!

4 inch heels and $150 of books later...

Today was FREEZING.

and of course this was the day I had to take the local train which makes like 6 more stops. and I had to wait 15 minutes. In the snow. In my 4" heels....probably should have picked out better footwear today but I'm usually sitting all day either at my desk or in the cafe so I like wearing heels when I can =)

Anyway, we got to work and the CD from BBH China was visiting for the big pitch we've been working on and he wanted Kat and me to go get some visual references for his idea. So we trekked around the city looking for some art books. Yet again, poor decision of footwear but oh well. We went to the Strand and they didn't have the specific book we needed so we just hung out looking for other books that were relevant (and warmed ourselves up a bit!) After calling several bookstores and talking to some particularly unhelpful Borders employees we FINALLY found a bookstore with the book we needed and made it back to BBH by about 3 with $150 of art books. Rob (our CD) and Johnny (China CD) were holed up with the "war room" as they called it with all the ideas from every creative team working on the brief and it was awesome. There were literally papers tacked up covering every single inch of wall space, I've never seen anything like it. It was really awesome to see how some of the other teams have been working with ideas very similar to Kat and mine, and Johnny pointed out one of our ideas for an iphone app that he particularly liked which was totally awesome =)

The rest of the afternoon we worked on some posters for Amy Servidea...she's a VC alum at BBH who basically got us the internship. As much as I've liked brainstorming for the last 2 weeks its nice to get copy and just have to design. She gave us this sweet book of old rock posters to use as reference so we spent a few hours sketching and making up some hand drawn typefaces. They're already turning out pretty cool so it'll be nice to have something to put in our books.

I'm taking the bolt bus down to philly tomorrow night so I can spend the weekend at UD and I'm pumped for that. It'll be SLIGHTLY warmer down there...tomorrow its supposed to be 4 degrees when I stand outside waiting for the train :-(...i'm definitely ready for spring!

So Sleepy...

The 2 hour commute every morning and night is starting to get to me.

I really don't know how people in my town have been doing it every day for years. Knowing that I only have to wake up at 6am for 3 more weeks is one of the few things keeping me going. That and how completely obsessed I have become with BBH :-)

This weekend was nice to relax and work on a campaign for Match.com that Kat and I started last semester. Ann thinks we should enter it in the ADC competition and now that I completely redesigned them this weekend I actually think they might have a shot!

Today at work was the same 'ol same 'ol...lots of brainstorming and trying to come up with some visuals. I'm finally starting to think in commercials instead of just print, and while they're not necessarily brilliant ideas for commercials it's definitely starting to get a LITTLE easier to think in video.

I would write more but my brain is fried and I need to get some sleep. I feel like such an old lady coming home at 8:30 and falling asleep by 10 or 11. And I've been missing all my favorite trashy reality tv shows. Ah the life of advertising...

commuting is exhausting

Today was the first time I commuted from home and its 2 hours from my door to BBH. ouch.

At least I LOVE working at BBH so it's definitely worth the commute and surprisingly I wasn't tired on the ride home...perhaps its the fact that having a barista at work has made me pick up my coffee drinking habit and I'm up to about 5 cups a day again!

Work today was similar to the past few days, Kat and I spent more time brainstorming and started working on visuals to present. We met with Rob the CD in the morning and he actually seemed interested in a few of our ideas which was amazing and he told us to meet with Josh and Marc, the new senior art director and copywriter tomorrow to exchange some ideas and get some new insight. I hope working with them we can start to get a better understanding of how the whole process works...ad in school is TOTALLY different than the real world. we've barely worked with partners before and I literally have no idea as to how things get from the idea stage to actually being produced, who works on what and all that. We talked to one of the art directors about it today when he came over and asked us how everything was going but there are still SO many things I have questions about.

Tomorrow will be the end of my first week...I can't believe how fast it's all going!

Halfway done with the first week!

Its 10:15 and for the first time this week I am sitting in my kitchen and I'm so excited to sleep in my OWN bed and not on someones floor in a living room. It's not going to be fun taking a 7:15 train in the morning but its totally worth it.

Yesterday Kat and I spent pretty much the entire day brainstorming ideas. It's a LOT harder than I thought it would be. At school I'll work on a project for an hour or 2, take a break, maybe take a nap and then get back to it. We worked from 9:30 til about 1 and hit a mental brick wall. I hope it gets easier with time. At least they give us the product and strategy as opposed to ad class where we have to come up with everything on our own. After lunch we tried to come up with more ideas then finally just decided to research funny commercials for inspiration.

After work, we went up to Bleeker St to see Kat's brother's band play at a bar. Unfortunately we had to trek several blocks in the pouring rain while I carried a 50 lb suitcase with a weeks worth of clothing, but the band was really great and it was a good time. We took a cab back to Kat's brother's apartment and passed out watching episodes of The Office.

Today was more brainstorming and luckily we didn't hit the mental brick wall until about 4...I guess it does start to get easier. I'm glad we have so much time to work on this campaign, I think we might actually have some good ideas. We're meeting with the Creative Director Robert Rasmussen tomorrow so I'm a little nervous but we talked to him the other day and he's totally cool. I was really surprised when I met Kevin Roddy, another Creative Director who I did my advertising research project about because he was also so down to earth and fun to talk to.

The more I work at BBH and the more people I meet, the more I love it and I can't wait to see what else is in store.

"baby got sheep" -jackie

I've never blogged before so it should be interesting to see how this goes.

Today was Kat and my first day working at BBH and I am so exhausted. I got about 3 hours of sleep last night after laying in bed for hours freaking out, but after a few xanax and an hour-long subway ride at 7:30 in the morning I was finally standing in front of the building. Kat and I met up at dunkin to calm each other down and down some coffee to wake us up and then we were on our way. The building is right by canal street in the AT&T building and its HUGE. BBH is on the 19th floor and when you leave the elevators the walls are covered in a mural of sheep.



I probably should have used the flash but I didn't want to look like a TOTAL creeper in the lobby. Anyway, once we were inside we got the official tour and the office is HUGE. There are tons of couches and tables to sit and talk at and lots of long desks surrounded by glass offices. The conference rooms are named for the different parts of the sheep like flank and rump which I thought was pretty funny. They made us take funny photos in a photo booth so they could hang them in the lobby, and showed us the kitchen filled with snacks which we are encouraged to raid as well as the xbox with rock band...in case we need to relax!

After the tour Kat and I were kinda confused as to what we should do since everyone kept telling us that they would come back with work...and then they didn't. So we set up our voice mail and drank a lot of the free coffee...and stalked photos of everyone in the office. Everyone is really awesome and friendly. However I was totally overdressed. And kat and I both accidentally wore black and red so we looked like twins. And every time someone asked us a question we would answer at the same time. People probably think we're the same person.

After lunch we finally got an email inviting us to a meeting for a new pitch BBH is trying and we spent 3 hours with the other creative teams getting briefed and talking which was really cool. Definitely a lot more in depth than any briefs we've gotten at school. I'm really looking forward to tomorrow where they want Kat and me to spend pretty much the whole day brainstorming and coming up with ideas...its really awesome that they're asking us to do REAL ad work and not just get coffee...

Alright its time for bed so hopefully I can come up with some amazing ideas tomorrow and impress everyone =) I hope everyone else is enjoying their internships and I can't wait to hear all about them!