Yes we Heine-k...can.

This week at work, we're still hustling through deliverables from the Heineken show, but as of Wednesday, I'm caught up on the half dozen freelance gigs that popped up (and back up, and back up again) during the fairly swampy past two months.  It's been a sleepless, fast-paced adventure and I'm looking forward to finally getting to blah-blah-blog all about it.

Dusty desert sunrise

Escape from New York Blizzards

Our week in Phoenix was spent waking with the sun and hitting the artists' bullpen in the Convention Center with only Starbucks in our stomachs.  The show coordinators would rehearse with Heineken's executives and bring back content and art changes for us to incorporate into the presentation graphics.  With two days' worth of stage chatter to represent visually we had our work cut out for us, and some nights got particularly long (and frustrating, since most of the work had to happen in PowerPoint -- a program my 7th grade self wouldn't have believed would still be around...).  But we made it through, and ultimately I was so grateful to have the amazing coordinator team and the fellow artists to work with.  Everyone kept their chins up and lent support to the team at large, even when we were all fried and groggy.

The gig went about like this:

• Heineken execs arrived onsite Saturday, after we'd all had a day of prep, and we hit the ground running on their presentations.  All of the execs were surprisingly accessible and very nice to work with, though for sure standards were set high.

• All of the individual Heineken-owned brands threw a giant party the first night of the convention (we at Image Media put it together - though all of the planning happened off-site so I wasn't aware we were securing a falconer, famous Mexican boxers, gold-painted living statue actors, and numerous other attractions for the big shebang).  It was amazing -- three warehouse-sized rooms filled with top-notch catering, free beer and Strongbow cocktails, sharp Execs wandering amidst scuzzy distributors, archers and photobooths taking shots at people, and each brand representing itself in a different area.  Newcastle, for example, the British beer, had constructed a pub complete with ancient looking round wooden tables and peanuts on the floor.  Dos Equis offered guests a chance to be The Most Interesting Man in the World with an adventure course.  

• I ordered room service a lot.  A lot a lot.  Not only did we tend to get out of work too late to hit local restaurants most nights, but having wine delivered to your luxury room is something everyone should be lucky enough to experience once.  It's served with saran wrap overtop. 

• I made it to the hotel gym three times, though exhaustion probably made the late night Sheraton worker bees wonder what was wrong with that noodly-legged girl on the elliptical.  

• Since we were short on artists, I ended up serving as the pinch-hitter and would get tossed on any presentation that needed changes and art created on short notice.  Because of this, something kind of amazing happened -- all of the coordinators talked me up to my boss, Ed, on their own volition at one point or another during the show.  Sometimes I overheard, other times they would let me know later what a great job I was doing and how grateful they were to have me as a 'secret weapon' and that they'd been sure to let Ed know.  It probably sounds brag-ish to note this, but I was honestly just surprised and amazed that anything I was creating so blindly on rush deadlines was turning out noteworthy at all.  Tanya, the coordinator I worked with the most and who is incredibly professional and poised (more so than I'll ever be) went so far as to tell Ed that she compared my work to that of the senior designers on the show and felt that it was absolutely on-par if not better and that she thinks I have limitless potential and a great eye.  Hot Dog.  That's all I have to say.  I'm forever humbled by the fact that these coworkers went to bat for me without any prompting. I'm certain it will open opportunities up for me at work and elsewhere, especially because --

• -- one of my fellow artists, a woman who's been in this strange presentation industry for years, took me aside and said that she could get me going as a freelancer if I was interested, and have me starting at $400/day.  This blew my mind, mostly because we're still talking POWERPOINT as the main engine of media delivery, but also because in terms of the work I've been doing for the past year or so in broadcast graphics, I'd assumed I was still at least several years off from making that kind of day rate as a designer/animator.  So to be able to do that right away wasn't something I'd thought possible for me yet.  And really, there would still be design and animation involved in presentation graphics creation, it all just gets plunked into a dorky program at the end of the day.  So now I can't believe I'm actually considering getting more involved in this strange industry, working for fortune 500's and their buttoned-up CEO's and traveling to whatever stages they're setting to leverage their business.  But I am.  Considering it.  We'll see....

All in all, Phoenix was a good experience for this kid,  and  I'm glad we don't have another big show anytime soon.

My handwriting is all over this one...

Heineken's 30-something supermodel of a CEO, Dolf, gives his opening keynote.  This doesn't show off
any of the more impressive graphics we made, but it's a good view of the stage setup.

Gettin' Distributors pumped on a club-vibe at 8:00 a.m. 

Rehearsals in progress.

Riding the Newcastle Bus (driver on the right, proper
UK-style) late to the wrap party.

Bowling at Lucky Strike with
the lovely show team.

Oh - and we got stranded in Phoenix for an extra day because of raging East Coast Snowstorms (which turned out to be mild at best) but I spent it knocking through my Prank Calls animations for Charles Rogers.  He's pitching his webseries to MTV this week in hopes of developing an actual show for them, and I'm wishing him luck of course because that would be fantastic exposure for my intro ;)