ConjureBunny

[arthur.rann]

Hi,

I probaby wont be around the forums much because I travel a lot and Chilton probably wants to bean me on the head with a pan next time I see him because of something stupid I said a few years ago that was absolutely not true. But I owe it to him to come here and tell this story because it's a good one and it has to do with Conjure. Ive been in graphic arts since it was done with a damn t-square and a good quill. Good designers only use quills. Im not a designer though I do the boring stuff like make money off the good designers work . But I have worked with some of the best in the industry. But its a story about Chilton. And he might erase it so read it quick. ha ha!

Oh if you think I'm biased though I'm not. Well maybe now though. I didn't want to hire him at first, and my partner back then did. And I think this is a good time to tell this story though it will probably embarras Chilton. ha ha!

We were looking for someone to help us build a very elaborate website. Huge deal it had a lot of different parts and it was going to be for designers so it had to look real sharp. And we put an ad out, which Chilton responded ot. So he shows up with his PowerBook and while we are talking, he whips out his tablet adn pen and starts doing this mockup stuff on the screen. All of it was just boxes though I think they looked like blueprints and not clean boxes like are in Conjure. And we also had some stuff drawn up on paper, and he says "hey neat" (was that sarcasm? I'm still not sure) and he holds it up in front of this silver bullet looking camera (istill?) he had on his PowerBook and snapped it straight onto the screen. Then he started drawing all over our drawing!

And he's talking to us while he's drawing like its no big deal. And wed say something and he'd write it down. And he'd make little notes and draw stuff while we were talking. It was like PowerPoint and photoshop and some notes programs all rolled into one.

Looking back the thing that struck us was that there was NOTHING like it out there and he's just tearing it up with it. So about half through the meeting, Rob says, 'HOLD UP What's that? HOW are you doing that?' and he says "oh this is something I made so I can do stuff like this."

So Rob says "can we have that?" and he says "no." Man I felt like a kid locked out a candy store. I know back then he called it Landscape and he said he'd make it for sale some day. And somewhere else on this forum (I can't find it now) he said Landscape and Conjure used to be the same thing.

But man I tell you this really made an impact on us. Since that day, I don't know any other graphic artist who ever actually did something on the computer in front of us. Most of the time it was crappy drawings on paper and then a 45 minute slide show of the stuff they did in the past. And mind you Chilton can't draw for crap! i'm kidding dont ban me!

My point is that Conjure or Landscape or whatever it was, was the thing that got him that job with us. Well that and he obviously knew his stuff. But Conjure was the VECTOR for him showing off his stuff. And my advice to any young graphic artists otu there is to get Conjure right now and use it to show off everything else you do. If I was just now starting as a designer and not could see for crap thats what Id do!

Nothing is more IMPRESSIVE than a well done demo. And you can show off all the sites or design in the world but who knows if youre lying? So you show up at a clients office with Conjure and you throw a mockup... you throw some proofs... you throw some solid design... and you draw on it and then you SHOW how the EYES travel down the page... or across a fabric... stuff like that. And thats how people know you know your trade. And its on the computer while everyone else is showing boring damn PowerPoint presentations. Yours is alive and FAST. And people see that and know you know your trade. And that gets you the money.

This is gold right here folks. GOLD.

(this took awhile to write so Im out for now. Also Chilton had some big poofy hair man. I mean like a lions mane. So maybe you need Conjure and some big lion mane hair. No, just Conjure ha ha!
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-Art

[Chilton]

Hi Art!

Yeah, I had some big hair back then (edit: I'm pretty sure I had more of it then, too). Glad to hear you're still in the biz. That was Conjure, or as I think I alluded to earlier, an earlier version of it. I was kinda hoping I got that job based on my mad skillz, but I'll take this as a compliment

This is a good point though. Conjure can be used like a realtime, 'living' PowerPoint / Keynote presentation. I use it all the time when I meet clients, for doing everything from initial design work to showing off their finished product before it goes live. I'm using it right now to wrap up the graphics for a game I did for a local toy store, so I might do a video based on that, after the game ships, and after I fix the bugs they're posting in the bug section, of course

-Chilton