Things what I done learnt...

Well it's been another mental week and a bit! The week at CheethamBell went really well, thanks to PK and all the guys there who made us feel welcome and got us in working on a couple live briefs. Paul as also kind enough to get us in touch with the CDs at BJL, Tom and Pete, who made some time for us to go over our book- a few similar comments that we'd heard in previous were made, so keep your eyes peeled for new additions/edits to the book soon!

After a false start on Wednesday (yes, yes, we went on the wrong night!), we finally made it to Leeds last Thursday for the Brahm Sh! awards...and not only were we pleasantly surprised enough to come away with first in the Advertising category, Creative Advertising also picked up 2nd place, as well as Tom from Graphics picking up 1st in the Design category! So a good night all-round...although it was slightly marred by hearing of the death of MJ (whilst sitting in some dodgy 70s bar in Leeds- we were, not him)

So after a few weeks of agency work I thought I'd compile a little list of insights we've got from life in the working world. A lot of them may be absolute rubbish, but they made me laugh at least..please feel free to add any more you can think of!

• Have an idea, work through it...you'll soon realise if it's shit
• Fight for your work with the accounts team
• Don't show anyone other than same-level creatives your sketchy ideas, do a mood board at least
• Don't take one person's opinion as gospel
• Have a fucking break. You're not a machine!
• Post-work, Friday night banter between Creatives and Handlers is classic, and you'll learn a lot
• Don't criticise the brief too much, but do it, and then do your own thing (within reason!)
• Your uni book means absolutely nothing once you graduate...maybe even now...do you want a degree or a job?
• Yorkshire tea and Nobbly Bobbly's are perfect creative pick-me-up. Just not at the same time
• Jonathan from Spotify is.....well, see here
• Try not to kill anyone from the agency with your Mac power cable
• Don't get complacent. Enjoy the moment...but what's the next step? Next brief? Next award? Next job?
• Always triple-check you're going to the awards on the right night!
• Don't take your drink up on stage with you if you do win
• Copywriter or Art Director? Decide now...damn student
• If you thought it was tempting to sit and trawl blogs all day, try sitting in an agency with 10 other people who've got time (well kinda!) to find even more amusing/pointless/disturbing/er...advertising, things to look at.

That's me for now. Updates soon x

Here's my card...

Over the next week I'm all over the place; interviews, holidays, placements, awards nights (yes, I know, it's such a hard life being an advertising student), and only yesterday- in the middle of an interview- did I realise that we didn't have a business card! And when someone from McCann Europe asks for your card, and you dont have one...it's time to get a move on!

We've got one in production at the minute, but I am tempted to call Josh and get him to stop the printers, 'cos look what I've found!

This has been making the rounds on the blogs at the minute, thanks to Ben & James for bringing it to my attention. In a strange twist of fate, Ben & James were also part of the interview team in the Brahm Sh! Awards I was at yesterday. (I think) Everything seemed

to go down well, apart from the lack of cards to hand out, and now it's just a waiting game to find out how we've done next Wednesday.

Quiet You!

Well...where to begin? It's been a long week since my last post, so much has happened!

The rest of the week with LOVE went down really well, the feedback we got on the live stuff we worked on went down really well. And the promo stuff we did was well received- we've got a mocked up version of one of them made up, but have to wait and see if it's going to be taken further before putting it up on here!

On Thursday we went over to JWT/CheethamBell for another book crit; we'd only gone there in the hope of getting 20 minutes of their time to go over our book, we ended up finding out on Friday afternoon that we'd been offered a placement, starting next Monday! Which is 'citing, if anything!

Another piece of surprising news was that we'd been shortlisted (along with another 4 teams from Lincoln) for the Brahm Sh! awards in Leeds. So I've got to go down there tomorrow for an interview and to show our book, then the week myself and Josh are in Manchester working, we're going over to Brahm HQ again for the awards night- best get our shoes polished!

Talking to a song bird yesterday

Wow, a week down already! We've had a busy busy week, both in and out of work. A lot of our time was spent coming up with promotional pieces for Love...a Yeti playing hide an seek in the street, office ten-pin bowling...as well as a new Umbro TV spot, and an identity and branding brief for new a new youth centre here in Manchester (again, don't really want to say too much about live briefs the agency is working on)

One of the highlights of the week was the last-minute Oasis gig! We managed to get hold of tickets for £15, and may even end up making a profit out of it after Liam offered refunds because of the fanny-on with the generator...scorrrrrre!

More blogging on work next week, think I'm about to OD on fruit so I'm a bit shakey and off for a lie down! Peace x

All you need is LOVE

After a fun-filled start to the morning (Josh knocked over some funky plastic wall in the agency that we struggled to put back up without all the pieces popping apart again) we finished off our hotel ad ideas to run them past Simon tomorrow.

After destroying some kick-ass burrito from Barburrito, we went back to the agency and had a book crit from Phil, which seemed to go down really well (or maybes he was just in a good mood 'cos the sun had come back out for the afternoon). He then set us on with some live briefs that they are working on or going to be working on now at Love...not really sure what they'd be keen on me having on here so not going to say much at the minute...but I will say there's some exciting things in the pipeline; all will be revealed soon! You never know, we could hit on some creative genius and see our work all around us by the end of the year (hey, we're allowed to dream aren't we?)

Also, a big thanks to SImon at Love for trying to get our name out there and get us some more book crits by giving us a mention on the Love Blog- check it!

It must be LOVE

Apologies for heavy use of the word 'Love' in the next few posts, but those of you who actually bother to read this will know that myself and Josh have now started at Love Creative in Manchester...and I need something to entertain myself on the bus on the way home, waiting for everyone to decide if the bus that stops at every stop is really the one they want to get on.

Yesterday we started and got to meet everyone on the team (must be better at remembering people's names) and then began to a bit of work on a brief that Love were pitching that day, just to get us rolling creatively. We kept working on it today, coming up with the banner ads that the client asked for initially in the brief, and then spending the afternoon trying something a bit different (I-Spy books for businessmen anyone?)

Being stuck inside on days like this is never the best, but one addition can always make any warm day so much better...the good old Nobbly Bobbly! mmm, retro ice-creams always help with creativity, definitely.

Summer-summer-summertime

When I was a kid, this used to mean 6 weeks off school, not having to get up until after 12, football in the park, and (when I was really young, pretending to be bin-men and fixing kerbs with Andrew Fawcett from over the road). But enough about the games of a privileged child from Durham, let’s talk about what this time of summer is really about: YCN commendations! (next year will be D&AD I keep telling myself!)

I completed two briefs this year, working with Neil on ASOS, and Josh on o2. Below are the ASOS print/48 sheets we did, and then the o2 piece, with our proposition outlined in the image. Much to our surprise, our o2 entry was commended, and can be seen in the next YCN book published sometime later this year. Updates soon on what happens next (exhibition/professional development/world domination).

ASOS w/ Neil:

o2 w/ Josh (commended in YCN book)

The fun doesn’t stop there though folks, myself and Josh are in Manchester now, we started at Love today (will blog about that soon..either tonight or tomorrow...rather tired right now). We’ve also entered our Language work into the ‘Brahm Sh! Awards’, with the shortlist/interviews with judges for those announced on the 17th June...so wish us luck! x