1. Red Bull Race Detroit

    Monday, June 7, 2010
    By Craig
    I snapped the panorama from the parking garage in the bottom right of the lower image.  The lower image I couldn't help but post because the shot came out so awesome. Well done Red Bull photo team!
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  2. Aegis MT logo design

    Thursday, May 13, 2010
    By Craig
    I recently designed the Aegis MT logo for a Medical Transcription company.   The word Aegis comes from a type of shield used by Athena in ancient Greece.  I have cut lines through the shield which represent the line by line process used by the company when working.  
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  3. Engineers can have taste too...

    Friday, March 19, 2010
    By Craig
    I feel like an outsider. The industrial design group at Altair is definitely the bastard child of the group. Birthed from the need to document and storyboard the engineers work, we slowly infiltrated the process. To this day we are still considered by many as the "stylists". Just today, in an email I was cced on, an engineer was asked to choose an off-the-shelf part and run it by the "style guys" to make sure it was okay. So I appreciate the thought, but we do a lot more then that. That alone is a subject for a longer conversation but my main point is what happens when we aren't asked to review things. There have been many a times where I have walked up to an engineers desk to see what he/she has been up to and then was brief on alterations to the design they have made. "I thought this looked good so I changed it". That statement makes me cringe. I don't believe they are sabotaging the design on purpose. In the end everyone wants to make a product that looks great. Who am I to tell someone that something that they think looks cool isn't. Okay, okay yes i have been trained at a top industrial design school but one thing I've never forgotten is "beauty is in the eye of the beholder".

    So how does a designer overcome such an obstacle? For now I have reached for the only card I have relating to this. I remind them that part of my job is to work on the overall design language. What happens when everyone starts designing individual pieces of one product? Each piece might be cool in its own right but as a whole it starts to look like The Munsters. I don't tell them that they have no clue what looks good and what they have done looks like a dog nert (even though this may be the case sometimes). That would just make them feel like crap and I walk away not knowing if he will ever ask my advice again. By telling him about the overall design language the engineer doesn't feel like you are a pompous designer who thinks that your shit don't stink. He understands that even though this small addition might be what he wants it may not be whats best for the overall product. If any one has any better ideas on how to go about this problem please let me know. Until then, I will most likely stick with this.
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  4. Dole Project


    Last year I was part of a brainstorming group at a company in Ann Arbor and together we formulated a plan for selling Dole lettuce. The picture is what resulted from this two day brainstorming activity. Probably not going to be found in the ole’ portfolio but I’m proud of it non-the-less.
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  5. The Fight


    Created a fight scene from a photo I found. I’m still not sure where the inspiration for this came from. Possibly a conflict with an engineer.
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  6. If design is dead then Starck killed it


    Philippe Starck most famously proclaimed that “Design is Dead”. Well mister Starck, it was you, in the conservatory with the……watch?! This statement was not proclaimed as of recent, however it has literally snapped back into my life. Starck wallowed in self pity because he believes his entire design career has been spent creating useless consumer goods for the elite. “Everything I have created is absolutely unnecessary”. I was against this statement originally because to a certain extent humans value material goods. It is our nature to want the latest and greatest and there is nothing wrong with that. For Valentines Day I purchased the beautiful S+arck watch pictured on the left for my girlfriend. I was rather excited to give it to her because of how amazingly simple, elegant, and modern the design is. I knew she would love it. Anything else the Fossil woman showed me just didn’t feel right. They all looked the same but that Starck watch…. THAT Starck watch was different.

    3 days after owning the watch we are returning to the Fossil store. Why? Thanks for asking. The plastic watch has snapped from its buckle. The strap that snapped is attached to the same buckle that when getting the watch sized, doesn’t allow for error. In order to fit the watch one must wait an hour and a half for the Fossil people to cut it appropriately without a special pin snapping which apparently happens quite often. Oh yeah that’s right, I said you must permanently cut the strap at predetermined locations in order to fit it. Now we must return and go through the same process a second time. You know what S+arck, you are right.
    Broken watch

    Broken watch

    Why not make an effort to learn the entire process one must go through in order to own your watch? Why not create a buckle that allows the user to increase or decrease the strap diameter without needing special tools? Why not use your talents to create products which make for not only a beautiful object but a beautiful experience. You would make a lot of people very happy. Or is that something you are against too now?
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  7. Education or Medication?

    Wednesday, February 17, 2010
    By Craig

    When you graduate high school they tell you that the world is your oyster. You can do anything. This is true! What most people don’t see is the fine print at the bottom that claims 8% interest on your student loans over the next 25 years. It makes perfect sense that in order to make sure you are a well-rounded individual one must make the trek down the long road of college as I did 5 years ago. The big elephant in the room is the crazy interest rate tacked onto those loans that help you become such a well-rounded individual. Why do banks need to make so much off of a person just leaving college with nothing but thirst for a great job? Should you be hit in 6 months with nearly $500 – $700 a month in students loans? Will that inhibit someone from being able to afford health insurance? If someone can explain this please do. When a company like Wells Fargo is making nearly 7% off of my student loan I feel as if I am being taken advantage of. I don’t have much of a choice but to accept the loan. I have had limited education on the world of finance from my high school. I don’t enter the world knowing a whole lot about it. Why is it that something so crucial to our lively hood gets overlooked for things like the War of 1812. I’m not saying the war is not important but if I can’t understand a loan document I can’t help but feel as if somethings been left out.

    What happens when a person leaves school in an economy as bad as this one and then must make payments of $500 – $700 dollars a month working at a job they thought was left back in high school with drama queens and jock kings. Can you afford minimal health insurance and pay back the big banks? Why should one have to make a choice after school? Do the banks need the money that badly after billions of our bailout money was recently handed over to them? Just lower the interest rates so people can actually afford at least the minimal crappy insurance offered by other big business. In the end, we are still taking money from one company and handing it out to another. Isn’t that how this economy works? Until greed is eliminated from all finance, trickle down needs to remain a marketing scheme for consumer goods.

    Feel free to correct me if you think any statements are false.

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  8. Sustainability goes both ways…

    Before I left my apartment the other day I flipped on the light to grab my gloves out of the closet. At this moment I realized that there has to be a way to not only live environmentally friendly but enable one to also sustain their lifestyle. The lightbulb in my hallway is a CFL (curly pigtail fluorescent bulbs) installed by my landlord. Awesome gesture I know. The problem with CFL’s is that they don’t turn on at full capacity instantly (boo hoo). Instead they must “warm up” making it difficult for one to find gloves in a dark closet filled with winter jackets and fabric grocery bags. Can’t we create a world that is sustainable to both the environment and a person’s lifestyle? I believe strongly enough in human laziness that the environment will not, in the long-run, stop us from doing what we want. Of course this challenges us to work harder so we can create those LED bulbs that turn on instantly and are extremely energy-efficient. Currently we are at a turning point where people must work harder to be more energy-efficient aka GREEN. The good news? Soon technology will give us the upper-hand in our fight for sustainable lifestyles. After flipping on my energy-efficient LED hallway bulb of the future I can see everything immediately, just like the good ole’ days!!! As I lock the door, all my lights will turn off auto-magically and the thermostat will turn down a notch. Same life, less energy, life’s good. Hang in…
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