graphics editor at
the globe and mail.
advocacy assistant with the toronto public space initiative.
check da portfolio, yo.
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Posts
- Feb 06, 12Hey all,
As you may or may not know already, I've been working at my (first!) new job in Toronto as a Graphics Editor at The Globe and Mail after graduating around three months ago. What does that mean, you ask? Well, I create explanatory graphics to illustrate concepts that would otherwise be difficult to understand textually. I'm still open to freelance offers and will consider each on a case-by case basis.
Cheers!
Matt - Nov 13, 10
During the summer of 2009, I interned at Bryan Christie Design in Maplewood, NJ (now in New York City) working closely with Bryan and his associates to create 3d illustrations for various clients. Pieces that I worked on were featured in IEEE Spectrum, Maxim, PC World, Medicine at Michigan, and Zeit Wissen magazines, among others.
While working at the studio, I was responsible for conceptualizing sketches for client approval and then creating and altering illustrations based on the demands of the client. Additionally, lots of teamwork was involved, as I was art directed by Bryan and worked with Joe Lertola (formerly of Time) and lead illustrator Jeong Suh to meet client demands.
You can find an example of some of my work here at IEEE Spectrum's website. For the August 2009 issue of IEEE Spectrum magazine, I modeled and rendered the first LED bulb image (which was used as cover art) and modeled most of the 3d models in the second bulb/reflective cup graphic.
A .pdf of my work at Bryan's studio is available upon request. Please E-mail me if you are interested. - Nov 13, 10
For my final long-term project at The Seattle Times, I worked closely with reporter Lornet Turnbull, visuals editor Denise Clifton and assistant art director Whitney Stensrud to visualize data relating to homelessness in King County, Washington.
The Seattle Times is hosting all of the graphics on their website, and you can click here to view all of them. - Nov 13, 10
Back in May 2009, I was commissioned by MSU's College of Communication Arts and Sciences and the National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory (NSCL) to create 3D informational physics visuals for the Rare Isotope Rap, a goofy rap video made to inform people of the coming Facility for Rare Isotope Beams (FRIB) at MSU. For those who aren't familiar with the FRIB, visit the official site for more info.
My partner and I worked with experts at NSCL to determine when visuals should be used during the song, what exactly those visuals would be, and to figure out how the science should be visualized. We had frequent sit-down sessions with Kate McAlpine ("Alpine Kat") and other scientists to develop and revise our ideas, then implemented those ideas in 3D form. My partner and I chose to split up the visuals based on our capabilities in each program (Maya for me, Blender for him) and also agreed to maintain some consistent colors throughout (i.e. gray for mechanical, green for protons, yellow for neutrons).
If you're interested in the music video, check it out here. - Sep 28, 10
Click photo to enlarge graphic.
I worked with technology reporter Brier Dudley, business editor Mark Watanabe, page designer Aldo Chan and assistant art director Whitney Stensrud to conceptualize, design and illustrate this piece on motion-controlled video games at E3, which ended up being the business centerpiece on the Monday following my first week.
Click here to download and view the full .pdf. - Sep 28, 10
This was my midterm project for “TC347: 3D Computer Animation” with Professor Dan Marsh during SS09.
Essentially, everyone in the class had to bring in a different object that made an interesting sound, and we all recorded the noises that our respective objects made. All the sounds we recorded were uploaded to the class server and every student was instructed to put together a song or collection of sounds using whatever music-making or sound editing program he or she desired (I used a free program called Renoise). After creating my song, I was instructed to make an animation in the 3D design program Autodesk Maya that synced up with my song, using only 3D shapes with flat surface shaders that give them a 2D appearance. Both the timing of my animation and the animation of the individual objects themselves (squash, stretch, etc) were required to match up with the sound.
In a nutshell, this was my spring break '09. While others were in Cancun making potentnially life-altering decisions, I was chuggin' away on my snail of a laptop making this.
Awards/honors:
2009 - Honorable Mention in Animation, MSU Digital Media Arts and Technology Showcase
2009 - Featured, IDMA IDEAS 09: Arts at the Digital Edge exhibition at Ball State University - Jul 06, 11
If you'd like to read my comics online, check out these links!
First comic (artist statement!): Design and Disorder
Second comic (wordless!): Peckish
Third comic (based on a true story!): Breathless: A One-Sided Love Story
If you'd like a free signed copy mailed to you, E-mail me!
This mini-comic book was the final project for my Comics and Visual Narrative class during fall 2009. Everyone in the class had to put together a book containing all of their comics from the course of the semester. Since the content of my book is kind of all over the place, I figured "Why not draw me punching a gazelle on the cover and title it 'EXPLOVARY'?" Makes perfect sense, eh?
I had to plan out/execute the layout, order, pacing, and other little details (e.g. "Easter eggs"). After laying everything out in Photoshop, I created a .pdf, chose my cover cardstock, and brought my supplies to Kinko's where they printed and staple-bound the books. In place of our final exam period, we actually had a comics signing at 21st Century Comics and Games (a local comics shop), where we all set up at a table and talked to interested customers about our work. Mine got voted "Most ROFLable comic" by some girl checking everything out, so I suppose that's gotta mean something.
All in all, I'd have to say this book, after all of the time and effort that went into it, was one of the most rewarding things I've ever produced during my time at MSU. Also, I guess people think its funny or something. Find out for yourself! - Sep 28, 10
You can find my entire concept development process here.
This my final project for my Fall 2009 Interaction Design class. The emphasis of the class was placed on various working methods pertaining to the design of interactive online environments. Over the entire semester, I worked with and researched a local business (record store Flat Black and Circular) for each individual project.
During the first half of the semester I developed a concept map to structure research, identified a need for information through activity diagramming, and constructed a user persona focusing on goals and motivations. The last half of the semester involved designing and planning for interactive patterns and behaviors. This planning was executed through the development of low-content wireframes and high-content storyboards. The final deliverable was an interactive Flash prototype (seen here) which shows specific moments of interaction as outlined by the user goals. - Sep 28, 10
The animations in this video (starting around 1:20 - after the explanation of our process) are all 3D digital pinball animations produced in Autodesk Maya for the MSU Theatre Department's production of The Who's Tommy in spring 2009.
The production re-envisioned the game of pinball for a screen-based generation and used projections in the set to help tell the tale. The animations are set to various key songs while Tommy performs (we were given choreography and music by the producer), and we had to create and sync up the game with what we would be seeing and hearing.
In this project I was the lead animator; responsible for modeling, animating, keeping all of my group members in line, and reporting back to our faculty advisor. Lots and lots of late nights and pizza, but these animations were extremely fun to make and more than worth it.
Awards/honors:
2009 - Best in Show for Animation, MSU Digital Media Arts & Technology Showcase
2009 - Thespie Award for Theatrical Innovations, Lansing State Journal
2009 - Featured, MSU Undergraduate Research and Arts Forum
2010 - Mid-Michigan Creative Alliance Gold Addy Award, Best of Show Runner-Up - Nov 10, 10
- Sep 27, 10
Click image to enlarge photo.
For my newspaper layout design class in spring 2010, I was assigned the task of conceptualizing and visually designing (not actually programming) a few sample screenshots for a hypothetical app for the iPhone. What you see here is what I came up with. The description:
"Designed by an MSU student for fellow MSU students, Course Adviser provides you with all of the honest inside information and tools you need to make informed decisions about your course selections.
An exciting feature this app has is student-editable content.The “What’s Really Taught” course descriptions and professor reviews are provided by MSU students, who are able to edit these as they see fit.
As a student user, you will also have the option to plan out your schedule for each semester, reference these schedules whenever you desire, plan out routes to figure out how to get from class to class, and “favorite” classes and professors for future reference. Future students, underclassmen, upperclassmen, and grad students rejoice! Your Swiss Army Knife of course planning has arrived."
In all honesty, I feel like tons of students would benefit from something like this. We need to get kids more involved in educated discourse about academia! - Sep 21, 10
Click to enlarge the graphic.
When Independence Day rolled around, I thought it'd be useful for The Seattle Times' readers to have a little guide about how they can legally celebrate. So, I pitched the idea to the graphics team, they approved and I went straight to researching. What you see here is the end result of my research (I had to call around to make sure that these policies were still correct + learned a lot about fireworks!), and the graphic got published on July 4 alongside more information about celebrations. - Sep 20, 10
Click photo to enlarge graphic.
Locator map with details, created during the great Barefoot Bandit chase of 2010. I was able to plot all the points on this map and provide brief descriptions based on a Google map created by another staffer at the Times (found here: http://bit.ly/bOGUzx). However, I had to really dig into that map to figure out the exact sequence of events in order to make a logical organization of the information we had. After I took care of that (I made smaller map that ran as a 2-col the next day), my super talented desk buddy and fellow Seattle Times news artist Mark Nowlin worked used his magic touch to open up the map to a big, beautiful, 4-column graphic. - Sep 21, 10
Click to enlarge.
Created to commemorate Alex Rodriguez's 600th home run. Click here to download a higher-res .pdf. - Sep 05, 10
Hello all,
In case you didn't know, I am currently working as a graphics intern at The Seattle Times. You can follow my adventures, both in leisure and work, by visiting this link.
Take care!
-Matt - Sep 28, 10
Back in the fall of 2009, Karl Gude commissioned me and a few other students to create the animations that ended up being used in this video. Peers Josh Farris, Elizabeth Levosinski and I received drawings, animation directions and a script from Karl, divvied up the animations, and all developed a consistent animation style for the drawn portions of this video. My portion was completed in Maya. - Sep 27, 10
Created for STA 467: Time and Motion during spring semester 2010.
For this project, I had to use Flash to frame information about a local initiative, issue, place and/or person from my community (current or historical) while focusing on motion as an information space. I chose the MSU Comic Art collection on the basis that lots of people don't even know we have such an amazing collection at MSU.
The idea behind the animation itself was to emulate a 60s PSA-style presentation, with cheesy narration, black and white color scheme, and tacky background music.
I created multiple storyboards in preparation (check out the final one here), took my own photos, drew all the vector illustrations, scripted the animation, and narrated the animation in that cheesy voice. - Sep 27, 10Conceptual Seattle Times Feature Page Design
First foray into feature page design. For this project, I designed a conceptual Seattle Times Food & Wine feature page. I chose all of the articles and art to support the theme, and wrote/edited all of the headlines, cutlines, and decks.
Main story headline is set in Gotham and Ziggurat (black italic), ampersand is set in Didot (bold italic), headlines and decks are set in Gotham, and body text is set in Hoefler Text. - Sep 27, 10National Post Front Page Design
This piece was my first foray into front page design. I was given only photos, cutlines, and articles; the design, headlines, decks, etc were all up to me. Text is set in Hoefler Text and Verlag. - Sep 27, 10
All of these models were created during my intro 3D Maya modeling, lighting, texturing, and rendering class. Only the Challenger is a rendered image; the rest are screenshots taken from the Maya scenes.
Click to enlarge.1970 Dodge Challenger (I chose the car), the
midterm modeling and texturing project; also
a beginning exercise in lighting and rendering.Animal performing an action it wouldn't normally do,
a beginning organic modeling and texturing project. - Sep 27, 10Breathless: A One-Sided Love Story
Third foray into creating sequential art, this time as a final project for my comics and visual narrative class. By the way, this event actually happened (not quite as poetic as I made it out to be in the story, however). - Sep 27, 10Peckish: A Wordless Comic
My second foray into the medium of sequential art, this time visually telling a story without words. - Sep 27, 10
- Sep 27, 10
Movie poster that I made for a friend based on what he told me about his movie. Essentially, the film is "a documentary that looks at the overwhelming marketing presence of Barack Obama during his campaign for the presidency and the mythology built up around him that made that presence possible." I pitched the idea to him and then sent him various drafts until we agreed on a final design.
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Info
- SummaryHey there! After graduating from Michigan State University's Media Art program with high honor in addition to two internships (Bryan Christie Design and The Seattle Times) under my belt, I currently find myself working as an information graphics editor at The Globe and Mail. My primary focus is in visual storytelling, with specific interests in human-centered design, interactivity, information graphics, mapping, semiotics and typography.
I'm super interested in how we can use new + old forms of visual storytelling to improve our communities in interesting and forward-thinking ways. Recently, I've been more concerned with public space, bicycle infrastructure, and transit advocacy.
And, of course, I'm always down for exploring new places, playing/enjoying music, riding my bike, reading, listening to podcasts, having conversation and savouring a good ol' cup of coffee.Specialties: visual storytelling; specific interests in human-centered design, mapping, interactivity, motion graphics, information graphics, semiotics, and typography.Experience- May 2011 - PresentGraphics Editor / The Globe and MailVisualizing data, producing explanatory graphics, and working on R&D projects alongside reporters, editors, designers, and other graphic artists at Canada's national newspaper.
- Oct 2010 - May 2011Motion Graphics Artist / Michigan State University Department of Physics and AstronomyVisually explaining particle physics and the Large Hadron Collider for CERN and MSU. Created images and animations for + helped conceptualize and develop a brief 5-minute planetarium show detailing MSU's involvement in the LHC experiment.
- Jan 2010 - Apr 2011Graphic Artist / MSU Outreach and EngagementResponsible for working collaboratively within the Communications & Information Technology office to design documents and Web sites used by various university organizations.
- Jun 2010 - Aug 2010Graphics Intern / The Seattle TimesWorked independently and also collaboratively with reporters, editors, and other graphics artists to produce daily graphics while working on larger, long-term projects.
- Aug 2009 - Oct 20092D Animator / MSU College of Communication Arts and SciencesCommissioned to create 2D animations for an informational video put together by the MSU Department of Food Safety & Toxicology in conjunction with the MSU College of Communication Arts & Sciences.
- Jun 2009 - Aug 2009Intern & 3D Illustrator / Bryan Christie DesignUnder the direction of award-winning information illustrator Bryan Christie, created 3D illustrations for various clients, including IEEE Spectrum, Maxim, PC World, Medicine at Michigan, and Zeit Wissen magazines, among others.
- May 2009 - Jun 20093D Animator / MSU College of Communication Arts and SciencesCommissioned to create 3D information graphic visuals for the “Rare Isotope Rap” music video put together by the National Superconducting Cyclotron Laboratory in conjunction with the College of Communication Arts & Sciences.
- Jan 2009 - May 20093D Animation Lead / MSU College of Communication Arts and SciencesResponsible for developing digital 3D visuals for the MSU Theatre Department’s adaptation of The Who’s rock opera Tommy; in charge of keeping other animators in check.
Education-
2007 - 2011Michigan State UniversityBA in Media Art (information design, visual storytelling)
Activities: Outreach Coordinator - MSU Chapter of the Society for News Design (May 2009 - May 2011), AIGA, ROIAL Players
Additional Information-
Websites:
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Honors:• Vice President (2009-2010) and Outreach Coordinator (2010-2011), MSU chapter of the Society for News Design • Presented at the 2009 MSU Undergraduate Research and Arts Forum • Accepted to IDEAS 09: Arts at the Digital Edge exhibition at Ball State University • Facilitator, 30th Annual Society for News Design Best of Newspaper Design Creative Competition • 2009 & 2010 MSU Digital Media Art and Technology Showcase Best of Show • 2010 Mid-Michigan Creative Alliance Gold Addy Award & Best of Show Runner-Up • 2010 Society for News Design student travel grant recipient • First Place Award in the Social Sciences, 2011 MSU Undergraduate Research and Arts Forum • 2009 Kevin R. Markwardt Scholarship recipient • 2010 Michael A. Chaprnka Scholarship recipient • Dean's List 8/8 semesters (3.93 GPA) • Summa Cum Laude and High Honor graduate, Michigan State University Honors College
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Interests:interaction design, information graphics, animation, typography, illustration, 3D, visual communication, human-centered design
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Tweets
- check out the fun graphic i worked on detailing skrillex's rise to fame: http://t.co/3hCJloPOFeb 14, 12 from web Reply, Retweet, Favorite
- just started my very own sketch blog/journal! check it out if you're into that sort of thing: http://t.co/RGUt4nbbFeb 14, 12 from web Reply, Retweet, Favorite
- Reconsidering Existential Texts in a Mario Broian Context - http://t.co/hoz7wY67 (via @htmlgiant)
- @johnkalmar thank you, sir. i'll just re-label it as a "holiday tree" to cover mlk day, valentine's day, st. patrick's day, easter, etc.
- @johnkalmar my christmas tree is still up b/c its still cold outside
- @TTCchair Thank you so, so much for everything you've done for Toronto's transit future lately. Gives me hope!Feb 10, 12 from web Reply, Retweet, Favorite
- @davidapike IMMA GET ME 1
- "Guy Fieri looks the way NOFX sounds." http://t.co/avfptDR2Feb 10, 12 from web Reply, Retweet, Favorite
- "I bought a cheese grater for my blind uncle. He said it was the most violent thing he ever read."Feb 10, 12 from web Reply, Retweet, Favorite
- Op-Ed: Accepting Less to Have More http://t.co/vBFdrj8O
- The story behind Toronto street names http://t.co/roaHW4kn via @blogto
- man im so excited to get tix for the winter classic!Feb 09, 12 from web Reply, Retweet, Favorite
- #crockupy potlucksFeb 09, 12 from web Reply, Retweet, Favorite
- List: My Family’s Trending Topics http://t.co/eZUPyDEi
- Kings’ Dustin Penner injures himself while eating a stack of delicious pancakes http://t.co/Wr1wdYWe
- breaking news: ice-t reunites body count to write anti-Monsanto song "Crop Killa"Feb 06, 12 from web Reply, Retweet, Favorite
- @ivortossell @thechrisws how is babby airplane formed?
- “everything is amazing, and nobody’s happy.” - louie c.k.Feb 06, 12 from web Reply, Retweet, Favorite
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Reading
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Posts
- Feb 20, 12
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- Feb 08, 12I need to draw more, so I decided I'd start my very own sketch blog.
Things to expect:- Hand-Drawn Typography!
- Urban Scenes!
- Random Musings!
- Other Stuff!
Yeah!
Matt
