RedBull

Special thanks to Chris Tschantz, who created the title procrastiNATION, and helped me throughout the brainstorm process. I owe you big time.

My Mean Joe Greene

One of the most important things I learned in a lecture my junior year was to get a mentor. I took this to heart, heading into my internship as an Art Director at Doner Advertising. I had no idea how deep the jungle was or how to survive. Luckily there were two men at that agency that I luckily could follow in their tracks and learn as much as possible. These men may not have been Mean Joe Greene, but they defanitly gave me more than just some sweaty, old football jersey.

These two men were Kevin Delsanter and Chris Tschantz.
There were other AWESOME people at that agency but these two stick out because of how much advice I could possible consume still resonates with me.

I will start with Kevin.
He was my big brother. He taught me how to mess around without getting caught by mom and dad (the CD's and the agency heads). We went through battles together with Arby's and came out bleeding and came out captains of the ship. He taught me how to enjoy a 9 to 5/6/7/8, he taught me how to grease the wheels (i.e. do it again) and he taught me how to love advertising.

Chris was more of a Batman, if I were Robin.
He is my true mentor. He took me under his wing and showed me the ropes, pardon the clichés. But it is true. The best part about Chris is that he rarely ever taught me, he showed me. He showed me how to think, how to act and how to play the poker tables in Vegas. But what is best about Chris was not what he taught me but who he was. This man graduated in undergrad, graduated portfolio center and had a slew of opportunities to work at some of the best agencies, working on some of the best clients. But he traded it in, for his family.
That is a man, that I want to follow.

I apologize if this post is a little too much cheese, but it is the truth. These men have changed the way I look at working in any industry, with any people, in any city. And I thank them for that.

What is a Potty Mouth?

Where is the line in advertising?

It is like no other industry. Creatives wear t-shirts wrinkled and jeans with holes. Cubicles are filled with Nerf guns and creative briefs chaotically scattered across desks. I hear stories of swearing, drinking, and loligagging around the office till it's time to punch out.

I come from a father who has bored me with old school business ethics since I could pick up a fork. So hearing of a creative amusement park like the advertising industry has me excited like an old woman on The Price is Right. (It's not the same without Bob anymore)

But there has to be a line. You can't wander into work hungover and drunk swearing like a sailor shooting freethrows all day. No way.

This has recently interested me due to the many responses I received from my first post, where on multiple occasions I say the F-word and avoid saying words like hell and bull shit.

I feel as the author it was justifiable. I didn't just swear for swearing's sake. I swore to clarify how upset people are at this current juncture. I feel it adds attitude and truth to the topic that I was writing about. If I were to censor myself it would be boring and a pile of marshmallow fluff.

But I do follow my father's examples most of the time, when he says that there are somethings you don't pack into your briefcase, and swearing is one of them.

But as I enter and converse with people in the industry when is it okay?

I have heard CEO's come speak in front of a massive crowd and let loose some language that you only speak in the locker room. And I have also heard people that have probably bitten a few bars of soap in their childhood and would never swear in public.

Right now I have no answer. But In my opinion I like to test the waters first when choosing certain words to converse with.

A Brand Called Colin Paul Murphy

Swimming, Sneakers, Menus, Beards, Viewfinders, 3-D Glasses, Shaky Hands, Martha Stewart, Glasses, Hybrids and Speech Bubbles.

These are all of the concepts I considered deeply when branding myself.
And I forgot to mention peanut butter and jelly.

My problem, was my ignorance.

I hear of these stories of people making incredible impacts on recruiters and CD's by showing their portfolio in AMAZING ways. A binder made of plastic bags, a portfolio shown on napkins, and all of the fixin's.

One awesome story I read in Luke Sullivan's Book "Hey Whipple Squeeze This". A kid put all of his work into a wallet made a fake license with the CEO's name on it and dropped it in the bathroom of the building where the agency was located. Then yadda, yadda, yadda, the kid got a job and Luke Sullivan is writing about him.

I went to bed that night concocting this brilliant scheme that I can put together, like the wallet, to get a job and eventually make millions, win 20 gold medals and be the president of the universe.

Well let's just say I'm still working on the job part.

I came back down to reality last semester when I told my professor all of my extravagant ideas of how I'm going to make a menu out of my portfolio and have all this interesting, food diction in my ad descriptions and blah, blah, blah.

My professor looked at my work with a reaction that I was not looking for. Content.
No remarks of pure genius, or singing from the heavens or kissing of my feet. Nothing.

That's when I realized, back to the sketchbook for me. So I slowly made more ideas come together. Ones that would express my humor and personality, ones that showed physical characteristics unique to me, ones that I loved and ones that I hated. I juiced it till there was only rhine.

Recently I came up with two ideas. Both were nothing special but showed some of the few things I wanted.
One was based around my glasses and one was based around my working style.

In the first concept I wanted to brand my glasses. I knew that this wasn't original, actually it is probably number 3 on most common things to make a personal logo out of next to animals and faces. But I thought of a great line that made it unique,
four eyes are better than two.
It gave off my style of advertising and writing; it said "I'm confident"; it said fuck you world make room for the bees knees.
But it didn't say who the hell is Colin Murphy. It just said I wear glasses.

So my second idea. One that has been the base of all of my concepts from start to finish: I am an idea man. Again not original. But it is something I'm standing by throughout this job process. I'm not the greatest Art Director and I'm not the greatest Copywriter. I'm a Thinker that can do both. When I was applying for internships they always told me to choose one, Art Director or Copywriter.

So from now on with this branding I will give agencies the honest truth. I'm a hybrid of both. I can write great copy and form a great design to boot. My professors have said that the industry is changing because the line between art director and copywriter is beginning to blur. To me, I am that line.

Here is my first attempt logo design:

Vitamin Shoppe Campaign

Copywriter: Kevin Delsanter
Art Director: Colin Murphy

MLB Playoff Billboard

McDonald's Ad

Walking an Unbeaten Path

I am fucked.

That is what everyone is saying,
I am fucked.

We are all second semester seniors at Syracuse University in Advertising. And what is on everyone's mind is,
What the H-E-Double Hockeysticks am I going to to do? We are going up against other seniors in art schools and other universities. We are up against people coming out of Portfolio Center, Miami Ad School, and other ridiculously awesome schools that none of us can afford right now. We are up against other creatives, juniors, and even seniors that have been in the industry for 5+ years. We are coming into an job market that looks like a gunfight in an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie (not including Junior). We have every right to say fuck.

But we can't.
And I want/have to figure out how.

I can only talk from my experience and future experiences so that is what I am going to do.

So to tie all of this BS together, is where I begin... How do I walk the unbeaten path.

I will write as much as possible on my epic Lord of the Rings journey through the dark, hot hell of getting my book out into the industry and trying to find a job in the most competitive, crazy and incredibly fun industry known as advertising.

Armed with my pride and joy (my portfolio), a thirst to aim high and an incredible, knee melting charm. I am ready to get this process going.

I will post my work,
Feel free to slash it, bash it and burn it, so I can make it better.
And I will describe everything and anything I encounter, when trying to enter the advertising world.
Enjoy.