Humor

Henri, the Existential French Chat

By Delphine Hirasuna | April 19, 2012September 4, 2014

If the existentialist playwright Jean-Paul Sartre had a house cat, it would undoubtedly have Henri’s morose outlook on life. This video short is written and directed by Will Braden, with narration in French by Will Braden, who lives in Seattle, Washington, and doesn’t speak French as his first language. Braden’s video production business is mostly engaged in making videographs of wedding receptions and producing special video projects for local organizations. He keeps his creative senses and his sense of humor sharp by producing his own film shorts. This one is a sequel to Henri’s first appearance in a short that Braden made as a student film project in 2007.

Brand Language

826 National’s Unnatural Marketing Strategy

By Delphine Hirasuna | November 24, 2010September 4, 2014

Bear with me. This is hard to explain. We got interested in this story because we loved the graphics and packaging for the new Museum of Unnatural History in Washington D.C., which isn’t a museum and not a real store either. It’s the Washington D.C. location for 826 National, a nonprofit tutoring, writing and publishing organization founded to assist kids aged six to 18 with their writing skills. It got its start at 826 Valencia Street (hence the name), a storefront location in San Francisco’s Mission District. To make the place seem “cooler” to kids, the 826 founders decided to disguise it as a “Pirate Store” and stocked it with pirate supplies like peg legs, message bottles and hooks. Kids loved it and sales helped support the tutoring programs.

Posters

Sasquatch Festival Posters Leave Big Footprint

By Delphine Hirasuna | June 14, 2010September 4, 2014

The remote reaches of the Columbia River Gorge in the Pacific Northwest are rumored to be Bigfoot country — the place where a gigantic creature, called Sasquatch, has been photographed by people with vivid imaginations and blurred-focus cameras. Every Memorial Day weekend since 2002, music lovers have descended on Bigfoot’s stomping grounds, setting up tents and RV’s near the lake to enjoy the three-day music festival. The closest town is George, Washington (yes, you read right) — population 528, give or take one or two people, about a three hours drive from Seattle and five hours from Portland, Oregon. The music is lively and eclectic, the scenery sublime, and the posters made for each performing act are the next best thing to a Bigfoot sighting. Here are just a few.