After the Kult House update I did earlier, I figured why not pick the brain of someone who works with the ‘Digital Agency of the Decade?’ R/GA is a full-service, digital advertising agency, who works with some of the biggest brands on the market. With names like Verizon, Nike, and Nokia and 6 locations worldwide, you’ve got to think to yourself, what type of person does it take to bring their multi-layered plans to life. Josh has been awesome about giving us a little insight about his inspirations and his work at R/GA even if his entire floor is so locked down that I couldn’t even squeeze a photo of his workspace out of the guy. Anyway, here’s the scoop:
ADM : First off could you tell us a little bit about yourself? How would you describe yourself as an individual and as an artist?
JR : My name is Josh Rhode, and I’m a 25-year-old Art Director at R/GA NYC. Simple guy but lover of many things. Travel, boats, MMA, comics, etc. Artistically I’m passionate about the variety of style, tone, and emotion out there. I could never pigeonhole myself in that way because things are always evolving. I love diving into brands (new and old) and seeing what you can do.
ADM : You work at R/GA, the digital agency of the decade. That’s a pretty big deal. Could you give us a brief description of a typical day at R/GA?
JR : R/GA’s grown tremendously since I joined up, and now boasts worldwide offices. Despite that, there’s a very tight-knit family quality here. Teams get fairly entrenched in their projects and accounts and grow very close with one another. Right now I’m fully absorbed in Nike+, and there is an unbelievable rapport with each other. Everyone is hungry, ambitious, smart, and collaborative. Overall, it’s an interesting hybrid workplace. To a degree, we’re an advertising agency that operates like an innovative software company directed by digital experiential storytelling gurus.
The work is incredibly challenging, and because the disciplines here are so tightly woven, each day is quite different from the next. Research, strategy, concepting, and feature scoping is like a rollercoaster ride. After that, we have a rock-solid production pipeline and very involved phases of work. That’s when you dig in and really unleash.
But by and large, each day starts off with booting my Apple hardware directly into Windows 7. Sorry, had to give it a shout-out. The standard with most people: coffee and blog checking while getting a grip on primary goals for the day. Our team is all consolidated to one floor, which makes the notion of meetings somewhat obsolete. Contingent with my responsibilities, at any moment I’ll be designing in my own bubble, motion-testing something, reviewing others’ work, collaborating with other disciplines (interaction designers, tech, etc), etc.
My start and end hours are fairly flexible. 10-7 is generally the norm for me. When I get home it’s spending time with the girlfriend, exercising, pursuing freelance/personal projects, etc. Two staples of every evening are SeamlessWeb and Netflix.
ADM : Did you always gravitate toward digital work? What kind of things influence you?
JR : Yep. When I was 8, I was determined to be a comic illustrator for Marvel. But by 10, I was hooked with everything in the digital world. It wasn’t gradual or anything. It just clicked. Hell, the first time I logged into Prodigy on a dial-up modem, I was like “yesss…”.
When I was 11 or so, I learned to program “punters and progz” for AOL, which also included designing outlandish UI for all of them. I was also creating levels for Quake and learning to code mods in QuakeC, design skins and models, etc. So I was pretty into the idea of being a game developer for a bit. Designing and programming websites, applications for myself, Flash experiences, funky animations.. all of these things just quietly amassed as things I loved to do. The unruly (and still so fucking nostalgic) design scene of 1998-2002 really had an enormous impact on me.
By my late teens I was completely enamored by filmmaking and eventually went to college for it. I think that was a critical point for me, where I really fell back in love with traditional storytelling (a la comics). That discipline really helped shape my work by introducing strong narratives. This translated to an understanding of branding, tone, and voice.
The reason I work primarily in “digital” is because of it’s potential to be a fantastic ubiquitous experience in your life. There’s just no limit. It never ceases to fascinate me.
So in short: Everything influences me, but I’m a super curious guy and have always learning and solving things. I get a little obsessed with doing new things until I can live and breathe them.
(Deep down, I still think it would be awesome to work at Marvel.)
ADM : Do you have any side projects that you are working on as well? What kind of things do you do outside of R/GA?
JR : I’m the co-owner of BadProtein, which is essentially a way for some like-minded individuals to take on select freelance projects. Less platform work, more pure visual styling.
I have two to three personal projects that I hope to launch at some point within the year. I hate promising anything though, as my career really takes precedent and is front and center.
ADM : Any design trend predictions for 2011?
JR : I hope there is an increasing trend towards cross-disciplinary designers. There’s just a world of crazy things out there you can learn and do.
As a personal note, everyone and their mother is using condensed type these days. Let’s see some badasses start to give love back to the extended.
ADM : Last comments?
JR : Keep hungry and you won’t go hungry.
So that’s what I’ve got for you for this installment of Creative Sessions. Stay tuned for more in depth discussions and creative insight from some of the best in their fields. Thanks again to Josh for taking the time to hook us up with the goods. Check out his work | R/GA | Kult House | Bad Protein
Josh Rhode | The Digital Direction
After the Kult House update I did earlier, I figured why not pick the brain of someone who works with the ‘Digital Agency of the Decade?’ R/GA is a full-service, digital advertising agency, who works with some of the biggest brands on the market. With names like Verizon, Nike, and Nokia and 6 locations worldwide, you’ve got to think to yourself, what type of person does it take to bring their multi-layered plans to life. Josh has been awesome about giving us a little insight about his inspirations and his work at R/GA even if his entire floor is so locked down that I couldn’t even squeeze a photo of his workspace out of the guy. Anyway, here’s the scoop:
ADM : First off could you tell us a little bit about yourself? How would you describe yourself as an individual and as an artist?
JR : My name is Josh Rhode, and I’m a 25-year-old Art Director at R/GA NYC. Simple guy but lover of many things. Travel, boats, MMA, comics, etc. Artistically I’m passionate about the variety of style, tone, and emotion out there. I could never pigeonhole myself in that way because things are always evolving. I love diving into brands (new and old) and seeing what you can do.
ADM : You work at R/GA, the digital agency of the decade. That’s a pretty big deal. Could you give us a brief description of a typical day at R/GA?
JR : R/GA’s grown tremendously since I joined up, and now boasts worldwide offices. Despite that, there’s a very tight-knit family quality here. Teams get fairly entrenched in their projects and accounts and grow very close with one another. Right now I’m fully absorbed in Nike+, and there is an unbelievable rapport with each other. Everyone is hungry, ambitious, smart, and collaborative. Overall, it’s an interesting hybrid workplace. To a degree, we’re an advertising agency that operates like an innovative software company directed by digital experiential storytelling gurus.
The work is incredibly challenging, and because the disciplines here are so tightly woven, each day is quite different from the next. Research, strategy, concepting, and feature scoping is like a rollercoaster ride. After that, we have a rock-solid production pipeline and very involved phases of work. That’s when you dig in and really unleash.
But by and large, each day starts off with booting my Apple hardware directly into Windows 7. Sorry, had to give it a shout-out. The standard with most people: coffee and blog checking while getting a grip on primary goals for the day. Our team is all consolidated to one floor, which makes the notion of meetings somewhat obsolete. Contingent with my responsibilities, at any moment I’ll be designing in my own bubble, motion-testing something, reviewing others’ work, collaborating with other disciplines (interaction designers, tech, etc), etc.
My start and end hours are fairly flexible. 10-7 is generally the norm for me. When I get home it’s spending time with the girlfriend, exercising, pursuing freelance/personal projects, etc. Two staples of every evening are SeamlessWeb and Netflix.
ADM : Did you always gravitate toward digital work? What kind of things influence you?
JR : Yep. When I was 8, I was determined to be a comic illustrator for Marvel. But by 10, I was hooked with everything in the digital world. It wasn’t gradual or anything. It just clicked. Hell, the first time I logged into Prodigy on a dial-up modem, I was like “yesss…”.
When I was 11 or so, I learned to program “punters and progz” for AOL, which also included designing outlandish UI for all of them. I was also creating levels for Quake and learning to code mods in QuakeC, design skins and models, etc. So I was pretty into the idea of being a game developer for a bit. Designing and programming websites, applications for myself, Flash experiences, funky animations.. all of these things just quietly amassed as things I loved to do. The unruly (and still so fucking nostalgic) design scene of 1998-2002 really had an enormous impact on me.
By my late teens I was completely enamored by filmmaking and eventually went to college for it. I think that was a critical point for me, where I really fell back in love with traditional storytelling (a la comics). That discipline really helped shape my work by introducing strong narratives. This translated to an understanding of branding, tone, and voice.
The reason I work primarily in “digital” is because of it’s potential to be a fantastic ubiquitous experience in your life. There’s just no limit. It never ceases to fascinate me.
So in short: Everything influences me, but I’m a super curious guy and have always learning and solving things. I get a little obsessed with doing new things until I can live and breathe them.
(Deep down, I still think it would be awesome to work at Marvel.)
ADM : Do you have any side projects that you are working on as well? What kind of things do you do outside of R/GA?
JR : I’m the co-owner of BadProtein, which is essentially a way for some like-minded individuals to take on select freelance projects. Less platform work, more pure visual styling.
I have two to three personal projects that I hope to launch at some point within the year. I hate promising anything though, as my career really takes precedent and is front and center.
ADM : Any design trend predictions for 2011?
JR : I hope there is an increasing trend towards cross-disciplinary designers. There’s just a world of crazy things out there you can learn and do.
As a personal note, everyone and their mother is using condensed type these days. Let’s see some badasses start to give love back to the extended.
ADM : Last comments?
JR : Keep hungry and you won’t go hungry.
So that’s what I’ve got for you for this installment of Creative Sessions. Stay tuned for more in depth discussions and creative insight from some of the best in their fields. Thanks again to Josh for taking the time to hook us up with the goods. Check out his work | R/GA | Kult House | Bad Protein
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