Recap: FINE Creative-Jams With Adobe

Last week, FINE joined Adobe for their annual Creative Jam in Portland. The festivities kicked off at PSU’s Shattuck Hall with Behance portfolio review sessions by a panel of professionals, including FINE’s own Marketing Director, Clay Walsh. Clay meted out constructive critique and career advice for eager-eyed young professionals, helping prepare for the world of commercial creative work.

Following the reviews, several key creative figures in the Portland community spoke on topics ranging from branding and illustration to social responsibility and business ethics:

Craig Winslow, Experiential Designer and winner of an 2016 Adobe Creative Residency wowed the audience with his evolution from designer to current “IT” creative, sharing projects past and present and highlighting Light Capsules, his passion project during the Adobe Residency. With this project, he’s literally illuminating the design work of bygone eras, finding old weather-worn and decomposing wall facades and signage, drumming up the original source material through historical societies and found photography, recreating them digitally then projecting them onto their original locations.

Illustrator Lisa Congdon took to the stage to showcase her work of the last 10+ years, including numerous illustrations, posters, book covers and patterns made for clients of all sizes. In a Q+A session with Creative Jam host Paul Trani, she detailed her experiences and challenges in working as an independent contractor, and methods of creative evolution.

The enigmatic Aaron Draplin dropped a concise overview of his misadventures in design, doused with heavy hits of gutteral-laughter and just enough F-bombs to ensure total authenticity. Additionally, Draplin showcased his breathtaking body of work, which has culminated in a book that boasts hundreds of designs, illustrations and products he’s created over his career to date – and is now in it’s 4th pressing run, due to popular demand.

Once the lights were back on, the pressure was on for the 20+ local college students who paired off into teams to participate in the Creative Jam. The rules were simple — contestants got 3 hours to design a visual piece based on one simple verbal prompt: “Human.” At the end of the session, they presented their work, ranging from poetry-inspired illustrations to typographic posters to abstract sound and motion graphics pieces, to the attendees and a judging panel of local agency and in-house creative professionals, including FINE Art Director Mehran Azma. The winning teams of the Audience’s Choice and Judges Choice all received special rewards and gifts courtesy of Adobe.

Congratulations to all who jammed, thanks to Adobe for including FINE and for continuing to support and advance the cause of creativity. Check out all the final projects on Behance.

All photos by Jeremy Pair.