Philadelphia Magazine

 The Summer of 2017 prior to my senior year I interned at Philadelphia, an award winning CRM (City-regional magazine, part of CRMA— City Regional Magazine Association). Through my education I have been focusing on print and publication design with in interest in magazines/editorial. This last semester I found myself the only junior in the publication class otherwise made up of seniors.

I reached out to Philly mag with a resume, cover-letter, link to my portfolio as well as my in-progress work from publication and was hired almost instantaneously. Working with the senior director and associate art director (who also interned at Philly mag) I work on a verity of collateral including web banners, and social posts, but the majority of work is for the book . As an intern much of my work is marketing based, but I have had the opportunity to work on several advertorials for Be Well Philly, Philadelphia’s  heath and wellness publication.

The advertorials are my favorite because I am essentially free to design my own layouts to create an editorial-look, which make strong portfolio pieces for my future in editorial as well helped me become a stronger editorial designer than when I began just three months ago. Additionally I learned a lot about publication-specific design, from the joys  of edits to attending photo shoots with piles of Gucci like I’m Lauren Conrad at Teen Vogue. My summer at Philadelphia  confirmed that I am indeed ‘Jenna Rink, big time magazine editor,’ that this is what I want to do with my future, and if the opportunity presented itself I would be ready for the big  city. Perhaps most exciting however is the

connection I made to Martha Stewart Living  (my favorite publication/dream job) through the people I met at Philadelphia — though I would gladly accept a position at Philly mag without hesitation.

Mattel

My name is Robin Krupnick. I am a senior Graphic Design major with an art history minor. During summer 2017, I had the amazing opportunity to intern with Mattel. Mattel is a global toy company that has held its standing as one of the top toy manufacturers since 1945. Under the Mattel umbrella are several brands, such as the entire Fisher-Price line (what I was specifically working on,) Thomas the Tank Engine, Barbie, Hot Wheels, and so many more.

I found this internship through a web posting on indeed. The irony of this internship is that I do not like children or working with children. I spoke to the Fisher Price headquarters in East Aurora first, then my direct supervisors, then a co worker and was eventually hired back in April. My position is the Digital Content Design intern, and I was working directly under Devin Flood who held a management position. Devin left Fisher Price after 7 long years to go to Harry’s Razor’s in my first three weeks. This meant there was much more responsibility on my end and I was looked at as a full time employee, doing real work for the company and the brand, rather than an intern doing, still challenging, but less important tasks. I worked under Dannielle Kryllios and Jessica Hernandez after Devin left.

I was involved in everything. My initial tasks were designing email blasts to go out to Fisher Price customers. These emails show new products but also feature parenting tips and activities. I started being brought on to bigger campaigns, such as the redesign of the Little People website and the launch of our Laugh & Learn Servin’ Up Fun Food Truck. Food truck was crazy because it was such a hit on the market and we wanted a cool, hipster-esque campaign to go along with it. I was also a part of the summer intern project, where we were tasked to concept, develop, prototype, brand, package, and market a new toy.

My biggest piece of knowledge that I am coming away with is how creatives work in a corporate setting. I love being in a corporate office. The structure of Mattel is a little crazy, they are going through a lot of changes right now with the brand identity and goals, but over all I understand how corporations work. It is very interesting to be in this side of the creative field. The connections I made are absolutely priceless and being able to work for such an established global company, even if it’s for children, was a dream come true. I felt very needed and respected in my team. Everyone seemed genuinely happy to help out with whatever questions I had, and I felt comfortable enough with everyone to always ask for help.

I am definitely most proud of the intern project, considering we only had three weeks to pull it together. Our Thomas Mini’s booster might be picked up as an actual product, which would be amazing. I have learned how to work in smaller teams in a corporate landscape and that truly all work in the real world is collaborative. This has helped me clarify my career goals because I am graduating soon and need to start thinking about if I want to go small studio or bigger agency, or corporate brand. Right now I am thinking going back to corporate. I would not have known I enjoy working for a corporation as much as I do if I had not taken this internship.

iStragety Labs

           

           This past Summer, 2017, I spent my time interning at iStragety Labs in Washington D.C. I learned about this opportunity from Mazzy Bell, one of my classmates who also did the internship the previous year. iSL is essentially a creative agency that creates content for companies on social platforms. This tends to be advertisements and commercials, however, there is another side to the business where they create things like escape rooms, design and develop websites and create physical things with the use of technology at the forefront.

   

        My direct supervisor was Campbell Kawaka. Her title is Senior Art Director. I had very little to do with her the whole time I was interning. That’s just because I ended up working on projects that were more given to Paul Dunbar, another art director. My day to day was largely based on what I wanted to do. I could take upon a project if I had enough time if I was up to date on my tickets. Tickets are these little tasks of finding stock photography and putting the correct logo on it. I despised doing this but at the end of the day, everyone in the company must do a little bit of this every day. Other tasks I was given was to brand a conference for front end developers called Fore_Front. I got to work on shoots, come up with visuals for their blog, work on Kroger projects, help brand the iSL Studios logo and other things.

           The thing I am most proud about is developing the brand for Fore_Front. I was given full creative control over the project and I developed and design an identity and website for the organization. I feel strongly about this project and I’m excited because the site is going to be developed by a talented team of developers and I do like the identity I created for the project. The skills I developed were not technical skills as much as they were skills on how a creative agency woks and the process on which something gets approved through the different levels of people. Prior to this job I had no experience in a professional work place that was creative. I’ve had plenty of jobs but none of which were creative so gaining that experience with iSL has been a great thing for me and it will hopefully help me in the near future when I graduate at the end of this next semester.

Brad Weesner Design

          My name is Pauline Joly and I am a senior Architectural Design major. During the summer of 2017, I was an interior design intern for Brad Weesner Design, a small interior design company based in Baltimore, Maryland. I have almost always known about my interest in interior design. It was confirmed in the summer of 2012 during my pre-college classes at the Corcoran School of Art and Design when I decided to take courses in interior design. Later on, when college applications were around the corner, I made the decision of pursuing an education in the design field, which led me to MICA’s Architectural Design program. This program was the closest thing to interior design that MICA had to offer. This 2017 internship was meant to give me a clearer sense of what interior design actually was about.

          In order to find this internship, I did some online research and looked up interior designers in the Baltimore/Washington D.C. metropolitan area. The names and websites of several designers popped up. I then proceeded by sending each of them an informational email explaining who I was and what my intentions were. Unfortunately, most of them either didn’t respond or emailed me back to let me know that they did not have any more space for a summer intern. A week later I found Brad Weesner’s website and decided to contact him. His response was immediate, asking for my resume and portfolio. I then met with him in person to discuss his intern program and how it would all work. I started interning there three weeks later.

I believe I gained a lot of experience in interior design by working in a small office, which allowed me to see many aspects of the job and running a small business. As most artists and designers know, the design process is what gives a project direction. Without use of a proper design process, projects tend to have no direction or coherence with what clients want. Therefore, in the course of my internship, Mr. Weesner made sure to introduce me to every step of the design process. I also had the opportunity to see actual client project boards first hand, which helped me visualize the design process better than before I started the internship. Mr. Weesner is passionate about fabric and spent a lot of time teaching me about the proper use of material depending on circumstances and on the client’s needs. I am now able to recognize different fabrics just by touch! The office has its own design library, which includes a collection of sample materials designers use for client boards. I could thus spend a lot of time looking at and learning about different materials. Mr. Weesner also taught me about project management by showing me how to use a site called Studio Webware, which is a program his office utilizes to create client orders, invoices, and also track progress on current projects. Due to the summer’s shortened office hours for the permanent staff, I was asked to take on some of the office manager’s responsibilities when she was not in the office. These tasks consisted of, among others, answering the office phone and talking to existing and prospective clients. Mr. Weesner also took me to the Washington Design Center, where I got to know different design companies and their individual styles by walking around the showrooms and talking to the showroom managers.

This internship has taught me a lot about interior design and owning and managing a small business. With regards to interior design, I remain convinced it is a field I want to specialize in. I have realized that owning and managing a small business is not an easy thing to do. It is not enough to be a good designer, you also need a lot of other skills to be successful.

The Studio

My name is Zi Xu and I am an illustration major going into my senior year at MICA. This past summer, I had the wonderful opportunity to intern at The Studio, a media production company located in New York City. I discovered this internship through their website, and after submitting my resume, a cover letter, and a link to my portfolio, I was offered the opportunity to join their 2017 summer internship program.

Being a multidisciplinary company, The Studio has artists who work in a variety of fields such as animation, illustration, live action, concept design, etc. Andrew Wilson, a full-time 3D animator at The Studio, was our direct supervisor and oversaw the projects we worked on during our stay. The first project was for Grace Ramirez, a Food Network chef who specializes in South American food and was looking for artistic content to boost her social media presence. I was tasked with making a selection of food and pattern illustrations for Grace, as well as helping the other interns make GIF animations. Throughout the course of a few weeks, I managed to get better at animating in Photoshop and learned a bit about After Effects as well. With our second project, we had the opportunity to pitch and design a logo for ex-astronaut Mae Jemison and her organization 100 Year Starship (which was, without a doubt, the coolest job I ever had as an intern!). Although I was only able to do a few final iterations of the logo for the client due to time restraints, it did give me more experience with graphic design, an area important to illustration that I have not explored much during my time at MICA.

During my stay at The Studio, I made a lot of work that I am proud of - most of which include patterns and food illustrations, things I usually do not focus on in my personal illustration work. One great perk about working here was that each intern got a free sketchbook as well as access to all of the art books in the studio space, and in my free time I was able to browse through them and do drawings and studies from my favorites.

Overall, working at The Studio has definitely broadened my view of what it means to work as an in-studio artist. The work environment was warm and friendly, there were food parties each week (we ate everything from fancy Venezuelan food to pizza to donuts!), and I made a lot of new connections, from my fellow interns to full-timers such as Andrew, to Mary Nittolo, the CEO and creative director of the company. As my original goal for this internship was to get to know what it is like working as an illustrator for a production company, I am excited to say that an in-studio job is what I will likely pursue after graduation!