The Blog of Studio Fuse » Natural History Museum

No Surrender, Dorothy!

Scott — Wed, 31 Oct 2012 19:19:24 +0000

It seems that nowadays Halloween is little more than tired social media memes and carnal desperation in costume form, stumbling into each other at a party (sometimes in the same costume). Sure—maybe it’s that I’m no longer a youth and feel bitter that God has forsaken me. But doesn’t it seem more likely that we’ve irreversibly wandered into the web 2.0 dystopia—an era of celebrity anarchy and narcissistic youth? Either way, it’s clear that the world should have quit while it was ahead. Yes, the candy is still good; yes, it still takes the edge off the beer. But one must wonder “What have we done to the kids?” Fortunately, there is somebody out there still thinking about the kids: The Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County.

Every year the museum puts on a themed Haunted Museum for their members, bringing together science and scares—and for the past several years, we’ve designed the invitations for them. Last year, it was “Fairy Tales and Scary Tales,” for which we created a two-sided book featuring a mix of characters from ogres to dire wolves.

This year, the museum decided to turn the Haunted Museum into a travel destination of sorts: the “Land of Awes” (as in The Wizard of Oz). This destination concept delivered the design direction to us on a platter: we would turn the invitation into a travel brochure. Fleshing the idea out, we designed one side to be a poster inspired by travel posters from the thirties, while the other side became a metaphoric map of the evening’s itinerary. Naturally, both sides included a hybrid of Oz characters and museum specimens, such as a tin Thomas the T. Rex, a cowardly saber-toothed tiger, flying monkeys, and Fruitaden Munchkins. It was a lot of work, but fortunately Grace the intern was here to help us illustrate Thomas and the tiger.

While it is just one invitation to one event in one city, we feel proud that we were able to do our part to keep Halloween from falling completely into the evil clutches of post-adolescent party culture and keep it just a little bit fun for the kids (however doomed they may be). Plus, it was just awes-fully fun to create. @scottfuse

Take a look at the gallery, and let us know what you think. >>

Tags: client illustration invitation Natural History Museum

Rejexhibition: The First Fridays You Never Saw

Scott — Mon, 04 Jun 2012 18:30:49 +0000

Welcome to the inaugural rejexhibition post. What’s a rejexhibition? Webster’s dictionary defines it as “not found.” Okay, let’s try again: For all of the successful design solutions we deliver, many a design is rejected along the way—and sometimes we can’t forget about them. It’s like your baby that everyone thinks is ugly, but that you think is the most beautiful thing ever. Should you leave it in a dumpster because it’s been rejected? Nay, you should gather it up with your other beautiful babies, tack them to a wall, and let the world rejoice in their unappreciated glory. That’s a rejexhibition.

(Un)fortunately, our recent work on the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County’s First Fridays series yielded a bevy of such unused work. For those unfamiliar, First Fridays combines DJs, live music and drinks with scientific discussion and behind-the-scenes tours. Each season is programmed with a theme in mind. For 2012 “This Time It’s Personal” was coined to expose scientists as more than lab coat wearing nerds, and to involve the audience with the idea that everyone can be a scientist.

Two of the initial approaches involved treating the artwork like indie rock posters, which often use simple but odd imagery to capture the tone and core ideas of the band. Applying this to Dr. Michael Brown and his discussion “How I Killed Pluto and Why it Had it Coming”, we came up with one version in which Dr. Brown is visually explaining how he blew up Pluto with his eye, like the Death Star destroying Alderaan. In another version, an X’d-out Pluto sits in front of comic strip panels in which discussion attendees share their opinions on the death of Pluto. Both good solutions, but…

Ultimately, the third approach was chosen. This direction focused on what the scientists were wearing underneath their lab coats. In our minds, they were hiding witty graphic tees inspired by the topic each of them was to present. This resulted in a series of postcards with t-shirts as key art. Additionally, all of the shirts were actually produced and made available for sale.

That is, all of the shirts that were accepted were made available. Several designs were thought to be too irreverent for the discussions, including the ones for “Is it Good or Bad that the World has So Many Languages?”, “Wicked Bugs—Fearsome and Ferocious Creatures in Your Backyard and Beyond”, and “The New Science of Darwinian Feminism: Evolutionary Insights from Bonobo Social and Sexual Interactions”. In addition, the First Fridays season shirt we designed also fell by the wayside.

Take a look at the gallery, and let us know what you think. >>

One of the accepted designs.

An accepted design.

One of the accepted designs.

In the end, while we were disappointed that some solutions didn’t make it to print, we understand that not all options can be chosen, and that they were not rejected out of spite—rejection is just part of the biz. We’re just glad that we’re finally able to take them out of the waste bin and tack them up for all to see. @scottfuse