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Episode 63

WTF Aaron Carter

In this episode of Overtime, Meg banters with hand-lettering artist extraordinaire Lauren Hom about jerks who steal work, misty movie posters, and the joy of passion projects. Plus, a special sit-down with Ryan Scott Tandy, Director of Product Design at Instacart.

This episode is brought to you by Instacart.

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Transcript

Meg: Wow, wow, wow! Design can have an impact everywhere, especially in places where you don’t expect it, like the grocery store. We know the shopping experience we all grew up with is pretty much the same as it was 100 years ago. But Instacart is changing all of that. They’re transforming the shopping experience for customers, people who deliver them, even the retailers and food brands. And the good news for you is that the Instacart design team is looking for food loving, talented, humble team players for both product designers and design managers to help design real world solutions for a complex marketplace at scale. If you want to learn more head to Instacart.Careers

Yeehaw, everybody. This is Overtime, Dribbble’s weekly podcast that explores the most interesting design news and gives you the tips you need to create your best work. What’s happening with my voice? I’m your host, Meg “Oh, she’s got a shiny hat” Lewis, and today we’ve got a super special episode coming right through your earholes straight to your design bone. In this episode, bad boy Aaron Carter, like, actually a bad boy, he’s been a very bad boy this week. He doesn’t credit an artist on an image he’s using and then he’s super rude about it. The Internet realized there are only like, 10 movie poster designs out there, Lauren and I talk passion projects, and I get a quick chat in with Instacart Design Director, Ryan Scott Tandy.

From time to time, I’ll have guest hosts and special guests that know more than me in certain areas, like today, designer, lettering artist, and bread lover, Lauren Hom. Hi, Lauren!

Lauren: Hello Meg!

Meg: So, let’s get into the news today. Okay, so first story today is kind of a bummer, but I think it’s going to be fun to discuss. So, artist Jonas Jödicke got his artwork used in a promotion of Aaron Carter’s new clothing. It’s like a line of hoodies. And Aaron was just using this image to promote the hoodie line and I guess this has happened to this artist before where this image that was used, it’s two wolves that are sort of joining at the forehead. And so, Aaron Carter was using it, and this happens to Jonas a lot with especially this piece, it happened before with Madonna, it keeps happening. And so, he really has gotten used to just kind of publicly calling them out saying, “Hey, artists deserve credit. You’re using my artwork to promote your merchandise and I have not given you permission to do so.” And classic good response from Jonas and Aaron sort of responded and was just a tad – it was a terribly mean response. He said, “You should have taken it as a compliment, dick. A fan of mine sent this to me. Oh, here they go again. The answer is no. This image has been made public and I’m using it to promote my clothing line, Aaroncarter.com. Guess I’ll see you in small claims court.” I actually don’t think Aaron’s voice is that low.

Lauren: I honestly can’t remember. It’s been that long. You know, when you sent me that link, it was the first time I had seen Aaron Carter pop up in any news in maybe the last decade for me, what’s on my radar. And honestly, the first word that came to mind after reading his response was like, what a little turd, it was just a turdy thing to do.

Meg: Yeah, that’s what I call a “Butthole Bob.”

Lauren: Ooh, that’s a good one. I’m going to have to use that one. But it’s ironic because he is a recording artist, was a recording artist, I don’t know. And you would think that from one creator to another, there’d be an understanding like, just because one of your songs is on Spotify, or somewhere online, YouTube, doesn’t mean it’s just fair game to use. And the same thing goes for visual art and I maybe naively assumed there was that crossover.

Meg: Yeah, I think it’s an interesting – these sorts of responses are always an interesting study for me in how people respond when they’re in the heat of the moment. I have personally learned to give it a day and let myself cool off and figure out how I actually feel about it. And you can totally tell that Aaron’s response was like, he just immediately responded, heat of the moment. He was so mad about it. But I think this raises an interesting question of artists stealing art, and the fact that this has happened with Madonna before where I guess with this particular piece, a fan of Madonna’s photoshopped her face on the piece of art. And then Madonna had no idea the source and so she just re-posted it. And I think weeding through Aaron’s response, I think that’s what happened here too, of like, not knowing the source and just being like, “This is great. The person that sent it to me it, I’m just going to assume they created it, or I’m going to assume it’s mine now and they just run with it.” So, I think that that’s an interesting thing that I’m going to keep in the back of my head if I start to use any kind of artwork in the future that I think I know the source of.

Lauren: Oh yeah, absolutely. And, you know, I’m one of those people who assumes the best of people. I’m like, “Well, what if this happened, or this happened, they might not have known.” I’m guessing that because Aaron Carter didn’t even credit the person who sent him the artwork that he was just like, “It’s mine now.” But that is, you’re right. That’s it, it raises an interesting question of there’s so much stuff online being shared by so many people. Sometimes the credit, you know, halfway through the shares, you know, loop gets lost, misplaced per se, and people might not have malicious intentions when they share other peoples’ work. But this artist in this case was totally respectful. I read his initial reach out to Aaron, it was just like, “Hey, I see you’re using this like, would have preferred if you contacted me, this happens all the time,” and just advocating for something where, objectively Aaron Carter is using the artwork – misusing the artwork.

Meg: Yes. And I think it’s so much of, in this and accidentally stealing something, whether or not you meant to, or even thought about what you’re doing, it’s all in how you respond, and that part is so hard for people. It’s hard for me, it’s hard for everybody to just apologize and say, “I did something incorrectly. I didn’t know what I was doing. It won’t happen again.” Of course, Aaron’s probably not going to do that, we’ll see. This tweet thread that happened and all of this publicity that the story is receiving is probably, sort of giving Aaron the little tickle that he might need to act appropriately. We’ll see what happens, I guess.

Lauren: I mean, and hopefully like, I was just thinking about how – what you said earlier too. If you don’t know the source of the image, it’s generally not a good idea to post it until you find the source. Do some reverse Google Image searching, go on Pinterest, whatever you need to do. If you can’t find the source in general, it’s a good practice not to use it. If you’re not going to credit the artist, then save it. You’ve got to find something else, or make your own, or hire someone to make one for you.

Meg: Exactly, yes. Okay, for our next news story, somebody tipped me off to this Twitter thread and I had the best time. So, on Twitter, Lee Steffen created a thread of when he realized that there were only actually 10 types of movie poster designs and movie artwork design. And of course, people commented and were like, other people have done this before. I love it. That’s always going to happen with any tweet that this one got, you know, 114,000 likes, so you know, it’s going to happen. So, I just want to kind of comb down this list, I have it in front of me, and discuss some of my favorite tropes and themes when it comes to movie art design and poster design. And we’ll try to see and do our best with how we can translate this to a podcast because we’re talking about visuals. But you know, this was bound to happen with a design podcast at some point. So, some of my favorites, the second one is called sexy legs and it’s just two mostly bare, white legs that are quite long and slender with a man in between them sort of peeking out from a distance of close range.

Lauren: Like an A-Frame.

Meg: Yeah, exactly like it. Like a nice A-Frame..

Lauren: Yep, that’s a good one. It was fun scrolling through that list too, because I think I knew about these, but to see them all together and how many of them there are, you’re like, “Oh yeah, that’s really a thing.”

Meg: Exactly. There are so many movies that have used these sexy legs. It’s incredible. And then there’s the classic rom-com leaning couple where it’s just – let me visually check. All but what one of these images is what looks like a man and a woman leaning against each other. The male figure is almost always wearing a suit. The woman figure is almost always wearing a gown. It’s incredible. And then one of my other favorite ones is called “Moody Misty,” which is just some kind of mist with a floating head sort of peeking out of it.

Lauren: That was one of my favorites too because the first thing that came to mind was, that seemed like something that I could have figured out how to do in Photoshop as a student. Just like, mist is a very forgiving medium.

Meg: That’s true. You know, I’ve actually personally never worked with mist, but I am eager to now.

Lauren: Yeah, you should give it a go this weekend.

Meg: Yes. Content Aware may work really nicely with a good mist. So, I feel like too, as a lettering artist, you probably could put together a similar – I feel like it’s kind of mean spirited to put together a list of like, “these are the only 10 types of lettering styles.” But you could. I’m sure if you could, you could take any medium and boil it down to 10 different things that people are doing. I’m sure it’s possible.

Lauren: I was just wondering about that. I wonder why it seems meaner to do that for something more niche like lettering and not as mean to do it for movie posters. Like, are movie poster designers upset at this Twitter thread?

Meg: I would imagine, and I think that it’s an empathy thing for me because I don’t know any movie poster designers, so I can’t picture my good friend Steve, you know, hunched over at his desk crying because he saw this tweet about his work, which is my problem. I should know. Yes, I should know more movie poster designers. Okay, so Lauren, you recently launched my new favorite site, WTFShouldILetter.com, and it’s a site for extremely goofy lettering prompts. And between that, and HOMwork, and all of the little projects you’ve launched in between, you are the actual hero of passion projects. And so, why has launching so many passion projects been so important to you?

Lauren: So, I always credit the passion project thing to, kind of a happy accident, but also the fact that I majored in advertising in school, which is so different than what I’m doing now. And you know, when I made the switch, I was like, “Did I just waste four years studying ad and I’m going to be a letterer?” Not the case. Because my brain is used to thinking in campaigns, I think that that’s where that natural inclination came from. Also, I’m not a genius. I’m just observant, like when I was in school, I saw all my favorite designers doing passion projects of all different magnitudes, and it was cool to see Jessica Hische’s “Daily Drop Cap”, or Dan Cassaro did that awesome 5050 project, the 50 states

Meg: I remember both of these.

Lauren: Seeing things like that, I was like, “Oh, here are people who are doing something that looks really cool to do and they just came up with that on their own and did it.” Like, what a radical idea that you could just self-publish whatever you wanted. And so, it was also just good timing that I happened to be in school, like in design school and start my career, when the internet was really picking up and things like blogging and social media were circulating work around. So, I just kept kind of repeating that formula with different ideas I had, exploring different interests or quirks or whatnot, and seeing how I could use my lettering skills to make a project. So yeah, passion projects are just fun for me. Like, I think you and I are probably similar in this way. I remember seeing in your story on Instagram one time that you were just like, “When you have an idea that you want to do something you just kind of go deep and do it, like you go into your whole week two, it’s a week, two weeks, you come out and then you’re like, ‘okay, cool. Like I scratched the itch, and I’m good.’” Even as someone who loves what she does for work, like I love to letter, I get work with awesome clients. There’s still something really nice about having 100% ownership over your little idea baby and getting to do it exactly how you’d want to do it. Basically, I always encourage people who are working as designers to do passion projects as a way to kind of get back into that art school student vibe and brain, like where you just got to make anything for any client and they approved it because they didn’t exist.

Meg: And I’m sure you’re like me where I’m always searching for that high where you’re like, people might not care next month or next year, it has to happen right now. And that’s usually the motivation that I need to go deep into it for a short amount of time and launch it really quickly. And it’s so exciting for me. The adrenaline is amazing and it feels great.

Lauren: Oh my goodness, yes.

Meg: So, I just want to have that happen all the time.

Lauren: You know, what’s funny is that’s how I typically operate, where I have an idea and it’s made within a month. Like, that’s like 95% of the time. So, “What the Fuck Should I Letter?” – that was an idea that I had a year ago. And so, the first thing that I do, any of my students who are listening will laugh because I talk about this all the time, the second I have an idea and I’ve come up with a name for it, the first thing I do is buy the URL. If I don’t do it, no big deal. If I do, then it’s there. And so I bought it, bought the URL a year ago and sat on it because things got busy, life happened and because it was a more involved project than most because I had to build a website and you know, write the lines, it had more moving pieces than a typical, just series of images that I would usually do. So yeah, it was in the works. I finally started it last fall, and now it’s here and the response has been amazing. And not that I won’t ever go back to doing things like “Daily Dishonesty” or “Ex-Boyfriend Tears,” but I’ve noticed the kind of personal projects that I’ve done over the last couple years are part helpful and part funny and creative still and still have that like, sense of my personality. I had so much fun making that.

Meg: I’ve noticed that with all of my favorite projects of yours, the recent ones especially, have really involved other people. And it really helps to lift other people up and support them at the same time. But in talking about all of this, I feel like you use the internet a lot. And that’s something that I think about from time to time because I teach in-person workshops and classes and I want to be teaching more online, but I’m not really sure… I have so many questions. So, what do you have to offer me? Help me. Why do you love to do all these passion projects online mostly?

Lauren: What I like about doing my projects online is the scalability of it or the reach it can have. Back in 2015, I did a project called “Will Letter For Lunch” where I went around and did different restaurant chalkboard menus in exchange for whatever I wrote on the menu, and obviously that was documented online and got picked up online, but the project really lived in the real world and I absolutely loved it. It was my first full year of freelancing, so it got me out of the house. You know, we all know how important that can be. But yeah, that was my only in person project. I think the thing I like about online for passion projects and for even online courses is, yeah, the ease with which you can upload it and share it and kind of distribute it. Whereas, if I wanted to show people my project in person, I’d have to get them all in one room to see it or I’d have to go walk it around to different places.

Meg: And too, I think it’s really helpful to teach online because a lot of us don’t live in areas where we are surrounded by design communities and other creatives and some of us are very isolated and feel like we don’t have access to knowledge or to fund workshops and creative spaces. And so, teaching online, I think is really nice and it’s great that you’ve done this because you can access so many people that you wouldn’t be able to otherwise access.

Lauren: Yeah, it really is a win-win. You know, I started teaching online because a friend had encouraged me to. It makes you and your knowledge and all the beautiful creative bits in your head accessible to a much larger audience than your surrounding physical area. And it’s also a great like, extra income source for a design business or a creative business. And so, everyone wins!

Meg: And I found too, it’s easier for me to start things online and then expand them offline. Luckily, as a designer, I have a skill set that allows me to be able to design, do a little bit of soft coding that I need to at least put something up and make it appear nicely and organized. And so, there’s lower overhead than if I was in person, I’d have to pay for the travel, I’d have to pay to print all the materials. And so, I found that doing things online, I can work weird hours too because I’m not reliant on people being present. And so, it truly is a win-win.

Lauren: Absolutely. It’s true. I mean, yeah, back to when you were asking me about online for passion projects too, the internet’s a great place to kind of test out ideas. A passion project is also a good way to test out ideas online where you’re like, “I want to make this thing and see what the response is.” Of course, you can still make it without any, you know, response from anybody else. But it does – it’s nice to have that sounding board of the internet or your community, Instagram following, newsletter, whatever it may be, to be like, “Does this have legs? Is this as cool as I think it is? Like, if not, here you go internet.” But if the response is good, then maybe you can actually be like, okay, I have a bout of confidence that this could be a thing.

Meg: Exactly. And I don’t know how you launch your passion projects with this in mind, but whenever I launch something, I always launch it with the intention of like, I just need to get this out of my brain, I need to release it. And then I’ll just kind of see how I feel about it after I’ve launched it. And sometimes I’m like, “Meh, I’ve moved on, and I’m glad people now have this, I’m going to move on to the next thing,” and other times people really latch on to it and I realize that it needs to be something more, so I stick around and I keep working on it. Is it the same for you?

Lauren: Yeah, I’d say for me, yeah. With most of my projects, I’ll put a couple things out there to, like you said, get it out of my head. Like, this needs to be a thing, throw up a landing page, or a little micro-site for it and then see what the response is, see how I feel. With something like “Daily Dishonesty,” when it started picking up after a couple of weeks, and then you know, 100 Tumblr followers turned into 1000, turned into 10,000, that audience showing up for it actually motivated me to keep going and to make more of them. I felt a responsibility, in a motivating way, not in like a crippling like, “Oh my gosh, the world is on my shoulders,” which can also happen. I know, it’s the irony of like, sometimes having an audience can be invigorating and hold you accountable and motivating. And then on the flip side, it can also seem like a burden sometimes. It’s like, “I’m letting thousands of people down, how, like I’m a garbage human.” Doing passion projects, you are the creative director, you also press publish, you get to greenlight it. It’s extremely empowering.

Meg: Exactly, couldn’t agree more. Well, it’s been great having you, Lauren. Please come back sometime. Is there anything else you’d like to promote?

Lauren: Yeah! “What the Fuck Should I Letter?” is a phrase generator. My friend and I wrote all the lines, so they’re fresh ideas. They’re yours to do whatever you want with. And it’s been great so far seeing people jump in and letter things. And the idea really stemmed from, I had been running my HOMWork challenge, which I think you briefly mentioned, but basically every Friday for the last two years, which is so nuts, I’ve been sending out a creative prompt to my audience, giving you an idea of what to make. I never give you the exact thing to make, I just give you an idea of what to make. So, an example would be, “if the last year of your life were a book, what would it be titled, and then design the book cover for it.” So, you still have to do some creative lift, like heavy lifting there. But it’s a great way to kind of tap into your voice and have something to share on Instagram, join a community, it’s free. And so, you can, I guess go to that, at HomSweetHom.com/subscribe to get to that. So, if you are looking for motivation to letter or to kind of eliminate those roadblocks and just sit down and start practicing your lettering, you can join my HOMWork challenge, or you can head to WTFshouldiletter.com, get some weird stuff to letter or illustrate or design. Do your thing.

Meg: Thanks, Lauren!

Lauren: Thanks, Meg!

Meg: Okay, as a designer who has primarily worked in the startup and tech industries throughout my career as a freelancer, I have always been super curious to learn more about what the heck kind of a working environments exist today in those spaces. So today, I’m joined by a special guest who can shed some light on this area that I truly know nothing about, it’s Instacart’s Design Director, Ryan Scott Tandy! Hi, Ryan.

Ryan: Hi Meg, good morning.

Meg: Good morning. So, what should I call you? Ryan? Ryan Scott? Ryan Scott Tandy? RST?

Ryan: A lot of people call me RST, because my full name is pretty long, but Ryan’s fine.

Meg: Great. So, RST, you’ve worked for major tech giants and smaller companies. What are some of the biggest markers in differences between the working environments of the two?

Ryan: I think the biggest difference is really what’s up to you as a designer. I personally have always loved working for small teams. Even going back to my first startup I worked at in the in the dot-com and the 90s. Quokka Sports is a really small design team and I learned a ton from working in a really small team. And I’ve kind of bounced around with bigger companies at smaller teams. So, I mean, if I look at starting my origin story, like back in the dot-com, going to Macromedia, and to Apple later on, these are always kind of smaller teams that I really loved the proximity and intimacy of a small groups.

Meg: Yeah. So, I think what I’ve noticed a lot and the differences between working environments and teams is the size of the project that you’re working on. Are you working on something that’s extremely niche within the product? Are you working on the product as a whole? Because the team is really small. What is it like at Instacart specifically?

Ryan: Yeah. So, I mean, we’re definitely in a growing phase right now. Our business is quite complex and design covers a number of different territories. So, we are designing for end users and customers who are shopping for groceries, we’re designing for shoppers who are doing the shopping in stores. We’re also designing for retailers and the enterprise sort of world as well as designing for brands and building an ad platform. So, we’re really doing a little bit of everything. And it feels like sort of four small teams coming together under one big umbrella.

Meg: Yes. So, if I got an offer at the same time from a large tech company, and then one from a startup, how do I choose like, how do I know which environment is best for me specifically?

Ryan: Yeah, that’s a good question. I’ve had this question asked to me a lot, whether it’s from students or our junior designers, even folks on previous teams. And I think it’s important to really go with your gut and know what’s important to you. I think it’s important to understand the mission of the company, obviously, so that you feel connected to it and you feel sort of the impact of your work. I don’t think there’s a right answer. When I reflect on sort of like what’s led me through different stages of my career, I’ve always asked myself what I would likely grow from choosing to go a certain route. And I think that’s a really important, the most critical question, because no matter what you’re going to, you know, be doing design work amongst a team and getting into solving problems. But the sum of that may be a little different depending on each place.

Meg: Yeah. And I think whenever you’re getting job offers, especially when you’re younger, starting out, and you have less power, it’s so easy to fall in that trap of assuming you have to say yes because somebody finally wants you. And I think it’s important for people to remember that they do have control saying no, my gut doesn’t feel right for this job offer. Or maybe this one isn’t as good compensation-wise, but it feels right. And I think it’s important for everybody to just, yes, what you said, listen to their gut.

Ryan: I think it’s awesome instincts to develop for designers starting off for sure.

Meg: Yes. So as far as your gut goes, what do you think makes a healthy sort of workplace culture to you?

Ryan: It’s funny, I think, you know, I think having good recognition for the work you’re doing and understanding where the design work fits into the process, hopefully, upfront, early and often throughout the process, I think this is a huge reason to stick with the company, is that your craft is central to the company. I think there are softer things too, just how teams sort of get together and the sort of like, between meetings and over the course of week to week, like the stuff that builds up over time. And that could be the small rituals like coffee or lunch, or breakfast. I had a team that did breakfast every Friday for years. I think these little things actually add up to being really impactful to people long term. You spend a lot of time with the people you work with and you want to make sure that chemistry is there too.

Meg: Yeah, getting to know your teammates as though they’re actual humans, I think is really important. I’m sure people still teach this today of like, don’t show your true self at work or like, don’t show yourself on social media, because somebody might see that, and I can’t imagine going to a workspace where you can’t feel safe to be yourself. And so, I think creating healthy environments where we can support and get to know people as individuals is so important.

Ryan: Yeah, there’s something we do here at Instacart, we meet every Friday, at the end of the day, just to reflect on the week. And this is not really a meeting or something that’s tracked or you know, it is literally a social touch point for people to support each other, and just sort of talk about the stuff that they went through and the things that they’re working on, things they learned, and things so grateful for. I think it’s a really nice ingredient to healthy teams.

Meg: Couldn’t agree more, and Instacart sounds like definitely a really inclusive space to work in. And the product is so important. I certainly love Instacart, I use it all the time. It makes my life easier. I love it so much. Thank you so much, Ryan for the quick chat today.

Ryan: Yeah, thanks Meg, it was a lot of fun. Nice to meet you.

Meg: And that’s it for this week’s episode of Overtime. If you want to continue the conversation on the internet, use the hashtag #dribbbleovertime. And if you love this episode, you know what to do, let us know by leaving a review, subscribe, yada, yada, yada. And don’t forget to tweet or tag me, Meg Lewis, on the internet. I’m @darngooood with for “O’s”.

And this week, I launched a trailer for my new podcast that surprisingly has nothing to do with design. It’s a part parody, part useful comedy meditation podcast and it’s actually quite relaxing and quite funny at the same time. It’s called “Sit There and Do Nothing” and you can listen to the trailer and subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts. Bye. See you next week, buddies.