Donald Trump, Art Director: Not The Real Thing

It's been called refreshing, healthful, sparkling and delicious; scintillating, satisfying, and an aid to digestion. Over the past 106 years, its price has steadily risen to keep apace with economic growth, as has its logo evolved from whimsically stenciled to willfully streamlined — always sporting the classic colors of the flag of its parent country.

But not until now has Pepsi opened itself up to a public makeover on national television, a redesign in the hands of a smattering of aspiring capitalists, a group whose combined knowledge of design principles might be characterized as, dare I say it — negligible.

Of course, last week's Pepsi challenge had everything to do with boosting real ratings and little to do with portraying anything even remotely to do with real design. (And as far as a true reality check goes, let's not forget that it was Coke — not Pepsi — who brilliantly nabbed the slogan "It's The Real Thing" way back in 1970.) Nevertheless, The Apprentice — which is, alarmingly, tied with NBC's The West Wing as primetime television's most upscale program — chose the redesign of the Pepsi bottle as last week's Trumpian challenge...

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The Designibles

In the new Robert Zemeckis film, The Polar Express, Chris Van Allsburg's dreamy illustrations are animated by way of a new three-dimensional CGI technology called "performance capture." In this process, real actors (Tom Hanks plays most of them) are wired with small sensors attached to a network of digital cameras that simultaneously record three-dimensional facial and body movements in 360-degree views. (In production shots, the sensors themselves are attached to the actors' faces, making them look as though they've been overcome by a rather advanced case of digital acne.)

Meanwhile, Pixar's latest foray into cinematic invention captures more than just performance, and is, therefore, incredible for a number of reasons — not least of which is the fact that it's not even remotely time-pegged to Christmas.

So what's so incredible about The Incredibles? It's not the brilliantly detailed portrayal of modern superhero culture writ large. It's not the witty, demented parody of celebrity hero-worship positioned against the rampant passivity of civilian laissez-faire...

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Am I Blue

Despite a moment last week when things were looking up for both graphic designers and democrats, things aren't looking too good for the Kerry campaign this morning. And while I've been quite vocal in my dismissiveness about graphic design's power to save the world, I briefly found renewed hope yesterday in this feisty, if frustrating campaign season.

Bumper stickers and lawn posters aside, Americans showed their concern on election day 2004 by standing in epic lines at polling centers around the nation, but also in certain subtle, discreetly visual ways. From dressing in all blue (or red) to wearing "I voted today" buttons, there has been a kind of silent visual communication effort steadily in play for the last 36 hours.

And then, last night around 2:00 am EST, it all seemed to boil down to a pretty basic color war, as results trickled in and an increasingly dense swath of red cut its way slowly across the US map...

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