But anyways, check this out. On a recent roadtrip I came across this amazingly awesome sign at Wind Cave National Park, just sitting there above the entryway to the giftshop. A million people a summer probably walk right underneath it & never even notice, how sad…

Pretty cool stuff here. Wonder what happened to Hy-Vee. Was it a random brand or was it like 7up sized? What about Sprite, never knew it was not only good but also Tart & Tingling, huh? The Mtn Dew cans are super good, they have a “throwback series of them in stores right now. Along those lines, Pepsi doesn’t do it for me…. I love the main Pepsi can but the Diet Pepsi, not so much. (They also have a throwback of those in stores right now.)

Here’s a link to the post on Lovely Package.

Before you even got in the show, you were inundated with art. This collection by the folks at Loser Machine was pretty nice, featuring hand painted helmets by a bunch of different folk including: Kris Markovich (paisley day of the dead), Persue (zombie), Lance Mountain (jesus loves the loser) and Jayme Schmidt (70′s van snakeskin fade).

RVCA had a pretty nice photo wall out front as well, completing the surf / island feel were two hula dancing mannequins which upon closer inspection were armed to the teeth…. and somewhat manly?

Naturally, painted skateboards would be there with so much other art. Two notable standouts were Tocayo’s Posada’s Puppet and Haley Robinson’s woodgrain, painted on a wood deck worked out nicely in my eyes.

There was a very nice collection of custom shaped surfboards all alone one wall of the show facing the lobby. A standout to me was Peter Schroff’s. Also, a New Zealand company called INLAYZ was there pumping it’s strength enhancing graphics… pretty interesting

Skullcandy didn’t want to be left out of the art party, so they one-upped everyone & had artist Taylor Reeve painting a couple single speeds at their booth.

You’ve heard that rally racing is now, somehow, part of Action Sports right? You know, million dollar cars fit right in with kids who can barely afford to eat at Taco Bell. I’m not complaining, because they are badass… just a bit out of place in my eyes. Whatever though, GoPro takes the cake for the most awesome, random, booth display (again) with an amazing Rothmans Porsche rally car. Dang. Oh and Subaru had Pastrana’s STi there as well, not too shabby. Extra points for GoPro not having the car roped off though so you could get a picture in it if you want (which I did not).

Might as well report on some of the stuff actually related to the show I suppose. They had a lot of skating going on with a nice looking 40′ or so wide mini ramp which was basically a demo of every street / miniramp killing pro you can think of going for the gold (gold meaning the large cash reward related to that gold). Aldrin Garcia decided to take his 2nd high ollie contest with a mere 44″ ollie. Seriously? That’s almost 4′
picture courtesy of Boardistan

Volcom’s booth is always hilarious. Just about every absurd theme you can think of, they’ve done and yet they keep coming up with new ones. This year was their 23hr party people theme complete with a dance game, raver outfits & techno dj. Only they could pull it off and again…. they pulled it off.

That’s it, that’s all. It was nice seeing the friends you only see at trade shows, meeting new people and it is a convenient one-stop shop for meeting with clients but thank god it doesn’t happen for another 5 months.

His website has a slew of work examples, all of them are amazing. To see more, check out his site! www.jeffnishinaka.com

Yep, it was briefly in the alphabet as the 27th letter. It’s name comes from it’s proper pronunciation during that time “and per se and” which obviously rolls off the tongue well enough that it was shortened to Ampersand. Pretty cool letter which begs to be tweaked & made even cooler.

Credits for images above:
Left column: Mobius Strip: Dave Bailey
Calligraphy: Laura Worthington
Octopus: Toby Triumph
Floral: thewheatfield / Katie Lombardo
Rusted 3d Figure: The amazingly awesome Ampersand Figures by House Industries

Right column: Top 3 – the late, great Herb Lubalin
4th Down: Steven Bonner
Bottom: Unknown, from 70 Creative and Practical Uses of the Ampersand

Here’s some more interesting ampersand articles if you’re interested:
Adobe.com – The Ampersand
Trusted Translations – The strange history of the Ampersand
The Ampersand blog
Blue FAQ – 70 Creative and Practical Uses of the Ampersand

Nice park. It would have been more funny if I spread the photos out a bit more so the one dude could have been in it more than twice. Click here if you’d like to check out a full frame panorama photo.

They’re not afraid of fairly phalic bowls in up there.

I’m putting this kid in there because he was ripping. You could tell he rides snowboards as well, he was throwing really clean frontside 5′s over the cone.

If you want to check out the park, it’s really easy to get to with good parking & it seemed to be in a decent enough area. Here’s the Google map of the location.

Click on the image to open a new window with a BIG photomerge of the mural.

Driving by it looked like it was a giant painting but upon closer inspection, you can see it’s a giant collage of wheat pasted posters. It’s hard to see work this big and not be impressed. It really got me wondering what they paid him to do it, even cost on something this big would be $1200 or so. I’m sure UO more than covered that & then some… In the last set of images, you can tell it’s a giant rasterized image (ie: jpg or tiff) because of the jagged sharkteeth along the lines (vector would be smooth).

If you’re interested, here’s the address for the Urban Outfitters – 3946 5th Avenue San Diego, CA 92103 – (619) 209-5279. The wall is on the south end of the store, facing the parking lot. There’s free parking for UO right there so don’t blow your moolah on parking if you don’t have to.

Random note with which I’ll show my design age a bit – Photomerge in CS4 is AWESOME! Sure it’s kinda cheating if you think of the old school million layer mask job. Good stuff, sometimes I don’t hate technology…