Mad about ads.

Mad about Ads.

 

Ad designer Dan Walton's love of drawing has led to a thrilling career.

 

Dan Walton gets a real buzz from billboards. He sometimes sits and stares at them. But that's not the only thing. He's also been known to drag his parents into the room to watch television when the commercials come on, and he's likely to stop turning the pages when he gets to the ads in magazines.

 

But you'd probably do those things, too, if you were Dan. He's one of the guys who designs ads. At just 23 years old, he's an art director at an Auckland advertising agency called Revolution. Ads that make you laugh or cry or encourage you to buy something don't just happen - they start out as ideas or concepts in the heads of people like Dan.

 

And to get from his head onto the billboard or television or magazine, he relies quite a lot on computers and software. When he gets an idea for an ad, he starts out by making rough sketches - like stick people, he says, and then, as the idea starts to come together, he fi lls in the drawings and adds more details.

 

At that point, he'll usually scan the drawing into the computer and use Photoshop to add colour, drop in words and maybe add some special effects.

 

Hopefully, the client will love the polishedup concept he's created and ask him to continue. Then, photographers and producers come into the show - and the 'shoot' is Dan's favourite part of his job. "It's always a comedy. People are running all over the place and there's lots of free food and drinks. But it's also really thrilling seeing my concepts come to life."

 

Dan usually brings a Mac operator onto the team, who is highly skilled at using computers and software for art and drawing. They'll take the photos, images and all the ideas and make a fi nished ad out of it. Of course, all along, Dan is directing the work and getting the ideas from his head onto paper.

 

Like lots of advertising creatives, Dan has always known he was good at art and loved drawing. But he didn't like the 'engineering' kind of drawing that sometimes comes with graphic design jobs. Lucky for him, he had an aunt who worked in advertising and told Dan about jobs for art directors at advertising agencies.

 

Dan was born in Sydney, but he's quick to point out that he's the only one in his family to be born there - they're a Kiwi clan who happened to be in Australia when Dan came along. He grew up in Taranaki and Auckland, where he attended Auckland Grammar and then did an intensive graphic design degree at AUT. After his degree, he spent three years on a placement at McCann Ericsson as a junior designer, where he worked on such big brands as Coke, L'Oreal, Pizza Hut, Schweppes and Maybelline. He's made about 15 television commercials and even designed a billboard for Microsoft.

 

Young, fresh ideas are always in demand, which is great for those just coming out of training. But don't be surprised to fi nd advertising a competitive industry. Dan, like lots of other beginners, had to work for free for quite a while. The best advice he has for someone who wants to design ads: know what you want and be focused. And try, he says, not to get discouraged when you take samples of your work around to agencies and they tell you, "'no, no, no. Do this and do that.' Don't believe them. Believe in yourself. It sounds gay, but you have to have faith in your abilities."

 

 

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