Behance Team Holding Strong Amidst Hurricane Sandy

A quick note from Scott Belsky, Behance’s Co-Founder, on Behance’s status this week.

It has been a wild week for all of us, but everyone on the Behance team is safe and sound. At this point, our thoughts are with those people and families that have lost lives, their homes or were otherwise impacted by the storm.

All of Soho lost power – and many of our homes are still without electricity or internet, but the team stayed coordinated to take care of each other, keep Behance up and running, and continue to serve our members.

As I look back over the years we have worked together as a team, it’s clear that adversity always makes us stronger. Server mishaps, broken elevators, missed planes, minor earthquakes, and yes – even hurricanes – bring us together. We become better communicators, more tolerant, and we learn how to prepare for next time. It’s easy when it’s all smooth sailing. But when something goes wrong, the greatest teams rise to the occasion…and really stand out.

I want to express gratitude to team Behance for their patience and commitment this week. Makes me especially proud to be on this journey with all of you.

Behance members: Our community management team is accessible and doing their best to respond to your questions. If you are having trouble getting ahold of us, please email energy -at- behance -dot- com.

Thanks and be well!
scott

Portfolio Review Week Begins! Events around the globe…

This week, Portfolio Review Week kicked off around the world! With almost 200 events scheduled wordwide, we’re seeing news from this inspiring gatherings to share work & get feedback buzzing all over the internet. Despite Hurricane Sandy, which has caused postponement of East Coast events, the communities in the rest of the world are thriving. Here’s some early news from these events:

Budapest, Hungary:

 

Rome, Italy:

Kyiv, Ukraine:

Hamburg, Germany

Read more →

Most Appreciated Projects on Behance

Appreciations are a way to send genuine kudos to another creative professional on Behance. This is our community’s way of curating the network, so that the best projects gain the most exposure. Here’s a look at two of the most appreciated projects on Behance this week:

No Entry Design is a Brooklyn-based, multi-disciplinary designer with specialty in hand-painted signs and custom murals. A recent project involved both with a facelift to a local cafe’s facade. Check out the custom mural and hand-painted signage here.

The “Weird Beauty” project is a collaboration between photographer Alexander Khokhlov and makeup artist Valeriya Kutsan. This series, one that Khokhlov refers to as an “experiment,” sets out to prove that simple shapes and forms, characters and familiar patterns can be part of beauty. Check out the full project here.

Meet the team: Sean Blanda

Who are you and what do you do at Behance?
 I’m Sean, the Associate Editor and Producer of 99U.Basically: I handle all the day-to-day work of running a blog with an audience of a million creatives. Stuff like finding guest writers, editing posts, writing posts, determining article topics/themes and brainstorming long-term growth strategy with EIC Jocelyn Glei. We hope to provide our readers with all of the stuff they need to execute on ideas. I’m constantly testing and tweaking to discover what resonates with our readership. Additionally, I play a role in helping to organize the 99U conference and a few other super-secret events we have up our sleeve.

What are three desktop tools you can’t live without?

1) Evernote – I’m a new convert to the church of Evernote but I use it, without exaggeration, every 10 minutes. For someone like me with a terrible memory, it’s a life saver.
2) Spotify – If it weren’t for Spotify I’d be listening to the same four Black Keys albums. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
3) Twitter - It’s how I reach out to writers, promote our work, get exposed to new ideas, and complain about the Philadelphia Eagles.

What have you worked on recently that you’re extra proud of?
I’m only 6 weeks on the job, but I’m proud that we’ve had the highest trafficked day in 2012 this month. I’m also proud to see the comments and tweets from readers who use the content to make their lives better. The best is yet to come.

What are some startups that you’re a fan of?
In a past life, I covered startups and venture capital so I’m a big fan of ambitious businesses that affect the general population and not just other tech-savvy startup people. My favorite of the moment are Uber (car service), Frank and Oak (men’s clothes), Lore (education), Circa (journalism), and Duck Duck Go (search). Also: anything Elon Muskis involved with. America needs more ambitious startups.

Name something you’ve learned since joining the Behance team that you weren’t expecting:
“Attention to detail” is usually some throwaway phrase on job descriptions. But here, I’m learning from the care that everyone takes in their day-to-day. I’ve seen (and taken part in) discussions about tiny details like the kerning on a site’s footer or the perfect copy to use in an article teaser. Whether it’s the new project editor on Behance, a partnership with a sponsor, an article on 99U, or some print collateral – everything is well considered, well designed and well executed. And that’s just been in the six weeks since I’ve started. I’m excited to see what happens next.

You can find Sean on twitter: @SeanBlanda. 

Portfolio Review Week Countdown

We are only days away from Behance’s global Portfolio Review Week!  Our meet-up organizers are receiving their kits in the mail and are making final arrangements for their events. It’s not look late to claim a spot in your area and RSVP to attend. To learn more about Behance Portfolio Reviews please visit be.net/reviews.

Behance Ambassadors – Creative News From Around the Globe

The Behance Ambassadors are a group of 15 who represent Behance in the real-world, helping to create local movements in their cities and provide real-world connections for creative professionals. They curate & promote stellar work coming out of their area, host & suggest local events, and help creative vibrant pockets of creative activity. Here’s what they’ve been up to:

Portugal:
Ambassador Rui Pedro Esteves just launched Behance Portugal! This site is the new hub for the creative community in Portugal, and contains info on upcoming events, inspiring creative work, interviews, and workshops.
Introducing Behance Portugal: http://www.behancept.com/

Argentina:
RSVP For Buenos Aire’s Portfolio Review Night
The official Portfolio Review evevent will happen on October 30 at the Universidad de Palmero, featuring presentations from 5 Behancers, plus special guest Hernan Berdichevsky, Director at imagenHB and Nobrand.

Congratulations to local photographer Lui Abadi, who showed his work at NYC’s MOMA PS1! Learn more about his work, “Casa de Cambio,” at the NYArtBookFair. In other creative news, Paola Dalman, your Ambassador, recommends joining the Buenos Aires Freelancer Community, or attending the IV International Designer Festival, going on from October 19-21.

Malaysia:
An exhibition featuring the work of local talent is in the works for November 28-December 8th as a part of “Behance Portfolio Review Week.” (invitation to come). Our Ambassador Muid Latif has been busy – he hosted a gathering for the Behance Community on October 7, and, as part of his duties as  board member of Creative Commons Malaysia, is speaking on creative copyright laws this month.

Read more →

⌘ Developer’s Toolkit: Kevin Ran

This post is part of a series where Behance developers talk about the various tools they use to get things done and make ideas happen.

1. Who are you, and what do you do at Behance?

I’m Kevin and like a few others on the Dev team, SUNY Binghamton is my Alma Mater. Personally, I play guitar, [lots of] video games and animate things once in a while. I’m also an avid C/C++ programmer. Overall, a very simple guy (despite the C/C++ part).

At Behance I’m a full time QA Engineer. It’s been a lot of manual testing of new features, automated testing and maintaining the framework that we use for those tests – our page objects. I focus a lot on enforcing a clear, maintainable pattern in our page objects, not just for ease of use (by me, Dan and potentially other devs), but for extensibility. It’s thrilling because I get the unique opportunity to focus on how efficient my code is and how to utilize and combine language features in nifty ways!
Read more →

Announcing Pantone Canvas

Behance powers custom networks for creative organizations like the Smithsonian’s Cooper-Hewitt, Adweek, Vice/Intel and more.

We’re thrilled to announce our newest custom network for Pantone, the world-renowned authority on color.

On PANTONE CANVAS you can share your creative work and see the portfolios of today’s top designers and creatives from around the world. Browse by category, style – even search for designs in your favorite color! Click here to browse or join Pantone Canvas.

Most Appreciated Projects on Behance: National Design Awards Edition

Appreciations are a way to send genuine kudos to another creative professional on Behance. This is our community’s way of curating the network, so that the best projects gain the most exposure. Here’s a look at two of the most appreciated projects from our recently launched National Design Awards gallery:

New York-based design studio Diller Scofidio + Renfro integrates architecture with visual and performing arts. In collaboration with James Corner Field Operations and Piet Oudolf, DS+R designed the 1.5-mile long public park known as the Highline. Built on an abandoned, elevated railroad the Highline runs from Manhattan’s Meatpacking district through to the Hudson Rail Yards. See the full project here.

Global design studio, MINIMAL, best known for their iconic, disruptive products put their detail-oriented approach to work in creating a high tech case that transforms your iPhone into a “rugged everyday warrior.” Check out the full projects for close-ups of the Gorilla glass lens, aluminum cover and even witness a Taktik-protected iPhone getting dropped over and over (and surviving) here.