Monthly Archives: July 2010

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Sharpie Walking the UK Cat Walk

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What’s Sharpie up to over-seas?  Check out this current UK promotion!

 

This year, Sharpie is one of London Fashion Weekend’s official sponsors and we’re giving one lucky winner and a friend a fashion-filled weekend to remember!

Sharpie will be treating the lucky winner to two Gold tickets to London Fashion Weekend on Sunday 26th September, which includes an exclusive catwalk ticket and a goodie bag packed with all your style essentials.  The winner will also spend one night, including breakfast, at the oh-so swanky Guoman’s The Cumberland hotel on Park Lane. To top it off , this winning fashionista will receive more Sharpie swag than they’ll know what to do with!

By filling out and submitting a questionnaire, the chosen GRAND prize winner of this fashion fabulosity will win to two Gold tickets to London Fashion Weekend on Sunday September 26th.  In addition, the prize includes an exclusive fashion week pass, a fabulous goody bag packed with all your style essentials, one night’s accommodation with breakfast at the swanky Guoman Hotel The Cumberland, and  £100 to spend on the latest trends plus bunch of Sharpie goodies to design DIY fashion masterpieces!

What an amazing opportunity!  I hope we can bring this to the states!

Gotta love the personal touch!

oo La La!

Check out London Fashion Weekend on Facebook!

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Sharpie BanDONT’s

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I know the Sharpie Bandits are so 2009, but I’d like to revisit the topic for a moment after coming across a Sharpie DIY project featured on Instructables.com not too long ago.

DIY No-Sew LOOT Sack

www.Instructables.com

Instructables.com offers a How-To on making a “No-Sew LOOT Sack.”  (This is a pretty cool idea that you could take in several directions, outside of the “loot” theme, it’s just up to you as to where you want to take it.)  But staying in line with the $$$ theme, reading this How-To reminded me of the infamous “Sharpie Bandits” ..

For those of you who don’t remember, here’s a recap:  October 2009, two male 20-somethings, from Carroll, IA needed to inject a little excitement into their lives.  What to do? What to do?  …How does that age-old saying go? “When in doubt, Choose Burglary.”  Ah yes, that’s the one.

Long story short, things didn’t pan out so well for this dastardly duo.  The Carroll Police Dept., responding to a call that two men had attempted to break into a home, stopped a car matching the caller’s description to find the two would’ve been crooks behind the wheel.  Here’s the catch, these two geniuses voted against your standard ski mask & ladies’ stockings and went with a unique disguise option…

    They drew all over their faces with black permanent markers! 

Read the full story at BoingBoing.net

It’s been 9 months and this still baffles me!  Tell me, who in their right mind (or wrong, for that matter) would think of this and say, “Yeah……YEAH! This is it, this is genius!  What a fail-proof plan” ?  And to that point, how is the one guy capable of convincing the other that this is in fact a good idea? 

I choose to believe that these “Sharpie bandits” just love Sharpie markers SO much that they cannot even entertain the thought of not incorporating Sharpie into every second of every day.  Well boys, if this IS the case, next time, I would advise you to go for the Sharpie DIY LOOT Sack option instead of playing connect the dots on your faces for a number of reasons:

  1. Sharpie does not promote Sharpie products  on skin.
  2. You could use the sack as a mask.
  3. Could use it as a good ol’ run of the mill loot sack to lug out all those valuables. 
  4. After getting caught (which you obviously you will) you can use the LOOT Sack to shield your face from the blinding flashes of the paparazzi.

WARNING!  DO NOT participate in any criminal activity and DO NOT Uncap What’s Inside if you’re going the Sharpie Bandit route. 

DO Uncap What’s Inside for constructive, creative, good-for-the-community-and-yourself purposes! :)

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Sharpie Squad Guest Blogger: Derek Benson

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You’ve read his interview, you’ve seen his art work and I bet now you’re hungry for more!  What he may lack in words, he more than makes up for it with his incredible Sharpie art.  Transforming lunchtime into a daily art gala, Sharpie Squad member, Derek Benson is inspiring parents everywhere to give their kids something to look forward to when that 12 o’ clock bell rings! 

Meet Derek Benson, the creative genius behind Lunch Bag Art:

I take my Sharpies with me to work. During lunch, I draw on my kids' lunch bags for the next day. My friend Chuck and I were at lunch here, and he wanted to do one for his son.

Batman supervises morning drawing. My daughter loves the Sharpie paint pens; she's working on a unicorn.

This is a water balloon. It was devastating.

Marvin the Martian, in all his power and majesty.

Hi!

I’m Derek Benson, and I have a blog called Lunch Bag Art.  I started it because I draw on my kid’s lunch bags, and felt like it might be a good idea to start taking pictures. 

Let’s talk about the paint pens… they’re perfect in all ways!   If you want to make a striking image,

  •  Make a silhouette in black (like Marvin here) 

  • Then, take the paint markers to it…

  • White works great as an outline. 

  • Then you can smear the color over the black.  Just use a fingertip; the color holds up and the colors are excellently opaque. 

  • Take a smaller pen to add a little detail and you’re good.

 

I can do one of these in under twenty minutes -  

Which is good if you’re on a lunch break!

Brophy

Dolls

Dragon

Faye

Gadget

Narwhal

Robo

Sephiroth

Zorak

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Sharpie’s Right to Highlight Sweepstakes

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There is one glitch in the collegiate system…  For most, college is pure joy – You’re on your own with this newfound independence, the rents can’t ask you where you’re going, who’s going to be there, or what time you’ll be home.  You are at that stage of life when technically you’re an adult but somehow can get away with things that would never fly in the real world!  In college, you build lifelong friendships.  You face your fears & take on challenges you never thought possible.  You find out who you are and want to be.  And let’s be honest, this is the only time in your life when it is socially acceptable and you are physically capable of going out 7 nights in a row and still be productive the next day!  Bottom line, college is awesome.

BUT (there’s always a “but”) there is one downfall… Shelling out the cash for books!  That’s at least twice a year when you are forced to pay +$600 for textbooks!  It’s like a friend stabbing you in the front  - You see it coming, you know it’s going to hurt and then AAHH! You’re hit!  If only a saint could come down and lift this burden.

TOO BAD! (bursting your bubble)   There is no saint!  Fortunately, for you there IS Sharpie!  Sharpie can’t magically make textbooks free or drop prices to $0.25 but we can offer something else… How about letting us pick up the tab next semester?

You heard right – Let Sharpie cover your textbook expenses!  Currently on Facebook, we’re giving you the chance to have your textbooks PAID FOR next semester for you AND 2 friends in Sharpie’s Right to Highlight Sweepstakes! Imagine what you can do with all that extra cash!

Sharpie’s Right to Highlight Sweepstakes

Here’s the rundown:

Sharpie is giving you the chance to win free textbooks for a semester for you and two friends when you enter Sharpie’s Right to Highlight Sweepstakes.  To enter, you must be an enrolled college student and “Like” Sharpie on Facebook.  Next, complete and submit the entry form provided.  After you’ve submitted, choose two other lucky undergrads to share this GRAND prize with!  

Head over to Facebook  for all the details & enter Sharpie’s Right to Highlight Sweepstakes for your chance to win!

 We’re not done yet!  In addition to the grand prize, we will also be giving away FREE weekly Sharpie Prize packs on Facebook!  Once you enter you are instantly qualified to win so keep checking back with Sharpie’s Facebook page to see if you won!  –Because who doesn’t love free swag!?

 

**Having trouble deciding on whom you should share the gift of free textbooks with?  Here are 10 People to consider:

  1. Your T.A. – Sucking up goes a looong way.
  2. Bouncer/Doorman – Because you look so much cooler walking to the front of the line.  
  3. Wingman – He’s always got your back.
  4. Your blackmailer – Maybe they’ll finally destroy the evidence!
  5. Golf team captain - Cars may not be allowed on campus, but no one said anything about golf carts! Skip the hike & hitch a ride to class!
  6. The cook at your dorm/fraternity or sorority/campus food court- They’ll pack you leftovers for the days when class runs long & the nights you work late.
  7. The DJ – He’ll skip over the songs you hate!
  8. That girl who never misses class…ever! - Hit the snooze too many times?  Not to worry, she’s already made a copy of her super extensive notes.
  9. Barista at the campus coffee shop – Waiting in line for coffee is never fun at 7AM.
  10. Party Pics photographer - He’ll hit “delete” for the times when you’re not the most photogenic.

 Enter to win now!

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Highlight What’s Right!

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I bet you can’t name one student over the age of 18 that doesn’t own a highlighter…  

That’s because highlighting is often an important part of note taking, reading and studying - especially in college!  College students are inundated with information overload and use highlighters daily as a tool to cut through the clutter to help them clarify, organize, and synthesize subject matter.  Highlighting helps to cut down the excess so that students can more easily focus on the main concepts that are important to them and study more effectively and efficiently. 

Highlighting correctly can be very helpful for students, however it can often be a distraction when done incorrectly.  Have you ever looked back through your textbook after reading a chapter only to find either, A) You had so perfectly colored every page a bright neon hue that your kindergarten-self would be jealous? Or B) you retained ab-so-lute-ly NOTHING?  If you answered yes to either (most likely both), you are a victim of “Over-Highlighting”!! 

Don't be a victim of Over-Highlighting!

“Over-Highlighting” is a common problem while reading – Take a look at your friend’s notebook or textbook next time you’re at the library –  I promise you’ll see entirely too much highlighting.  To keep this time-waster from happening you’ve got to stay focused and refrain from getting caught up in mindlessly “coloring” the page.

Try applying some of these tips on highlighting text effectively from CliffNotes.com: 

  1. Focus on the main point – and that may not be the entire sentence. It’s perfectly okay to highlight only key terms or parts of sentences. In fact, you may get a better sense of the main idea of a paragraph if you highlight a string of words (excluding extraneous information) that lets you glean the main idea at a glance.
  2. Consider reading the entire paragraph, and then going back and highlighting the important words and ideas. If you highlight from the start, you may not be sure of the paragraph’s purpose and how to best capture that purpose or idea with your highlighter.
  3. If you buy a used textbook or other reading material, look for one with little or no highlighting. It’s hard to ignore the previous owner’s highlighting. In addition to highlighting, consider jotting notes in the margins, next to passages.

Now, don’t be a victim, highlight effectively and efficiently. Above all else,

             Highlight so that you get an A on the test! 

 

Sharpie Highlighters are the number one choice when it comes to highlighting and doing so effectively.  Available in 8 different styles and 10 bold fluorescent colors, there’s a Sharpie Highlighter for your every need:

  

Save on Sharpie Retractable Highlighters just in time for Back-to-School Season

  

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Uncap What’s Inside with Sharpie Pen

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Did you know that Sharpie is not just limited to the world of markers?  Sharpie Pens are among Sharpie’s newest innovations that take everyday writing to great heights.  Whether you’re a doodler, a science geek, a business professional, a mom on the go, or a student in a lecture hall, there is a Sharpie Pen for your every writing need.  

 

Sharpie Pens come in three styles and in six eye-catching colors...

  1. Sharpie Pen - Sharpie’s first-ever pen for everyday writing that won’t bleed through paper.
  2. Sharpie Pen Grip - The no-bleed technology with a soft grip for added writing comfort.
  3.  Sharpie Pen Retractable – That same no-bleed through promise with a one-hand click convenience.

   Check out the Sharpie Pen family at www.sharpie.com and buy a set of Sharpie Pens for yourself today to experience how to Uncap What’s Inside in an entirely new way. 

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Bring on the Heat!

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At 9:27 p.m. on July 8th the top three free agents in the professional basketball league officially joined forces when LeBron James announced his decision to play for the Miami Heat, with his buds & now teammates, to essentially form a superpower dream team, or the Three Kings as some have coined the trio.  A momentous occasion indeed!

Taken from NBA.com

What does this have to do with Sharpie? — Sharpie will be front and center TONIGHT at The HEAT Summer of 2010 Welcome Event celebrating Dwyane Wade’s return to the team, and to introduce Chris Bosh and LeBron James to the South Florida family.  This once in a lifetime celebration is scheduled to begin at 8:00 p.m. at the AmericanAirlines Arena with Live statewide TV coverage on FOX.  FOX Sports Florida will provide exclusive live coverage of the press conference, beginning at 7:30 p.m. ET - Sharpie holding literally the best seat in the house!  At the press conference, all three allstars will be fully equipped with Sharpie Pens to lay down their signatures on to what could be the most important document ever to be laid in front of them… THEIR HEAT CONTRACTS!  Wade, James and Bosh will then autograph photographs that will be framed along with their respective Sharpie Pens.  The autographed photos & mounted Sharpie Pens will later be auctioned off to charity.

We will be posting exclusive footage from the event – so Stay Tuned!  Look out for the Sharpie Stainless Steel markers tonight and pick one up for yourself so that you can Uncap What’s Inside & bring the HEAT just like Chris Bosh, Lebron James & Dwyane Wade!

Uncap  What’s Inside

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Sharpie Squad Guest Blogger: Hanna Agar

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I’m handing the Sharpie blog over to one of our Squad members today!  Sure you love my writing…but it’s refreshing to get a new voice on the blog. every so often.  For the next several months, (almost every Wednesday) I will pass the blog torch to one of our inspiring, super cool, muy interesante (sí sí) Squad members, giving them the chance to do basically whatever they want with the Sharpie Blog!  In doing so, I hope to give the Sharpie Squad yet another creative outlet, while also allowing you the opportunity to get to know each & every one of them a little better.

Now that you’ve gotten the rundown, let’s kick this thing into gear.  Sound the trumpets, turn on the bat signal, alert the media - our first-ever guest blogger, Hanna Agar is on stage!  Hanna is a 2nd year Squad member, is extremely creative & talented and… how about we hand the mic over to Hanna to tell you the rest - Take it away Miss Agar! *(Warning you might be blown away by what you are about to see.)

  Hi!  I’m Hanna Agar!

Here is a little bit about me…

My art pictograph

I am labeled a photographer, but I would like to think that I am more than that.  I am a craftsman, a painter, a performance artist, a stylist, a fashion designer, a set builder, and a light sculptor.  I create scenes, narratives, performances, metaphors, and I document them through photography.  I like to create very dramatic, mysterious, provocative, almost disturbing images that entangle as many skills as I can possibly manage to juggle to construct something more than just pressing a button. 

I draw inspiration from stories and theater, from creepy nooks and crannies, from basements and thrift stores, and from my instinctive response to environmental trashing.  After taking a psychology class I began thinking more and more about what goes on in people’s minds. This prompted me to begin my newest body of work in which I give people writing assignments that I integrate into photos or use in performance installations.

Documented performance installations are something I find very compelling.  It allows me to create something more than just a photo.  I can create an experience.  These experiences I find to often be slightly therapeutic in that they require the subjects to really look inwards and think about themselves.  Each subject is alone in the experience and takes something different away from it.  That is my gift to them.  These performances are not rehearsed. I am compelled by these installations because the results that occur are unpredictable and unique.  The process could be repeated hundreds of times and each time would be different.  I enjoy these performances because while each image is in itself interesting, the entirety of the experience becomes truly fascinating.

Another element that weaves its way into my art is recycling.  This initially began while I was working in a photo studio and noticed that after the white background paper became slightly dirty it would be cut off and thrown away.  This always horrified me.  What a waste.  Here was this ten foot long role of semi-used paper lying crumpled in the dumpster.  I took it upon myself to be the savior, the resurrector of forgotten and abandoned material.  I started using these salvaged chunks of paper to line little nooks and crannies and to transform them into three-dimensional canvases.  These first creations emerged as documented performance installations as you’ve seen above, but then continued into creating not only sets but also costumes and props.  After reusing these materials I recycle what is left or store it away until inspiration strikes again. 

 When I first received my invitation to join the Sharpie Squad I had two thoughts.

  1. It was a joke from work (I worked for two years at a photo studio called Sharp Photo and Portrait and we referred to ourselves as “Sharpies”).  
  2. It was spam. 

After getting over the shock that this was for real and overcoming my intimidation of feeling under qualified after looking at how accomplished all the other Squad members are I began to settle in and enjoy this experience.  When I would tell people about being a member of the Sharpie Squad the most common reaction was, “Oh, my god!  I love Sharpies”  …Yep, me too!  Since I had just graduated from college with my BFA in Photography and was experiencing a lull in creative job opportunities, joining the Sharpie Squad motivated me to keep going with my artwork and continue with my series of writing assignments.  Being on the Squad also motivated me to finally put a website together, which, drum role please, you can visit at www.hannaagar.com

For me being on the Sharpie Squad is a great way to transition from college to the “real world”.  The next step in my transition will be my move to NYC this fall where I hope to hone my skills as an assistant to some awesome photographer.  The next step…who knows?  But I can’t imagine my life continuing without some form or other of creative and exciting experiences.

 

…and that’s how you Uncap What’s Inside.  Thanks Hanna! You have an amazing talent. 

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What’s Red, White & Blue with Sharpie All Over?

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Happy Birthday America!

I’m always in search of a good piece of Red, White & Blue flair to show off my American pride- especially on the 4th of July!  Nothing caught my eye this year so in true Sharpie fashion, I took it upon myself to DIY the colors of the flag…  

Celebrate USA in with these DIY Sharpie Shades

In just about 5 minutes, you too can sport team USA and be the envy of all your friends!  All you will need to make these American flag Sharpie shades is:

Steps

  1. Start out by drawing an outline of half of a blue box on the left eye with a blue Sharpie paint marker.  Color in the “L” shape you’ve made while drawing star outlines as you go. 
  2. Next,  draw red stripes with a red Sharpie paint marker across the remaining area.  If you are worried about drawing straight lines, just do as I did and cut thin strips of tape to lay across the rim.  This will also ensure that the white stripes are even with the red. 
  3. Lastly, (this may not apply to everyone) if you smeared any red or blue marker onto the white space use a cotton swab to wipe of access ink.  Wet one side with Rubbing Alcohol then wipe off the paint, then dry that spot off with the other end of the cotton swab. 

TAH-DAH! You’re finished!  Now you are set to look Sharp(ie) & celebrate the holiday weekend with family, friends & fireworks!

Happy Fourth of July!

Happy Fourth of July!