Microsoft Expression Studio Commemorative Edition

Last month, Microsoft had announced that they would spoil every MIX 07 attendee with not only a copy of Windows Vista Ultimate, but also a special Commemorative Edition of Expression Studio as a celebration of it’s launch (and for putting up with seeing the Pussycat Dolls for one more time at a Microsoft event in Vegas). Earlier today, Jeff Sandquist posted a blurry photo from his phone captured from behind-the-scenes.

Microsoft Expression Studio Commemorative EditionThis limited edition packaging features one-of-a-kind artwork said to reflect Microsoft’s beliefs for hand-crafted design and user-experiences. In other words, they wanted to do something cool.

Each copy of the commemorative edition is unique and features different pencil sketches on the cover. But these are not just any sketches, they are carefully scribbled by professional designers and even the members of the Expression team. You can’t deny a lot of work went into each one of these, especially when thousands of attendees will each receive a visibly different design.

Just even thinking of drawing thousands of unique pencil sketches sounds a lot of blood, sweat and tears, not to mention the logistics of transferring them onto the box. However I do hope there’s no blood or sweat going in those boxes.

Miwa Mueller from the Expression team who worked this concept explains,

Pencil is still the number one tool for designers so I thought it would be cool to have a design that acknowledges that aspect of the whole process before designer start doing something digitally. So these are pencil sketches created by designers when they were brainstorming on a new project. Some of the art comes from our own Expression Team. Each one is unique.

Microsoft Expression Studio Commemorative Edition
Microsoft Expression Studio Commemorative Edition
Microsoft Expression Studio Commemorative Edition

Extra special thanks to Miwa and Cherri who went out of their way trying to get me these high-resolution photographs.

12 insightful thoughts

  1. The first box art looks like a sketch of Bill Gates or Ray Ozzie with a foot in his mouth. Could be Jeff Raikes too, who knows.

    I like the middle one [inset] with that swirly thing going on.

  2. Amazing work!
    My doubt now is: how will people know if a copy is really original? I mean… if each design is unique, it’s a matter of time till someone makes one and sells a fake copy to someone…

  3. ROFL at the third high resolution box. Why is there a Chinese fish-cooking recipe on there? :p Very cool indeed.

  4. actually they arnt high res photos, but infact renders, since they dont have the hinge at the bottom right corner, or the button to pop open the box, but i know what you meant 🙂

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