Talk Paper Scissors

Welcome to a 4-part publishing series all about the world of zines! From makers near and far, with small and large publications, you’ll hear about this exciting medium where anything can happen at the intersection of art and independent publishing.

First up we have Ioana Simion, who is an artist-educator and facilitator based London. She runs community workshops under the artistic identity of Artizine. 

In this conversation, you’ll hear how to Ioana’s zine making evolved from solitary practice through to creating in community, and how she experiments in her zine making. She shows us what type of magic can happen when we take formal design practice and marketing out of the equation and focus solely on making in a community space.

 Let's Connect on the web or via Instagram. :)

Meet emerging typeface designers, Paulina Marin and Darrab Qureshi! Paulina designed a typeface called Funky Pants and Darrab designed an Arabic typeface called Qalam in GCM 806 Advanced Typography at Toronto Metropolitan University. In the following conversation, you'll get to hear about each typeface. You'll also hear their perfect type pairings, sensory descriptions of each (sight, smell, touch, sound and even taste), as well as what was easy and difficult about the process. Let the type geekery begin! 

 Let's Connect on the web or via Instagram. :)

Welcome to a thought-provoking and paradigm-shifting conversation with James McCrae, author, poet, and teacher who empowers creators to live with purpose and turn imagination into reality.

In this conversation you’ll hear how James’ career has always been rooted in both art and writing, including his navigation through various facets of the design industry. You’ll hear why James believes that social media is an art form in its own right and how making mistakes have been some of his greatest moments of learning.

We talk about the role ego plays in creative practice, and the importance of planting intentional seeds, allowing quality ideas to grow and mature in our subconscious. We also talk about trust and control in creative processes.

 Let's Connect on the web or via Instagram. :)

Today we have educator, storyteller and Toronto tourism go-to, Alex Sein @BeardedProf416. In this conversation, you’ll hear Alex’s story of becoming a Torontonian, including his link to graffiti culture in the city and how he accidentally became intwined in this community.

You’ll hear about the history of graffiti, why it matters and how graffiti is often a collaborative process. You’ll not only hear about physical infrastructure of a place (including the idea of a 15-minute city), but also the emotional infrastructure that signage, advertising and graffiti help shape. You’ll hear the surprising ways that graffiti is deeply-rooted in history of places all over the world and both consciously and subconsciously connect and foster belonging. 

 Let's Connect on the web or via Instagram. :)

Today’s conversation features Paige Deasley, photographer, storyteller, and creative strategist passionate about helping people reconnect with nature. 

In this conversation, you’ll hear about Paige’s life that exists at the intersection of nature and creativity. You’ll hear how she handles working remotely while immersing herself in nature, how she found her photographic voice, as well as what about the natural world inspires her and what it’s like to swim with an octopus. Finally, you’ll hear about Paige’s ideal vision of a life that allows her to explore creativity in the natural world.

 Let's Connect on the web or via Instagram. :)

Today we have the one, the only, Amos Paul Kennedy, Jr., an American printer, book artist and papermaker who has been puttin’ ink on paper since 1949. He is a citizen printer, which you’ll hear much more about very soon.

In this conversation, you’ll hear about Amos’ incredible book, Citizen Printer, including how it came to be, what it means to be a citizen and Amos’ vision for citizenship today and tomorrow. You’ll hear about activism, humanism, materialism, capitalism, environmentalism, and the need for a new system. And in the wise words of Amos, “participation changes the system”.

 Let's Connect on the web or via Instagram. :)

Today’s guest is internet artist, Nolen Royalty. He's interested in getting strangers to interact over the internet in unusual ways and in pushing mundane technology to its limits. Projects of his include stranger video (a website that shows you live, silent video of a stranger's face until one of you blinks), One Million Checkboxes (a website with a million global checkboxes), and games that run inside Google Calendar, MacOS Finder, and your unclosed browser tabs. 

And he’s also created a game called Talk Paper Scissors, which is how we—by happenstance—connected.

In this conversation you’ll hear how Nolen brings strangers together for spontaneous joy on the Internet. You’ll better understand why Nolen prefers creating experiences that foster collaboration rather than competition, how building constraint facilitates participation, as well as the role multi-level storytelling plays in his work.

Also, you’ll hear an epic rock paper scissors showdown of monumental proportions to decide the ultimate Talk Paper Scissors champion….

 Let's Connect on the web or via Instagram. :)

Could you collaborate to make an award-winning professional short film with a team from start to finish in just 48 hours? Our guest today has done just that! James Rowan is a technologist, educator, and researcher working at the intersection of film, television, and emerging technology.

You’ll hear James talk about the ways in which both creativity drives technology and technology drives creativity. He provides advice about how to develop both creative thinking skills, paired with the technical skills necessary to make a vision come to life, and what’s needed to bridge the gap between these two states of being. 

We chat about the inventible failures that will occur in figuring things out as you go, and that failure is simply data. We talk about collaboration and the power of the hive mind; diverse individuals with different areas of expertise coming together to push innovation through experimentation.

Here's the link to watch James and team's incredible 48-hour film project: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPRe2bVe27o 

 Let's Connect on the web or via Instagram. :)

Elliot Jay Stocks is a designer and musician, known in typographic circles thanks to his time as Creative Director of Adobe Typekit, founder of typography magazine 8 Faces, and for his recent collaboration with Google that lead to the creation of Google Fonts Knowledge. 

In this conversation, you’ll hear about Elliot’s prolific career in type. We talk passion projects and opportunities to broaden skills sets and unique opportunities that can happen from following one’s genuine interests. Elliot also shares his process for writing and designing my very favourite typography textbook, as well as the entry point for students who are just beginning to formally explore the world of letterforms. 

A quick note that this episode isn’t sponsored — as always I’m just a curious human trying to connect with interesting, creative people and projects out in the world. 

 Let's Connect on the web or via Instagram. :)

Welcome to 250th episode of Talk Paper Scissors where I celebrate YOU the listeners, chat about podcasting milestones and share info about the upcoming release of my book called Brave Creative Human: Reframe imposter syndrome, embrace failure and be unapologetically you, with the foreword written by the one and only Drag Artist & Creativity Professor, Guy Anabella! 

Release date: September 28, 2025!

Here’s to the celebrating the small successes that turn out to be not so little with time and consistency.

*Note: The Book above is not my book; it’s a delightful read by author Keith Houston that’s “a cover-to-cover exploration of the most powerful object of our time”. I couldn't agree more! 

 Let's Connect on the web or via Instagram. :)