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Quote of the Week:

What a week.

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. I truly understand that opening line from that book Mrs. Zamboni made me read in high school, now. This week has been good, and really horrible.

Bad: I had jury duty on Monday. Before you all tell me what a privilege it is to serve on a jury, I will say: you are absolutely right, and I was happy to do it. The bad part is that it was on a Monday morning, when your clients are trying to make up for the lost time from Friday afternoon when we all knocked off early. But c'est la vie. I was nearly seated, but in the end didn't sit in the box. Maybe next year.

Good: met with a new prospective client, who has an excellent business plan, and asked me to maybe create some branding and web stuff for her in the nearish future. That was cool. And I found that the Daz Bog on 17th and Downing makes their coffee a lot better than other non-Daz Bog coffeehouses do (and they were just as polite as the folks at Generous Servings, which is saying a lot).

Bad: I wanted to make sure this client had a lot of options on the table, since their plans are a little in flux, so I made several variations on each proposal. This took time (that's the bad part). Happy to do it, but it was a lot of proposal writing.

Good: Prospective client loved the extra effort, and, for me, having those options on the table meant that they could make a more fully-informed decision. Clients often tell me that they've never seen such detailed proposals, which makes me warm and fuzzy inside (it also makes me wonder why no one else seems to be offering basic details like a schedule, a scope of work, licensing scope, and so on, but that's another post).

Bad: I had another proposal due on Saturday, and it's a proposal from an RFP, which I haven't done in years. Most of my projects come from organizations or businesses who approach me with a need, we talk about it, I get specifics, and I issue a proposal. This one is necessarily (due to the nature of the organization) more "official", and it took me several days to wrap my mind around it.

That in itself wasn't a bad thing; it was the fact that between all these proposals and jury duty AND (surprise reveal!) our dryer konked out, I got zero actual creative work done this week. None. Nada. And the designer in me died a little. And of course I had almost no time to post anything here. But there you have it. And since there is an ebb and flow to everything, I expect next week to be filled with unicorns, rainbows, and lots of time to make creative wonders for my clients.

Right?

Labels: customer service, whining

posted at 8:04 PM Leave your comments here: 0 comments

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7.24.2009

Want more proof that logo "contests" are spec work? And that spec doesn't pay?

...then I would suggest you follow Spec Watch, on Twitter. They seem to be aggregating some of the nasty stories about so-called contests in the design world.

I'd also recommend NoSpec. And my posts about bartow's survey of $99 logo sites and the AIGA's position on spec work.

Labels: advice, graphic design, spec work

posted at 10:52 AM Leave your comments here: 0 comments

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7.23.2009

Radio Shack rolling out new brand identity in August

Following the Tour de France today, I came across Lance Armstrong's message that he will be partnering with Radio Shack next year to form an American pro cycling team. That was enough news for one day, it seemed. Until I noticed in Radio Shack's related presser that the company will be rolling out a new brand identity in a few weeks. As Their Chief Marketing Officer, Lee Applebaum said in the release:

"We are re-launching our brand with a new creative platform in early August, and now having Lance on our team - an American icon who embodies the spirit of mobility, connectivity and philanthropy - really allows us to accelerate our brand's evolution."

"re-launching our brand" I guess could mean they're keeping the same identity, but I don't think so. "new creative platform"....that's nice and vague. Skywriting? Perhaps some sort of chalk-bot-inspired piece of MAKE-kraft? THAT would be truly DYI-inspired, and be a hit with the MAKE-rs of the world.

I'll be interested to see how they position themselves. For years, Radio Shack was the go-to place for hobbyists and do-it-yourselfers interested more in making things work than the brand name on the package. Lately Radio Shack has positioned itself as not only a place you can go for capacitors and AC adapters, but also to buy cell phones, sattellite radio receivers, televisions, and more "finished" consumer electronics goods.

With the recession making everyone look towards fixing what they have rather than throwing it out and replacing it with something new, Radio Shack's fortunes have actually improved, as people once again turn to it for replacement power cords, battery chargers, and resistors.

So which way will Radio Shack go with the new brand? More towards consumer goods? Or back to its roots as the neighborhood electronics parts supplier? I kinda hope it's the latter--we already have too many consumer goods stores, and look where CompUSA and Circuit City have gone. I'm not the only one who thinks this is a good idea, either.

Radio Shack Armatron (I had one of these!) from unlovablesteve on Flickr.

Labels: advice, branding, cycling, DIY

posted at 1:46 PM Leave your comments here: 0 comments

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XHTML 2 dumped, HTML 5 ascendant. Does it matter?

Here's the short version: XHTML was based on XML, back in the '90s when people thought XML was the future.

As mentioned in Techworld.com a while back:

XHTML 2 will not become a W3C standard, [W3C spokesperson Ian] Jacobs said. "We're investing in HTML 5 for the future," he said. Work stops on the XHTML language, but W3C still plans an XML formulation of HTML 5, to be done by the HTML working group.

A prominent AJAX and web development proponent applauded the W3C decision.

Firefox and Safari also include HTML 5 support, as well as Google's Chrome and Android.

So, what's the practical difference for us web designers and developers; people who need to know the code underneath the user experience, but aren't necessarily considered "coders"?

XHTML info from Mike:

XHTML 2.0 is based solely on XML, forgoing the SGML heritage and syntax peculiarities present in current web markup. XHTML 2.0 is supposed to be a “general-purpose language,” with a minimal default feature set that is easy to extend using CSS and other technologies (XForms, XML Events, etc). It’s a modular approach that allows the XHTML2 group to focus on generic document markup, while others develop mechanisms for presentation, interactivity, document construction, etc.

...and HTML 5:

While XHTML 2.0 aims to be revolutionary, the HTML working group has taken a more pragmatic approach and designed HTML 5 as an evolutionary technology. That is to say, HTML 5 is an incremental step forward that remains mostly compatible with the current HTML 4/XHTML 1 standards. However, HTML 5 offers a host of changes and extensions to HTML 4/XHTML 1 that address many of the faults in these earlier specifications.

Read his post for more.

Another post explaining the difference had a nice example of the structural, easy-to-understand nature of XML:

<farm>

 <barn>

    <horses>10</horses>

    <tools>

      <hammers>1</hammer>

      <shovel>2</shovel>

   </tools>

  </barn>

  <field>

   <cows>8</cows>

   <pigs>30</cows>

 </field>

</farm>

The structure shows the hierarchy of elements, and makes no effort to style of make them act a certain way. XHTML is simply a version of HTML that is valid XML code.

HTML 5 will contain more support for web applications, APIs, and other stuff that wasn't as built-into earlier versions of HTML. And as mentioned above, it will be (mostly) backward-compatible with BOTH HTML and XHTML.

So why, or should, we care? Probably not a lot, at the moment. But be prepared to make adjustments in the nearish future, and bone up on the new specification with the Definitive Guide of your choice. O'Reilly, here I come, once again!

Labels: advice, coding, W3C, web design, XHTML

posted at 9:51 AM Leave your comments here: 0 comments

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7.20.2009

Raising the visibility of the U.S. National Design Policy initiative

Read Allison Arieff's article on Design as Policy in today's Times and remember that every made thing you encounter in your life was designed by someone. And why can't things be designed to be more effective communication tools? The U.S. National Design Policy initiative wants to make that situation better. Check it out. You can download a PDF on Redesigning America's Future, also from the USDPI here as well.

Labels: advocacy, aiga, design, PSA

posted at 10:28 AM Leave your comments here: 0 comments

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7.14.2009

A Ringing Endorsement

Sometimes a negative is a positive, especially when it comes from a company that has an even worse online portfolio than I do! Really, folks, I know my site is still in the stone age, but don't talk the trash if you can't back it up with work we can see (the portfolio section, if you can call it that, was some sort of slow-loading Java thingie that never finished loading, and wasn't branded with the same UX as the rest of their site. C'mon, people! Let's use something better than iWeb to build your own site--especially if you offer web design services!)

The interesting thing to me is that these guys are in southern California (a place where I've never had any clients) and work primarily in the entertainment industry (which, aside from being a DP on a friend's short, I've never worked in or for). Love the birdie photo on the right, especially. I mean, really, WTF? Is this how you promote your business? I have a feeling they pulled my name off a Google search for "creative services denver" (picking Denver at random, perhaps) and plucked my URL from there.

Who knows? Who cares, really? Just another example that the internet may be a great place to find good people who can help you to make your business succeed, and it can also be a place full of mediocrity and Red Bull-filled nonsense.

Labels: b2b, branding, california, humor, underpants gnomes

posted at 11:23 PM Leave your comments here: 0 comments

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7.09.2009

Compensation: Graphic Designers

Planet Money asked people how they are compensated, and I added my two cents today, regarding graphic designers. I've posted about this before, but it's a nice (relatively brief) summary:

Compensation for graphic designers is all over the map, depending on how long you've been in the industry, how your shop is set up, and what you have been trained (by either clients or your boss) to expect.

Most designers who work for someone else--in a studio or in an in-house design department--make a salary, like many white-collar workers. Benefits, etc. all depend on the size, wealth, and philosophy of the employing firm. So that's fairly "normal".

Where it gets interesting is when you're working for yourself, or looking at how the client/studio relationship works in regards to compensation.

Crowdsourcing, and Logo "Competitions"
Of late there has been a lot of "crowdsourcing" of logos: logo "competitions", where freelancers submit a design (based on very little info about the "client" company), in hopes of being the "winner" and having their design chosen. The payout for this is usually very small--a few hundred dollars for something that (when a firm does a lot of research, takes time to get to know the client's organization, and so on) potentially is worth several thousand dollars, at minimum. A lot of designers, design advocacy organizations, and professional groups have come out against this model, saying it's bad for both the designer (not getting paid fairly) and for the client (not getting a logo or brand identity that's really all that effective).

Value-based Fees
Typically, a graphic designer will charge a fee based on the value their finished product has for their client. The logo for a small local business with a lower annual revenue has less value assigned to it than a brand identity for a national, multi-million dollar corporation. A lot of time is spent by designers and firm owners figuring out what these values are, and how the value _they_ assign to them fits into the competitive marketplace. A firm may charge more for a given product for a given client than another firm, but perhaps they offer value-added services (additional consultation, an approach that fits the personality of the client better, and so on).

These fees take into account not only the value that the client places on the product, but (internally) takes into account the actual amount of research, concept, design, production, and implementation time for the designer. They know that they can't make less than $X per hour if they want to pay rent on their studio, cover health insurance, buy design software upgrades, and so on. And since on average a designer only does about an hour of design work for every two or three hours spent looking for work (or planning projects, or doing their accounting) the actual hourly rate is lower than the figured rate.

The client usually doesn't see any of this. It's part of the larger calculation that figures in the value of the piece to the client, as well as hard costs of production.

Hourly Rates
Other designers will charge their clients an hourly rate, but in my experience this hurts the client, the designer, and --ultimately-- the project. If you're paid hourly, what's the incentive to work efficiently? If the client runs out of money, does the project stop where it is, or proceed with the designer getting paid less, effectively, per hour? Or does the client cough up more dough?

Setting Expectations
Whether a designer is charging based on value or based on time, a set fee for a project with a defined scope of work is better for everyone, setting boundaries and expectations on all sides, and resulting in happier designers and clients in the end. The AIGA has excellent resources for designers (both those just starting out and those of us who have been at it for a while) regarding contracts, fees, and terms of use; as well as resources for people who need to hire a designer.

Labels: advice, b2b, graphic design, logo

posted at 10:55 AM Leave your comments here: 0 comments

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Butter, coffee, and business

I wanted to let all you designer and branding people know about one of my fave places in Northwest Denver to have coffee: Generous Servings. Not only is the staff unfailingly friendly, and not only is the coffee great (especially the vietnamese iced), you can sit and drink your joe, and work, while watching people cook. There's a large lovely window looking into Generous Servings' classroom, where on any given day you can watch folks get ready for that evenings' class. In the morning the Happy Cakes people from next door put icing on their stock of cupcakes for the day, too. Frankly, the coffee shop part of the operation is a great sales pitch for their cooking classes...after watching everyone prep all this lovely food, who wouldn't want to start cooking, too?

Mary, half of the duo of sisters who run the place, has a blog on cooking and running a small business, and her post on making your own butter caught my eye. If you're a foodie, and like to experiment, check out her blog. And stop in for some coffee, too. It's a great example of a place that takes its craft seriously, and also seems to be full of people who are happy. A nice combination.

Some of her butter post follows below:


"Butter is my new favorite food. Not ingredient, food. Generous Servings now uses only homemade butter in all our cooking, which gives you another reason to have one of our croissants or scones--they are more homemade than almost anything you'll ever eat.

It is very fun to have a bowl full of ten pounds of butter, as you can see:



And it is very good for moisturizing one's hands. This is not to say that my butter recipe development has been without frustrations. There has been a lot of cream thrown out of the mixer onto the floor. One time the cream never turned into butter, although I mixed it for about an hour and a half (usually it takes 15 minutes). That evening our cleaners happened to be working in the kitchen, and they asked me several times what I was making. I kept saying that I was making butter, and they would look dubiously at the bowl full of cream, which never looked remotely like butter. The next time they came, I was making cultured butter, which requires me to sterilize all the implements I use, so I had an array of big pots of boiling water, alcohol swabs, thermometers, and spoons balanced precariously to prevent their bowls from touching the counter, and a whole area of the kitchen blocked off. Again, the cleaners asked what I was doing, and I said I was making butter. At this point, they think I'm delusional.

"

(Via The Cooking Doctor.)

Labels: craftsmanship, small business

posted at 10:02 AM Leave your comments here: 0 comments

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7.06.2009

Passport Stamps for Fictional Countries

I'm working on a project for a client which has, as a component, stamps for fictional countries. It's a lot of fun, and is a great excuse to look through lots of countries' visa and customs stamps for inspiration. A lot of them are pretty boring (I'm looking at you, United States!), but some are quite fun. Here's an early version of one of the dozen or so I'm creating:

Labels: graphic design, illustration, information graphics

posted at 1:50 PM Leave your comments here: 0 comments

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