Another Reality Series?
Yeah, it’s another reality series, but we don’t have that many relating to the creative fields.  Sure there are cooking shows, bakery series like Cake Boss, and custom motorcycle documentaries like American Chopper; but it’s not often that we actually get a show relating to our field of marketing and advertising.  That’s what makes The Pitch so exciting!  In the first episode, we see two competing advertising agencies travel to Milford, CT to pitch their ideas to Subway on their next breakfast sandwich marketing campaign.  The two agencies literally are working head to head just to win the job.

What’s Cool
Celebrity Apprentice and The Apprentice are a little similar, because we get to see an entire marketing campaign from brainstorming sessions through the final branding and execution. With the The Pitch, these advertising pitches aren’t made up for the sake of a TV show.  This is the real thing – the big leagues in the marketing and advertising world.  We get to see the agencies’ branstorming sessions, the good ideas, the bad ideas, and even their creative processes. You get to see how they interact with one another.  We even see how some of the creatives’ ideas become things they are personally attached to, while other members of the team don’t always see the value in them.  You also see how hard these advertising professionals have to work, and travel.  It even gives us a glimpse into the private home life for some of them.  Let’s just say it’s not the type of job we’d all like to have.  Unless you like to work to live; working long hours, lots of travel, and

Advertising in a Show About Advertising
Not surprisingly, you have to remember that the point of all television shows and movies are created to also bring in advertising dollars. At one point in the Subway pitch episode you will see them browsing for stock images on the Getty Images website.  Getty is obviously of a traditional stock agency (non-microstock pricing) where iStockphoto is their microstock collection.  Not surprisingly enough, at the end credits, you’ll note that it says “promotional consideration by Getty Images and iStockphoto”.  Talk about a great advertising opportunity, because ever single advertising/marketing/graphic designing creative type (at least that I know) is going to be watching this show. Getty is smart to have added this paid product placement, but it would be nice to see if we could also see behind the curtain to when the ad agencies actually purchase from microstock agencies, as well.  We probably won’t, because that is what the promotional consideration Getty has paid for will mask.

Let us know what you think about The Pitch.  Leave a comment below, and please share this post!

If you’re a graphic designer, web or app developer, you probably have already heard about this sweet website called dribbble (with 3 B’s, yo).  Dribbble is amazing, but being restricted to spectating kind of stinks.  It’s nearly impossible to actually get an invite so that you can post your own work. I’ve been trying to find an invite to the big dribbb casually for a few years now, but they keep the gates tight on that place (and for good reason – they want to keep out the riff raff, like those pesky folks that like to post iphone photos of their cat).  Even without an invite, dribbble allows you to follow people, click like on their “shots”, and also to compile “buckets” (lightboxes or galleries) of your favorite works.  Here are some of mine, to get an idea.  Nonetheless, it’s an amazing place to view the work of other creative professionals, and to get inspiration from.  But, what if you want to actually participate more, by posting some of your work right now?

Here are 5 of our favorite websites similar to dribbble that you can post your design work to without an invite.

favwork
The first cool site, very similar to dribbble called favwork. I definitely have to post some more of my own personal graphic design portfolio, once I can get around to it. The only main difference to is that there are no gallery or lightbox creating options, and you can’t follow certain artists. You can like pieces, comment on them, and even rework them just like on dribbble.  The traffic is decent, as I’ve been following it regularly these last several days.  It’s not as hopping as dribbble, but I think it will get there once people keep spreading the word.  You would think that this would be the “dribbble for all of the misfits” but I think you will be really impressed with the selection of work on the website.  The site is called favwork for a reason – you’re only supposed to post your favorite and best pieces, for discussing.  Favwork is my favorite dribbble alternative

behance network
Ease of upload on Behance net isn’t as smooth as the others, but the social design community is crazy big, and covers a slew of creative fields.  If you’re a photographer, videographer, illustrator, painter, this website covers it all.  You can submit your work as much as you’d like, without an invite.  This is also another one of my favorite places to browse when I’m bored for inspiration, or just for fun.

deviantart
It’s another website similar to behance, but with a lot more anime and teeny boppers mixed in.  I call it the myspace of creative social networks.  Behance would probably be more like the linkedin of design social-networks.  Deviant is still a fun one, and really well trafficked.  If you haven’t at least browsed the site in a while, we’d highly recommend it.  They have everything from crazy retouching examples, to cool photography, awesome vector illustrations, pencil sketches, paintings, and even more traditional artwork.

forrst
I’ve applied but have to wait to see if I get in to forrst. You can do the same.  While I was waiting, I had a few friend send me an invite.  I am loving Forrst!  This is probably the best dribbble alternative I’ve found, to date.  The community is hopping, and you’ll get lots of honest feedback and critiques.  The site is very easy to use, and allows you to enable email notifications, if you care about that sort of thing. 

psdbucket
This place is similar to favwork, with very quick and easy signup and uploading.  The main difference is (this coming straight from the owners on twitter) “Psdbucket is more to promote your best work/sell good items and favwork is more to get feedback”.  So there you have it.

Honorable mention:

Coroflot
This website has been around for a while, and is more of a personal portfolio tool.  It also allows users to follow one another, leave comments, and like each others’ work.

Yes, there are many other places similar to these we’re sure, but these were the major ones that stood out.  Graphic design related forums can also be a good place for feeback, but the problem with most internet forums is they’re full of trolls (at least most of the recent ones we’ve visited).  We hope you enjoy these free online services for sharing your work and hopefully getting the type of quality feedback and criticism you yearn for. Have any thoughts about these places, or want to link up with us? Chime in below with a link to your profiles on each.

This is a powerful example of how rewording such a simple phrase gets an entirely different reaction. The blind homeless man has a cardboard sign with the words “I’m Blind – Please Help”. An onlooker stops and changes his sign to read “It’s a beautiful day and I can’t see it”, and then the spare changes starts coming in like money is falling from the sky.

Thinking outside the box (as cliche as that expression is) when it comes to slogans and advertising propaganda is definitely necessary. Sometimes being overly simple and direct with your message can cause your audience to overlook it. We all are being inundated with information on a daily basis; so much that we tend to zone most things out, sometimes without even realizing it. Think about this video on your next marketing project, whether you are designing a simple ad, or titling your next tweet or blog post; I know I will.

]]> http://arenacreative.com/blog/graphic-design/the-power-of-words-in-marketing/feed/ 1 http://arenacreative.com/blog/graphic-design/have-you-developed-your-own-social-work-network-yet/ http://arenacreative.com/blog/graphic-design/have-you-developed-your-own-social-work-network-yet/#comments Wed, 18 Jan 2012 16:46:54 +0000 ArenaCreative.com http://arenacreative.com/blog/?p=2917 Let’s face it. Sometimes while freelancing, the jobs coming will just die down. Other times you’re so swamped, that you have to pick and choose; maybe even turn work away. There’s a simple solution to all of the madness!  Remember that old saying, “One hand washes the other”?

It’s always good to have a network of friends and colleagues to push work back and forth to/from. Remember – one hand washes the other. When you “pay work forward”, it all comes back around. Whoever is too swamped at the time, or doesn’t want to do a particular job, will push it over someone else that might want it. This type of arrangement is highly recommended with regards to any type of freelancing position.  Sometimes you might not want to deal with a certain type of a client.  Dealing with the public can be trying, and not all of us handle certain types of people as well as others.  This is another perfect scenario of why you might want to shoot the job over to your colleague; not to dump them with a jerk of a client, but maybe you know they really could use the work.  “Beggars can’t be choosers”.  Wow, two old school expressions in the same blog post *facepalm*.

Great platforms for building your social work network such are twitter, behance, google+, linkedin; anywhere you can interact and connect with like minded creatives.  It takes constant effort, though.  You’ll need to actually keep in touch with your “creative network” somehow, and make sure you communicate regularly.  You’ll want to remember members of your network, and hope they remember you as well.  Keep each other updated on how busy everyone is, and who is in need of the most work at that present moment.

Do you already have something like this?  Please share your story in the comments section below.

Psst… wanna win some awesome design and photography related FREE STUFF worth over a $200 combined value?

Although we’ve been selling royalty-free stock imagery and graphics for almost 7 years now, this is the first year we launched our own private storefront offering all of our professional stock photos at affordable prices.  We look forward to serving the needs of image buyers for the years to come.  We’ll be adding hundreds of fresh stock photos in batches throughout the upcoming years, so be sure to bookmark us and tell your friends.  Thanks again for a great first year! It’s almost a new one, so before the date turns over to 1/1/2012 we wanted to do something special.  Here are the details of our first big giveaway:

Big Kahuna First Prize Package:

- Free 2012 Norman Rockwell Saturday Evening Post wall calendar courtesy of PromosOnline

- Free one month subscription to ArenaCreative (a $50 value) good for up to 25 high-res stock photos, which you can use for any of your marketing, publishing, or design needs.

- Free full copy of the Trick Photography and Special Effects 2.0 E-Book + Video Course (a $97 value) – it has tons of creative photography and post processing techniques that I love – read my review.

- Free $25 discount coupon good for Lightroom Presets, Aperture Presets or Photoshop Templates from XposurePro

Here’s how easy it is to enter the contest:

Score 1 entry
for following us on twitter @arenacreative and for every time you tweet this message on twitter (the hashtag #arenacreativecontest is important, so that it counts and we can track your entry). Triple click to select and copy this bold text:

I’m entered! RT to win tons of FREE #design related prizes at http://bit.ly/vTiEr9 @arenacreative #arenacreativecontest

For every tweet, you get an additional entry!

Score 5 entries
by signing up for our newsletter mailing list between now and the last seconds of 2011.  We only send out email blasts once every great while, usually quarterly – chock full of  blog post highlights, tutorials, coupon codes, and newly featured stock images.

Score 10 entries
for any stock imagery purchase you make at Arena Creative between now and the last seconds of 2011.  Every cart order = 10 entries.  If you need some affordable stock images for your website, blog, or the latest piece you’re planning on designing, that’s our specialty. (Hint: be sure to use coupon code FRIENDSFAMILY25 for an extra 25% off your shopping cart, valid through the end of 2011.)

Score 20 entries
for a quality blog post or website review written about your experience with Arena Creative Stock Imagery and what we offer, linking back.  If you haven’t ever purchased anything from us, you can simply write a brief review about what we’re all about in your own words.  Feel free to use any of our watermarked images or thumbnails to glam up the post.  We’ll just need either a trackback url sent, or an email via our contact form to verify these entries.  This would be a huge help to us spreading the word about our brand.  If you’ve already written a review about us, and we’re just not aware of it – let us know!

but wait, there’s another way to win!

Comment Contest Prize Package:

- Free $15 discount coupon good at ArenaCreative.com on any royalty-free stock photo order.

- Free $10 discount coupon good for Lightroom Presets, Aperture Presets or Photoshop Templates from XposurePro

Just post a simple comment at the end of this blog post – it doesn’t have to be long.  Tell us why you want to win, or whatever it on your mind.  Say hello!  This contest is separate, only for those that comment on this blog post.

A special thanks goes out to Promos Online, XposurePro, and Evan Sharboneau with the Trick Photography and Special Effects ebook for helping us sweeten the pot of our 2011 giveaway.

Promos Online has been serving businesses for years, in producing custom branded merchandise for all of their clients’ marketing and giveaway needs.  Some of the larger clients they have served include Facebook, Google, Volkswagon, Cedar Point, and the list goes on.  You can order custom printed promotional items with any logo or design on them, at great prices.  They are great for your business and branding needs (of course), schools, clubs, leagues, houses of worship, family events and more. 

The winner will be notified via email and announced here in this blog post in the first week of January 2012 and will then have to provide their mailing address info to receive their prize.  Please be sure to share this contest with all of your friends and colleagues via the social buttons above or below. Oh, and while you’re here – do you see our social icons at the upper right hand corner of this page?  Please hook up with us in the social media world.  We’d love to chat with you about anything, whether it’s dogs, kitty cats, how much you love/hate your job, or even what you think about global warming.

Here are some more images and info about the prizes:

Norman Rockwell Calendar

In this visually stunning color photos and pad calendar, Norman Rockwell, the master of Americana, goes back to a simpler time with this nostalgic collection of thirteen illustrations. Straight from the covers of the beloved Saturday Evening Post magazine, these scenes of Americana will keep you smiling all year long. Each monthly illustration includes its own charming description. Runs from December to December. Can be combined with other themes, minimum of 100 per theme, all with same binding type.

XposurePro Presets & Photoshop Templates

Creative presets and templates to make your photos jump out from the rest of the pack, without having to spend hours in Photoshop.

Trick Photography and Special Effects E-Book and Video Course

It boasts over 270 pages of instruction and over 300 creative photographs made by some of the most talented artists around the globe.  Even if you never even use what you will learn how to do in this educational package, you will no doubt benefit from the inspiration you receive from it.

ArenaCreative Stock Photos

A unique collection of stock imagery that focuses on personality, diversity, and most importantly creativity. Our portfolio is constantly growing. You’re probably sick and tired of browsing through the same old boring stuff all of the time. That’s why we try to produce stock photos with spunk; imagery that will get your projects noticed.  At the moment, there are well over 7000 royalty-free stock images to choose from.  Here is a sample of the collection.  For more, browse the entire collection by clicking on our logo at the top of the page.

If you are interested in giving away a product or service in order to promote your website or business, and you think we would be a good fit for your target audience (business, marketing, graphic design, photography), feel free to contact us with the details.

Update 1/1/12: Contest winners have been announced!  Scroll to the top of this post to view them.

They also bolded the word “mistake”, that’s another good point – you know that’s why your eyes jumped straight to it right after you read the first line. This would be a great example for a typography class. Just in case you’re still trying to figure out the mistake, the word “the” is repeated twice.  It’s okay, we know you’ve probably had a long day and/or didn’t have your coffee just yet.

If you really got a kick out of this, check out these other great mind benders, optical illusions, and brain teasers.

We all know that education is important.  In most cases, having some sort of training is vital to at least start you off on the direction you’re going to make your move in.  Whether you want to become a tradesman, a creative professional, or even just a general business associate, you usually have to have some form of training in order to even be considered for the job.  My parents always encouraged me to get a college degree, as it was a great feather in your cap, as well as something to fall back on.  Four and a half years later, I did just that – and it did get me started on the road to the creative fields I wanted to work in.  But know this: college doesn’t guarantee you a job.  I’ll say it again.  College does not guarantee you a job.  There are tons spewing out of the universities that can’t even find employment in their field of study within even the first year or two after graduation.  College could land you a great job that feels secure, but actually isn’t.  Having a degree doesn’t seem to as much influence or value as it used to.  Associates, Bachelors, Masters; heck – even a Doctorate degree.  In the end, I feel that I definitely learned a lot about design, business, and other people in general, in college.  I don’t regret it, but sometimes I wonder if it would have really mattered.  That’s an entire story in itself, but let me get back to where I was going with this before I digress further.

Going back to the year 2000, when I had just started my first semester of college, I thought I knew which direction I was headed.  Originally I had starting out in college with a computer science major; taking advanced calculus classes, and java to learn the basics of programming. The math part was challenging, but I was always pretty good at it. The java, was (to me) incredibly boring and dry, very very complicated stuff. The entire class was filled with your typical programming nerds, mostly Asians and Indian in their late teens that were probably foreign exchange students. They all seemed to be understanding everything and eating it up like it was fresh cupcakes on a platter being served up.  I looked around and asked myself… did I take a wrong turn somewhere?

Having always been an honors student, school and grades always seemed to come easy for me. I was always a good student back in grade school, studying and doing all of my homework.  I definitely was not an overachiever, however.  I did the absolute minimum to get by, but I made sure I did my best at whatever I was assigned.  Yes, it was a lot of work – but I actually did care about my grades.  Not so much what my teachers or the other students thought of me; I was more concerned about proving to myself that I did my best.  Now, here I am in a class learning programming.  What was I thinking?  I didn’t want to be a computer programmer.  Somewhere along the way, I must have thought that a computer science course of study would eventually lead back over to graphics, and playing around with Adobe Photoshop – one of my beloved past-times.  It turns out, there was another major in the university I had been attending. It was called Graphic/Info Design – a course of study more specific to what I really wanted to do for work.

This design degree program was a great fit for me.  The math classes required for it were all basic, that I was kicking myself for already suffering through a lot of advanced ones.  Papers and research projects in this Graphic Design major were now transformed into design projects.  I hated writing papers (now I just write super long blog posts; go figure).  Ask my parents – they will attest to me staying up many many late nights, gluing my design pieces to black foam core and then covering them with acetate until 2 in the morning.  But – I got to play with Photoshop!  That made it all worth it.

So I did well, graduated with mostly A’s in design classes, got a couple of bad grades from some tough history classes, and ended up with a 3.28 GPA – not bad.  Now what?  I started applying for jobs.  There were very few, and a lot of candidates.  Designers in my area were spitting out of colleges by the hundreds.  Who wouldn’t want to have a cushy computer desk job, where they get to play around with artwork and photography layouts all day?  Probably a lot of people.  But there are also a lot that see that type of work as “just their fit”.  I applied and interviewed and applied and interviewed, and then three months later found out of an opening in a company that a friend told me about.  That was my in.   Who knows how long it would have taken me to land a job, otherwise.  Sometimes it’s not what you can do, or what you’ve got in your cap, but who you know.  How did she know I would be interested in a graphic design position?  Because I talked about it.  A lot.  Use your yapper, and the right people will hear you, eventually.

That worked out great for a while, and I learned so much on the job.  After getting married and realizing there wasn’t much more room for growth, (you need more income when you have to support a family, of course) I eventually left the company to move on to broader horizons; so I thought.  The pay was better – the design work was more fun / interesting, and the benefits were excellent.  Later on, I was regretting that decision, due to the high stress level of that job.  About a year after that I got a pink slip, due to the corporation going into Chapter 11 bankruptcy, around 2008 when the worldwide economy was really tanking.  Oh wait- what just happened?  I thought those with college degrees could never get laid off?  Ha.  Huge myth and common misunderstanding.  There’s no such thing as “job security” in anything you do.  There’s only something called “time to figure out your next move, plan, and execute it”.  Remember that.  Still, that layoff was a huge blessing in disguise.  If you’re currently laid off, reading this – try to look at it in hindsight – not as a curse, or a drawback, but as a blessing to hit the “reset” button on your path and to try something else.

All while I was working these traditional graphic design jobs for 4 or so years, designing everything from custom magazines, to marketing materials, and advertising of all shapes and sizes, I was introduced to the wonder world of stock imagery.  Stock photography is something as a graphic design that you are forced to at least get familiar with in the course of your job.  You obviously need effective imagery to advertise.  What our eyes see is a powerful influence on the mind.  I ended up using a lot of stock photography, and eventually in my endless searches I noticed that there were individual names attached to some of the images I was purchasing on the microstock websites, like Dreamstime and iStockphoto. I also learned what I was looking for, as an image buyer.  That placed me directly inside that type of customer mindset.

I realized that stock imagery was something I wanted to dabble in, for a side income.  I could make graphics and illustrations, even shoot some snapshots with my digital point and shoot; and then hawk them online for small commissions.  Awesome.  So, with much persistence, I got in.  It grew.  One image I got approved on istock had even earned $3000 over it’s short life span.  I was spending a few hours here and there on nights or weekends doing stock, mostly as a fun hobby to see how many sales I could rack up.  My earnings were viewed more like a score, or points.  This was just a game for me.  Something fun I could mess around with, and get the jollies when learning which images people liked to purchase the most.  Eventually I was earning enough to pay a lot of my family’s major bills, like the mortgage.  That’s right about when I was laid off from my graphic design dayjob.  Thankfully, stock imagery was my next major move.

So, I had a great start. About 3.5 years of working at shooting photos, designing graphics and layouts, keywording, description tagging them, uploading them via ftp to the agencies, processing them, and tracking stats led me into a lucrative side gig.  I knew that it was do or die time.  I needed to prove to myself, and everyone else, that when you dedicated a full time work week to this, you could make it a full time job.  Just three to six months later, I had hustled so hard that I was making double the earnings from my stock images.  I know that stress, anxiety, fear, and hunger had a lot to do with my hustle.  Sometimes its healthy to get a little hungry.  Have a little ambition.  Put your best foot forward, and work your hardest at whatever you set out to accomplish.  At least if you fail, you’ll realize that you tried your best.  Now I’m mostly a photographer.  After 6 years shooting, learning, improving, I finally consider myself a little bit more a photographer than I do a graphic designer.   Who’d have thunk it?  Not me.  So I went from high school grocery store employee (customer service booth jockey, cashier, cart pusher, grocery bagger, and dairy stocker – how I paid my way through college, and much motivation to stay in school so I could get out of that rat hole dead-end job) to computer science student, to graphic designer, to photographer.

It’s easy to feel overwhelmed if you ever find yourself at some sort of a “career path crossroads”.  Maybe in 5-10 years, I’ll be doing something entirely different.  Who knows? Don’t let anxiety or stress get the best of you.  Things will eventually work out, as long as you’re keeping your eyes, ears, and mind open to different potential opportunities.  Don’t forget to be adaptable.

Ask yourself the following questions:

What am I really good at? 

What have I learned about myself and about the industries I’ve worked in? 

Which businesses do I know the client, inside and out? 

What do I love doing, and actually have a passion for? 

If there’s a way to actually make money doing it, how can I combine the two into a job that will support myself and/or my family? 

Even if I don’t think I’ll absolutely love a certain type of job at first, am I willing to take a chance on it, and see where it leads me? 

Is college or some form of secular training course going to be affordable, or even worth pursuing for this specific field? 

Have I done my homework by talking to other friends, neighbors, or even random internet friends about what they have learned? 

Always keep your options open, kiddos.  You will eventually find your niche. Some fall into it quick, while it takes very many years for others.  There are never really any wrong moves, because with each move your learn more about where you’d rather be or what you’d rather do.  There are risks, and there are educated risks.  Use your noggin.  Sometimes you learn what you really would like to do isn’t always possible.  Either way, you can’t be afraid to make a decision when they time comes to do so.  Life is a journey.  We all have to remember to try and enjoy the ride as we figure ours out.

Funny enough, I noticed the dunking basketball player stock photo in the montage above is in fact one of our royalty-free images!

Now don’t leave just yet… did you enjoy this post?  Then please be kind and leave a comment below!  Which of the above image manipulations are your favorites?  These posts take a lot of effort to compile, so please share this with your friends and colleagues.

An amazingly executed job by Coca Cola.  All three soccer players are smiling and staring towards the bottle.  The corporate logo is clear and identifiable at the upper left, with a simple, two-word catch phrase “open happiness”.  Why are the guys so happy?  Oh, it’s the cola.  It’s plain and clear.  You see it, and you get it.  And yeah, it only takes a few seconds.  Brand recognition is visible not only in the form of the logo, but also in the product itself.  The photography is excellent, and the image has been stylized in almost an illustrative way to make it stand out from the crowd.

The Applie iPad did it right also.  Logo, upper left hand corner.  It’s human nature that we read from the top left hand side, from left to right.  It’s proven fact.  They placed the logo and product logotype there.  The photo of the woman lounging with the iPad on her lap, shows how portable the product is.  It’s almost like you’re looking over her shoulder.  This billboard has no words other than the product name, but it promotes the lifestyle.  Once again, less is more.  And when is the last time you saw a crop like this on a billboard?  This woman is relaxed, and enjoying her brand new iPad.  Similar to the Coca Cola ad above, the product here speaks for itself. There is no need to busy the ad up with website urls, phone numbers, or any other call to action.

Bad billboard design has text that isn’t viewable from further than a few car lengths away, and they usually have way too much text.  You can’t read that much text on a billboard, because you’re usually traveling at least 65 mph down the highway as you’re viewing it.  Mostly passengers will have the advantage over the drivers, but effective ads will be brief enough to be noticeable to the drivers as well.  If you ever have the privilege to design a billboard, keep these pointers in mind.

]]> http://arenacreative.com/blog/graphic-design/less-is-more-when-it-comes-to-good-billboard-designs/feed/ 1 http://arenacreative.com/blog/graphic-design/15-hilarious-old-school-vintage-print-advertisements/ http://arenacreative.com/blog/graphic-design/15-hilarious-old-school-vintage-print-advertisements/#comments Fri, 16 Sep 2011 12:13:58 +0000 ArenaCreative.com http://arenacreative.com/blog/?p=2480 Graphic design has undergone a lot of change in the last 100 years.  They only just started using computers in design back in the late 80s, or early 90s.  But besides the technical side of things, society has changed a lot over the years as well.  We have had endless technological advances in product design, health standards, science, and even general common knowledge.  We’re living in an informed generation, where you can learn anything in a matter of a minute spent searching Google.  Here are 15 retro / vintage print ads that might come across the wrong way by today’s standards.  I hope you get a kick out of these flashbacks from the dark ages.  Some of them are hilarious, others quite offensive by today’s standards.

That’s definitely a realistic reenactment of what happens after blowing tabacco smoke into a pretty woman’s face.  About 5 Tipalets for 25 cents.  Not 5, but about 5.  Just in case we throw in an extra half, or 4, or 6, or 3. 

Cocaine.  Instantaneous cure for everything.  Right.  For sale by all druggists.  Coke heads rejoice!  Nowadays they call them “street pharmacists”.

Oh look!  There’s actually a Soda Pop Board of America, and what do they recommend?  Starting babies on Cola EARLY ON!  Sure, that makes a lot of sense.  No wonder why most Americans are overweight, and why many school systems have removed their soda machines.

There’s nothing like a fresh and crispy gat on Christmas morning LOL!  Put a heater in your pocket on those cold winter days.

I’m not a real doctor, but the big tobacco company has paid me to act like one endorsing how healthy it is to smoke in this ad.  Smoking cigarettes is actually healthy?  What a joke.  Decades of health research has proven otherwise.  I actually just recently saw a 20/20 special on the smoking and smoking kids / babies epidemic going on over in Indonesia.  Check it out, it was pretty interesting. The full 20/20 episode is here.

I’m giving my wife a Kenwood Chef, because it does everything but cooks.  But hey; that’s what wives are for! (Well, they used to be. Things done changed somewhere along the lines but let’s not get into that history lesson.)  I wonder if this ad pissed women off back when it was released?  Probably not.  Today, they would receive about 150,000 hate letters on the first day public.

Who wouldn’t want to go on a gay cruise with their wives and family members, while playing with puppets!?  Every voyage a gay cruise.

Yeah, we’re all going to die somehow.  Who cares, just smoke our cancer sticks!  Take it from this dude in the bowtie.  He looks like a wise fella.

There’s definitely nothing wrong with a hard working woman.  I can hear the ad slogan now, “Put some PEP in your step, with Kelloggs PEP cereal! Vitamin enriched so you can get all of your chores done on time!”

Lane Bryant today refers to clothes for heavier women as “plus size” or “plus sized”.  Back in the day? Chubbies.  LOL!

Wow, a softtop Schlitz beer can!  I wonder how long we’ll need to wait to have something similar!?  Ever heard of the on-can flip top aluminum tab?  What about the vented wide mouth opening?  Yes, things have come a long way.

DJ Paulie D would say: “Oh yeah, beer for babies yeah.”  Please don’t give beer to your children, people.  You know what?  I “pick up” a little every time I have a beer in my hand too, so I can see why mother and baby would also.

Wives: cry to your husbands for what you want, and then they’ll buy it for you.  Very realistic!

Wow, Motorola actually used to make TV sets.  This study showed that a television set meant better behavior in kids.  HA!

Tape worms.  They do a body good.  Eat all you want, and then let the tapeworms steal all of the calories, and grow inside of your stomach until they come out of your throat.  Mmm tapeworms!  Beats throwing up.

The California Travel & Tourism Commission logo is a perfect example of how to effectively remove pieces of your logotype, and turn it into something amazing. I noticed it on one of their TV commercials a while ago, and just thought it was worth sharing here.  The yellow line just reminds us of a sunny dusk horizon on the California hills.  A great example of a simple, yet unique and highly effective logo design.  It looks just as good over white as it does over darker colors. Good graphic design is many times a reductive art.  Less is more; something even less of certain portions of a typeface.  What do you guys think?  Isn’t it a great, logo design?

Just when you thought that reCAPTCHA couldn’t get any more annoying or trying on your patience, they went ahead and started using Papyrus font. What’s next, Comic Sans!? Wow.  This got me thinking about the all time worst fonts to use in your design work.  VideoJug beat me to the punch.

Courtesy of VideoJug, here is a list of the top 5 fonts that you probably should never, ever use – whether you have the slightest bit of designer in your, or even if you’re a soccer mom making a flyer for your daughter’s girl scout bake sale.  These are the five worst fonts ever, and definitely the most over-used fonts of all time:

#5. Arial - There are so many cooler sans serif choices, like Avenir, Myriad, or even the always favorite Helvetica.  Arial is oh so played out.  It’s still kind of usable (on minor website text links and  things like that) but try to use something better.

#4. Times New Roman - The classic default serif font.  I go nuts when I see people using Time New Roman in their logos.  It makes me want to cringe, scream, and then punch myself in the throat.  Try Georgia, Garamond, or Caslon.

#3. Papyrus – Just don’t use it!  There are so many other unique fonts out there.  This is used on more restaurant signs than anything.

#2. Comic Sans - OH!  It looks like handwriting, how cute!  NOT.  There are a bajillion script and handwriting fonts out there.  Get a better one.  This one is cheesier than Velveeta.  If you’re just looking for a good font to place on a post it note graphic, there are so many better choices than Comic Sans.

#1. Curlz - It’s one of those typefaces that shouldn’t even be qualified to be called that.  Stay away from the fonts that screw “I’m a specialty font! I’m unique, special, and I know it!” Corny, infantile, lame, there just aren’t enough adjectives to describe it.

Did we miss anything?  Let us know what your favorite fonts to hate on are in the comments section below.  Also be sure to check out dafont.com for all sorts of great freeware and shareware fonts.  Be sure to read the terms of use for each, as some are more specific, and not all of them allow commercial use.

For those of us that are either self-employed or freelancing, have you ever thought about how difficult it might be to go back to working for someone else once again?

If it came down to it, where I couldn’t make ends meet – of course I’d go back. But honestly, even if I was struggling at the time – I would rather take a massive paycut over returning to the massive amount of stress I’ve had in my last few corporate jobs.  It’s not that you don’t get stressed freelancing, but at least you have a bit more control over the stress. Plus,  you don’t have to deal with as much with the plastic corporate politics and all of the other baloney that comes along with the territory.

I think anyone self employed would go back to working for someone else if they absolutely had to.  We all have  to provide for ourselves and our families; that’s main reason why we work.  You might be able to compare self employment to his scenario.  Picture a wild Tiger, who falls into a trap, and soon after is transported to a city zoo.  The food is provided for him daily, although not as tasty as what he was used to feasting on in the wild.  Out in the real world, the Tiger was able to hunt and choose is own food… his own “work”.  He picked his own “jobs”; chose what he wanted to do, and when.  Of course there are rules to hunting, but he had a lot more freedom to pick and choose his cuisine, than the zookeeper offered him.  The Tiger one day is able to escape from the zoo cage, and upon leaving – stops to look back at the zoo.  Was he really losing anything of value?  Did he not already have the natural instincts built inside of him to provide for the needs of him and his family?  Sure he did.  The problem is, the zoo made him soft.  He’s not as quick as he used to be, 10 years prior.  Part of him years for the warm den he was provided, and regular meals that he had to put forth zero effort of his own for.

If it ever comes a time when you are able to escape from the “city zoo” – sure, it can be a little bit scary.  But don’t lack the confidence in yourself that you can’t figure out a way to do what you do best, and survive on your own.  There’s absolutely nothing wrong with working for others.  I’m very glad I had the opportunity to work for others, and learned so much in my time doing so.  In reality, it’s not as sheltered as a zoo – because an employer can give you the boot at any time.  It’s the relative safety and regularity of the income that drives most people out there to want to work for someone else.  Sure, it’s a lot easier to be fed than to have to do the hunting on your own.  For those that desire to be their own cat, the option is always out there, no matter what the economic climate is.

So… which Tiger are you? The zoo cat, or the wild feline?  If you had to, could you go back to working for someone else?  Do you think it would be even easier this time, or way more difficult?

It’s really fun to hear and share the many different stories how fellow creatives got where they are; how they might have stumbled into their career, or got there on purpose.   I recently had the pleasure of an interview with illustrator Cory Thoman, founder of myStockVectors.com. Cory has an amazing knack for creating some of the coolest cartoons and cliparts, which are being used all over the web and in many other commercial applications.  His artwork covers a wide range of subjects and topics, and all of them are available for royalty-free licensing in vector format.

Hi Cory, tell us a little about yourself.
Yay! My favorite topic, me. Well, I’m an illustrator and designer living in Austin, Texas. I have a Bachelor’s of Fine Art from the Ringling College of Art and Design. Don’t let the fine art part fool you though. I mostly spend my time drawing silly cartoons, but there was an emphasis on figure drawing and painting when I went to school. So, I guess I’m classically trained, but most of my work happens on the computer now.

As far as career, I’ve worked a few graphic design jobs. My favorite was a toy company called Jazwares. I was there for about five years and learned a lot. In 2005, I decided to leave the 9 to 5 world to pursue a freelance career. That’s where I am today.

What kind of images do you produce?
Right now, it is pretty much all digital cartoon style vector illustrations. Most of my illustrations are character based. I draw a lot of animals, kids and people. I love goofy expressions, so I try to make most of their facial expressions as humorous as possible. Other than that, I try to keep everything pretty simple in my work. No complex ideas or hidden messages, just fun colorful cartoons.

I start with pencil sketches, but everything is finished in the computer. I guess I’m a nerd because I’m always on the computer. I’m often jealous of the photographers like yourself that get to go out and photograph people and the world. Meanwhile, I’m stuck in my office/cave making sketches and digital drawings. Illustrators could be the hermits of the art world.
(haha don’t be fooled, Cory – I’m probably at my desk just as much as you are.  Maybe 1 or 2 hours for a photoshoot once every few weeks, but it’s never enough away time from my desk)

Tell us a little about your website myStockVectors.com?
Excellent, the shameless promotion part! I decided last year to open my own store, myStockVectors.com. After several years of selling stock, it felt like the right time to open my own site. I thought I had a pretty good grasp of what the customers that bought my files wanted. I didn’t feel most of the major agencies were catering to that. I think I’ve created some unique features at the site that you can’t get anywhere else.

I’ve organized images into a Series and Collections category. The category allows visitors to view all images of a particular character in various poses or costumes. I find that many customers like to buy multiple images from a series, so this allows them to do that easier. I’ve also introduced a category called Design Files. These include several images from the series in one file. It also contains a font and other elements like word bubbles and backgrounds. The idea is that it contains all the elements you need for your design project in one file. The best part is that it is cheaper than buying all the files individually.

Those are some of the things I’m working on with the site. I think the great thing about having my own store is that I can really cater to what the customer wants. So far, I’m excited by the results. It’s one thing to build it, but another for people to show up and purchase images. Hopefully, it will continue and I can learn some SEO tricks.

Do you just sell stock or do you work on other things?
I’m also a full time freelancer. I’ve had the opportunity to work with some great clients. I did a few projects with the Cartoon Network which was a lot of fun. Freelancing gigs can occasionally be spread out though, so that leaves a lot of time in between to create stock. Plus, the two are sort of intertwined. Stock brings in new freelance projects and clients. My stock library is like having a giant portfolio that is organized and searchable.

Here is an interesting video made in 2002, that asks people on the streets of Melbourne some basic questions about what they think graphic design really is. It’s really interesting to hear all of the different responses.  Some of the folks interviewed were able to answer the questions spot on, while others were way off the mark.

Has this ever happened to you, when someone asked what you did for a living?  I remember most people I spoke to thought that I did CAD or computer aided drafting.  Nope, sorry – I’m not an architect.  It got really annoying after a while.

Do you think that the results might be a bit different, today? 10 years on into the future? Now that modern reality shows like NBC’s Apprentice and Celebrity Apprentice have featured graphic designers on many of their episodes, I wonder if more might know what a graphic designer really does at work.  Other reality shows that have designers on them also come to mind, such as Discovery Channel’s American Chopper Junior vs Senior.  Their designer Jason Poole mocks up all of the bike designs in Adobe Illustrator on his fancy $2000 Wacom DTK2100 21″ graphics monitor pad doohickey.  The guy has some serious skills, too – even designing many of the parts in 3D.  You have got to love that show.  The creative process from concept to finish is such a great idea for any reality TV show.  Cake Boss, and Ace of Cakes are all similar – and that’s why they’re so popular.  Custom manufacturing at its finest.  I digress…

Video produced by Studio Pip and Co. and Dogma Productions with Andrew Pegler

I have always admired the artwork of famous artist Norman Rockwell, but for some reason, never realized that he also produced illustrations and stock art for use in advertisements and marketing materials.  Here are some vintage Norman Rockwell advertisements that feature his unique, photo-realistic illustrative style.  Rockwell’s masterpieces even made the cover of The Saturday Evening Post a number times.  Way before there was Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, or even mainstream digital photography, Norman Rockwell was a true creative.

To learn a little bit more about Norman Rockwell and to see some more of his fantastic artwork, check out this other post.

Get Noticed or Get Out
The marketing world is a pretty rough place.  Mediocre in marketing just doesn’t cut it anymore.  You’ve got to be memorable, and get attention.  People have just about seen it all nowadays, and have been desensitized to most forms of advertising.  TV commercials that don’t stand out from the rest are just plain ignored.  Print ads without appealing photos or graphics are worthless.  Websites without any sort of call to action are pretty much ineffective.  Nowadays you have to be clever in order to really grab the attention of those potential clients or consumers.

Shopping Bag Designs That Work
How powerful is shopping bag artwork?  I’d say that it’s pretty valuable, especially in urban areas or heavily trafficked shopping malls.  Think about it.  In larger cities most people walk or take public transportation, everywhere they go.  Their purchases are going to be carried, and in turn, these consumers become walking miniature billboards for the stores they just visited.  It’s free marketing for the company they purchased from, whether they like it or not.  And it is cost effective, with just the small price of the printed bag production costs.  Many of the shopping bags in the above video are incredible.  Realizing how the bags are held, the designers laid out the imagery and product artwork according to the way the bags are used.  They not only utilized the space of the bags, but also the negative space.  So yeah, this means that sometimes negative space can even be off the page, or off the product packaging.  There are sometimes holes, cutouts, or even drawstrings that can really be creatively combined with the overall designs.

Following up on this previous post (a discovery of how the company Gigabyte computers used my stock image of me with my finger up my nose in an ad campaign for dockable laptop PCs) here are a few more discoveries from that ad campaign that I wanted to share.

Should I Be Proud of This
Am I embarassed by all of this?  Would you be?  I know some people might, but those probably wouldn’t have shot a photo like this in the first place, and then sold it on the internet through a horde of microstock agencies.  I’ve personally don’t have any shame about this.  Don’t get me wrong, I think the whole ad series hilarious!  It’s good I’m a goofball by nature, and have a reallygood sense of humor.  Let this be a lesson to all of you who have at one time modeled or have sold stock images – you never know where these might end up!  This ad campaign hit youtube, international techie trade shows, was plastered in busy marketplaces, and on the side of buildings in Tapiei, Taiwan, and probably was marketed in print and other web campaigns.   I had no clue it would be used like this, because in this business we are rarely told if, when, and where the photos that are sold end up getting used.  Most of them might even end up on someone’s hard drive collecting dust for years before use.  I know back when I bought a lot of stock imagery, I would stock pile images that I knew might be useful in my future upcoming graphic design projects. Because I thought a photo of a person picking their nose might be a niche stock photo subject, I did it anyway.  It turns out that it was, and someone somewhere found a use for it.

Why It Works
Do I think that it was an effective ad campaign?  Honestly, I don’t see the act of nose picking as something that’s oh so enjoyable, where you can compare it to a dockable laptop. I think that there might have been other more tasteful comparisons made, but if they were going simply for shock factor – they got it.  This ad series definitely gets your attention and then draws you in to figure out what the heck they’re advertising.  I’ll admit, the photo quality isn’t great.  This was an image I originally captured about 5 years ago, when I was still learning.  I had mounted my camera on a tripod in my office, with a white shower curtain on the wall behind me.  The lighting actually is pretty bad, but it was good enough to have enough value in the eyes of the buyer.  This was a photo where I had tungsten lighting mixed with natural window light, and so there were way too many color temps going on in the image.  I guess sometimes a buyer just needs a photo of a dude digging for gold, even though this photo might just land itself on awkwardstockphotos.com

Special thanks for the above gigabyte nose picker ad images were courtesy of micgadget.com and onecuckoosnest.com – click to view their take on the ad campaign, and how they felt about it.

What are some other touchy subjects you might want to stay away from, if you model in stock images?  Things like spousal abuse might make for some interesting dinner conversation, if they happened to end up in a major magazine or newspaper article.  What about topics like sexual incompetency or impotence?  Hemroids?  Drug and alcohol abuse?  Criminal themes?  Some people might not be bothered to “act out” touchy themes like this, but if you’re working with models you need to always be upfront and clear about potential image use.  I would also assume that reputable pharmaceutical companies that advertise sensitive topics would also do the same, and that they wouldn’t be using stock images grabbed from an online stock photo agency to use in that field of marketing.

I recently had the pleasure of meeting a skilled freelance designer out of the UK on twitter named Pritesh (everyone calls him Pritz for short).  Here is a brief interview I had with him recently.

How did you get into the creative field?

When I was at school, I wasn’t interested in anything other than Art and Design, so that’s all I’ve ever done. As I got older I got more involved with digital arts and that’s how it all started.

Would you recommend education for those that are just starting out, or thinking about getting into the design business?

Education is always important. A good set of qualifications goes a long way, but you also have to make the right choices in courses and institutions. I went with what I thought would be best for me, so I would say go with what you feel seems right, and something you enjoy doing. I’ve learnt that education brushes up on the things you already know. I think my choices in education have helped me improve in my work, and gained my interest in areas I would never think about going in to.

What is one of the most important things you think freelance graphic designers will need to do in order to stay successful?

Staying motivated and inspired. This is why I blog things that I’ve looked at nearly everyday, that’s what keeps me going. I would also recommend printing things off and keeping things you like for example in a sketchbook. You just have to keep at it and work hard, then opportunities will be knocking on your door when you least expect it.
Are there any specific people that inspire you?

There are lot’s of people that inspire me, all excellent at what they do too. Some names that inspire me include Jacob Cass, David Carson – whom I’ve had the pleasure of meeting at my college, Photography inspires me a lot too, I love the composition of colours and beautifully taken photographs. You don’t always have to look at specific people in the field that your in to be inspired, I think your interests are your best sources of inspiration.

Where else do you find your creative inspiration?

Nearly all my work is screen based, so I find myself sitting in front of the computer a lot. This is my biggest source of information. You can find anything and everything on the internet. But like everyone, I have my collection of design books too, along with my sketchbook of things I like, or photos to flick through when I’m looking for ideas. Mostly I just like to see everyone’s work all the time. This way I can encourage myself to do something great too.

To contact Pritz you can follow him on twitter or check out his blog