ingenious thoughts on the world of design

FRAUD

2009-12-22T21:13:00.002-05:00

WARNING: Adult language.

I'm ashamed.

All day long I talk about God. I pray before meetings and in groups. This morning I thought that my worst sin was attempting to steal glory from God (which in Christian work is like saying "I'm too much of a perfectionist" in a job interview). I end my prayers with "I love you and praise you."

Tonight though I came face-to-face with how little that has taken root in my life.

Sarah and I were driving through the neighborhoods around our home looking at Christmas lights, laughing and cutting up, our two dogs in the back. We found this cute little community and were talking about her parents living there or maybe us one day. There was even an adorable Airedale (dog) in the front yard.

Next thing I know there's a middle age man screaming at me, cursing, threatening. I stopped and tried to take stock of the situation but I think my senses had already left, along with the love of Christ. Before I knew it I'd called him names, cursed back at him, threatened to call the police for his lack of adherence to the leash law and as I drove away I flipped him off, only to hear "fuck you" as we left.

The whole thing only lasted one, maybe two minutes but it was enough to ruin the last three hours of our evening.

But, this isn't about us. It's about Christ and the fact that for some reason he never entered the scene. Not because he couldn't but because I didn't call on him. I "took care of it" under my own power. To be honest, I felt like I'd really shut this guy up, gotten him good. Don't get me wrong, the guy was definitely the agressor and I think drunk but I was the one the really showed how little I had allowed God to indwell me.

Where was the new creation, the peace, patience? Where was the spirit of reconciliation--the evidence that anything was different in my life than his? Absent. I'm a fraud.

This guy could have been drinking because he lost his job. Maybe another guy did go down his street and hit his dog. Maybe his wife is cheating on him.

Yeah, I guess I got him good. I guess I got the last word. But, isn't that like getting the bigger bowl of dessert, the one that makes you sick. The sweet taste of victory that causes your soul to lurch in an attempt to vomit it back up.

So, for now the Christmas lights are off, the wrapping looks a little paler, there's no carols to sing. My sin separates me from the joy of the love that Christ showed us as he became man.

I know I'll pray for forgiveness, I even know I want to find that guy and apologize but somehow Christmas just lost a little something for me, at least this year.

Bye Old Friend

2009-06-03T09:25:00.002-05:00

It's hard to change. It's hard to stop doing the same things you did over and over again. It's even harder if that thing is a person, a friend. However, there are times when relationships should and do end.

That doesn't make it any easier to not wake up early on Wednesday morning, not walk upstairs for a talk, shoot that person a quick email or read their blog.

To my dear beloved friend, goodbye.

Five Things to do when you make a Mistake

2009-06-01T20:47:00.004-05:00

Have you ever had the client that won't stop, the project that won't end or the worst mistake you've ever made. As much as we never want to see any of those things happen they do and the question isn't how it happened but what to do now.

These problems present us with unique opportunities to really show what we're worth. Will we throw up our hands or will we do everything possible to make it right.

In college I worked my way through as a waiter. As much as I checked my tickets or reviewed something occasionally food came out wrong. I could have misheard the client, typed it in wrong, the kitchen could have prepared it wrong or even it just wasn't what the guest was expecting.

What now?

I could argue with the guest that this is what they ordered, tell them it wasn't my fault, blame it on bad ordering software or a myriad of other things. We all know that isn't the right way to handle the order. Many restaurants had exact steps for handling those situations:

Remove the order from the table: don't let them sit there and look at the mistake.
Apologize: It doesn't matter whose fault it is. Be the bigger person and diffuse the situation. Ultimately these people are your clients and are paying your salary (waiters don't get a pay check other than their tips).
Clarify the order: Make sure you understand the problem and how to fix it.
Correct it- Quickly: Get the order in to the kitchen ASAP, don't hold the ticket. Talk to the kitchen and let them know the problem and bring the manger in on it.
If all else fails bring a manager into the process: They are equipped with higher levels of authority to make good for the client, not to argue with them.

How easily though we forget that when we enter the professional world. I think the same could apply to almost any industry including design.

I wish I had remembered that earlier today.

Lifechanging iPhone Apps

2008-12-01T22:00:00.002-05:00

Thought I'd post a few apps that are way above normal (sorry for the lack of links but just type any of these into the app store and they'll pop right up):

MobileFiles: This app allows you to view your iDisk from your phone. Built in support of several file types makes it easy to view the files once you're there.
scenario where this rocks: I set up all my computers (my macbook for travel, my iMac at home and my iMac at work) to sync with my iDisk. I then designated one folder active projects and created an alias on my desktop. This is where all my files for everything I'm presently working are at. Creative briefs, proofs, support docs and images are all there. Now I'm in a meeting and someone asks what the deadline for the project's first proof. I just open up MobileFiles and view the creative brief. Maybe I'm meeting with the client and nobody has the latest proofs, same deal just open up MobileFiles. It means always having my files with me and viewable.

Remote: This robust app allows you to control your iTunes libray from your iPhone. The interface looks a lot like your iPod interface on the phone and you have access to everything.
scenario where this rocks: I have my home stereo and a few other rooms of speakers set up to play off my iTunes via a airport express (another little device that has changed my life). I can not only assign and unassign those rooms from the Remote app but now anywhere I'm at I can change the song. The possibilites are endless but bottom line it makes your home entertainment that much more seemless. It's like having an iPod with a remote in every room.

Weather Channel weather app: I love the simplicity of the iPhone weather app but I'm always left wondering a little bit more. Here steps the Weather Channel's weather app. These guys did a great job. It's still very simple and you can get that at a glimpse view when you start the app but if you want the 36-hour forecast or the 10-day or if you want to see the radar it's all one click away. These guys should be proud. In my opinon they outdid the iPhone team on this one.

Flashlight: This definitely hasn't changed my life but it's one I wouldn't want to live without. It basically turns your whole screen white and can provide a bit a light when you need it. Worth having around.

I'm sure I'll have more but these blew me away this weekend.

Must have applications for a new mac

2008-12-01T21:35:00.004-05:00

For all my new Mac friends a few (free) programs I can't live without:

istat pro- everything that's going on with you Mac from disk storage to fan speeds to temperature.

Screenshots- This has to be my most used app. It allows you to set what format a screenshot is taken in (screenshots are Shift + command + 4 for you new guys, you can then hit space bar to take that whole window). From jpeg to PDF to GIF to TIFF. This is especially helpful since many programs don't especially love Mac's default of PNG.

Flip4Mac- This is one of those programs people get early on and then forget they have. It's crucial allowing you to view windows media player files natively in quicktime. This allows quicktime to truly be your all in one media player.

OpenOffice- For any kind of power user I'd recommend getting iWork to meet all of your presentation, word processing and spreadsheet needs however for the casual home computer open office is awesome. It allows you to open and create word, excel, PowerPoint and access files. It even looks just like the older versions of MS office so PC users will feel really comfortable.

Version Tracker- Okay so not a program but it's the one site that I get almost everything for my Mac for free. Anytime you want anything stop here first. Most likely someone has made it and made it freeware.

Sites I really like

2008-11-14T11:39:00.002-05:00

Wow I didn't even know this blog still worked. Sorry it's been so long since I posted but honestly I'm not near important enough to have anything to say.

BUT I do surf the web a heck of a lot looking for "stuff." A lot of my creative and web friends ask where I get this or that resource or where I find out about that. So I put together of list of my favorite sites for FREE vectors and images as well as the blogs I follow that give me even more goodies. Sorry there's not screen grabs, just didn't have time. Click a link and see it for yourself.

Sites I go get stuff from:

Kuler- Amazing color site by adobe. Type in anything and get a great color palette.

Brusheezy- Cool photoshop brushes and patters. This site has literally saved me hundreds if not thousands.

myPhotoshopBrushes.com- Same deal as brusheezy but they also have custom shapes, styles and gradients. This stuff is that little extra that makes your work extra sweet and someone else did a lot of leg work for you.

Vecteezy- You guessed it, it's brusheezy but with free vectors. This site is especially good for floral, ornaments and icons.

Dafont- This is my favorite font site. Almost everything is PC and Mac so no finding the perfect font and then oh wait font designers love PC better. They have a great range of fonts but by far I love the destroyed and eroded sections the best.

Urban Fonts- Not near as cool as dafont but they have those gems. Dafont has hundreds of good fonts. Urban font has 5 amazing ones.

CreativeMYK- This is a site specifically for churches and Christian designers. The art is really good and people upload their work in layers. Check the terms carefully, not everything is free to use, however being able to look at how someone achieved a look in layers is a cool way to sharpen your skills.

BgPatterns- This sites mostly for fun. I've never used anything here but it's a cool way to create a truly custom background.

Bittbox- Another cool site I've never been able to use things from but it definitely feeds me.

morgueFile- A free stock image library. I don't know that I'd say the art is amazing but it's free and it can be that spice in there that is not the critical piece.

Lost and Taken- amazing super hi-res image backgrounds and textures. Fun stuff.

Blogs I follow:

Creattica Daily- Great commentary and links to anything in the creative world. The highlight cool designers, designs, sites, conferences, etc. It's a one stop shop for creative fun.

Smashing Magazine- Another one just like Creattica. Actually I found this site on Creattica one day. Another one stop shop for everything awesome.

Usability Post- They basically crawl the web finding problems or solutions and put them out there for everyone to see. Lots of little things that make your world, err, I mean site better.

For sale

2008-06-16T15:24:00.003-05:00

I want to put my projects up for sale. Not to designers or printers but to my clients.

I want to create a new level of ownership with my clients, on their counterparts jobs.

How can I bring them into the process and ask them to help us have ownership?

A few quick ideas.

Invite them to:

weekly department meetings
daily standup meetings
weekly big idea brainstorm sessions
other clients discovery meetings

Anybody have any other ideas of ways to bring them in?

Writing, right to left

2008-05-27T08:41:00.002-05:00

I'm a lefty. I've used a right handed mouse most of my life, switched to left hand in college for a while just because it fit better on my desk. Mostly, though I've been a right handed mouse hugger.

About a year ago I had the opportunity to check out a WACOM tablet. Fell in love. So I picked up one of the lesser models to try it out. The question was which way to set it up. While I can mouse ambidextreously I can only write, well, left handed.

So right it is, but that has made it hard to get anything out of the WACOM really. So today I made the switch. I'm a left handed mouse person again. But while I'm at it I thought why not drop the mouse all together and go with the pen 100% of the time.

The part is pretty easy, I just didn't realize all the other stuff that would have to change, like hitting alt+tab to change programs. I'm used to keeping my left hand on the keyboard so I'm having to relearn all that too.

We'll try it for a week or two and see if I can get used to it.

Left handed mice unite!

A new blog

2008-05-13T21:16:00.002-05:00

Yesterday was the one-year mark for this blog. WOW! I didn't know I had that much crap to say.

Sixty something posts in all.

But, it seems fitting that today I started a new blog.

This ones a little different. It's actually sort of a personal journal. I have so many fears it's not funny about posting these things. But, I feel like this is the part where I sacrifice my life for His glory.

I've been struggling a little bit with my faith lately and I want to put that out there for others going through the same thing.

So, not your thing, don't click. If you do click, please don't judge.

Just got the first post up, design and all to come.

As I Step

I love a fast bus

2008-05-06T21:24:00.002-05:00

I'm not exactly on the bleeding edge with this but in case you haven't noticed yet the new iMacs are out and they finally crossed a signifigant threshold for me.

The new iMacs on top of crossing the 3 ghz range for the processor and having a beautiful HD (optional) display has finally added a front side bus capable of greater than 1ghz. The best I can explain it the bus is basically the bottleneck between your processor and everything else. It's kind of like a throttle and despite how much RAM you have and how fast your processor is more and more this is becoming the choke point.

Before, to get anything this fast you were looking at a Mac Pro that starts at $2,700 minimally equipped without monitor. The new iMac 24" display (the largest) on the 3.06ghz processor (the fastest) with 2 gig of RAM is running $2,200 MSRP.

Why does all this matter? This now makes the iMac a very viable option for hardcore graphic designers and a good portion of video editors (save Motion and AfterEffects work) at a grand lower than the previous cheapest option.

Branding: a family story

2008-04-29T21:36:00.003-05:00

The conversation about branding to students has been coming up a lot around Perimeter. There are at least as many opinions on the topic as there are people in the room.

I really wanted to look around and see what leading youth pastors and church communicators were saying on the topic. Surprisingly no one is writing on it at all.

So I thought maybe I would. [in the words of Mitch Hedberd] I mean who am I, I'm not that cocky:

Don't make over-generalities. Adults aren't students and generalizing them to the point of hyperbole only shows how little we know. Their culture just like ours consists of every facet of person and while culture shifts may go one direction or another over generalities act more of an insult as we try to insinuate that we "understand" them.
Student aren't opposed to branding, so long as they like the brand: Nike, Apple, Taylor Made, BMW. All of these companies are sought after by both students and adults alike. The fact that a student's parent has an ipod doesn't stop them from wanting on.
However, students do want to uniquely personalize within that identity. They probably don't want the same color BMW or Nike shoe as their parent but that doesn't mean they are against the brand. In both cases the core value of the company exists. Whether it be fine German engineering and luxury nameplate or a high-quality and durable pair of shoes the brand is intact.
Students get their brand awareness from their parents. This is something I learned when I got married. Sarah's idea of what a quality product was and mine were different, from each other, but not from our parents. We learn the values of quality, durability, and reliability from our parents. According to Piaget, full formal thought doesn't *start* until age 12 and continues into adulthood, that is the ability to draw conclusions from available information.
They will like some things their parents don't but it is far more likely that students are more broadly accepting of culture than adults are. Pure experiential info here but my experience has been that adults are far less tolerant of concepts and experiences they don't fully understand than students are. Even given their still developmental state they are *seeking* new experiences while adults already have preconceived notions about most of the world around them.

Application: You don't need to divorce or change the brand of the parent organization, so long as the brand of the parent organization isn't contrary to their values (an anti-skateboarding organization would not do well to market to skateboarders). It does however need to be customized, different from changed. Customized is to take the brand and make it their own, to take ownership. Changing it would be to try and make it something it never was.

Earth hour

2008-03-30T21:35:00.004-05:00

In case you didn't hear Saturday night from 8-9 was Earth hour. Surpised me too!!

I actually found out when I logged onto Google that night. Check out what they did. Apparently turning the page black causes so fewer pixels to be illuminated that it saves massive energy.

Funny though, there's been a page doing this for a while now...blackle. Google search with an earth friendly face.

Conflict dissolution

2008-03-30T21:13:00.003-05:00

Don't you wish they'd just fall in line. Don't you just love to bring the hammer down. That is if you're perfect...

We all have to deal with conflict. In communications you're always finding people breaking the rules. You know the guys stretching you're square logo to fill an 8.5x11, misspelling your web address on they're promo materials, rearranging the vision statement to fit their needs.

I've been thinking for a long time on how to deal with those conflicts and misunderstandings. For one, I'm a really straightforward guy. Some people like that, they know where I stand immediately, other times it hinders me from being able to be heard. If you rub someone the wrong way they stop listening.

So here's what I've discovered for myself, and it seems to work. I've based it on watching my mentors and hearing what scripture has to say on peacemaking.

Affirm that you have a relationship. Let the person know how you feel about them, not the situation. I often love the person that I'm talking to and that makes it all the more difficult. Also doing this helps bring the group together towards a solution and not the blame game.
Before you ever start, identify if this a personal, work or spiritual problem. Each has their own unique way of being handled. That's not to say that all of them shouldn't be addressed but some are more clear cut than others.
Bring a positive/Be a part of the solution. I learned this from my mentor and friend Randy Renbarger. Instead of ever coming down on someone he always offers a solution. Instead of looking at someone and asking why they did this or that without consulting communications he instead asked how he could help. He knew they weren't out to get him so instead he went strait to the heart of the problem, they didn't know they could get help.
If you do need to address the hurts bring specifics. Don't say things like "you always" or "I can't remember when but you did." If you're bringing a hurt it's on you to address the specifics. Most people want to help and don't want to have wronged you. Not bringing examples puts them in the conundrum of wanting to help but not being able to.
Go to the person responsible, quickly. Don't talk about it with anyone who does not need to be involved. Do it quickly so that hurts don't fester. We all know times when we've put off discussing something only to find out that once we did the person was incredibly sorry and never knew they had offended. I will always miss time I could have spent with friends over perceived wrongs.

So that's my model. I'd love to hear if you do something different, would add something to the list, or have a hard time with one piece. Obviously different situations and relationships call for different angles, but for me these have proved to be a foundation to build on.

_sl

Identity Crisis

2008-03-22T13:04:00.002-05:00

Well it finally happened- I've been victimized. I can now join the ranks of those who have in some way suffered identity crisis.

Doing bills last week I noticed things were way off of where I expected. I started wondering if I had suddenly purchased a new apple product, but realized with the apple backlash day looming that couldn't be.

So I started looking closely and there it was, 440 bones to paypal.

So I called my bank, they assured me that it would be taken care of, not to worry. An investigation would start as soon as it posted to my account and they would temporarily refund me the money until the investigation was over. Cool! They also canceled my card an initiated a new one. Go wachovia! Good user experience abounds.

Then I emailed paypal. Not so happy about having to go the email route. I just lost a signifigant sum of money. I need to hear a carbon based creature assure me. Never the less I was able to follow the progress through a resolution center view. An email was sent to the "seller." The same night the case was closed as the seller had refunded my money.

So I'm mostly feeling ok about it, until today when the fee hits my account. No new stuff has posted to paypal so I'm sure it's the original charge, then I'll see the refund.

All in all a good experience considering a someone from a country we don't have diplomatic relations with stole my money. Ain't the web great.

Got experience?

2008-03-12T21:34:00.002-05:00

I need help. In many ways. We're looking to hire three "experience consultants" to go through our site and tell us what they like and what needs help. We'd like two professionals and one mystery shopper.

If you know anyone, or would like to be someone, to help us out with this email me.

Only caveat is we would like it if they didn't know Perimeter well.

Seems like there should be a whole post in why we think this is important but it's getting late.

I'm lost

2008-03-12T21:24:00.004-05:00

The other day I had to go to the DMV. After driving for two weeks with an expired license including a trip to Orlando and back, I decided it was time to put on my big boy shorts and go get it renewed.

If you don't know I live WAY out. Literally half way between Atlanta and the S. Carolina state line. That wouldn't be so bad if I worked in S. Carolina but I don't. So I went to my local DMV in a smaller county.

I drove up, no one was there, maybe 10 cars. Walked in, no one was there, like perhaps eight people (I guess someone left a car overnight). Looking around, they were obviously using a number system to call people up to the counters but I couldn't see a ticket dispenser so I assumed they were slow and weren't using it.

So after a moment I sat down. The guy next to me told me I needed to go get a ticket from one of the counters. Cool! Nice guy. Should have bought him a starbucks.

After that smooth sailing. In and out in 15 minutes.

BUT, what if I didn't sit down next to the nice guy? How long could I have waited? How frustrated could I have gotten?

Everything was perfect except they blew the experience at a key point.

How often do we do that to people that walk in our doors or visit our website? I'd love to say never, but I know better. Perimeter is a big place, I often see people looking for this class or that prayer group. I always try to help someone if I notice.

How many people walk in on Sunday and walk right back out? We are responsible for that. We need to help them find a seat, get a bulletin, find the sermon downloads.

When we don't what kind of frustration do we cause? How long are we letting people sit in the lobby waiting for a number they didn't get? How can we empower members to be the nice guy that helps out?

One day when I'm smarter I'm write a top five on how to fix this. For today I'm just asking the question.

Planning for inspriation

2008-03-10T06:51:00.004-05:00

I know we've all heard the addage "failing to plan is planning to fail."

Poppycock!

Well at least to an extreme. Too many times I see people create process documents and ministry plans that are excellent but are unwilling to veer from them when inspiration comes.

Unwavering plans and rigid structures leave out room for the inspiration, creativity and the influence of the Holy Spirit. Some of the coolest things often happen by accident. For myself some of my best designs come from when something accidentally happens, when I clicked the wrong button and it was suddenly cool.

The question is how do we build room for inspiration into our plans? We have to create that space for the Holy Spirit and creativity and we DO need to plan.

For different disciplines that answer is going to be different. In the tech/production world it might be systems that allow greater flexibility at the 11th hour. For IT it might be processes and systems that allow greater freedom.

In communications I think it comes down to building policies that allow that flex. I know I'm guilty of not letting this work. I often have preconceived notions of what something should be. But we have to create structure that allows creativity to fill in the blanks.

At Perimeter we love spreadsheets, process docs, critical paths, you name it. As a creative my challenge is to work in those margins. To find something cool in the spreadsheet.

One more thing to know if you're a mac user at Perimeter

2008-02-25T12:33:00.002-05:00

ok, ok, ok. I had to say this, especially after reading Jeremy Scheller's post on Keynote.

The last thing you have to know if you're a mac user at Perimeter is:

Even though you may have some more polished tools than some of the people around you, you STILL have to play nice.

Case in point I recently was asked to put together a presentation for a new strategic planning dealy here at Perimeter. My first question: Am I presenting this or do I have to hand it over to someone else to present (run the presentation)?

There were a lot of early requests that would have been very confusing without doing some simple animations (made incredibly easy in Keynote '08). So, I went ahead and start creating in Keynote.

It was easy and fun.

Some bonuses for me were:

Easy animations along a path, ability to animate scaling, rotation and transparency.

Fun and really fast

Finished product always has more polish

Presentation viewer is really nice

Works well with all types of media, including photoshop files (in case I'm too lazy to convert)

In the end though the guys upstairs wanted edibility and the ability for everyone to view the presentation on their computer. PDF wasn't going to cut it anymore.

So reluctantly (at least for me, to them it was yes sir) I went ahead with the conversion. It had to redo some text, bullets were a mess, and my sweet animations had to be replaced with before and after slides transitions. Bottom line though, it doesn't matter.

I go back to we're lucky because we have a choice. So it's our responsibility to play nice with others.

Taking our licks

2008-02-24T09:05:00.004-05:00

If you've paid attention at all you know we just lanuched our new website. I think this is going to be such an amazing tool for ministry here.

First though we've got to work out some of the bugs. There were a few things that because we knew it so well we never realized how unfamiliar they would be to other people. So here's a couple of things we're hit on and how we're working to make them more clear.

Visitor/Perimeter Family/myperimeter:

We created three different sections to our site. Really three complete sites. One for visitors with all the top-level-before-you-get-here information. This is our main url. The family section has all the deep ministry information. It's what you think of when you think of the site. We tried very hard to keep the site shallow to help navigatbility. Never more than four layer: home>ministry category>ministry>ministry subpage. Myperimeter is a personalized content site like myyahoo! or igoogle.

People are having a very hard time figuring out where they are. They land on the homepage and can't find ministry links. We've received this coment a couple of times: You have a lot of great information for visitors but where is ____ ministry.

So we're adding a new homepage that lays out the three site and directs them to the one for them. As much as I hate splash pages this is one extra click to get people where they want to go and maintain the visitor/family experiences.

Downloads:

We're having a few problems with very random downloads on some operating systems. So random we're having a hard time tracking it. It is becoming an increasing problem though. See my post on PDF's and Vista for more on this.

Week at a glance:

On our old site we had this page of things coming up this week including who was preaching and leading worship. I way undervalued how important that was. Not so much sure why but it is.

We adding back the link from our e-newsletter, the pulse, which is where most people found it.

There are about 100 other smaller things that we've seen and taken care of since our launch last month. Here's a post we recently put on our intranet for our staff describing some of the bigger, small things.30 Day Update

Changes Made:

Within the first week of the site we doubled the number of pages on the site – and maintained an average of less than 24 hours to make changes and corrections.
In the first 48 hours:
We had ~1,800 visitors
Visiting ~20,000 pages
Averaging 10.65 pages per visit
While staying on the site an average of 6.5 minutes (600% the industry average).
We have added password protection capabilities for sections of the site, specific pages, groups, and files.
Enhanced our Content Management tool with a “duplicate page” option to make it easier to create new pages.
Completely overhauled the MyPerimeter login and Create a Group process per feedback and suggestions.
Added the “remember me” feature so you get “Welcome ________” when you login to MyPerimeter.
More than 20 ministries have been featured on the Perimeter Family home page scrolling window.
More of you are using the “Change Request” feature to manage content then doing it yourself.

Coming Soon:

We are increasing the visibility of our Search and Feedback options.
We are creating a new Home Page in order to correct the confusion between the Visitor experience and the Perimeter Family experience.
Improved navigation via new links on the Perimeter Family home page.

But I'm on a date...

2008-02-24T08:50:00.002-05:00

I like to pretend I've got some things figured out here. The reality is I'm more a juior to a lot of seniors out there (that's for you Tony). I'm still kind of breaking into this thing.

So, today, my Sabbath, I'm walking through church and I couldn't make it to the service without being asked several questions about work. Why does this brochure look like this? How do I get this on the web? Any word on that project?

This isn't really unusual.

I retreated, to a room that me and only two other people have a key to. I'll pretty much hide here until just before the service, grab Sarah and run into the back of the auditorium.

Has anyone figured out how to work at your church and still enjoy a rich, full Sabbath? Is this just the by-product of working for a church? Should I accept this as my Holy duty?

My problem is I just wasn't thinking that way. I was thinking about worship, trying to prepare my heart (which is an all week thing, but corporate worship is special, it's like going on a date with God. You guys always talk but this is special devoted time to block out the rest of the world and focus on Him). I was thinking about how great it was to be doing that with Sarah.

BLAM! I get hit out of left field.

I hear my name and then the questions. I love the person that asked the question, it was a good question. I just wasn't ready. So I stammered for some answer and finally came out with,"What can I do for you right now?"

Any sage advice out there?

Vista and PDF's

2008-02-22T16:27:00.002-05:00

I figure with the ultra-cool, highly sophisticated readership I have all the problems of the world can be fixed. Or the two people who actually read my blob (not a typo), Tony and Richard, know people who can fix this problem.

On our new site we're having some problems with downloads. Here's how it goes down:

Someone goes to this page on our site.

Three out of the four pdf's download no problem. Lesson one corrupts on the way down.
We've been able to track down that this might well be a vista problem.

What we've done to troubleshoot:

Re-saved the pdf backward compatible to acrobat v.5
Renamed the pdf
Emailed the pdf to the person who couldn't download it, they were able to open the email.

This is becoming one of those increasingly negative problems. Just happens that other than homepages, this is our most visited page on the site.

P.S. Same seems to be happening with some audio downloads. Two work one doesn't. I think the problem is related, since it also appears to be a Vista problem.

My kitchen stadium

2008-02-22T11:23:00.002-05:00

I don't get to do that much design anymore. I still love it but I couldn't do that and my duties as well. So, anytime I get to do a little design I relish it.

With the launch of our new site we added a flash scroller on our family page to show the upcoming events. With the volume of design that goes into that it simply wasn't an option to outsource. I was pretty reluctant to take it on as I thought it would suck away my time.

It's actually turned into one of the most fun things I do all week. I look forward to the one hour I set aside on Wednesday to do them.

That's right, one hour. That's the fun. I've turned this into a challenge. On average we have three new images a week. That means I get 20 minutes to concept, find imagery, design and test per image.

It's actually opened up a whole new style of design for me. Here are my design criteria:

It has to be simple. I have to do this in 20 minutes, so the concept has to be simple for me to do.
It has to be simple. Deja vu. The image is only up for 5 seconds, so it has to be easy for the viewer as well.
It can't get stale. Again I do three a week. The tendency to create a white background, simple image, and text is too easy. I force myself to try and keep it fresh. Every week I watch the whole thing to make sure they don't look alike.
They have to match what our graphic style is for the web. Simple, clean, interesting, and contemporary.
I really wanted five points.... They have to be fun for me. Again this is my relished time of the week. If I hate what I'm doing, I need to stop.

See, it's just an opportunity to choose your attitude. When this got added to my plate I thought, it's just too much. This could have become a begrudging, belabored part of my week. Instead it's become one of my favorite challenges.

What part of your job or life could you turn into a challenge and enjoy more? I've even found cleaning can be more fun when we put a time limit on it and then add a reward. What can I say, I'm a simple creature.

If you're a mac user at perimeter

2008-02-21T18:36:00.002-05:00

Perimeter is a PC centric place. That said our IT team graciously let's some people use macs based on their need. I imagine that's not very different from most places.

But as an off-the-grid user how to "play nice" with the people around you.

As I've said I like lists so here are my steps to being a mac in a pc world:

Realize you are not entitled to the platform of your choice. You are the alien and they owe you nothing. You've been given something in that you get a choice. So try to play nice.
Purchase the MS office suite for mac. One of the first steps to playing nice is using what they use.
Get a PC. Install some sort of virtualization software on your computer. I prefer VMWare, however, given that our "PC's" are all virtual at Perimeter I prefer to use a client as it doesn't use my processor or memory.
Map the network drives. Mounting in mac vernacular. These are actually a great drop zone between your virtual PC and your mac, plus you'll need it to access network files.
If you have multiple drives to mount use automator to write a script to mount all of them at once. Save as an application and put in your dock.
Download screenshots for free from versiontracker.com. Your PC friends can't open you png screenshot files easily. Screenshots let's you determine what format they save in.
Obviously get a good security suite and password protect your machine. You are now an open tunnel into the network.
Get IP addresses for your printers and print via IP. Our IT department is so awesome they added a server side application that allows me to add printers as a bonjour printer. I bet Tony may tell you guys what that is in a comment.

So there it is.

That'll teach me to pray

2008-02-19T22:26:00.002-05:00

Middle of last year we were doing a lot. All the ministries were kicking off their promotions, we had normal year kick-offs, were working on a new website, new graphics templates, oh and it was our 30th anniversary (I'll add pics tomorrow).

I was getting a normal amount of positive and negative feedback, but a lot more of both given the nature of how many things we were doing. I have to admit I'm a fragile flower and can easily get my feelings hurt. I know bad combo for a designer. Ya think?

My boss, Randy, as someone described him, is like a muscadine. Now I've eaten a muscadine but I was intimately aware of the nature of this grape like fruit. But as they explained a muscadine has a really tough outer skin but has a really juicy, sweet inside. Think grape with the skin of a lime.

So I set out to be a muscadine. I prayed for a thicker skin. If only I knew that was like praying for patience.

Fast forward a couple of months and we're launching the new site. Of course, no one checked to see if their stuff was up to date, if their ministry existed, anything. In the week prior to launch we DOUBLED the number of pages on the site. I'll post some stats tomorrow. Pretty cool.

Just the way it fell I became point for the launch. For two or three weeks people called me day and night in a panic, mostly thinking we had intentionally deleted their ministry. I think I answered the same three questions about 100 times.

This did two things:
1. Gave me an opportunity to think about what I would have done differently.
2. Gave me a really thick skin.

Fast forward to today, one of our clients called a meeting to discuss a particularly cursed project. One of those ones everything went bad, for a lot of reasons, some mine, some his. We were able to talk it out without any feelings getting hurt and actually our relationship is better for it, all because I became the muscadine.

Macs are bulletproof

2008-02-19T21:49:00.004-05:00

To be honest I've hesitated posting this, mostly due to embarrassment. But, I figure Richard Dolan or Tony Dye (names later) would end up posting it so I better get my side out first.

About a month ago I woke up, walked into my bathroom, looked and the window. It was still dark so it was easy to notice the streetlights shining off the wet pavement. I thought, why do I care the pavement is wet. Then panic hit me like jumping into a very cold pool.

I left my mac in the back of my pick-up truck.

The night before I did a little overtime, placed my bag in the back of my truck to come home, as I've done before. My intention was to come home and do some more work. I got home really tired, walked in and fell asleep on the couch.

So I did the best I could. I opened the lid. Amazingly it came right up, my goal was to shut it down quickly. As I went to the shutdown button the screen did very weird things. I was able to get it turned off and took it very humbly into our Viant guys.

They were pretty optimistic. We did a complete tear down. Danny Ybarra, amazingly did a complete tear down of the LCD as well. Sprayed it with denatured alcohol and waited.

When we first powered it up it worked. The screen was glitchy. So I took it downstairs to remove the hardrive while I sent it off for repair. I figured any repair cost would be better than replacing a new macbook pro.

When I took it apart I looked at the video ribbon cable, it was loose. A little jiggle and it clicked. I closed it up powered it and it worked. Perfectly.

I'm actually still using my macbook pro everyday with no problems. Well except both fans run at 6,000 rpm's constantly. But hey, I have the coolest running mac ever.

I love my mac.

Communication Outlets

2008-01-06T09:25:00.000-05:00

Churches have a very unique communication challenge, that of the ratio of communications needs to communications outlets and opportunities.

I say this is unique to churches because I can't seem to find it in the business world. Sure, the more targeted a message becomes the more scarce that vehicle becomes but the number of vehicles is quickly approaching limitless.

Think of Coka-Cola or Nike or a blockbuster film title. They groups can determine who their most targeted audience is, look for the outlet that reaches that audience and purchase space. For example if Coca-Cola were releasing a new product that was determined to appeal mostly to middle-class, white, suburban men and they determined that the largest demographic portion of channel 21 fit that group then they buy ads there. Simple.

With a church they have a very large number of products, in this case called ministries or programs. In our case around 250 (if you want to know what I think about this check out this post.) Churches also have a very limited communications window.

We have a very active campus, with around 50,000 events on campus a year there's always people here, but even with that great bustle going on daily most of our congregation is here on Sunday only. A lot of what happens here happens off campus, such as discipleship, neighborhood congregations and then there's Perimeter West (also known as Starbucks).

So we have the walls of our building to display brochures, posters, postcards, invites, whatever. We have the service itself, which we limit announcements and such in. We have our website and we have our email newsletter, the Pulse. That means we have two active, push style media.

We've done some things to try and help this.

1. We created a tier or emphasis system to make sure that things that need to be heard by the whole congregation are and other things receive an emphasis equal to the portion of the congregation they touch. The problem with that is 90% of the ministries or programs don't get actively communicated.

2. Next week we'll bring live the new Perimeter website. With it the myperimeter section creating a personalized content page so that people can check the info they are interested in. This is sort of active passive. They select the info, allowing them to cut through the clutter of things they are never going to be interested in (like a senior high student may not want to see the children's ministry info) and for the ministry to be able to push content to those blocks.

To be honest I'm looking for a new system to propose. Something that evens the playing field AND reduces the overall clutter and noise.

I think I've got one, comm coins, tell you more next week.

My sandbox

2008-01-01T12:50:00.001-05:00

A few years ago ingenious|atlanta started as a freelance outlet for the small amount of creativity I have. Since taking a creative position at Perimeter I get my creative fix daily and don't do much outside anymore.

I still do however keep my portfolio updated (I say thay loosely, about every 3 months).

I updated it yesterday. If you're interested you can view it at ingeniousatlanta.com.

My New Phone

2007-12-31T09:22:00.001-05:00

I've been in the market for a new phone since the day I purchased my 8125. What a brick. I've had to have the device replaced by AT&T twice.

So I regularly make trips to the AT&T store looking at what's new. Given our requirements here at the church and what I've learned about my own preferences here where my specs:

Win Mo 5 or 6
Must have "real" buttons for dialing
Must be small and somewhat attractive
Must be a phone first and a PDA second
Must be a good PDA
Must have at least pretty good battery life (i.e. shouldn't need a charge mid-day)

Things I realized I didn't care about:

WiFi
Touchscreen
Cameras (although nice they usually aren't any good anyway, no matter what the megapixel count is)

I found it the other day in the Pantech Duo.

----

CNET reviews

Pantech Duo Website

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The phone is as small as my wife's Samsung Sync flip phone, has both a qwerty keyboard and a real phone keypad (due sliders) and if you didn't know it you would think it was only a phone. It runs Win Mo 6 smartphone edition.

The exterior is pretty good looking. As a bonus it also has 3G wireless. It doesn't have WiFi but see above on that one.

I could forgive quite a few since on it's appearance alone but here are a few quirks after having used it for a week:

Sometimes freezes up. Hey it's still a MS product.
Keyboard is a little hard to type on.
Couple of personlizing things I would like. Most seem to be an issue with the fact that I'm using smartphone instead of pocket pc.
Vibrate isn't super strong, but it is quiet.

My Christmas Prayer

2007-12-24T23:11:00.001-05:00

Humbled. That's what you were. You chose to take a form so beneath you it's incomprehensible. Comparing it to me becoming something like a maggot doesn't even begin the comparison of what you did for me.

Perfection. What heaven is and what you are. You introduction was without notice to most of the world. You met earth and immediately were covered with it. Disease, dirt, and depravity were you cherubim. They surrounded you but could not overcome you.

Dirty. What we were. Instead though you decided to get your hands dirty. Pierced actually. So that we could be clean again. We were trash. Because of you we are treasured.

Overwhelmed. That's me. To think that you would do all of this so that I would be clean. That you would leave, humble yourself from perfection to become dirty so that I could be treasured...overwhelming.

Thankful. Is what I can never be. I can't start to be thankful for the sacrifice you made. I can try. I'll never understand. I can't comprehend the contrast. I can't.

Rest. Is what you tell me to do. In your lap. In your arms. In your grace. So I will. Until the day that I can be risen up with you, to see your perfection. I'll realize my own dirt that you humbled yourselves to save me from so that I can be humble enough to finally thank you the way you deserve.

Speechless. What I am until that day.

Ministry is like a used-car

2007-12-23T12:39:00.000-05:00

A friend of mine, Tony Dye, recently purchased about a 15 year old Acura Integra. As he took me for a spin and told me about the car he told me more about the person that had owned it than he did about the car.

He described how meticulous the person was in caring for the car, how in order the records were, how carefully the car had been driven. All of these details told me how good the car was by how good the person was to the car. It wasn't a matter of love, we all love our cars, even when we hate them. It was a matter of care and the realization of that love into affection.

So, question: How many people would want to inherit your ministry after you? How are your records (could anyone pick it up if you suddenly moved to Hawaii)? How many people could successfully adopt your ministry?

A sinking dinghy

2007-12-21T00:50:00.000-05:00

I've been reminded recently of the dangers of not focussing on internal communications.

When an organization with a lot of things to be positively proud of stops communicating them to those on the inside terrible things happen.

People need a sense of pride in what they're doing, accomplishing. When organizational pride is removed or not fed people will go looking for that satisfaction. They will attempt to find it in individual or departmental sources, or any way they can.

Instead of pushing the whole ship forward they jump ship, grab a dinghy and start paddling.

Which do you think can go further though, a huge ship or one guy in a dinghy?

How do we convince people that the ship/process isn't a hindrance?

Things I don't want to do (maybe there's 10)

2007-12-21T00:39:00.000-05:00

<DRAFT> Sort of- I guess a public draft.

10 Things I hate doing/feeling:

I don't want to say no.
I don't want to be perceived as a road block.
I don't want to have to justify good practices.
I don't want to have to charge people, even if it was their mistake.
I don't want to lose my calling.
I don't want people to not like me.
I don't want to care so much.
I don't want to care so little.
I don't want to sacrifice relationship for process.
I don't want to have mistrust for those around me.

10 Things I wish I had more of:

I do want to help people everyday.
I want to make people's day.
I want to advance ministry.
I want to love on people personally and professionally.
I want to be affirmed in my calling.
I want to care more.
I want to care less.
I want to surround myself with fun, Christ centric people.
I want support from above and below.
I want Christ to be honored in my every action.

It's cold

2007-12-17T08:52:00.000-05:00

It's a cold day here in Atlanta. That is there are a few patches of ice on the ground and I needed to wear a coat this morning.

As I was driving in I had the thought from my childhood. My dad once told me air conditioners don't make the air cold, that take the heat out of the air. Sort of made sense. So I had this thought, cold is the absence of heat, sort of like black is the absence of color. The edges of the universe are cold, because there is no sun to heat them. The default if you will is cold.

Similar in people, our default is sin and negativity. Negativity can be seen as the absence of positivity or some counter active force. You have to have something counter active to the negativity to create a positive environment. You will always be going against the default.

This has another implication as well: The amount of positivity can only be equal to the ratio of the positive force to the environment. Since the environment is inherently negative you have to have a significant ratio of positivity to create an overall positive environment.

The problem we're all left with is how can we create enough positive force to counter act our negative tendencies?

Flip Video- First Review

2007-12-12T15:14:00.000-05:00

From one of our global outreach teams:

Thanks to Communications for the use of the “just over $100 Flip video camera” in Sao Paulo, Brazil & Buenos Aires, Argentina November 27- December 5, 2007. Brian & I filmed 60 minutes, dumped the files on a laptop, and then took another half hour or so of footage. Here’s my review:

I found it to be very user-friendly, considering I’d never used a video camera before. All I had to do was turn it on and push record! Timid GO Journey team members will definitely appreciate that, as well as its small size (fit in my purse so I had it with me every minute of the trip), the ease of getting it through airport security, and its use of simple AA batteries. Not having to charge it came in handy in countries where you need an adapter to use electrical outlets. The Flip camera didn’t run out of juice until 7 days into the trip.

From what I can tell viewing our clips on a computer, the quality is good, but I am eager to verify this by seeing a clip incorporated into a video and played on the big screens.

For GO Journey teams, I’ll need a quick instruction sheet for:

1. How to use the Flip video software to dump the files (and that saving them in a new folder each time will mean no duplicate names)

2. How to use Real Time to view them on the computer

3. How to post clips to a blog

Crystal Steadham

Global Outreach Mobilization

Perimeter Church, Duluth, GA

Flip Video

2007-12-03T11:08:00.001-05:00

After many ministry requests to borrow a camera, about two months ago I purchased a cute little device called a Flip Video recorder to see if it could meet our needs.

We purchased them to be a small, fast, and inexpensive device that used an international power standard that would allow people to vlog from anywhere in the world pending an internet connection.

I was so impessed when I unpacked the box. First of all it was small and inexpensive. Given that the request came mostly from our Global Outreach ministry that was a big deal. We have cameras, but the thought of losing a high-def Panny over the side of a ship (don't ask) just didn't seem like good stewardship.

I intentionally didn't read the directions. I'm a pretty tech savvy guy but wanted to see how easily I could use it. Took me about 30 seconds to figure out how to install the battery, turn it on and shoot the video.

Getting the videos off was equally as easy. The device has it's own USB the "flips" out so that you can attach it to your computer. The software contains all the needed drivers and doesn't actually "install" but instead runs off the device. Tony Dye did a great first user experience post on his blog, tonydye.net.

We just sent this little device oversees with one of GO teams, which was it's original intent.So far our global ministry has asked us to purchase somewhere between four and six of the devices.

Overcommitted

2007-11-20T20:59:00.000-05:00

I was in downtown Decatur today, waiting for a friend, when I saw this truck. At first I didn't even notice, just looked like a moving truck. Then, since I had time I started reading it. I laughed out loud when I read the first line of the ad.

Truth is though I feel that way all the time. Overcommitted & undertrained. In over my head.

How many of you feel that way? How many of you have to feel that way? What do you specialize in? What could you let go of? What are you willing to let go of?

Website- A brief survey #1

2007-11-18T10:26:00.001-05:00

I can't tell you how many times I've sat down to write this post but been called away by the urgent. I had a choice I could write about what I'm doing or be doing it. For me it was way more cool to be doing it.

A quick history on the Perimeter website (since I was in middle school when some of this was happening pardon any parts that aren't perfectly precise):

10 years ago we launched a single page billboard website to give people basic information on Perimeter.

During the next five years that grew to the point we needed a CMS and to decentralize maintenance of the site. We decentralized the site so that each ministry could update their own pages. At that time we had still only a few pages (less than 100).

Today Perimeter has grown to around 250 ministries with about 1,500 pages on our site. We have 33 subwebs (read different subdomains) and a myriad of looks as we've sought to keep the web up to date.

3 months ago we wiped the slate clean and brought in an awesome design/hosting group called eye-speak. This team is amazing. Randy and I sat down and archicted the site for them and they went away for about two months and did that programming stuff that I have become uncomfortably comfortable with.

Two weeks ago we went beta with the site. We sent out the link to the staff and encouraged the spread it around. We wanted as much feedback as we could get. After all, we couldn't think of everything.

Now next week we go full live. DNS servers will be changed, redirects will happen and most likey pandmonium will occur.

Tony Dye, the IT guy has encouarged me over and over to be documenting the process on this and I haven't, see my first statement again.

Next I'll post on what our process has been and then ultimately what we came up with.

Worship Well?

2007-11-18T10:07:00.000-05:00

Is worship intended for the worshipper or the worshipee?

How often have you heard someone say, "that style of worship just doesn't appeal to me," or, "I prefer a more _____ stye of worhsip."

Worship isn't for *us*, it's for Him, the One, the Creator. It's like going to a birthday party and being upset that the cake isn't our favorite flavor.

I wonder if I could fully grasp that how my worship would change.

Art

2007-11-18T10:06:00.000-05:00

You start to fell almost paralyzed by this idea of how grand something hs to be to be legitatmate art.
Shepard Fairy, Juxtapoz Magazine, Nov. 2007

The takeaway

2007-10-04T15:44:00.000-05:00

It's been almost a month since MinistryCom. I left with so much stuff in my head I wanted to blog it but couldn't. So I've been digesting over the last month and this is the takeaways I'm left with.

1. You don't have it so bad. There are many ministries at other places that are less resourced, less appreciated, more overworked. No matter who you are there is someone who has it worse. Which leads to:

2. You are not alone. It was amazing how many people I heard with the same struggles as me. It taught me that I need to be better, the situation is the reality. I need to adjust my expectation.

3. A brand is a lasting experience not stuff. A brand is not your logo, collateral, or web site. It's how you make people feel. A lasting impression has a lot more impact than a brochure.

4. Web 2.0 is way more than I ever though. Matter of fact it is everything. Web 2.0 is how people interact with you. Our constituents don't want data hand fed to them (well actually they do). They also want to interact with that data, make it theirs and manipulate it.

And a few more but that's all that fell out right now. More to follow.

Is it true?

2007-10-03T22:32:00.000-05:00

I've heard Kem Myers speak about. I've read her blog but until just now I never knew exactly what she meant when she said, "everyone doesn't hate you, it just feel like it." Maybe I "knew" what she meant but really thought it was hyperbole.

It's not.

If you work in communications, especially church communications, for more than six months you're going to understand what she means.

I got vendors that won't call me back, a wife that falls asleep alone most nights (ps I'm typing this at 11:35 p.m.) and ministries that I'm sure hate me. Hate's a strong word. Yep, accurate.

The funny thing is I love them. I am desperately passionate about getting their message out, well. Maybe that's the problem. Everyone knows the old triangle, good, cheap and fast, now pick two. To be honest I'm not sure where the breakdown is.

Do they expect too much or are just difficult? Am I slow and incompetent? Is the reality of the situation unfortunate? Who knows.

Well hopefully I will. I am desperate to find out how I can serve these guys. I want to create a team atmosphere where we're all on the same team working together towards the common goal. Nothing illustrated how obviously not true that is as a meeting I had today.

A ministry partner made mention of bringing a volunteer with a particular skill with THEM into a meeting with US so that he could be sure he understood us. WOW! I didn't think we were that bad. I thought that was what I did, protect them from the over-the-head vendors out there. Gut check!

So I like lists. Here's my steps to getting back to that team spirit:
1. Find out what they think about me. I hate surveys but they have their place. I'm going to try to get some candid feedback from a web survey on how we can best serve them and what roadblocks they feel like they face. I'm also going to keep making my daily walks around. I want to be around the ministries and hear them.
2. I'm going to start trying to heal hurts as I find them. Sometimes its not hard to find the hurts and sometimes they're more difficult. I'm going to make a point to start rebuilding relationship first. Which leads to my next two more subpoints (trying to get to five points, its magic there.)
3. Rebuild relationship. I am going to continue to actively work to build relationship. I'm going to bring them breakfast on a day they have a major ministry event. Show up with extra things they need. Staff an event. Volunteer with them. Pray with and for them. One other thing: My wife serves during our first service and I've taken a semester off from serving. Which means I've got about an hour and a half to do whatever. Going to my office is BAD. So I've started going to each ministry, one a week, and just sitting with them. Doing whatever they need. I WANT to know them.
4. Exceed expectations. This is always a goal but really want to step it up. I want to always be thinking one bigger, smarter and better than they are. That's why they "want" me around.
5. Try not to say no. I thought I'd love the day when I was a decision maker. Yes, no. Horse hockeys. It sucks. I hate saying no. I want to say yes. Honestly, it's easier. But now I want to say yes in all the right ways.

If there's one thing I wish my ministries knew it's that I love them. Work and product aside, I love them. I love what they do. I love what I do, and I love serving them. That and $4 will get me a venti, non-fat, no whip mocha at 140 degrees at Starbucks.

A non-law abiding citizen

2007-09-28T10:38:00.000-05:00

I'm normally a pretty law abiding type of guy. Sure I get the occasional speeding ticket for 30 over the speed limit but I'm haven't say committed any federal crimes lately.

Today I saw a device that makes me want to take that risk. We've all been there knee deep in a heated meeting. Debating the finer points of acronyms that I don't even understand. When suddenly the meeting leader gets a phone call that derails the whole thing.

Maybe you're in church and the pastor is bringing it down. Closing the service. God's really moving. Then that familiar Cingular (now AT&T) ring tone.

Being severely ADD this really kills me. I saw a new device on engadet.com today that blocks most GSM signal for a mere $166. Seems like a small price to pay for the chance to break major laws and stop meeting disruptions right?

The non-post

2007-09-17T19:04:00.001-05:00

Hey guys, I feel like I should write a whole post on not posting on your blog. Let's consider the past month or so a ministry sponsored experiment on what happens when you don't post.

That said I haven't stopped thinking. I've got quite a few things I hope to get up in the next day or so. One is basically the whole thrust of what I'm thinking from a philosophical strategic communications direction. Hey I'm thinking book deal here.

So check back soon for more rocking good and sometimes plain fun thoughts on communication.

(Tony does this even count?)

Fusion- Week 1

2007-08-28T08:56:00.000-05:00

I work in a very microsoft dominant environment. Being one of a few Mac guys in a PC habitat can present some challenges.

I've overcome most of those through the use of a couple of Automator scripts to help mount network drives. Recently though everyone went to office 2007.

So I needed a solution for playing elegantly in their world. After all the remainder of the organization are my clients. I have to interface with them in the way they expect it.

After reading several reviews and seeing a great comparison chart in MacWorld (May 2007) it looks like VMWare's Fusion is the way to go.

We installed it last week and I've been trying to make the change over. Here are my notes as of week one:

It is amazing to be able to have a full version of windows alongside my native Mac apps.
It is giving me a lot of functionality that I had lost being siloed on a Mac
The program runs quickly and I haven't had a single crash yet (even though it's running windows) PS-- I went to send an email while typing this... It crashed.
I love that it can see all my peripherals including all my drives and anything plugged into a USB outlet.
Unity mode adds a cool element that allows me to use Expose to view ALL windows open, instead of looking at a window within a window.
Drag and drop has worked pretty well. Dragging an attachment from an email to the desktop is a little buggy.
One negative- It is chugging my system down. I typically have the entire Adobe CS3, Entourage, Stickies, Itunes, Ichat and FireFox open at all times. My system (2.33 core duo with 3G of RAM) usually handles that effortlessly. Since installing fusion it's been a challenge when working with large files.
One other thing making the switch challenging is email. It doesn't look first at my contact list so I can't just start typing and it picks up the name. Sure that can be changed in some option menu.

Overall I like it. It's working pretty well and it allows me to function the way I need to, without an additional computer. I'll keep you updated on whether or not I can make the switch. I'm still keeping entourage close by and reaching for it often.

_sl

My take

2007-08-22T06:29:00.000-05:00

Viral marketing is the most powerful. If you can't get your own people to proselytize their friends towards your product back away from the marketing. You should start to investigate your product instead of your communications.

Reactions?

God thinks he's funny

2007-08-20T13:52:00.000-05:00

In case you didn't know it's blistering down here. It's been around the one hundred mark for some time. Today it's 95.

So, it made sense when I came back in from lunch knowing that I would have to leave again quickly that I left my windows down.

When I turned my car back I was greeted by the sound of static. My FM transmitter was gone. They took the ipod too.

First thing when I sat down at my desk this popped up. God's funny. In all things praise him. Whoever took it needs an ipod more than me.

First Impressions

2007-08-20T09:53:00.001-05:00

I saw this as I was driving the other day. This was a small church near my home.

Question is what should a church marquee say? What should it communicate?

I'd love to get feedback then I'll put up a post on a couple of my thoughts.

What do you think?

2007-08-19T21:02:00.000-05:00

A couple of months ago on Friday at 3:00 p.m. I got a request for a design, for that weekend.
The event was an evening of worship with the them of a disturbance. That as Christians we would be a disturbance to the status quo around us. The impetus for positive change.

I laid out the card quickly and showed it to a few people. One designer that I respect a lot responded with, "that's really disturbing, in a good way."

So what do you think?

What I learned from Giants and Spiders.

2007-08-19T20:30:00.000-05:00

How much do you have to do today? How full is your calendar? How many tasks are there in your inbox? Okay, now the tough one, how many emails will you have to ignore today because there isn't enough time?

If you know me at all lately you know that the answers to some of those questions for me would be unbelievable. Write down all the things you've done over the last five years. All the brainstorming sessions, tasks, errands, and projects. Now do those over the next three months. That's pretty much been me.

I told my supervisor, Randy, the other day that some days it feels like all of these plates are spinning and you have to select which one you're going to let fall. Some days you just know you're going to need some new plates. But in my field that isn't an option. A plate is a relationship and those can't be bought.

This is the stress level I've been living with lately. It's manifested itself in my relationships and in my body. My wife is amazing. She is so supportive but some days she just looks at me and doesn't know what to do.

All this climaxed this weekend. Through a set of circumstances that I was unable to control (not that I couldn't but just wasn't able to) I was left heartbroken, or at least just broken. I wrote my resignation (I'm not turning it in, it was just a creative exercise to get some stuff out).

The next night my family watched the movie Facing the Giants. I've heard from many people that they felt the turning point of the movie was a scene were the coach encouraged a player to finally give his 100% towards the team effort. To not give up. The player achieved more than he thought he could.

That may well have been the climax but certainly not the turning point. The turning point was the night before. The coach completely in despair, did the only thing he knew. He turned to God. In what was an amazing scene his wife wakes up and sees and empty pillow beside her. She looks up to see her husband in his study reading. She turns, gets on her knees and prays.

Oh to have that faith that the first place I turn was to God not to my own understanding. Proverbs 3: 5-6 says, "Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight."

Tonight my wife and I were watching Charlotte's Web. Have you figured out I love movies (maybe I should write why one day)? Thirty minutes or so into the movie Wilber finds out his fate. He isn't a pig, he's pork. He's crushed. He cries out "I want to live."

Charlotte drops down and tries to console him. This leads her to a promise to save him. When he asks how she doesn't know but reconfirms her promise. Wilber accepts that and walks away.

Oh to have that kind of faith. His very life is on the line but he trusts his existence to a spider he can barely see. But we have a Big God. Our God is eternal, immutable, self-sufficient, wise and just. How much more should I lean on Him.

As I was talking this through with Sarah we started naming off the times God has been faithful. We've seen many miracles just in the short time since we've been married. God has protected us and our family.

Why then when faced with times of trouble am I not on my knees? Why do I think Outlook and I can tackle anything?

If we ever understand the grandeur of God we couldn't be paid to get off our faces.

Go back and look at the answers you had to the first questions I asked. Confess how many times you think you could solve the problem. Reflect on how much you prayed about each.

I heard it attributed to Ben Franklin (although I've also heard rumor he was an atheist) that he once said, "I often find myself so busy that I don't have time not to pray."

Psalm 9 says:
9 The LORD is a refuge for the oppressed,
a stronghold in times of trouble.

10 Those who know your name will trust in you,
for you, LORD, have never forsaken those who seek you.

_SL

Three steps (and growing) to reboot your creativity

2007-07-23T07:49:00.000-05:00

Let's face it, for all of us the well runs dry from time to time. No matter what your field nobody wants to continue looking at things the same way. New ideas drive the world. Original ideas change it.

We all want to challenge ourselves not to walk through life like a child at Disney World, simply accepting the facades. I've written down some ideas that help me to stay unique even when I'm creatively constipated.

I've generalized them so that they could work in most vocations:

1. Go back to your roots.
Nature played a heavy part in who we are but there was also a time when we were at our creative peak. I was a jazz musician, professionally for a very short time, I loved to write and photograph almost anything. For me these caused me to look at things in a unique way, each or their own reason.
Go back to the time you felt most creative. Think about things you enjoyed do them again. If your a programmer go back and write a simple and fun game you've done 100 times. Go back and find that first love. There's a reason you are doing what you are. Try to find that reason.

2. Go old school.
I'm not the "good ole days" type of guy. I'm too young for that. But we have allowed our minds to get lazy, especially in the way we entertain our minds. Listening to someone read a story on the radio takes me creativity than watching TV. Reading a book takes more still. Stop letting the world feed you. Create your own thoughts.
There's a reason the stereotypically smart people listen to classical music. It's complex, the chords change, there is dissonance. Listen to music made in the 1950's or earlier. After that period music began to follow established, simple rhythms and structures.
Take well composed photos, write, talk, sing, pick up an instrument. Your mind is a muscle. If you want that power there when you need it you have to train for it. Mentally if you want to be a power lifter you have to mentally train like one.

3. Get simple.
Go back to the basic concept that are fundamental to your field. For me its just got basic composition and layout. Too often we look at something so much that we begin to accept compromise on the basics. Go back and remember the things you did that landed you the job or the first time you did something that made a friend say, "You should be a..."

4. Pray.
You want to be creative? God is the creator. He invented creation. He is the root of all creativity. Realizing that you have never had an original idea is the beginning to finding your unique voice.

If you've got something that works for you that can be generalized to any field drop me a comment. I'll update the post with more.

Bottom line is find your own unique voice. Don't walk through life accepting the structures put there by people less intelligent than you. Question everything. Create something.

The calm after the vent

2007-07-20T15:04:00.001-05:00

So if you read last week you know I was kind of going through an internal crisis about how do I/we unify 242 screaming voices into a coherent choir.

Thanks to everyone who left feedback.

Question though- Should I try to make those messages the same? If so, to what extent.

Trust me I know this flies in the face of all traditional marketing and communications thinking but I'm mentally going down a path here.

Also don't go to the other extreme, absolutely I think that an organization as a whole should have one key message (or maybe a couple) to its audience.

What if all of the message are trying to achieve the same goal but with different messages. Is that noise?

I played football and ran track in high school. I remember running, focusing hard on the goal and all around me people were yelling. Sometimes I could focus in on one person saying GO! GO! GO! but not most of the time.

Most of the time I heard yelling. But immediately I know if they were yelling for me or against me.

Think of it, 1,000 voices yelling different messages all with the same goal. It worked. I knew if I had messed up or succeeded by the tone.

Is that how corporate messaging should be? Different voices yelling at the same time different messages pushing on to the same goal.

As I've mentioned we are in the middle of a rebrand. I was surprised to find out during the focus groups that people get us. Is that because we are doing it right despite my thoughts otherwise? Everyone cheering, everyone saying press on to the goal.

ingenious?

2007-07-16T23:09:00.000-05:00

Sounds errogant huh? I like the definition I found on google the best.

imaginative: marked by independence and creativity in thought or action

adroit: skillful (or showing skill) in adapting means to ends

clever: showing inventiveness and skill

What I covet the most

2007-07-11T08:51:00.000-05:00

My boss, Randy Renbarger, is truly one of the greatest communicators I know. This is a guy who has a broad perspective on almost every topic, patience with our clients, and a servant heart that just can't be muted. Yesterday he and I were talking about a discussion he was having with other communications professionals in the church world. All of them are giants in their own right, and I look up to them.

During the conversation, as I understand it, the topic of communications noise was brought up. Too many messages, too little space and difficulty unifying that message. This is the core of branding, and it seems everyone is struggling with it. At our church we have about 250 ministries, all competing for "air play."

The complication is there just isn't that much space available. So obviously you start trying to unify messages so that you can speak once but include 10 groups. But, does that do any good? Aren't you still watering down their message and yours.

Another obvious answer is reduce the number of messages that you have, i.e. the number of ministries. Wow, is that tough. How do you tell a ministry seeking to reach out to battered wives that there just isn't enough interest, or a divorce support group that there isn't any more space. Out of all of the professionals on Randy's conference call only one said they could reduce the number of ministries.

So I'm back to my question how can I support and communicate the message of all of those groups. I truly don't have an answer on this. I'm looking. If you have a map let me know.

The Big Vent

2007-07-11T08:20:00.000-05:00

I've been banging my head against a wall for months now, literally. I mean I have a headache and my stress hacky sack is starting to leak all over my desk. I can't get this frustration out about how some churches seem to communicate so clearly and flawlessly (and in a fun, cool way) and I feel like we are at an impasse of uncoolness.

On the surface I would identify it as better design or more money but that's not it. They have something that seems like a constantly moving target- a unified message. Somehow these guys have figured out how to reduce the clutter and increase the impact.

I mean this is the most obvious communication principle in existence, concentrate the message to increase the impact. It's just like a water hose, turn the nozzle to jet and a single, concentrated stream of water comes and moves stuff, it has impact. Turn it to mist and millions of tiny droplets come out that have no impact on anything and barely get your feet wet.

I don't covet my neighbors car, house, wife, donkey, anything like that, I covet his unified message.

I'm sitting here swooning over the idea of designing for a concentrated brand message. It would be so easy. I would know exactly what it was about, who it was for, oh it would be so swell.

There's more to come on this topic. I want to explore it and I beg for input. It's a given that my organization isn't going to start doing fewer things so I want to discover how to continually unify those things into a cohesive message that makes sense.

P.S.- As I've mentioned in my other posts we are in the middle of a brand audit with Aspire!One. Our hope is the product of that audit will illuminate how to do some of this. Despite my feelings of no unified messaging during their focus groups they discovered that people actually know exactly who we are and can identify with all of our key messages. Maybe our frustration is just the byproduct of the filtering we do everyday.

I quit... the WORLD

2007-07-09T15:44:00.001-05:00

In the past few weeks I've been threatened by my neighbor, flicked off and been given a dirty look. My wife being in the car for all of the incidents confirmed I wasn't the offender.

Stuff like that makes me want to give up, on humanity. I want to quit the world. We have to remember the impact that something so flippant has on the receiver.

I would like to encourage everyone to remember we are all pretty close neighbors on this planet.

If you are a Christian you are commanded in multiple places to love your brother. In the last few days I've been reading through Hebrews and found it twice. Hebrews 12 specifically says,"Make every effort to live in peace with all men and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord."

Just a reminder- Be nice.

Quality v. Value

2007-07-05T16:19:00.000-05:00

I started reading a book yesterday by Leslie Cabarga called the Logo, Font and Lettering Bible. Not sure about the term bible but it's a great book so far, mainly focusing on the holistic creation of logos.

In the first chapter the author quickly jumps on soap box about the art of hand lettering. She makes a statement (my paraphrase) that today the contribution that many designers bring to the table amounts to nothing more than font selection.

I thought about that a while. On the surface it appeared to be a royal smack down to me. However, I went on to read that custom fonts for new logos often go for around $20,000. Boy, am I in the wrong field.

As I thought I began to consider should I be creating custom fonts and lettering for my clients. Am I cheating them by not? But most of my clients couldn't afford a fraction of that for a complete identity package, and in some cases my work is pro bono.

Does the use of existing fonts cheat my clients out of a truly unique mark or am I providing them value that they couldn't otherwise afford.

At first glance it seems to be a question of quality or value.

I would love to get some input from anyone passing through, designer or not. Actually, even better if not a designer. That gives the designers that read a client's perspective.

~sl

Make Clients Want What You Give

2007-07-03T08:56:00.000-05:00

"A good thing about being an in-house designer is that once I built up a reputation, upper management began to trust my judgement. But there are still times when communication breaks down. I find that if I visually show them what they want and they can see that it doesn't work, then they tend to rely on and trust my opinion more. Unfortunately, that means more 'wasted' work on my end up front, but payoff later."
--Kimberly Conger

My new favorite thing...

2007-07-01T07:14:00.000-05:00

Anyone who is around me at all has heard me raving about this site but for those that haven't heard yet, I love Lynda.com.

Lynda is a training site. It offers a huge library of training videos on almost any piece of software imaginable. Each video based training is about 3-10 minutes long allowing me to take a quick class during moments of downtime. Memberships are only $25 a month and include unlimited classes.

I can't tell you how this has empowered me. For instance I'm extremely comfortable in Photoshop but not Illustrator. I can get around but I wouldn't say proficient. I find myself running back to Photoshop well before I need to. So now I get to take the time to learn more and have a resource feeding it to me. How great!

Illustrator down, next Flash.

Wisdom From the Stars

2007-06-26T16:04:00.000-05:00

A quote on my Starbucks cup:
It's relationships, not programs, that change children. A great program simply creates the environment for healthy relationships to form between adults and children. Young people thrive when adults care about them on a one-to-one level, and when they also have a sense of belonging to a caring community.

~Bill Milliken
Founder and vice chairman o Communities in Schools, author of Tough Love and The Last Dropout.

It is possible that applies to more than children.

I love woot!

2007-06-19T21:11:00.000-05:00

For those of you who have never wooted before what a joy. They even have fun 404(ish) errors. Went to check out today's product and got the enclosed image.

Imagine you were creative. What would you do?

2007-06-15T14:34:00.000-05:00

Let's face it I'm not creative. Yes, I am employed as a designer, sort of. Yes, I do make things that people later see in print. But I'm not creative.

I think my designs stink. I think other people think my designs stink. I wonder if it hurts my printer to actually produce my designs.

Flashback to the other day at the HOW conference in Atlanta (I want to post on that but I'm not sure what is worth writing). I was sitting in a session with Sharon Werner, the brains behind brands like Mrs. Meyer's Clean Day and 10 Cane Rum. She was speaking on packaging and how to give packaging personality. She said that at her agency they personify a project, to the level of defining what kind of shoes it would wear. Then everything they do gets tested and compared to that persona.

I started thinking about that. I've always personified everything. I used to personify the letters of the alphabet. I always felt sorry for U because it seemed so isolated from the other vowels. OK, maybe I'm telling a little too much about myself.

Never the less I started thinking about personifying things. During one of the breaks I needed to work on a logo for a client that had a tight turnaround. As I was working I asked myself this question: Imaging you were creative, what would you do?

It seemed simple yet profound. If I were a creative person would I add a flourish here, would I let this go to print, would I take this client? All of a sudden I began to give character to my creative self. I manifest a whole new personality (any psychiatrists reading this can contact me via email). This was my creative persona.

I've now gone so far as to use an inflatable Jerry French as the visual representation of this character.

I was surprised in one other the HOW sessions when the speaker asked how man of you are really good designers and a majority of the room raised their hands. This is not for them. They know/think they are good. But many people I know question the validity of their creative ability.

Many times I've considered giving up design, it's too frustrating. I can't though. I'm an addict. I love it. This idea of portraying the creative part of me as something outward has had an amazing impact on my work thus far. I don't feel the pressure or the rejection like I may have in the past. It's not me, I'm just doing what Jerry said.

I may not be creative but Jerry is.

Four ways to train people to ignore you. (borrowed)

2007-06-02T22:46:00.000-05:00

I was reading a post on CZ Marketing's website that I thought was interesting.

For the complete text follow the link.

Top Four ways to train people to ignore you.

1. Send out something for the sake of it. (press release anyone?)

2. Everything is urgent.

3. Not understanding how to properly utilize your website for you constituents.

4. Expect branding to generate sales.

Who can define branding? (the same way twice)

2007-06-01T08:07:00.000-05:00

The concept of branding may be one of the most talked about, misunderstood, and debated topic in the world of communications. To some it means creative collateral, advertising, logos or slogans.

I've been looking around for resources that describe what branding is really about. Even as of a year ago I thought branding was a good logo that was used correctly. I found an article (which I can't seem to find on a webpage anywhere and is copyrighted so I won't reproduce it) where Roland Jacobs is being interviewed by CZ Marketing. Roland is the managing director of Aprire!One, a branding agency specializing in church branding.

In the article Roland breaks down branding to a key message that directly reflects your mission. The brand is in the message and every touch point you have is part of that message.

So it isn't the creative although that supports it. It's about taking a clear look at the mission of your organization and determining how to convey that message to your audience. You can immediately recognize when a company is doing that poorly, their message seems frayed. If you can't quickly identify what you at least think they are about then there's a problem with the message.

Volvo seems to be a great example of good branding. What are they about? Safety right? I went to the Volvo cars USA site and the first text I saw was "The luxury car that treats life like the greatest luxury of all." They have clearly defined who they are and everything they do supports that.

Creative is a huge part of what a brand is. A great design can inspire feelings and emotions that can't be conveyed through a text tagline. Supporting your message with graphics is important. What if Volvo told me they were about safety but had a cheap pixelated website. I'm going to think they make cheap cars and they've lost my consumer faith.

To see some of the article I've been reading check out the links to CZ and Aspire!One.

How to organize a creative?

2007-05-29T22:39:00.008-05:00

The task list for a creative is a little different than most. We're often called into brainstorming meetings where ideas fly around and it comes down to us to create steps that make the idea happen. Even our daily list of to-do's can change drastically based on deadlines or vendors.

I'm sure you have your own method. Just today I was sitting in a meeting with another guy I seriously respect for his ability as a designer, Britt Collins. I've got my pad and I'm jotting ideas and drawing lines to connect similar points, doodling along the way. Britt across the table from me brought only three neatly folded papers to the table. He laid them out and jotted with extreme precision each idea on one of the three sheets.

All this to say I've been looking at websites that help creative people stay organized. I'll post them here. If you have your own ideas or places please post them here too.

Lastly I came up with my own idea based on the method I've been using since I started working. My printer was kind enough to discount me a few pads. Feel free to rip this idea off if it helps.

behance.com is a site dedicated to making ideas happen. They interview giants in the industry and see how they were able to make it happen. They have an outfitters section with some pads that I really like. They also have an "unscientific" method on how to use them. Thanks to Drew Kimball, who creates some of the best designs I've seen, for the link.

knockknock.biz is a site that I just like. Some of their office pads really interest me and just being on their site gives me ideas. Don't know how much I'll ever use. Thanks to Jason Walch, a guy that just oozes creativity from every large pore on his body, for turning me onto them.

And last- here's what's working for me.

_sl

Our private little sandbox

2007-05-12T20:28:00.000-05:00

This week I’m departing from the series on concepts of design for a moment of personal investigation on a topic.

Just the other day my boss came into my office and plopped a magazine down on my desk. “You’ve got to read this,” he said. This is a guy I highly respect and who is a leader in his area so I listen carefully when he gives something such a glowing remark.

Before leaving I threw it into my bag for a read over the weekend. As I was browsing through the articles I came across one written by a guy with some lengthy credentials. The title caught my eye as something I thought I could relate to. So I dove in.

Whatever my expectations were I realized by around the second column that they weren’t going to be met. Don’t get me wrong, the content was great. The author was quoting sources, using proper illustrations, and using a logical story progression.

Technically it should have been a perfect article. The problem was it didn’t say anything to me. It was talking a lot, and quite eloquently, but I didn’t get it.

I thought about this pretty carefully. As I said I was interested in the topic, I was in a proper setting to hear what it had to say, in my normal chair at a quiet time on a Sunday evening. It just didn’t register.

As I went back and read over it a second and then a third time I started to see problems in the writing. First and mainly, the writer was writing for himself. The article was more of a journal entry that had been adapted for publication. Much like a book adapted for screen, it just usually doesn’t live up.

The writer was playing in his own sandbox, making his sandcastle. It was a perfect castle to him and most importantly it made sense. The problem came when someone else wanted to play in his sandbox.

When I came in I didn’t understand the rules or the circumstances of the sandbox. Therefore it made little sense to me.

Looking over it I realized crucial points were left out of the illustrations, gaps were left between supporting resources and his own points, leaving the reading to wonder about their connection.

There is a parallel here with design. Often designers play in their own sandbox. We create complex symbolism and iconography that often is lost before that masses.

However, I don’t believe that the burden of understanding lies on the public in this case. As designers it is our creative task to develop symbolism with significance. If all we ever do is play in our own sandbox then how are we to expect others to understand our meaning when they don’t know our circumstance.I love symbolism. I often spend time looking up color meanings, animal icons and type histories. I want everything to be authentic and meaningful. But when you look at one of my designs will your first instinct be to crack open your laptop and google the colors I used. I would imagine not.

As designers it is our calling to create images with universal application and understanding. We must create design with both meaning and comprehension for everyone. How, is the much more challenging and eternal question.

Avoiding the fatalistic other extreme is equally as difficult. We mustn’t determine that since not everyone will understand that we will only create those things which have no significance.

Erring on one side or the other allows the birthing of design which is not worth the time the public will spend viewing it. We absolutely must strike a balance. Failure to find that higher middle ground only leads to the degradation of the art itself.

The perfect little black dress?

2007-05-12T20:23:00.001-05:00

Last week I said that you can classify almost all popular design today into four categories: timeless, retro, grunge, bleeding edge or high tech. Bu what do those style mean and what message do they convey to your clients?

Today I want to look at the first and most classic style of all, timeless design, and what it really means and how it fits into the supermarket of design before us.

Before I do that let’s take a look at something familiar to all of us. Ladies, all of you probably own something you call the perfect black dress, for the guys imagine the perfect white oxford shirt. It’s a mythical thing really but it’s your best friend. It’s something that you feel awesome in. It goes with almost any occasion. It can be counted on.

Now I’m going to borrow from the guys example for a moment. Guys, you all have that shirt in your closet, crisply pressed and hanging ready. Do you even have the perfect tie that always goes with it. It’s a classic right, timeless?

Go check out your dad’s closet. If he still has it, pull out his 20 year old perfect white oxford. Would you were it to the next office party? But it’s timeless right?

Timeless doesn’t mean that it never needs to be updated. Cuts change, collars grow or shrink, buttons are replaced. It’s happened to us all, we’ve reached for the thing that we thought was timeless and realized that it’s gone out of style, not the little black dress or the white oxford but at least the one we have.

Design is similar to this. There is a style that will not fade but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t need to be updated.

One company that I think does a great job of this is Coca-Cola. That font based logo with the long tail has been there for 20 years. Sure they tried something different but just like new Coke it went away in favor of Coke Classic. They have a timeless logo, but they’ve changed the dressing and the elements around it to keep it cutting edge.

What does that say to us? It says,”We’re consistent and we aren’t changing, always Coca-Cola, but we’re also young, fresh and still cool.”

Now think of another company, Wells Fargo. Wells Fargo is a result of a merger between California-based Wells Fargo & Co. and Minneapolis-based Norwest Corporation in 1998. The new company chose to keep the name Wells Fargo, to capitalize on the 150-year history of the nationally-recognized Wells Fargo name and its trademark stagecoach.

They are banking on the credibility that 150 years of financial service gives them. People every day allow them to carry millions of dollars of their money.

Their logo and trademark, however outdated modern design may claim it to be, conveys that message. To them being outdated is an asset, it means, “We’ve been here, and we’ll be here.”

So are there any characteristics of a timeless design? I think there may be a few. First, they are almost always text based in simple fonts, many times a serif font. This allows background, graphical ornaments and icons to move around them without altering them. They are also usually done in primary colors. Pastels, bold colors, muted colors seem to come and go. Primary colors seem to never be the most popular but they always exist. Lastly, they seem to only consist of very basic shapes if any, i.e. circle, square, etc..

At the end of this series we’ll talk about each of the styles and who they apply to and how they might be able to strengthen your overall design package.

Is your design timeless?

2007-05-12T20:20:00.000-05:00

You can mostly classify all popular design today into four categories: timeless, retro, grunge, bleeding edge or high tech. Pretty much anything you see is going to, in some way, fall into one of these categories. Some really masterful design is able to incorporate pieces of each into a single design making an artistic melange of creativity and style.

The thing is, each of these styles means something, it conveys a given message to your audience. For established companies a great concern may be the shelf-life of the design they have.

I have some close friends who would essentially say that the freshness of their companies design doesn’t really have an effect on their perceived ability as a company. They may even take it further to say that their design simply doesn’t matter, that as a company they have to have a design because they need to get information out and that it is expected, but that that design doesn’t necessarily matter.

This just isn’t the case. Let me compare this to something that we are all consumers of, the music industry. There are a lot of songs from decades ago that we still listen to. We all know Van Morrison’s Brown Eyed Girl- in April 2005 the White House officially announced it was on regular rotation on W’s ipod. But it was released in 1967. How many songs from 1967 can you name?

The simple fact is some of them went out of style and some never made it and even others popped in and went out before we really noticed (Milli Vanilli?). What we are talking about here is style. Some of these artists were able to create styles that were cutting edge for their day but didn’t last, some created styles that weren’t even noticed for years, and some created styles that have been recurring hits for 40 years.

You might say, “Well that was their main job but style isn’t my main focus.” Not true, their main focus was to make music, they could have done it a la Mozart or James Brown, it was how they did it that we remember. Artists such as Aerosmith and U2 have been able to prove that they could produce music in many different styles, from ballads to head-banging metal music. Again this just proves they could have presented their message in many different ways, the way they chose made them icons.

In the coming weeks I’m going to talk about the different styles and how I think they impact companies and the marketplace in which they exist. There are pros and cons to each but ultimately it’s about a fit. The design has to fit you and your company. Hang around and see if you think your design is off the rack or custom tailored to your needs.