I’ve mentioned Ultra Essence before. They were the subject of an earlier post because they provided a great example of how a correctly designed advertising display increases sales. The company has a new skin-care product for men, “Ulltra Handy Man” or simply “Handy Man,” that gives me the chance to write about a simple case of creating a logo and a brand identity, and nicely illustrates the difference. The rest of their products primarily target women, so this is a … Continue reading
I had a fascinating conversation recently with the renowned Danish photographer Thorsten Overgaard. Thorsten shoots almost exclusively with a Leica, the camera that arguably has more claim to the word “classic” than any other, and is one of the most brilliant documentary photographers in the world. Like many in the profession, he uses Adobe Photoshop Lightroom to “develop” his digital images into their final form. Also, like any professional, he knows his tools thoroughly, knows how they work and knows … Continue reading
This is the story of a book. It starts in a waiting room, where the lady sitting next to me had a spiral bound book on her knee. It looked — it screamed – “home made.” It wasn’t something you’d want to try to read. I couldn’t let it go by without doing something to help, if I could. Here’s what the cover looked like: In the last post I talked about pictures that are too small to be useful in … Continue reading
Here’s a common scene that plays out between a designer and a client: Designer: “We can’t use that image in your [brochure/flier/magazine cover] because it’s too small.” Client: “But I got it from our website. It looks fine there, and it’s almost three inches square!” Designer: “Well, do you have the original photograph? I can work from that.” Client: “We gave it to the guy who did our website two years ago. I don’t think we have it anymore. Can’t … Continue reading
Ultra Essence is a national distributor of popular skin care products, sold primarily at shows, state fairs and similar venues, where people are looking for things they don’t normally find in stores. Their sales booth advertising was in need of a face lift, though, being just a bit too “down home” and not a good match for the quality of their main product, Ultra Balm. It’s a great example of how the design process works, and what it can do … Continue reading
Constant Contact, by far the leading email marketing service for small businesses and nonprofits, held a webinar yesterday for Constant Contact partners — people like me who provide email marketing services to their own clients, using Constant Contact. Gail Goodman, the CEO, knows more small business people and more about how things go for them than almost anyone else in the country. She should; she built an Inc. 500 company on catering to their needs. She brought up one statistic … Continue reading
We have been surveying owners of local small and medium-sized businesses about how they handle advertising and promotion. It’s a simple survey; because we wanted to get a feel for how we might help make our local area more commercially successful, and being in the graphic design business, this was an obvious subject to find out about. The news was not good, but it is interesting. About 60% of business owners consider promotion an expense rather than an investment. For … Continue reading
Working with entertainment clients, you sometimes get a project that has to be turned out very quickly with limited resources. The show WILL go on, and a full-page ad that’s due on press tomorrow must have enough impact to make people notice the show and want to attend. On this occasion, we had about three hours to put something together. All that was available were two photographs of different sizes and styles: a live concert shot and a publicity shot, … Continue reading
We thought this year we’d make a video “card” for all our friends. It’s not something you can put on the mantle, and you can’t hang it off a ribbon, but you also don’t have to get rid of it after the holidays are over.
Rufus Deuchler of Adobe Systems posted an interesting article about his tests with a service that lets you create full 360-degree images using an attachment for your smartphone or tablet.
