Archive for August, 2007

A lot of freelancers have been asking us if we use a standard contract, what issues we address and the verbiage we worked out with our laywer. Since our contract was hard-earned, I thought it would be worth sharing. This is lawyer ratified, but if you choose to use it, neither Peter or I, nor our lawyer will be standing next to you in court when things blow up. Please, please, please sit down with your lawyer and make sure to get the odds and ends in place to fit your business.

All our contracts have a cover page, then the revised proposal followed by the terms and conditions and signature. I might be willing to create a template for the entire proposal / contract document if we get enough requests in the comments.
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I’m on a Mac Powerbook. For months, I’ve been having trouble saving images for the web in Adobe Photoshop. What would happen is I would File > Save For Web and Devices… and find that many of the colors are de-saturated in the preview window.

What happened to my colors???

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Inspired talks by the world’s greatest thinkers and doers

Sometimes greatness is in my own backyard and I never even know it. I was recently introduced to Ted through a client of ours in Israel. Ted is brilliant, funny, innovative and I can’t believe I missed out. And course happens to be less than 30 minutes away from my back door. So all I need is to figure out is who to knock off the list so I can get invited and then convince my wife that I can spend 6k on one-week orgy of learning, creativity and personal growth. Their website is as addictive as “cocaine” cheese, known to most of you as Tostitos Nacho Cheese.

Want to push a ton of product to a target demographic? Then follow Nike’s lead. Unwilling to settle for just one award-winning, mind-blowing, heart-thumping flash site, Nike has been assembling an armada of flash-based product demos that all come together in their hub site. What follows is a recipe for marketing success in the changing new media landscape.

Let’s say this first: I’m not a Nike rep, I don’t wear Nike shoes, sport Nike golf clubs, or own stock in Nike. I’m just a young, “plugged in” designer who’s been keeping an eye on Nike’s advances into the new media picture via a set of some pretty hot websites. It seems like a month doesn’t go by when I don’t find Nike gathering a new award or developing hype around a new product. It’s not their products that excite me, it’s their strategy.

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When I was just getting started in design, I asked one of my favorite designers what single thing I could do to improve and expand my capabilities as a designer. His answer: “Read. Read everything you can get your hands on, empty your bank account, then read some more”. Looking back on 7 years of designing, I’d have to say that was the single greatest bit of advice I ever received. So, without further ado, here’s my list of recommendations.

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