Unfortunately the SSD’s of today are having live down the ’sins of their fathers’.  First-generation SSD’s were littered with errors and caveats.  The two major errors being 1) That the drives would fail impossibly fast (read/write cycles were limited) and 2) that the drives were impossibly expensive (read here as cost prohibitive for just about any average joe).  While these issues were true for the first-generation SSD’s, we’ve come a long, LONG way since then.The SSD’s of today no longer have the short life span (indeed most will outlive your platter spinner by a great deal), and while these drives are still arguably expensive, they are no where near the costs of yesteryear.  It’s also important to realize that you get what you pay for, and in the battle of Hard Drive (HD) vs Solid State Drive (SSD), this is clearly the case.  Let me explain…

I was first introduced to using an SSD for everyday computing when I set up my Dell Mini 9 netbook.  I could rant and rave about the wonders of this awesome, little companion, but I’ll digress and save that for another post.  The point is that, when I bought this netbook, I quickly upgraded it’s RAM and the stock drive to a fast SSD.  The results were utterly phenomenal.

Back in the day when one of your non-tech friends asked you, “How do I make my computer faster?” you’d always respond in one of two ways, “Buy more RAM.” or “Do a fresh install.”  To be quite honest RAM, while an affordable upgrade, doesn’t truly make your computer faster, it just lets you do more at any given time.  A fresh install will restore your computer to ‘factory-fresh’ condition, but its a pain to do and requires a large amount of time.  Let me just say that installing an SSD is the single-most amazing upgrade you can perform on your machine if you are looking for a speed boost in everyday computing.

“Ummm… okay, but isn’t this post about the significance of using an SSD in conjunction with my design profession?” Good point, lets get to the specifics of that…

SSD’s up until this point have been floating around in tech-head circles.  You know what I’m talking about.  The IT officianados who outfit their systems with the latest and greatest even though they don’t come anywhere close to utilizing that raw processing power.  I’m not knocking them- after all they are the ones that test drive this stuff into the ground to make sure its good for the rest of us.  Now, while the tech heads were ranting and raving about SSD’s the rest of us have been complaining about the cost of these things and not giving them a chance- “An SSD is how much?!?  Forget that, I’m going to buy a top of the line HD with double the space for half the price!”  Makes sense on the surface right?  But let’s take a closer look at why that’s flawed thinking.

An SSD is fast… no seriously, REALLY fast.  There is not a HD out there that will even come close to competing with an ENTRY level SSD.  SSD’s range in speed (rated by the speed at which they read/write files on your system), but one things for sure, they’re all fast when compared to a standard HD.

As designers, we’ve swallowed the myth that RAM is what we need the most.  Back 2-5 years ago this was somewhat true.  Computer manufactures, for whatever reason, sorely under equipped their machines with RAM.  Those were the days of 256 and 512mb of RAM as a standard.  Designers soon realized the limiting effects this had on their day to day operations and would quickly upgrade to 1, 2, 4 and sometime 8gb of RAM (though to be quite honest, anything over 4gb is overkill for your standard designer who isn’t doing much video work).  Fast forward to the machines of today and you realize that manufacturers finally have taken the hint.  Its unusual to purchase a modern production machine that has anything less than 2gb RAM.

Which brings me to my point- of all the computer processing variables and components, which one(s) are currently the most important for the graphic designer?

In my opinion, the single most important processing variable for the designer is the read/write cycles.  And that is completely dependent on your hard disk.  Years ago I worked as a designer for a large format print shop.  It was not uncommon for us to save files in excess of 1gb in file size.  This meant that saving (writing) and opening (reading) processes took large amounts of time.  To counter this issue we’d run multiple machines at any given time via a KVM switch.  At one point I was running three beastly machines at once with open and save operations running simultaneously on all three machines.  This was an odd workflow for sure, but it was the only way we could get around the amazing amount of time necessitated from these large file sizes.

With an SSD however this issue is virtually eliminated.  I recently was able to apply this to a real-world situation.  My work computer at the time was not equipped with an SSD.  I was tasked with creating tradeshow-sized displays.  The designing and saving of these huge files took me an entire (9 hour) work day.  The following day I worked from home and used my SSD-equipped netbook (yeah, that’s right my netbook) to accomplish the same size task and I did it in 2 hours.  Let me say that again: 2 HOURS (that means I was able to do the same task in 22% of the time it took me the previous day)!  This is where we get to the crux of the matter- for designers this is an upgrade you can’t afford not to make.  If you’re someone who loses a lot of time saving and opening files, then this upgrade will pay for itself as you regain precious time for your business.

A large SSD may be cost prohibitive for you, but you don’t need a large SSD to start benefitting from the speed bonuses an SSD provides.  Designers looking for speed boosts in OS startup and application launching will benefit from buying a small SSD drive (anywhere from 16gb-32gb) to dedicate to their OS and applications while they use a larger HD for file storage.  This means that everything will launch extremely quickly and you won’t lose precious time waiting as your machine slowly chugs through launching procedures.  However, if you want to gain the speed benefits of fast file saves and opens I’d recommend investing in a larger SSD (64-128Gb… anything large just isn’t cost effective in my opinion at this point) that will allow you to store more than just your OS and applications.

My personal favorite option for upgrading to an SSD is Kingston’s 64gb and 128gb SSD upgrade kits.  These kits, though not the fastest SSD on the market (but hey that’s like comparing a Ferrari to a BMW sports car… sure the Ferrari is faster and more expensive, but are you really going to be less impressed with the speed and quality of the BMW?) are at an awesome price point.  While still somewhat pricy, they won’t break the bank and you’ll get far more in return then you shelled out over the course of time.  These work in pretty much any machine with SATA2 capability.

To sum up, an SSD drive is the single best upgrade you can make to your machine as a designer.  There is nothing else currently on the market that will provide as much of a speed boost to your workflow as this.

In this screencast, I cover some more advanced ways to integrate twitter search into your freelance/business model. The first section is a basic introduction to using operators and advanced search techniques. The second section teaches you how to combine web services with software applications to create your own twitter command center.

Links from screencast: Welcome to the Hive Mind: Learn How to Search Twitter, TweetGrid, Fluid App, Prism

Boston the “Beantown”

From the moment I stepped off the plane, I have been so impressed with this gorgeous city.  I mean what else can you say when you look out of your hotel window and this is what you see (I shot this with my camerphone!):

The subway system is laid out extremely well and navigating the city is as simple as grabbing a map and heading to the nearest station.  For designers and creative types this city is a dream- it’s littered with hometown coffee shops (good riddance Starbucks…), art galleries, some incredible architecture, and friendly people who are more than willing to help you out.  I got to explore the city a bit today and hope to quite a bit more in remaining days.  Here’s just a smattering of pics that I randomly took while exploring the town today.

Projects

With all this inspiration around me I can’t help but be motivated during my off-hours.  This has led to progress on multiple projects!  While here, I’ve finished a wedding invitation I was working on, some business collateral, and am almost finished on branding/logo piece I have in the works.  Wow.  I like the effect this city is having on me.  I’ve also been learning a lot of new techniques that I’ll be able to apply to my work once I’m back in the office at Food for the Hungry (my dayjob).  Hooray for creative juices being re-infused with energy and vigor- I needed that!

Photoshop World (PSW)

I first attended PSW last year in Orlando, FL.  For what you pay, you really can’t beat the quality of what you can potentially get here.

I say potentially only because you need to know how to pick the classes, and you need to know when to get up and leave a class if you aren’t learning anything and move onto a different one.  The problem with PSW is that it, by nature, is designed to cater to both beginners and advanced users.  A majority of the classes are some what remedial, however there always at least 1 or 2 classes going on at any given time which will stretch advanced users as well- the key is finding those classes.  Having gone to last year’s conference, I’ve learned which instructors to avoid and which ones to target.  This has worked out pretty well so far and I picked up a few new tricks today.

With out a doubt, one of the best parts of this conference, is the workbook that you get.  It is massive… like really, really MASSIVE.  It contains notes for all of the classes being taught at the conference (which is roughly 80 or so I believe).  This is great, because there are 6-7 classes going on for every session time and it is impossible to visit them all.  The workbook in and of itself is worth 1/3 of fee for the conference in my opinion.  One side note- I wish they’d let you pick this thing up at the end of the day as opposed to right when you get there.  This thing is rather unwieldy and weighed down my already-full backpack for the duration of the day.  It’s no fun exploring the city with 30 pounds extra on your back… okay well its still fun, but it’d be even easier without the 30 pounds.

The Tradeshow

Interestingly enough, one of the best new ‘tricks’ I learned was actually taught to me on the showroom floor by one of the exhibitors!  I stopped by the Gridiron software booth originally in response to a tweet posted by Peter Lalonde announcing that “The first person from twitter to find me at the show will get a free copy of our new Flow software.” (which incidently, I was and did indeed win a full copy- woot!).  Angie Taylor (Gridiron’s UK Creative Director) showed me a really cool way to extract ‘piecy’ items (like hair, feathery fabrics, fur, smoke/fog, etc) using Photoshop’s calculation tools and layer channels.  It’s a great technique and the results are awesome- definitely not intuitive but really cool nonetheless.  By the way, Gridiron Flow is awesome!  Talk about a great way to control versioning, time tracking on projects, and track/find files based on their relationships all at the same time.

Two other booths/products that caught my eye at the trade show were Moo.com and Mimobot.  Moo.com just does a really quality job with their printing and presentation.  They are one of the only printers I know that lets you order business cards that have a different image on every card (granted the cost is a bit higher than other printers but this option is really nice).  I really appreciate the small details they put into their products, namely their packaging.  Their business card boxes are flat out stupendous and I’m tempted to order from them just to get that darn box!  Mimobot is just plain fun; they are a designer USB flash retailer… what does that mean you ask?  Well to put it simply they sell USB Flash drives that look like all different types of characters (cartoons, star wars, fictious, etc.). Yeah it’s nerdy/geeky but I think that’s what they were going for.

All this to say that I’m now incredibly inspired and my brain is firing off tons of ideas for personal projects.  In no particular order, my to-do list has been enlarged to add the following:

• Design a custom Mimico character based off of my DesignMutt brand and pitch to them to see if they like the design and would use it… what the heck, you never know… it just might work…
• Create an innovative leave behind piece utilizing the services of Moo.com (I can’t reveal this idea yet, but I think it would be AWESOME).
• Create a new screencast entitled “The Creative’s Guide to Never, Ever Losing Your Files… EVER!” which teaches you how to setup a virtually indestructable 4-tiered defense system on your computer to ensure that you will never lose your work.  This idea hit me like a lightning bolt and I really think it could be helpful to a lot of people and alleviate some major stress for those worried about not having a strategy for data backup/maintenance.
• Create a screencast follow-up to my previous “Using Twitter to Find Work” video.  This time show how to manage multiple accounts, monitor job results more closely, and how to combine multiple services together to empower their usefulness.
• Write a blogpost ‘interviewing’ the greatest designer this world has ever known- God.  Yeah it sounds funny, but this was a thought I had while flying this weekend.  Really, God is the the most creative being this universe has ever and will ever know.  Think about it- information design, branding, package design, 3D modeling, photography, creative writing- what we call creativity is really just our attempt to ‘copy’ THE original creative act of God himself.  This thought struck a chord in my heart and I think it would be cool to share this viewpoint through a post dedicated to it.  Not sure how I’m going to run the interview… I’ll probably search scripture up and down to get direct quotes from God to use in the ‘answers’ to my design questions.
  
• Update my portfolio using the services of AdoramaPix’s photobooks.
• Print up some new business cards for a startup idea I’ve had in the works for sometime (sneaky, sneaky my friends) through Uprinting.com.  This venture is one I’m really excited about but I will be unable to reveal for at least a few more months.

My goodness why do I do this to myself… so many things I want to do, so little time to do those in.  Ah well- at least the wheels are churning.  God has been some incredibly good to me this week and I have been refreshed in mind, body, and soul- He is so mighty and awesome!

Hey all, I’ve got some exciting news for you: we’re hosting our first ever giveaway promotion!  UPrinting.com has graciously offered to provide free printing services to two lucky individuals who leave a comment on this blog post (see specific rules below).  If you haven’t checked them out yet, why not do so now?  They’ve got a pretty cool proofing setup that lends itself extremely well to custom size orders.  So what are you waiting for?  Check out the rules for entering below and get commenting!

Many thanks to Gino Orlandi and the rest of the UPrinting.com team for this opportunity to share with the community.

How to Enter: Simply leave a comment at the end of this blog post, describing what you would use the free business cards and/or postcards for. For extra credit, post a helpful design resource link that relates to business card / postcard design and leave your twitter handle!

Prizes: On April 1st, 2009 I will select two winners based on the comments to this post. One person will receive free printing on 500 postcards and the other will receive free printing on 500 business cards courtesy of UPrinting.com!  And I promise… this isn’t an April Fool’s Joke.

Rules: Winners in the United States and Canada qualify for free shipping. Shipping fees will apply to winners outside these areas. Limit one entry per participant.

About UPrinting.com: For over 25 years, U-Printing has been a trusted leader in the printing industry, featuring its signature easy-to-use website and the famous Free File Review, a complimentary proofing service which requires no upfront payment. U-Printing offers convenient marketing support services such as design, lists, and direct mailing to help grow small and medium-size businesses nationwide. Powered by brand new fully automated in-house Komori presses and CREO direct-to-plate, they offer faster turnaround with minimal human error and lower overhead cost. This allows them to provide customers with consistently high-quality printing at the lowest possible prices.

The only problem is… many business cards aren’t designed very well at all, so my collection of cards is sorely lacking in the talent and design arena.  I was thinking to myself one day, “How can I fix this?”, and had an idea.  Read on to find out how you come in to this equation and can benefit as well…

I propose the first annual ‘Designer Business Card Exchange’.  Here’s how it works:

• The first 30 designers to leave a comment here on this post will be included in the first business card exchange.  Next, send me your email address via twitter (I’m @sonatacreative) or via my contact page here on the site.  I am asking that for the first round, only graphic designers (logo, print, web) participate.  We may open this to all creative pros later on.

• Once all 30 designer spots have been signed up for, here’s what you’ll do: I will give you my address and you will send an envelope which contains 30 of your business cards, as well as an additional self-addressed and self-stamped (I can’t afford all the postage myself!) return envelope for me to use when mailing the new business cards back to you.

• After I have received all 30 business card packs, I will add a sample card of each participating designer’s card into your self-addressed and self-stamped envelope and send it on it’s way back to you.

• In the end this means that, for sending out 30 of your business cards, you will receive back 30 unique business cards from your colleagues.  The goal behind this is to increase our contacts, creative inspiration, and interaction with one another.

A couple of  things to note:

• This is first come, first serve, so sign up soon to take part!

• Please remember to supply enough postage on your return envelope- these will be containing 30 business cards, so plan accordingly.  I live in Arizona, so if you are outside of the USA and still want to participate, make sure you plan accordingly for postage and mailing times.

• If you have an odd-shaped or overweight business card, please let me know ASAP so that we can insure it will not cost everyone more postage.

• Your address information will only be seen by myself, and not by others since you’ll be providing your own self-address envelope for the exchange.  Although… if you have it on your business cards then odds are everyone will know that information anyway… duh.

So- what say you fellow business-cardigans?  Will you join me in the first annual exchange?  Once we have 30 willing designers, we’ll start the exchange!

Hey all- this is my very first screencast.  I think I’m going to do many more of these, so please feel free to let me know what you think.  This particular screencast focuses on getting work using Twitter.  In this lesson I ’spill’ a few secrets to finding job leads and teach you how to leverage technology to this end.  I hope you find it helpful.

Design at Food for the Hungry - I’ve been up to my ears with design work at Food for the Hungry recently.  The department budgets all refreshed this month, so we have a ton of departments coming to us requesting design for print pieces.  While it is a lot of work, I can honestly say that I enjoy what I do and who I do it for.  I’m wrapping up the design work on a City Initiatives brochure (above).  This is a cool ministry that seeks to promote Biblical change right in the heart of the city we are planted in (Phoenix, AZ).  As a global relief organization, it’s easy to forget about your local community- this is a great reminder.  I’ve also been cranking out print pieces for our Hunger Corps, Artist Program, Transformational Development Conference, Website Redesign, Gifts In Kind, Child Sponsorship, and Ministry Partners departments.  So… if you wonder why you haven’t seen as much personal design work and postings… that’s why.

Logo Designs at IncSpring.com - I found a fun, new hobby- creating logos for IncSpring.com.  In a previous post I introduced IncSpring and stated a few reasons for my fondness of the service; I’ll spare you the rehash here.  Needless to say I cranked out a two more logos this last month: NerdNe.ws and Octbox.  Both of these domain names are for sale on IncSpring.com and the include their respective domain names.  If you’re looking for a niche site like NerdNe.ws (come on- that domain name is COOL isn’t it?) or a catchy, short domain like octbox.com feel free to spread that purchasing love… 

Business Cards - I finally, FINALLY got the time to order some new business cards.  I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been asked for my card while talking to someone only to come up empty handed.  To be honest, it’s been awhile since I’ve been actively looking for projects (I was actually having to turn away projects for awhile) and I hadn’t missed the cards as much.  Now that I’m getting reconnected however, these are going to be great to have.  I’m planning on going with OvernightPrints.com.  I’ve been surprisingly happy with the work they’ve done in the past for me.  There is actually a ‘hack’ way of ordering spot UV coating through them which got me really excited, especially since it doesn’t cost extra!

Building Tomorrow’s Church 2009 Website - I’m currently working on designing/developing the BTC 2009 conference website.  Last year’s conference was a tremendous hit and we are anticipating many more participants to attend this years conference.  There is a great committee of people behind the creation of this conference and I am proud to say that my church is the primary sponsor and founder of this national conference for Reformed Baptist young adults.  I didn’t get a chance to offer my services on last years site (I was getting married at the time, so my priorities were elsewhere), so I was excited to be able to lend a hand with building out this site.  It’s a labor of love (translation: it doesn’t pay in money, but it sure pays in soul)!

Resume - It’s been a long-time since I’ve updated my resume.  It’s one of those projects that always seems to get bumped onto the back burner.  Well, I finally updated it and revamped the entire format.  I’m really happy with the outcome.  I’m a staunch believer in 1-page resumes at all costs: get only the necessary info down for the reader and make sure it reads quickly, well, and includes to-the-point information.  Nobody wants to hunt through a pile of ‘dress-up’ words.  While I didn’t see the immediate relevance of revamped resume, I’m not understanding this it plays its role in freelance work as well as full-time work.  Cool!

Xenula Corporation- My good friend Brent Foster (owner of Xenula) never ceases to amaze me… the guy just does not stop innovating.  That said, he has had a ton of work for me recently.  I completed a packet of promotional materials for the GSEA competition he was involved in in Chicago.  While he didn’t win the competition, he lost to the winner of the competition so… that’s not too shabby. I had the great pleasure of being an usher in Brent’s wedding a couple of weeks ago- it was a beautiful ceremony.  Shortly after Brent returned he had more work for me; secret work.  Yep, that’s right, I can’t tell you about it per his request (ominous I know).  What can say is that he has had me working on technical drawings- something that is a really unique change-up to what I normally do as a designer.  It’s been a lot of fun and I really enjoy working with Brent and Xenula Corporation.

Speaking of secret projects- I have two other projects that I am not allowed to unveil yet per the clients request.  One is a really cool startup venture that I’m excited to be working on, the other is some site development for a really talented creative individual.  I’ll post more on these projects when I can.

As you can see- it’s been busy around here- I hope this helps shed some light on my lack of blogging!  I’ve added a few new pieces to the portfolio to reflect the influx of projects.  May you all have a very blessed week!

While some have hailed this site as just another ’spec work’ purveyor, I strongly disagree.  For one thing, the roles are reversed; in spec work, the client is naming the price while the designer deals with unfair, demeaning competition.  With IncSpring, designers are naming their own price- they are not directly competing with anyone because each brand is unique to it’s intended audience.  In my book, it’s a win-win for both sides.  I also love the fact that you can include domain names with the sale of your brand.  This is one aspect that will have entrepreneurs grinning, as the domain name game is a big part of the marketing process.

My first submission to IncSpring was an idea that I originally sketched up on a napkin called ‘Design Mutt’.  I liked the sound of the name and soon found that the domain was available too.  After putting the design of this off for awhile, I finally found the time to turn my sketch into a finished piece.  I bought the domain to finish off the package and plopped it up at IncSpring.  Take a look here and let me know what you think.  All in all, it’s been a rewarding experience.  So often my ideas end up at dead-ends; just sketches in a book.  Even if the exposure is low and the chances of this being purchased are slim, at the very least my idea is out there and available for purchase… something that can’t be said for the sketch in the book.

I was first introduced to Job a little over a year ago when I took a tour of Food for the Hungry here in Phoenix, Arizona (I did not realize at the time that I would soon become employed here as well).  I did not meet Job in person, rather, I met Job through a small 8.5” x 5.5” packet with his photo on the front.  These packets (called Child Sponsorship Packets) each contain a unique child who lives in an impoverished country.  The packet gives a brief bio of the child’s situation and status and contains paperwork for you to setup a monthly giving program to provide for his/her needs.  I felt led to make this a regular part of my life, and started sponsoring Job that day.  Unfortunately it wasn’t long before I had forgotten about my sponsorship commitment.  While it was being deducted monthly from my credit card, I really didn’t pay it much attention.  What I did not realize is that I had just embarked on more than a charitable giving campaign, I had embarked on a life-changing relationship.

Fast-forward to a few months later: I receive my first piece of mail from Job.  It was written in his hand writing specifically to me and it was accompanied by some pencil drawings of animals.  I hadn’t originally realized how I would be affected by direct correspondence with my sponsor child…  Suddenly I realized (in a panic I might add) that this child was indeed real, and my contributions were actually affecting his life!  I instantly began to feel selfish and self-absorbed.  For all my worries in life, they are nothing compared to what Job faces each and every day.  While my worst worry is: will I have enough food to enjoy those extra things in life (you know the essentials… like… coffee, fast food, movies…), there are plenty of others around the world that don’t have enough money for shoes, supplies, and yes, even food.  Talk about a reality check!

From that point on I renewed my outlook on this relationship with Job.  I vowed to pray for him consistently and to let him know that I cared for him the way Christ has cared for me.  I wrote a letter back to Job asking him questions about his life and telling him about my own.  I included a photo of myself at my workplace.  What followed was a series of corresponding letters back and forth.  Every time I’d send a letter, I’d get a letter back from Job a few months later.  It has been such a wonderful way to see poverty relief in action and to know that you really CAN make a difference in someone else’s life.

Two months ago I had another really great opportunity arise that allowed me to reach out to Job.  A friend of mine here at work was traveling to Piswa, Uganda (where Job lives) and she volunteered to go visit Job for me.  I was able to enclose some small gifts which consisted of a writing book, colored pencils, a photo, and letter from my wife and I.  I received an amazing email back from her detailing her trip.  Not only was she able to meet Job, but she was also able to have tea with his entire family- turns out Job has 6 brothers and sisters!  Job’s dad, Alfred just recently became a Christian and is seeking to train his children up in the ways of the Lord.  I also learned knew things about Job, like the fact that he wants to become a doctor and really likes Science and Math.  The family was so moved by my friend’s visit that they even gifted her with a chicken.  This is a custom of generosity and was a huge gesture of thanks from this family.  To say that I was blown away is an understatement.

I am now making it my goal to one day visit Job in Uganda.  I want to be able to speak to him face to face and to be able to hug him and let him know that he is loved.  You see, in sponsoring a child I thought that I would be the one changing someone’s life… in the end it turned out that that child actually changed me.

So what’s the point of me telling you all this?  Well, for one thing- you need to get involved.  No matter how difficult or uncomfortable it may seem, you NEED to get involved!  Many of us have been privileged with so much and we cannot afford to turn a blind eye to poverty.  There are simple ways you can get involved.  Stop making excuses and start making a difference.  Not sure where to start?  I’ll help you, simply click here.