I posted earlier about an excellent site, Mirificam Press.  Shortly after this posting I was contacted to be interviewed regarding being a designer who holds to a reformed Christian worldview by MP.  I was humbled to be considered for this opportunity and agreed to the request.  During the course of preparing for this interview, I found myself being challenged to consider how my faith impacts every aspect life.  Christianity is not a T-Shirt that you can put on and take off my friends; it is not a brand name that you can discard whenever it becomes ‘inconvenient’.  I hope that this interview is an encouragement to fellow Christians who find themselves in this profession! Many thanks to Mirificam Press for this opportunity to share my faith and profession.

I was recently turned on to a cool new website called IncSpring.  This site is basically a place for logo/brand designers to connect with entrepreneurs seeking branding for their upstart companies or initiatives.  I really think this site fills a niche in two ways: 1) It allows designers to ’shop’ their unused, innovative ideas to an eager audiences, and 2) It provides the entrepreneuring professional an appropriate outlet to shop for professional, appropriate branding work.

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.

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When I launched Sonata Creative, I came in with the intent of revamping the way I approached blogging.  I wanted to make the posts less mundane, and focus on being more purposeful and professional.  This still holds true, but I realized recently that I can’t afford to lose the personal flavor that a blog like this affords.  My friend, and fellow designer Drew Dunlap, has been posting some excellent examples of his work recently (check him out) and this got me thinking- “When was the last time I posted some recent work?”

For fun I recently entered a design pool going on over at MyInkBlog.  The goal was to create a big typography poster using the quote “What we do in life, echoes in eternity.” (Gladiator anyone?)  I love these type of side-projects because they really help me focus on being creative just for creativity’s sake and not for a paying client.  I fervently believe that its important to take time out of the daily design grind to just have fun and let your creative juices simmer.  If you’re ever feeling burned out or lacking inspiration, be sure to call a timeout and do the work you want to do.  When you’re not getting paid for creativity it can often make a world of difference.  Let me know what you think of the following pieces…

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I was excited to discover that a blurb I had written awhile back was recently featured in a posting over at FreelanceSwitch. My ‘tip’ was selected as one of their top ten “Ways to Create an Incredible Client Experience”. Sweet!

FreelanceSwitch graciously gave a free subscription to freshbooks for a year to all those they selected to the top ten. I was particularly excited about this because I have been interested in the possibility of using freshbooks for quite sometime. This will give me the opportunity to play around with and decide if its something I’m going to use longterm. I’ll keep y’all posted with the outcome.  So far I’m loving the layout and features of it!