Twitter is gaining more momentum each day and everyone wants in.  The problem is, people are starting to use Twitter but give up after a short while due to lack of followers/conversing.  Here are some of the ways I have built my followers over the past couple years.  Yes, building twitter followers takes some time, but it’s worth it in the end.

1) Twitter is a big community.

You have to retweet what others say (that you obviously like and want your followers to see) and you have to reply to people who mention you.  It also helps if you mention people out of the blue and just build them up with something nice to say about them.

2) People care about the small things.

If you spend all your time just tweeting ‘quotes’ or ’scriptures’ or ‘jokes’ … people sometimes have a deaf ear, but if you become more personable and tweet about your daily life (i.e: “Going camping with the family and can’t wait to spend some quality time with them”).

3) Don’t follow too many people all at once.

If you decide to follow someone, they will get an email.  Lets say when they open up that email, it says YOUR NAME, they skim your profile, then see that you follow 1000 people and only have 100 followers, they will most likely think that you are just mass following random people and don’t really care about them specifically.  The best way to build followers slowly but surely is every time you find someone worth following, you tweet why you are going to follow them or mention them somehow, then obviously follow through and click that follow button.

4) Use #HASHTAGS!!

Hashtags are an easy way to get someone to notice what you are doing.  Hashtags can be used in a couple of ways.  The main use is when someone wants to track what the tweet is about.  For example, if I were going to tweet about something in American Idol it would go something like this:

“I can’t believe they voted of PIA! What is wrong with this world? #americanidol #ai”

What this does is anyone who is searching for american idol [on twitter] will see your tweet in that stream and if they agree with you or see that you have that in common with them, they may follow you.  The other use of hashtags is more for fun – but making a point like so:

“My wife made the best apple pie #mywiferocks” or   “I just love when people cut me off on the highway and I go into the ditch #sarcasm”

5) Recommend people for Follow Fridays.

Follow Fridays is something that people put out on Fridays… (duh).  Ha, and well they use the hashtag #ff or #followfriday and recommend people that they think their followers should also follow.  http://techdows.com/2009/09/what-is-follow-friday.html

6) Make sure you have a BIO

If you don’t have a bio, then how will I know who you are or what you do. Also, a little wit goes a long way here.

7) Refrain from always posting your tweets in the form of a question.

It can be good once in a while… but people who form all their tweets in a form of a question come off desperate.

This is a sure fire way to get a good follower base that you can connect with on a daily basis.

I truly consider my logo’s being published to be an honor, because it was books like iheartlogos that provided me with the inspiration to pursue my career in design in the first place. Seeing my work published in a design book means so much to me, because it means that my work may be able to inspire someone years from now, as well as providing me with the ability to show my work to the people who are close to me.

Here are some pictures from iheartlogos facebook page and you can see a few of my logos (homespun chili & jupiter grill) being printed:

The books are being printed as I write this article and can be ordered here.  Get your copy today, or if you are an up and coming logo designer, start submitting your work today!

My job the past weekend was to finalize the logo and create certain illustrations/elements to play in a supporting role for Josh’s design.  Here are the final steps in the many directions we took regarding the fixel logo.

First Concept: The first concept was a custom sans serif.

I had originally sketched out some custom script and wanted to give it a try.  Here are some of the sketches I was looking at when doing the next few logos:

These sketches helped create the following logos:

I liked the above directions but something about them just kept irking me.  The main reason for the change (seen below) is because of the thickness.  When we were building the site, we made it clean and modern… which the logo (that was rounded and bubbly) felt completely out of place.  I went back to the drawing board and scripted it with my own handwriting.

Overall, I’m very pleased with this direction and can’t wait to start using it in different mediums.  Check out wearefixel.com to see what we are up to!  The site is still in development, so excuse the dust.

Audiologists aren’t known for having professional logos or websites.  They wanted to use this to their advantage to help make themselves stand out from the crowd.  The initial thought process didn’t have much direction except that they wanted something with hands in it.  They really wanted to drive home that they were different than most hearing aid dealers.  I had enough information from them to get started.  The first round of concepts were presented:

Sketching:

Yes I know these are some bad hands, that is what a computer is for.  I sketch to generate concepts and composition.

Concept 1:

Two hands forming an ear in the negative space.

Concept 2:

Here I combined two ears with inner lobes to create a butterfly silhouette.  Butterflies are often associated with care.

Concept 3:

Here I drew a simple silhouette of an ear and sound marks going into the ear.  I was trying to focus on the “center” of the ear.

After these concepts were presented, there wasn’t much positive feedback to be taken except that #1 wasn’t clear enough to be an ear, #2 was too childish looking, and #3 didn’t represent care very well.  After some more discussion with Michael, I went back to the drawing board and looked into some other possible ideas.  Here is what was presented in the next round of concepts:

Concept 4:

After talking with Michael, we thought about looking into a heart as a symbol that would be acceptable for the word “care.”  This concept represented that the main care of the audiologists was ears and that they loved to take care of them.  I also wanted to present a different color scheme that was warm and inviting.

Concept 5:

Here I wanted to present a different idea.  I wanted to use a hand and make the main focus the sound waves.  The design was better in my head.  Sometimes that happens.

After presenting these, they let me know that I was going in the wrong direction.  We talked again about an ear/hand combo and I went back to the drawing board.  I think I spent an entire weekend looking at ears and hands.  I would consider myself an ear expert.  With some renewed inspiration, I presented another concept with the hope that this would wet the whistle of the client.  Here is what I presented in the next round:

Concept 6:

In this concept, I thought it really embodied everything they were looking for.  I hadn’t seen anything like it and thought the ear turned out well.  You could clearly see the hand/ear combo.  Someone also pointed out that the hand looked like sound waves (not my intention, but it is abstractly there).

Again, this one fell short.  I was a bit discouraged and was going to just throw in the towel.  I read the clients feedback and it was frustrating.  I couldn’t understand how none of these worked.  Instead of walking away, I was determined to work through this and make them happy no matter what.  It was time to go back to what did peak their interest.  I decided it was time to get some feedback from the community on the first design and see how I could improve the ear inside the negative space.  With the help of a few designers on dribbble… well take a look at the progression:

Concept 1 (again):

Revision #2:

The ear is becoming more defined with some bending of the fingers.

Revision #3:

More bending of the fingers and a new inner lobe design.

Revision #4 (final):

Client approved version with type:

After about 5 weeks, we ended up with something that we were both happy with.  It just goes to show you, that if you really care, you can make the client happy.  As long as both parties are on course in the right direction, progress can be made.  I hope you enjoyed another look into my design process and would love to hear any comments or thoughts on the final outcome.  Also, I don’t think I’ll ever take another “ear” project again.

As many of you know (if you own an ipad), holding it in some positions can sometimes feel awkward and even give you a cramp in your hand.  I must say that after holding this device for hours, it just felt like an extension of my arm.  It’s feels almost Cyberdine’ish.  Whenever you hold the iPad with two hands, it’s nearly impossible to type.  This is especially true for women or kids who have smaller hands. With the hand-e-holder, you are only able to type with one hand but it’s still pretty quick.  Here are some pictures of the product:

1. This is the iPad with the product below.  It can be used as an elevation device for cushioning and can tilt towards you if you want it to.

2. Here is what the product looks like.  The Hand-e-holder rotates 360 and really makes using the iPad easy.

3.  A close up of the Hand-e-holder.  The strap can be undone and fitted to your hand.

4.  The Hand-e-holder is easily detachable so you can fit your iPad into any existing case.  The back adhesive you see here is not velcro but actually referred to as “dual lock.”  Look at the next picture to see a close up.

5.  Here you can see the dual lock technology.  At a first glance, it looks like velcro.  However, this is stronger than any velcro or adhesive.  It is made by 3m and can be described as little mushrooms that interlock.  It is truly remarkable just how strong these are.  I’ve heard there is a video somewhere of two people playing ping pong with two iPads equipped with Hand-e-holders.

6.  You can see the dual lock ring on the back of the Hand-e-holder.  The only con here is you have to push it in with a good amount of force.. so much so it feels like you might crush your ipad.  No worries though, you’re iPad can’t bend.

Overall I must say that this product has changed the way I use my iPad.  I would recommend it to anyone using an iPad.  If you have any questions, visit their website here.  Thank you Jeff for letting me test this out.  Looking forward to using this more and more for many days to come.

During the past week, we stayed at Marriot Harbor Beach Resort in Ft Lauderdale and had the time of our lives just relaxing.  We decided the first day that we werent going to have an itinerary and just go with the flow.  This turned out to be so much more relaxing than we could have ever of imagined.  Normally on vacations, people try to jam pack their days with all kinds of activities to do.  This results in more stress than when your at home.  No cell phones, no computers, just relaxing and watching some shark week.  My wife and I also got to hang out with none other than Mr Two Giraffes.  He so graciously treated us to the world famous Jaxson’s Ice Cream.  Who would have thought I would see one of my clients/ now friends twice in a a few months.

After enjoying ourselves in Ft Lauderdale all week we got back on Sunday.  We obviously were having withdrawls from not eating Monoglian Barbecue all week so we went straight from there from the airport.  After that we enjoyed shopping and walking downtown Ann Arbor.  We got back to our place to find our dog (who was in a boarding kennel all week by herself) more excited than ever to see us.

Unpacking and relaxing continued on and then realized we had no groceries – My wife, was not going to have any of that so she went with her sister to the grocery store.  After coming back they brought in some of the groceries and told me there were a couple things left in the car to go grab.  So I got up and went outside to grab what was left and low and behold, a 27″ iMac was sitting in the backseat.

I. WAS. IN. SHOCK.

I had no idea what to do.  At first I was thinking “oh crap, she just ruined the surprise” and then turned around to see that my wife and her sister followed me outside to capture my reaction.  It was incredible.  I still feel like I’m dreaming.  My wife is one seriously amazing woman.  I know she’s a keeper so you don’t have to tell me twice.

This new iMac is exactly what I needed and she got it for me.  I have quite a few upcoming web design projects to do so this is going to come in handy.  I’m sure I’m not the only one, but designing a website is a bit harder on a 15″ screen.  I know many of you do it, and so did I.  I can’t wait to be able to see the entire canvas of a site I’m working on… that was the main draw for this big of a screen.  Going with the shopping spree mode, I shelled out some more moola to make sure I was set to go and bought the Adobe Design Standard CS5.  I only use photoshop, illustrator, and sometimes indesign so it worked out perfect.

Happy 1 Year Babe – I’m excited for many new things to come and I am looking forward to putting this gift to work!

If you’re a designer you know about dribbble. Even if you’re not a designer, you still probably know about dribbble. For those who don’t know, it’s basically a place where you can post screenshots of what you’re working on to get feedback, constructive criticism, and hopefully praise from your peers.

If you typically give a penny for someone’s thoughts, you’d probably only give half that for mine. So  despite a lot of talk lately over what dribbble is or isn’t, how it’s supposed to be used, who’s right and who’s wrong, I’m not going to dive into that…yet. Rather I’d like to offer just a simple guide for how to use dribbble to benefit both yourself and your fellow dribbblers.

Read more about the entire post here: “How to Use Dribbble.”

After we established the direction of the logo and the color palette, the next step was to design the website.  The logo was quite illustrative and fun so we thought it would be a good idea to continue that theme throughout the site.  His previous site, named Tributary Development was a very useable site, but in no way represented who he was and what his business encompassed.  The new site’s goals were to reflect a fun, laid back developer, who is passionate about two things: 1. Making sure code was top notch and  2. Always making the client happy.  Below you can see a glimpse of his previous site for Tributary Development.

As you can see, it was very basic and just didn’t look creative enough to stand out in the crowd.  I really wanted to take the design up a notch and to have it reflect his personality.  After talking to Toni about some possibile ideas for illustrations, I decided to illustrate his office.  He sent me some pics and I then started drawing out some possible ideas.  After I drew one that I like (seen below), I decided to mock it up and use it as the homepage illustration.

Here is what it looked like mocked up.

Toni was thrilled with the way it came out and the different elements that were incorporated into it.  I think my favorite thing about the illustration is the fact that he is a Linux/Windows guy all the way.  I’m a mac guy and so appropriately, I provided him with two imac screens .  I told him it would look better to clients.  After that we carried this illustration onto the business cards:

The next steps were to develop the rest of the pages.  We talked about some ideas but he had no idea I was going to illustrate every page.  Needless to say, he was pretty happy with the theme throughout the site.  Below you can see how the other pages turned out.

Services Page:

About Page:

Portfolio:

Some fancy new forms and a nicely illustrated footer:

Overall I love the way the site came out and the unique one of a kind look that it has.  He will be able to have lots of fun coding it and implementing some new features into it.  Visit the site here and if you need any code work, hire this guy.  He’s unreal.

Speaking of which, BBQ War inspired me in this post.  I’ve been doing some indoor grilling lately (condo rules won’t let me have a grill outside) with my george forman or skillet over the stove.  I decided to collect some logos that were both conceptually sound and tasty to look at.  So with that, enjoy these barbecue logos that will most likely make you hungry.

Texas Barbecue Academy

BBQ

Weststreet Deli

BBQ Man

Q BBQ

BBQ Notes

Bohan Barbecue

Good Nature Pork

Mondora Grille

Roadside Ribs

Red Star Fish Bar

Stack Shack Barbeque

Tallgrass

Uncle Billy’s Barbeque

Big Daddy’s Backyard Grill

California BBQ Association

Wing Basket

BBQ War

And there you have it, just some fun logos to be inspired by.  Now, go eat some barbecue and don’t work too hard.

Also, If you’re not on this list, it’s not a ’shot’ at you or its not that I don’t like you.  I seriously couldn’t remember everyone and if you leave a comment below with your twitter info, I will keep updating the list.  Enjoy and let me know your thoughts.  Also, they are not ranked in order of favorite to least favorite.

And of course, I know I’m missing some people.  If you would be so kind to recommend them in the comment section, I will gladly add them to this new and updated list.  And if you would like to, you can follow me here: twitter.com/brand_clay.

Having been a member of Logolounge for about a year now, the exposure you get from it is incredible.  Not to mention, you have the opportunity to connect with top creative firms and freelance designers around the world.  If you are a logo designer, you need to be on that site.

The logos chosen were some of my favorites.  The first one was Brandstack; an online logo marketplace where you can go to sell unused and new logo designs.  They also implemented upstack, a new and innovative way to hire graphic designers who range from logo design to web design.

The other two logos that were chosen are We Heart Short Films; a popular blog dedicated to reviews and news about short films, and  Video Burst; a video production/editing company in Michigan.

Thanks LogoLounge for the Inclusion!  Time to start uploading lots of new work!

Church: Grove Church
Designer: Sabingrafik, Inc.

Church: Watermark Community Church
Designer: Jon Flaming Design

Church: Lord of the Ring
Designer: Jon Falming Design

Church: CalledToBusiness
Designer: Siah Design

Church: Grace
Designer: Pure Fusion Media

Church: Cross
Designer: Vonster

Church: Ministry Studio
Designer: Mattson Creative

Church: First Family
Designer: Marlin

Church: 4 charis
Designer: Green Ink Studio

Church: Conferences of Churches
Designer: Albonello

Church: Westwood Lutheran Church
Designer: Schwartzrock Graphic Arts

Church:First Baptist Church of Paducah
Designer: Vladimir Sijerkovic

Church: Dig for Saint Michaels
Designer: Down with Design

Church: The Well Church
Designer: Brandclay

Church: Grapevine Church
Designer: Brent Couchman Design

Church: Crossway Church
Designer: The Infantree

Church: Hebraic Christan Global Community
Designer: Mattson Creative

Church: Addington Baptist Church
Designer: Visual Inventor

Church: First United Methodist Church
Designer: Oxide

Church: Twin Oaks Presbyterian
Designer: Metagramme

Church: Valley Creek
Designer: Church Media Group

Church: Seeds of Grade
Designer: Rick Landon Design

Church: Bethel Temple
Designer: Church Media Group

Church: Westbrooke Church
Designer: Blues Cue

Church: First Trinity
Designer: Brandclay

Church: Calarus Group
Designer: Murillo Design

Church: Kingdom Advance
Designer: Second Shift Design

I hope you enjoyed this post.  Which one was your favorite?  Did I miss any?  Leave a comment below with your thoughts.

Here is a list of the sites I used for references:

Logopond
LogoLounge
Logomoose

Contracts are a great way to hold the client and designer accountable.  Contracts can always back up what was discussed prior to the project and include all the responsibilites for both parties.  It’s important to have a contract for every project in case things turn south and you need to have everything in order.  In this post I will lay out some of the things that you should include while making your design contract.  I would open up a microsoft or pages document and start with:

1.  Project Name:

Clearly identify the project and name.  Save all files that associated with this project with a similar name and in a folder that is easy to find.  You need to be organized and detailed.

2.  Contractor Information:

This is most likely going to be you or someone who works for you.  This needs to list all the people who are going to be involved in working on the project.

3.  Client / Company Contact Information:

You need to make sure you get the names, emails, and phone numbers of everyone of the company you are going to be doing work for.  This is important because you’ll always be able to pull up information quickly.

4.  Client / Company Billing Information:

Grab their home address (if applicable) or their company office.  Business residence address with phone number of the company and general information email and operator contact.

5.  Project Start Date:

Have this so you can always look back and verify when the project officially started.  Email is not good enough since it is not signed.

6.  Projected End Date:

This is important if you are working with a deadline.  Be sure to add in this area that it can be amended if discussed and agreed by email.

7. Milestone table:

This is usually set up as a table.  - You can set it up like this:

#   |   Milestone   |   Deliverables   |   Target Timeframe   |   Cost

8.  Terms and conditions:

Accessibility – Here is where you will detail when and how often you can/would like to be contacted. Daily hours, estimated hours of work, how to contact; including phone numbers, IM services, etc.

Delivery – Here again (as you can see it is important) is where you will want to list projected end dates and delivery of files.

Payment - Determine price, retainers, incremental payments, deposits, etc upfront and be very clear and direct.  Include when everything is due.

9. Signatures:

Make sure you have 3 lines for your signature, your printed name, and the date.  Same goes for the Client/Company.

10.  Trademarks & Copyright

Graham Smith from Imjustcreative says (I have added this to my contracts – Thanks Graham):

“Due to the lengthy and often costly procedures required to initiate any form of Trademark, Copyright, and legal name search, I am unable to help with this.

If you require the logo to be trademarked, then you must seek appropriate legal advice.”

11. Artwork release form:

I scoured google for some different types (I usually require the company to draft this) of artwork release forms.

Check them out here

I would love to hear your thoughts on this and if it helped you or not.  Remember, you don’t have to follow these exactly and you can make it unique to you, but these are key in order to keep your work and your business safe.

1.  Sketching:

Sketching is a vital part in the logo design process.  It allows you to get out of your comfort zone and really lets you explore all the options that are possible.  You can instantly explore ideas that wouldn’t be possible with the computer.  Sketching allows you to try things that would be uncomfortable in a computer application.  Putting pencil to paper is the easiest way to let your god given creativity loose.

2.  Mind Mapping:

People often underestimate the importance of mind mapping and brainstorming.  In my questionnaires (download available below), I always ask the client to give me a list of keywords that best describe their company.  I take those words and plug them into the dictionary and thesaurus, often finding better words that use a more illustrative definition.  This allows you to start thinking about images and symbols rather than words.

3.  Moodboard/Questionnaire:

Another part that is often overlooked in the process is getting a sense of what the client wants before the project starts.  Colors, fonts, style, etc are all key elements that you need to know before starting.  I have attached a sample of my logo questionnaire, in case you’d like to see what I ask my clients.  One of my main questions in the questionnaire, and the one I often rely on the most, is the question about what kind of logos they like.  I have them attach/link logos they like.  Be careful and make sure you read about who their company is trying to appeal to.  These two could potentially conflict.

4.  Choose the right typeface:

I am not a typography expert, but I have been able to pair fonts with logos rather easily.  I don’t know all the technical terms but I would recommend reading:

How to Choose a Font – Just Creative Design

On Choosing Type – I Love Typography

Typography – Graphic Design Info

I would recommend any of these sites, especially I love typography.  For a list of sites to get some unique fonts, I would visit veer, myfonts, fontshop, house industries, and linotype.  These are some great places to buy and get free fonts.

5. Lateral thinking:

You will often find the most successful logos have a hint of hidden elements in them.  Hidden images, hidden meanings, something that makes you go “aha!”  Now this isn’t the case all the time, but when a logo does this, it does evoke some thought.  I remember reading a blog post done by David Airey about a book named “Lateral Thinking – Creativity Step by Step.”  This book changed how I thought about approaching logo design.  It teaches you to think way outside the box… something that is needed when designing logos.

6.  Presentation:

Presenting the logo to the clients is always very important.  Everyone has their way of doing it.  I personally do it a very simple way.  I produce low res jpegs that show the logo in full color, black and white, and in grayscale.  This allows the client to see the logo in the three different formats that it will most likely be used in.

7.  Revisions:

Ah! the word revision can often be coined as a four letter word.  Often the reason why is because of all the horror stories you hear about from clients from hell, and who can forget the hilarious article by the oatmeal “How a Web Design Goes Straight to Hell.”  I would say to you though, to look at the word revision in a new way.

It’s also important before I go any further, that if you are a logo designer, you have to set a limit to how many revisions you give the client after a concept is presented.  If you say unlimited, you are in for one heck of a ride.  I’ve been there… I’m never going back.

That being said, revisions are actually something that can be very helpful.  Sometimes, when you stare at something for so long, you start to lose it.  When you give the design to the client, its a fresh new eye looking at it; they may see something that you don’t.  You can see a case where the end logo was better than the beginning one here.

As always, I’d love to hear some steps that you guys take and what your thoughts are on this post.  Thanks and look forward to hearing from you.

Other Links:

Quality Logo Products