Posts Tagged ‘creative’
Thursday, January 26th, 2012
In our 12 Questions blog series, we feature interviews with someone from the crowdSPRING community. For these interviews, we pick people who add value to our community – in the blog, in the forums, in the projects. Plainly – activities that make crowdSPRING a better community. Be professional, treat others with respect, help us build something very special, and we’ll take notice.
We’re very proud to feature Vinay and Asha (crowdSPRING username: Knifeonbutter) today. Vinay and Asha live and work in Goa, India.
1. Please tell us about yourselves.
We have traveled around the world, working in places as far and diverse as Fiji Islands and Dubai, not to mention all the cities across India. We now reside in Goa, dream beaches, sun,sand, coco feni, and like to pretend to work hard. Ideas fortunately , winning ideas save the day for us on sites such as yours. We just love crowdSPRING.
2. How did you become interested in writing?
We are both writers from the day we left college, and have worked with top 10 ad agency networks. It all started in school, when the teachers noticed we had a flair for writing, however, the idea lightbulbs started glowing, later on, after 3 years of hard, rigorous college education in disciplines as strange as physics and home sciences.
3. Who/what are some of the biggest influences on your writing?
David Ogilvy for sure. He was the greatest at one time. We never studied literature, so
we can’t quote Shakespeare. We are more fascinated with Adworld writers, Paul Hegarty, and creators like the Saatchi brothers.
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Tags: 12 questions, ads, advertising, branding, community, copywriting, creative, creativity, crowdsourcing, crowdspring, inspiration, interview, Knifeonbutter, marketing, social media, Vinay and Asha, weekly glance of awesomeness, writing
Posted in Awesomeness, community, crowdsourcing, inspiration, Interviews, marketing, social media, writing | No Comments »
Tuesday, December 13th, 2011
In our 12 Questions blog series, we feature interviews with someone from the crowdSPRING community. For these interviews, we pick people who add value to our community – in the blog, in the forums, in the projects. Plainly – activities that make crowdSPRING a better community. Be professional, treat others with respect, help us build something very special, and we’ll take notice.
We’re very proud to feature Roman (crowdSPRING username: Romasuave ) today. Roman lives and work in Northridge, California.
1. Please tell us about yourself.
My name is Roman Faiman, I am 37, husband to a wonderful woman and father to 2 amazing children, Ben who is 7 and Olivia, 4. We reside in Northridge, a suburb of Los Angeles and I do all of my designing from the comforts of my home studio/Kids play room.
I have a full time job, an Art Department Manager for a printing company, I handle all of the work that comes in and I prep it for printing, which is at times an arduous task since many so called graphic design gurus don’t really know how to set up their files for proper printing. On top of that I also spend a good 30-40% of my day creating designs for our clients. Our biggest account that I am involved in designing is The Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation, for whom I have designed anything from brochures to presentation folders to event books.
After my work day is over it’s time to work for my company, 4-8 Designs, my main focus at the moment is photo retouching, with print design, including logos, stationary secondary. My website is www.4-8designs.com
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Tags: 12 questions, blog, community, creative, creativity, crowdsourcing, crowdspring, design, designer, graphic design, graphics design, graphics designer, inspiration, interview, logo, logo design, logos, Roman Faiman, Romasuave, weekly glance of awesomeness
Posted in Awesomeness, community, crowdsourcing, design, inspiration, Interviews, Uncategorized | 3 Comments »
Tuesday, November 15th, 2011
In our 12 Questions blog series, we feature interviews with someone from the crowdSPRING community. For these interviews, we pick people who add value to our community – in the blog, in the forums, in the projects. Plainly – activities that make crowdSPRING a better community. Be professional, treat others with respect, help us build something very special, and we’ll take notice.
We’re very proud to feature Svetlana (crowdSPRING username: Allmond) today. Svetlana lives and work in Sofia Bulgaria.
1. Please tell us about yourself.
To be honest I don’t have the slightest idea (how I happened to be in the spotlight) why I am in the spotlight. It’s nice to meet you. My name (translates into) means “light”. There are scattered letters in my left hand, and northern wind in my hairs. I imagine the light, I spend my time playing the space clockwise and back, searching for the meanings, 
reaching for horizons, wondering why do we alibi only for what we’ve done, and not for what we never dare to do.
I live in Sofia | Bulgaria | (Southeastern) Europe.
2. How did you become interested in design?
Do you remember the magic of the dark room, the way the images appear on the white paper…?
I was in love with photography since I was13. As I graduated MA in Fine Art Photography, I was flying for a private air company, and working as a TV presenter for a photography edition. A teacher of mine used to say that living on a peninsula we’re (torned) torn between the water and the land. My heart was torn in few directions and neither of them was enough for itself. I think that the design gives the best opportunity to (see in your mind’s eye) envision in the most creative way ideas, visions and traveling … of brain mind, a perfect (symbiosis among) connection between water, land and air.
3. Which of your designs are your favorites and why?
First of all I have 2 favourite design projects – my daughter Ema (8) and my son Dimiter (almost 6). They never stop inspiring me, teaching me, (ushering me into the land of creativity) showing me how to be more creative. It’s amazing how we can discover the world through the eyes of the children. About my graphic design projects – certainly I try to give my best for every single design, and I feel happy and satisfied when my works are appreciated. I always say to my clients that they have to be 100% happy and comfortable with the result, so this is what matters to me – when a good idea finds the right way to show off. Not everything I like is what the client likes, so what is important is that we meet in between.
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Tags: 12 questions, Allmond, community, creative, creativity, crowdsourcing, crowdspring, design, designer, graphic design, graphics design, graphics designer, inspiration, package design, packaging design, print design, weekly glance of awesomeness
Posted in Awesomeness, community, crowdsourcing, design, inspiration, Interviews, Uncategorized | 9 Comments »
Tuesday, October 18th, 2011
In our 12 Questions blog series, we feature interviews with someone from the crowdSPRING community. For these interviews, we pick people who add value to our community – in the blog, in the forums, in the projects. Plainly – activities that make crowdSPRING a better community. Be professional, treat others with respect, help us build something very special, and we’ll take notice.
We’re very proud to feature Debs & Johnny (crowdSPRING username: UsBeingUs ) today. Debs & Johnny live and work in the countryside of central Portugal.
1. Please tell us about yourselves.
Well firstly what a lovely surprise to be asked to do this, we are touched and honoured – thank you – you will certainly get to see some of the diversity within your crowd 
Well here goes, our story……I think it could be long, so I’ll leave our previous professional background to our own website if anyone wants to know it. But UsBeingUs started really with us finding us – Johnny & I had both previously been married and when we met we were literally start again teenagers in our mid thirties – we were living in England at the time and had very normal busy lives, however we were on an uphill climb as we were start again financially too – we were often ‘stressed out’ and to be honest not necessarily the nicest of people, we had
become snappy, irritable, with little time to relax and enjoy what’s real – thankfully we recognised who we were becoming and felt it was time to try things a different way to see if we could get a bit more balance in our lives – I have traveled quite a bit previously and whilst I love my homeland, I also love the warmth and slower, more relaxed lifestyle that some other countries manage to lead – to be honest we didn’t really know what we were looking for we just knew that we wanted to experience something different, try life a different way – so we took the plunge to experience a more rural lifestyle and moved to Brittany in France in 2003. We were lucky enough to find a beautiful former farm, which we renovated together. A busy time for us as we had a big mortgage and bills to pay – but being in the countryside with space around us did give us the opportunity to experience a different way of life – we chose not have a television, which was one of the best decisions we ever made, everyone always asks us what you do???
Well we got in touch with our surroundings to begin with and we talked, we read, we surfed the net & we opened our minds to new ideas – we began finding out who we really were and discovering what felt right for us – we became vegans, our furry friends started to find us. We also took the time to teach ourselves new skills, the main ones for us, our art and graphic design, passions that have grown and grown
We decided to continue to follow our love of a more natural life & our creative passions – so we gave up the house, the heating, the running water, the dishwasher, the luxuries, the mortgage and the bills and have opted for living in a yurt here in stunning countryside of central Portugal – We have a lovely riverside plot of land and are surrounded by nothing other than nature. We live with our furry family of animals, all of whom have found their way to us one way or another, we have 14 gorgeous dogs and a cat – not planned, just fate
We are lucky enough to have had the love and patience of our family and friends, who may not quite understand what on earth we are doing, but nonetheless give us their support both with their love and their finances at times – thank you so much – you are all here with us in our hearts x
We have just had our third anniversary of living here in Portugal and so far so good, there are certainly challenges and certainly some we were not expecting, having so many dogs was one of those So it took a while with many ups and downs, but this last year, we have been finding our rhythm and so far so good – We love our ‘off grid’ lifestyle here and in time we hope to become as self sufficient as possible with a forest food garden & permaculture system – we are also just starting the process of building our own handmade ecological home to accommodate us all – That should be fun
We have now become I guess what could be described in today’s terms as an alternative couple, with a wide range of interests and ‘cookey ideas’ but in fact as you can possibly see from our art we are probably more traditional than most…
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Tags: 12 questions, blog, community, creative, creativity, crowdsourcing, crowdspring, Debs & Johnny, design, designer, graphic design, graphics design, graphics designer, illustration, inspiration, interview, logo, logo design, logos, UsBeingUs, weekly glance of awesomeness, writing
Posted in Awesomeness, community, crowdsourcing, design, inspiration, Interviews, Uncategorized, writing | 1 Comment »
Tuesday, October 4th, 2011
In our 12 Questions blog series, we feature interviews with someone from the crowdSPRING community. For these interviews, we pick people who add value to our community – in the blog, in the forums, in the projects. Plainly – activities that make crowdSPRING a better community. Be professional, treat others with respect, help us build something very special, and we’ll take notice.
We’re very proud to feature Kate Casey (crowdSPRING username: katecasey ) today. Kate lives and works in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
1. Please tell us about yourself – A lady never reveals her age, so we’ll skip that part. I am a native Floridian transplanted to Minnesota. “How did THAT work,” you say?! My husband tricked me. That’s 
how. For now I work in the mortgage industry; I’m an administrative assistant. One day, I would love to be able to parlay my love of writing into a career. But for now I must just bring home the bacon; or the cheddar. Whichever euphemism you’d like to use.
2. How did you become interested in writing? – I have always had a love of words and telling a great story. It’s a funny thing to admit, but I could stand around telling stories for hours to anyone willing to listen. The art of weaving a story is like a drug for me. It works the same with writing, creating something on paper that someone else might find interesting is so much fun for me. It’s not at all like work. I am most certainly a frustrated artist.
3. Who/what are some of the biggest influences on your writing? – I don’t know that I have any one, particular influence – Maybe Stephen King. I love his books and I’ve read them all; some of them more than twice. That’s a strange juxtaposition for someone who loves comedy as much as I do. I love observational humor. I watch things happen and how people react. I love to incorporate that into my writing. The best things always come from real life.
4. Please tell us about your favorite projects. – As far as cS goes, I like the web content projects. They really give you a lot creative freedom. I really LOVE taglines. They are like telling an interesting story in very short form. My favorite projects to work on are the ones where the buyer really gets involved and gives feedback. So many projects you get no feedback at all. That’s a bit frustrating, because I know that when I get feedback it inspires me to really put my thinking cap on. I appreciate it so much when I get those comments, good or bad from the buyer. It steers me in the direction that I need to go and from there new ideas blossom. It helps so much. I wish I could stress that fact to each and every person that has a job on cS – give feedback; you’ll get great results in return.
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Tags: 12 questions, blog, community, copywriting, creative, creativity, crowdsourcing, crowdspring, inspiration, interview, Kate Casey, katecasey, weekly glance of awesomeness, writing
Posted in Awesomeness, community, crowdsourcing, inspiration, Interviews, Uncategorized, writing | 2 Comments »
Thursday, September 22nd, 2011
I stumbled on a fun project by Alessandro Novelli, an Italian designer who created a spelling video, where each character is the initial letter of a font name. Here’s the short video:
If you’re interested, here’s a nice writeup on how Alessandro Novelli created the video.
Tags: creative, design, graphic design, typography, video
Posted in Awesomeness, community, design, inspiration | No Comments »
Tuesday, September 20th, 2011
In our 12 Questions blog series, we feature interviews with someone from the crowdSPRING community. For these interviews, we pick people who add value to our community – in the blog, in the forums, in the projects. Plainly – activities that make crowdSPRING a better community. Be professional, treat others with respect, help us build something very special, and we’ll take notice.
We’re very proud to feature Dragan Lončar (crowdSPRING username: draganfly) today. Dragan lives and works in Belgrade, Serbia.
1. Please tell us about yourself.
Hi everybody! I am Dragan. I finished graphic design at Belgrade University some fourteen years ago and ever since this is mostly what I’ve been doing, getting to the level of jobs like Art and Creative Director. Apart form my inherited immediate family, I have another family, consisting of my fellow human rights defenders, and the youngsters that need some support in building self-esteem and major encouragement, since it is very difficult to be gay in Serbia. I also have enemies, but I assure you that I never did anything to turn them against me, except for my liberal sense of humour and their unfounded envy. I lived almost a year in Helsinki, Finland, and over six years in London, UK, where I had various experiences in fast paced market, even to the point of being a Creative Partner in my own company that was buried after several unpaid pitches, just after a half million pounds budget branding and launch campaign. Somebody would say that I was never bored in my life as sometimes I cannot recall all the details. Also, because my design interests and experiences are so diverse. I practice Nichiren Daishonin Buddhism as the tool of global peace movement through the SGI organisation, changing my karma and doing something what is called ‘the human revolution’. I am one of the leaders in SGI Serbia. I love cooking the mix of Mediterranean, Scandinavian, Japanese and Thai food, and love swimming and jogging. All of that, of course, when I can grab some time from super needy clients and horrible socio-political situation in Serbia. Currently I count 38 years of age, but who’s counting… I intend to stay forever young!
2. How did you become interested in design?
When I was a child, my parents were not really poor but we lived very modestly. I was never bribed with toys, or I always wanted the most expensive ones which they couldn’t afford. I was always inclined toward quality rather than quantity. Since my sister is much older than me, I could be considered as a single child who was often alone. So I spent time making castles of playing cards, or I would recycle any packaging that would come into my hands, and make furniture, cars, or anything that I could resemble or that took my fancy at given moment. Later, I don’t see if I really had a conscious choice. It was more an inclination that had to be fulfilled.
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Tags: 12 questions, ads, advertising, blog, branding, community, creative, creativity, crowdsourcing, crowdspring, design, designer, Dragan Lončar, draganfly, graphic design, graphics design, graphics designer, inspiration, interview, marketing, package design, packaging design, weekly glance of awesomeness
Posted in Awesomeness, business, community, crowdsourcing, design, inspiration, Interviews, Uncategorized | 4 Comments »
Monday, September 19th, 2011
This week I will be speaking at Ad:tech London with our friend John Winsor, the CEO of Victors and Spoils. We will be discussing the future of the agency, the current business climate, crowdsourcing and the new models for delivering creative in the post-agency world.
Among other questions, we will be discussing the economic impact of the new models (who benefits, who gets hurt, and who cares?); the institutional aversion to change in the agency model: client resistance to the new models and how companies like V&S are helping to break that down; small business economics and access to great creative via the crowd; small agencies and how they can compete effectively in the new models; and new media models, information democracy, and the DIY economy.
While the ad industry continues to grow, this is a time of dynamic change: the rise of digital capabilities and smaller agencies built specifically around these are posing a great challenge to the traditional incumbents. For instance, Ogilvy & Mather has been in business for almost 7 decades and employs over 16,000 people in 125 countries. Victors and Spoils has one tiny little office in Boulder, Colorado and a tiny staff, but are leveraging the global creative crowd to service clients like Dish Network and Harley Davidson. Can a slow-moving behemoth like Ogilvy compete effectively against nimble newcomers a fraction of its size? Can great ideas come from places other than the traditional agency? There has been lots of discussion on this general theme and many have been writing about it for the past few years; I wanted to share a few great posts on the topic and get the juices flowing prior to Ad:tech!
Mike Carlton: The Nimble Agency ”It wasn’t so long ago that when someone wanted to learn about an agency the first question asked would be, ‘What are their billings?’ The underlying issue was, ‘How big are they?’”
Edward Boches: Five things ad agencies have to get good at ”Ad agencies are really good at certain things. They’re masters of simplifying and focusing. They’re great at creating – or better yet revealing – a brand’s story. They know how to get attention.
John Winsor: “The Future of Advertising“ The question for creative agencies is whether they can wake up, react to what’s going on, engage the crowd, and make themselves a part of the new reality.
David Armano: Agency Ecosystems ”I started to think about how experience design fits into the bigger picture within the agency setting”Image: crowdSPRING
Tags: ad:tech, ads, advertising, agencies, branding, copywriting, creative, creativity, crowdsourcing, design, entrepreneur, entrepreneurship, future, inspiration, leadership, marketing, social media, Strategy
Posted in business, crowdsourcing, design, marketing, social media, Strategy, Technology | 8 Comments »
Wednesday, September 7th, 2011
Although project galleries on crowdSPRING can be visible to all users, crowdSPRING offers buyers the option to make their project galleries completely private.
We put together this short tutorial to help you understand the differences between public and private galleries and to answer some of the most common questions we regularly hear from users, including: Do public or private galleries get more entries? Which one is better for which type of project? Can gallery settings be changed after a project is posted?
PUBLIC (open) GALLERY
In a design project, the entries in a public gallery are visible to all users (in writing projects, the galleries are always private). If the project has an NDA (non-disclosure agreement) the gallery is visible after the NDA is executed.
When buyers score entries, creatives can only see their own scores and comments from the buyer (until after a project is awarded, when scores – but not comments – are revealed). Creatives can use the “Project stats” tool at the top of the gallery to decide if the buyer is active in the project (this tool show the total number of comments and the score distribution in the project).
PROs
FOR THE BUYER - Although opinions are split about open and closed galleries, we’ve found that more creatives tend to participate in open gallery projects (there are plenty of exceptions, because the size of the award, quality of the brief, and other factors also play an important role). Since we make it very easy for anyone to report potential violations of intellectual property, open galleries also make it easier for other participants to flag problem entries.
FOR THE CREATIVE – The creatives can see the competition, how other designers solve the problem, and bring up their own designs accordingly. They may also see if they can add something new to the project, or realize the competition is too stiff, and choose to move on to something else.
CONs
FOR THE BUYER – If a buyer is concerned about privacy, open galleries may not be the best option. A public gallery will allow others to see the ideas in the gallery. So if you’re concerned about privacy, you should definitely consider a private gallery. Also, some creatives only prefer to work in private gallery projects. This is a minor point because overall, participation in open gallery projects is very high.
FOR THE CREATIVE- If a creative has a unique concept, posting in an open gallery will show others that concept – and some creatives are leery of letting other creatives see (and potentially copy) their work in progress. We have strict rules about concept copying (see Q&A 14 in our post about intellectual property) – if an original concept is copied, the creative can easily report the entry by clicking ”Report violation” in the details view for that entry.
PRIVATE (closed) GALLERY
In a private gallery, only the buyer can see all of the submissions. Creatives only see their own entries in that project.
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Tags: blog, community, creative, creativity, crowdspring, design, designer, gallery, graphic design, graphics design, logo design, private gallery, public gallery
Posted in community, crowdsourcing, design, Site Updates | 5 Comments »
Monday, August 29th, 2011
Like small businesses, most not-for-profits have limited resources, ambitious goals, and finite capacity. Many NFPs operate in ways that would not be considered ‘business-like,’ AND these organizations, like their small, for-profit cousins, can benefit by leveraging the ideas and tools that we often discuss in the Lean Marketing series.
Here are 8 tips for not-for-profit organizations on marketing their organizations, and some tools and suggestions for setting goals, maximizing resources, and extending capacity.
1. Define your goals.
Many NFPs have long-range plans, ambitions, and a clear mission. But one of the tenets os lean marketing is to define short-term and intermediate goals. It is of critical importance that NFPs define smaller, intermediate goals which are highly measurable and allow the organization to assess whether the strategies and tactics in use are successful. When determining these it is important to be as specific as possible, and to determine in advance how progress will be measured. Here is a post which goes into greater detail on the topic of setting goals.
2. Have a plan.
Put it on paper. Like most business startups, NFPs should also write their plan out in the form of a report or a presentation. Key to this process is homework: research, research, research. It is just as important for NFPs to write a formal document as it is with a for-profit business and the content of the plan should have many similarities to a formal business plan: an executive summary, a description of the market space and size, competitive analysis, and projections of growth and description of how that growth will be measured
3. Understand your market.
Many NFPs don’t view their organization as being a participant in a market, but the truth is they are. A market merely defines the aggregate of demand for a product or service and every organization, whether for profit or not participates in one. Without a clear understanding of your market, it’s size, shape, and composition it is impossible to define goals, raise funds, or execute strategy. Ross made a video on this topic and it is just as relevant for NFPs as it is for all small business and startups.
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Tags: community, creative, crowdsourcing, design, entrepreneur, entrepreneurship, facebook, leadership, marketing, NFP, not for profit, pr, public relations, small business, smallbiz, social media, start-up, startup, startups, Strategy
Posted in business, community, crowdsourcing, How To, marketing, social media, start-up tips, Strategy | No Comments »
