Elastic Media Freelance Web Design Leeds

I posted this onto Elastic's Facebook Page the other day, but it got such a good response, I thought I'd include it here. It's built using Google's Search Story Video Creator.

"At present I have about £150,000 of work on the order book directly from the web site. We've also been specified by a number of architects who’ve visited the site, so that's a real bonus to us and a sign the site is reaching its most desirable audience."

Scott Chafer
Architectural Street Furnishings

After a long and productive day at the digital coalface, there’s nothing quite like a cool refreshing beer. A personal favourite is anything from Brooklyn Brewery (I can recommend the pictured Black Chocolate Stout by the way *). This isn’t just because of its cool, refreshing taste * but also because of the design of its packaging and labelling which I’ve always liked.

So I was happy to find out that the entire Brooklyn Brewery identity - from day one - has been designed by New York graphic design legend Milton Glaser.

Good stuff, inside and out!

Milton Glaser Inc
Brooklyn Brewery

* Although true, this is an obvious plug in the vain hope that Brooklyn Brewery sends me some free beer.

I was really excited to be asked to design WWF New Zealand’s Annual Report for this year. I had some really great imagery and content to work with.

Anyway, see what you think. You can download and view the report here: WWF New Zealand

Well, who’d of thought it! A week or so ago I received an email from a budding web designer asking how I'd created the header graphic for my site. He said he'd seen Elastic Media featured in Web Designer Magazine. I had no idea, so I bought a back issue, and bingo! There we go, No. 8 in the "Blog Beautiful" section. Thank you Steven Jenkins!

" Smart, stylish, contemporary and cool are just a few adjectives to describe what you will find in this issue's Blog Beautiful. Features editor Steven Jenkins has taken it upon himself to choose 24 of his current and former favourites that has left him open-mouthed in awe… "

I needed a new phone. My long serving SPV C550 had degraded to such a point that it had really started to annoy me, so I was on the lookout for a replacement.

Initially, I was dead set on HTC’s Touch HD. Side by side the specs looked comparable to the iPhone, which I was also considering …and it ran Windows Mobile.

Now, Windows Mobile isn’t a great OS by any stretch of the imagination, in fact its pretty much awful, but that’s what worked with my outlook/exchange setup, and I was looking for the path of least resistance.

Unfortunately in their wisdom, Orange decided not to offer me the HD on upgrade. I’m unsure why it wasn’t made an option, but I gave up trying for it and my attention wandered back over into Apple territory.

The iPhone is obviously a great phone, but the 3GS had just been launched on O2, prices were raised across the board(!), and the 24 month contract that was on offer started to seem like an awfully long time. Then the HTC Hero was launched.

Recently the social networking site Facebook introduced what people have begun to call Vanity URLs. Instead of your profile page having a long and difficult to remember URL such as http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=123456789, you can now choose a username that will get tacked on to the end of the URL such as facebook.com/johnsmith.

This doesn't mean a huge amount to most Facebook users. Most people leave their profile page fully viewable only by people they've become 'friends' with (this is the default setting). Your friends have you in their friends list, therefore there's no real need to have a short, memorable URL to give out to people.

However, Vanity URLs make much more sense when you look at Facebook Pages. Any user can create a Facebook Page. People create pages to allow Facebook users - or 'fans' - to congregate around a common interest.

So as part of managing my Personal Brand I've been looking into the places on the internet where you can set up for free. Free websites in other words. Back in the 60's the main player in this area was Goecities. They provided a relatively easy way to create a website and share with the world pictures of your cat. Geocities is no more, but arguably the likes of Facebook, Bebo, and MySpace have stepped in to fill that gap. Everyone now can have a 'presence' on the web.

But what if sharing cat pictures isn't your main concern. What if you're a fledgling business and want a professional website to reflect that? Generally you'd employ the services of a web designer, but if money was tight, how would using these free web services compare to a bespoke website?

A Film by Aaron Stapley and Sarah Castelblanco

Nice film. As a small business myself, I identify with a lot of points in this.
...especially the hours!

I'm finding the subject of personal branding of great interest lately. Especially being a design freelancer.

But what is personal branding? Well, what is a brand?! Generally speaking, a brand is the way people associate with, or feel about a product or service. Branding is the act of manipulating that association or feeling to differentiate said product or service from it's competition. So, personal branding is manipulating the way people associate or feel about you. Reading that back, it sounds much more evil than it is!

Think of it this way. If you're going to a job interview, you'll clean your shoes, comb your hair, wear your Sunday best. You want the interviewer to have a good impression of you. Well, in the world of business, and especially online, there's a myriad of ways to 'clean your shoes'.