Daily Brad, the blog

Here’s a logo I recently finished for Zensterz. (The URL won’t really go anywhere right now as the official site won’t launch for another couple months.)

Click image to view larger

Zensterz is a subscription-based online portal where family groups can share events, coordinate activities, brag about recent trips or promotions, etc. They can do all this within a password-protected site that’s packed with Web 2.0 features (ie Software-like functionality). There’s more to Zensterz which I can’t talk about (which gives it an extra punch to stand out in a fairly crowded space of “family websites”), since it’s still under wraps for the time-being, so you’ll have to be on hold until it goes live.

The selected concept that was taken to completion was based on and illustration of two individuals (one green, the other orange) who are conversing through the letter “Z”. The blue circle and relative roundness of the shape behind them represent the wrapping of the two individuals from around the globe where they arrive at the “Z” (representing zensterz) that is made from the negative space from their faces. I used an all-lowercase version of the font Gill Sans, to emphasize the ending of zensterz (with a “Z”). Gill Sans has always seemed like a “friendly” font with its mixed chunkiness, but still have a professional appeal. Seemed appropriate.

Paris Hilton. Even the mention of her name elicits some kind of response in most everyone. You either like her or hate her. But either way, as a graphic design and developer of brands, I’ve gotta hand it to the girl - she’s a brand powerhouse.

I recently read a blog post by the folks over at Strategic Name Development about Paris Hilton launching a new Heiress brand fragrance which prompted me to write this post. I got curious about the brand “Paris Hilton” versus the hotel chain her grandfather started. So I headed on over to Google Trends and entered Paris Hilton vs. Hilton. Since the search term “Paris Hilton” contained “Hilton” the search wasn’t as dramatic as I’d liked. So I thought of one of Hilton’s (the hotel) biggest competitors and entered them. Paris Hilton versus Marriott.

It’s interesting to see how one individual’s popularity (in searches anyhow) nearly equals and sometimes surpasses the popularity of an entire hotel chain with over 499,165 rooms world wide in almost 3,000 properties. The large spike in the graph reflects one of the many scandals that have either been caused by or put upon the hotel heiress. This one happened to be when her cell phone was hacked and all her famous friend’s personal emails and phone numbers were exposed.

Okay, so she was born an heiress, so have a lot of girls. But what has Paris done with it? (more…)

What is Web Directions North?

Put together by designers and developers, for designer and developers, this conference is brought to you by Dave Shea, Derek Featherstone, Maxine Sherrin and John Allsopp. Over two days and nights, Web Directions North is packed tight with sessions by renowned, inspiring, entertaining speakers and experts, parties, and more.

Come along and hear Kelly Goto, Andy Clarke, Adrian Holovaty, Douglas Bowman, Dan Cederholm, Joe Clark, Molly Holzschlag, Derek Featherstone, Veerle Pieters, Jeremy Keith and all the other present and future web luminaries, who’ll be covering covering Ajax and Javascript, CSS, Microformats, mashups, standards based web design and development, accessibility, web app development, XHTML and HTML and more. Beginning with an optional day of workshops from some of the web’s best educators, and rounded off with two optional days of skiing and boarding at Whistler [that's British Columbia folks], Web Directions North is 2007’s web design and development event not to be missed.

What did I say about the Design a Snowboard contest? This contest is sponsored by Digital Web Magazine and here’s what they had to say about it:

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Here’s a logo I recently completed. I can’t talk much about the company or what they do as yet (since it’s a bit of a new product that’s got to be kept under wraps) but it has something to do with producing unique CD-R and DVD-R products. The name of the company is “Therty Brand”, and since there was an odd spelling for a common word, I wanted to somehow put emphasis on the “e”. Since they also dealt with CD-R and DVD-R products, I wanted to use that as part of the concept without making it too trite or silly. Here’s what I came up with:

I chose a bright blue to keep it fresh, but I’m working on adding a rusty orange to the pallet (and maybe a chocolate brown - though the blue and chocolate thing is kinda trendy right now…)

The concept I came up with was a very simple text treatment centered in a circle of color that represents the CD or DVD Media product. Without being to obvious, the “e” at the center makes the center of the media. Smallest possible use of this logo may separate the “blue dot” from the text treatment… but I still haven’t settled there.

Thoughts? Comments?

It’s funny, I remember that Janet Meiners (the blogger who got me started doing this blog) said that one of the reasons she started blogging, is that she didn’t have that great of a memory. She said that she blogs to remember ideas she’s come across or had herself to save for reference later.

So I thought I’d blog about a recent discovery that prompted a few ideas in my brain that I thought I might forget. (That’s the funny part… at least to me anyhow.)

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I’ve been adding a few links every week to my lists of Utah talent (have you checked lately?), so keep checking back. I’m always doing Google searches trying to find more to add that I’ve missed. Tonight I ran across a directory called Salt Lake Sites at http://slsites.com where I was able to find a few more design firms, a photographer, and an illustrator I was missing.

Salt Lake Sites
Salt Lake Sites claims to be the largest open directory for Salt Lake City, Utah and surrounding communities. While it may not be the prettiest directory I’ve seen, with over five thousand listings in 280 categories, it well could be as it claims. The site was created by Kevin Delaney as a non-commercial hobby site. All he asks for being listed is a shout-out on your blog or website, or a small listing fee in return. There was a couple ill-fated links in the design section that I reported to Kevin - I’m sure he has plenty on his hands to do just approving new links.

So in an effort to get more people to find my site, I’m listing it there tonight. I’ll let you know how it goes (I use Google Analytics to track it).

Utah Designers, Illustrators, Design Firms and More
And keep checking back for my continued lists of Utah Talent! (I add a few new ones every-so-often, and verify their existence at least every week.)

And please let me know if you have any suggested links of other Utah talent!

100% Cotton

Originally uploaded by chezrump.

Did you ever play with Adobe Photoshop to create a third eye in the middle of someone’s head? Yup, that clone tool can be a lot of fun to the first-time user.

But it’s amazing to see the handiwork of someone who has really harnessed the photo-editing power of Photoshop like this image entitled “100% Cotton”. Check out some more of Paul Hollingworth’s photos on flickr and see other samples of his amazing work.

Kind of surreal, don’t you think?

On the front page of Axis41’s website, they define themselves:

“We’re not an ad agency, consultancy, design firm, or web shop. But the best from all of the above. No one word describes us. Although the word refreshing is a popular choice for those who have been through marketing hell.”

Perhaps that’s why their website is organized a little bit different than most ____ shops who do design work are.

Axis41
155 North 400 West, Suite 135
Salt Lake City, UT 84103
T 801.303.6300
F 801.303.6339
E info@axis41.com
W www.axis41.com

OVERVIEW
Axis41 has proved itself as a firm to be reckoned with - its designs seem to be appearing in all the recent publications that I’ve been looking at, and they’re winning a lot of awards. Since they don’t have much on their website to say “about us” other than describing the solutions they provide and their approach to those solutions, the only tidbit I found beyond the above is their press release signature:

About Axis41
Bringing a revolutionary approach to marketing communications, Salt Lake City-based Axis41 comprises a team of communication and program design specialists who strategically use and develop a wide variety of marketing and Web tools to effectively create a measurable voice that radiates from their clients’ organizations. Included among Axis41 clients are: Ciena, ClearOne Communications, FranklinCovey, Symantec, ADP Lightspeed, Novell, VISTA Staffing Solutions, and Intermountain Health Care. Learn more — visit www.axis41.com.

I assume that their name originates from the fact that Salt Lake City lies near the 41st parallel, though technically their location in downtown Salt Lake is about 40.77 degrees north. (I guess a little “rounding” was in order there. I can’t imagine Axis40.77 being as easy to remember.)

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I posted on a previous occasion some of my favorite design quotes. I had several of my friends comment to me personally that they were a big fan of the one by Steve Jobs. When I did this post, I did a quick search online for a few more design quotes and ran across the design section and the graphic design section of Wikiquote. Here are a few of the quotes I found of note listed there:

• “Design is the contrast of the core of limitations therefore there are no boundaries. It is simply an interpretation of creativity.”
  - Jenaiha Woods
• “An essential aspect of creativity is not being afraid to fail.”
  - Dr. Edwin Land
• “I think so many of the objects we’re surrounded by seem trivial. And I think that’s because they’re either trying to make a statement or trying to be overtly different. What we were trying to do was have a very honest approach and an exploration of materials and surface treatment. So much of what we try to do is get to a point where the solution seems inevitable: you know, you think ‘of course it’s that way, why would it be any other way?’ It looks so obvious, but that sense of inevitability in the solution is really hard to achieve.”

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I was clicking through the list of Utah Illustrators I compiled for my Daily Brad Blog and was impressed with Trent Call’s website, his drawings/paintings, and overall talent. Under his “current” link I discovered where his website “SWINJ” gets its name, (though I don’t know what it means exactly.) or perhaps where his publication gets its name.

SWINJ (A limited edition book produced by Call that showcases local artwork) recently released their sixth edition. SWINJ #6 features the work of 31 Utah-based artists that was collected over the period of a year. The limited edition book has some great work in it, looks good aesthetically, is well put together, and exemplifies the growth that the ‘zine has experienced since it started out as just a small xeroxed publication in 1998. Trent Call is responsible for the publishing, editing, and organization of the book. If you’d like to purchase a copy, they’re $15.

Listed contributors include: Endur, Eliza Strack, Cein Watson, Fletcher Booth, Camilla Taylor, Liz Evans, Toward Feeling in the Blank, Jonathon Clarke, Trent Call, Vile Blue Shades, Alex Ferguson, Nick Bottman, Tessa Lindsey, Ryan Jensen, Alexa Filanowicz, Stephani Dykes, Russel Daniels, Kevin, Camron Larson, Patrick Eddington, David Clarke, Jason Jones, Sri Whipple, Oliver Chipping, Jenni Lord, Ruby Claire Johnson, Gentry Blackburn, Leia Bell, Zak Jensen, Jessica Minckley, and Steven Larson.