Hello, my name is Jhames

In what has to be the coolest thing I have seen online today, my LDSA Frank shared Personas Personas is a component of the Metropath(ologies) exhibit, currently on display at the MIT Museum by the Sociable Media Group from the MIT Media Lab. It uses sophisticated natural language processing and the Internet to create a data portrait of one’s aggregated online identity. In short, Personas shows you how the Internet sees you. Naturally, the program couldn’t get much on me using “James Elliott”. “Jhames”, however, was a whole other persona.

If you read Flickr Censors Political Image Critical of President Obama by Thomas Hawk, you’ll see an interesting discussion centered around a Photoshop’d photograph of President Obama and Flickr’s decision to remove the image. Firas Alkhateeb, a 20-year-old college student in Illinois, is responsible for the image: he started with a cover photograph of Obama from Time magazine and used Photoshop to render Obama’s face as the Joker from Batman: The Dark Knight.

I am often asked “What do you enjoy most?” when people view my portfolio. My history showcases work in copywriting, visual identity, print, web, and interactive design—there are also the sitemap and wireframe documents I produce for some clients which I don’t include in my portfolio. People want to know am I a graphic designer, a user experience designer, or a front-end web developer? I reply that I view design as a process to solve communication challenges – be they print, web, identity, or user experience – my enjoyment derives from the process and the solutions. “No, I mean if you had to choose just one, what would it be?” This is where the conversation turns uncomfortable.

When I’m not looking after three dogs or working on a site redesign for a client, I pass the time at FontStruct designing fonts. (Some people like to read books or work on home improvement projects. Me? I like to design when I’m not designing for others. I’m sure there’s a special circle of OCD for people like myself.) I am up to eleven designs at the moment but this week I have focused entirely on one design that currently stands at 156 characters. I call this design Fontima.

During brand discovery, the client answers a series of questions about their mission and company values which the designer uses to produce myriad design directions. A visual identity (or brand) will take shape and eventually form somewhere between the client’s personal investment and the designer’s professional objectivity. When designers are tasked with creating their own brand, a challenge arises: how can one remain objective when the designer and client are one and the same? I certainly was not immune to the situation, it was only yesterday that I created my visual identity after working as a designer for 12 years.

A tweet from Paul Mayor brought me to Just—My—Type™ where one can download various typeface designs in Illustrator format. The site brought back memories of college and how I would constantly draw letters in my sketchbooks & notebooks. Classmates would look over my shoulder and remark, “that’s cool!” I wanted to intern with a typeface designer during my senior year but, alas, my department chair wasn’t able to make it happen. For two years I bought graph paper, sketched as many letterforms as possible, and then recreated the sketches in Adobe Illustrator. I used a lot of ruler guides.

So let’s have a chat about blogs and newspapers. Seattle is home to many a newspaper, now one less with the passing of Seattle Post-Intelligencer in print format, two of which are free weekly publications: Seattle Weekly and The Stranger. In order to maintain reader interest beyond a laissez-faire interest, both weekly publications have online blogs that track daily life in Seattle, as well as nationally and globally. Both publications are known for their reporting and commentary that often cross acerbic and sardonic lines. As such, each publication attracts a certain kind of reader that associates with its personality.

CREATE YOUR DEBUT ALBUM COVER Go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:RandomThe first random wikipedia article you get is the name of your band. (Alternatively, if the first article you hit is short, hit Random Article two more times.) Go to http://www.quotationspage.com/random.php3The last four or five words of the very last quote of the page is the title of your first album. Go to http://www.flickr.com/explore/interesting/7daysThird picture, no matter what it is, will be your album cover. Use Photoshop or similar to put it all together.

Since 2003 I was doing all my design work on a 17″ PowerBook G4 with a 17″ Studio Display. Five years later, I upgraded my design studio for a desktop and larger display. I decided to transfer my files from the PowerBook and sell my older studio on craigslist. The ad short and sweet and the sticker price was under $1000. I received a few responses from people who disappeared after an initial round of communication. Then I received an e-mail from a guy in New York City. To be honest, his response didn’t raise any red flags since he seemed interested in the studio and, frankly, it’s a great deal. He inquired if I would accept payment via PayPal, I replied yes. I took the studio to a shipping store for an estimate and e-mailed the total costs of the studio and shipping. … Continue reading →

Continue reading →