Adobe launches new FREE web-based Photoshop

In an effort to increase its brand awareness, especially with kids, Adobe is now offering a completely web-based version of photoshop for free online.

As a long time photoshop evangelist, I completely support this move because it really should help to cement this product in the the minds of the up and coming generation.

Read more about it here.

Live from SXSW

So my coworker David Mead and I made it out of Cleveland apparently just in time to avoid one of the biggest blizzards in recent memory in our fair town. My wife informs me that the snow is up to her hips in the back yard. She promises to send me a photo, yet I have the digital camera with me here in Austin, so I am not sure how she will do that.
I am just sitting down in my third session here and so far have had mixed reaction to what I am hearing. Part of that is my own fault for choosing poorly the session that I started my day with today. After that, I did have a much better experience for my second session.
Right now I am sitting in Ballroom B in the convention center in Austin and anticipating a good session called Great Design Hurts. I will try to file something post session to fill anyone in who might be reading this.

Cool Web Gallery Tool... all in DHTML!

So I stumbled upon a really cool photo gallery tool built by this guy named Gerard Ferrandez. The whole thing is done in Javascript with DHTML and is really nicely implimented. Of course the code, which he gives away for free, is incredible and graceful as one would expect. Photos move around in relation to where you mouse is located on the screen. Transparency is used to overlap them. You can click on a photo to to zoom in and get a closer look and click on it again to move out. This is really a nice alternative to flash and is just a beautiful implementation. Love it.

Inspiring clients to take risks and stand out

Over the last several years I have done probably hundreds of web designs. Here at Optiem, we typically we do at least two different designs to present to a client. First of all, our contract usually states that this is what we will provide, but on a more practical level, it really gives the client something to compare and contrast when they are looking for a new design.

If we have done our job correctly, we already have a very strong understanding of the client's "aesthetic". So our designs are targeted to reflect that. But as designers this can sometimes leave us wanting... wanting to push the envelope more... to stretch our wings.

So recently, on those projects that have the potential, I have been trying to provide a third look. But I try to make that design something that is really out there. Something that no one else in their industry is doing. Something that really sets them apart and is a differentiator. But these are usually hard to sell to clients.

How do we comfort clients enough that they are willing to be more aggressive in the design of their web sites? For many companies, taking a conservative, "proven" approach is the safest and easiest path. And when dealing with a larger group of decision makers, it is much easier to get consensus on something a little more traditional.

My goal is to get our clients to see the web with different eyes. With a twist. To take a "risk" and put a site out there that is a really different approach or concept. To be a leader in their respective industry. To have something that no one else has. So when someone visits their site they say (or at least think) "now this is different. Who are these people?".

This requires some forward thinking by the person or people picking a design. But I feel in the long run this kind of thinking could really pay off. Being a trend SETTER as opposed to a trend follower is what really makes for success. Sony created the Walkman. They set the trend in personal music devices. Of course Apple has really run with that in recent years. But Sony enjoyed a great deal of publicity with the whole Walkman trend. They launched a whole new product line.

I guess there are people out there that are uncomfortable sticking their necks out to be different. To take that "risk". But the gains can be really worth it. From a marketing and brand standpoint, this has the potential to elevate a company into a whole different realm.

I remember back in the dot com boom days that kids were starting companies in their parent's basements. They would design really hot web sites with flashy logos and give the illusion that they were really something. And in fact, many of them BECAME something. Of course there is far less risk in being a kid in your basement and acting like you are a multi-million dollar company. As opposed to a multi-million dollar company pretending they are a kid in their parent's basement. But too many multi-million dollar companies are unwilling to look less than polished and buttoned up. Too bad.

I digress a little here. But this is just to say that we want to try to get our clients to look at opportunities to stand out. And doing the same old thing as everyone else is doing isn't enough anymore.

The beauty of the web is that you can change it immediately if it isn't working for you. It isn't like you have printed 100,000 brochures and all of a sudden the company logo changes and those boxes of brochures become door stops.

So, take a risk or two with your design. Push the limits of what you have done before. Use the limits your competitors stopped at... and start there.

Reality Rejects!... Our Latest Video Project

From my friend Clyde's blog:

Optiem recently launched a new online video series for our client Insurance.com.

The concept behind this series, Reality Rejects, is a send-up of the reality TV genre, shot and edited in the style of mock-umentary shows like The Office and The Larry Sanders Show.

The premise behind the show is that each of our contestants has had a failed attempt to get onto another popular reality show, be it Survivor, The Biggest Loser, Beauty & the Geek, Americas Next Top Model, Dancing with the Stars, etc. and have now all come together to compete in a Bachelorette-style competition to win the affection and company of Jessica, as she and the final remaining houseguest will go on a weeks vacation together once the competition has concluded and a winner is chosen.

Jessica will be eliminating one houseguest each week, based on her judging of the outcome of that weeks competition.

The first episode, Meet the Contestants introduces the cast members, Rick, Barry, Hank, Danny, Candi and our host, Jessica, as we see them move into the Reality Rejects house and interact for the first time.


You can view the video at any of the following sites:

The May The Best Win blog

Our YouTube Channel

AOL Video

Danny's MySpace Page

Enjoy!

Why Wireframes are Bad for Designers

Recently I have had a ton of design work cross my desk. And despite my previous post regarding the use of our new Creative Brief format, many have come and gone without the benefit of that document.

In some cases I have instead gotten a "wire frame" drawn up by the account executive or by the project manager. And although I do greatly appreciate their efforts on behalf of our clients to get all of the important information into the interface design, wire frames come with a certain risk that as a designer, I always hate to confront.

Wire frames by their nature IMPLY design. When putting information onto a page and moving it around, the person creating a wire frame is in essence suggesting layout. And this is where I take issue with designers seeing wire frames. In fact, I would say showing these wire frames to clients may give them an unrealistic impression of what the final design will look like.

A designer can not help but feel beholden to the various locations set up by a wire frame. If the wire frame shows navigation on the left then the design will most likely reflect that. Especially when the client has seen the wire frame and has an expectation based upon it.

To really allow our designers to design, we have really tried to put the wire frame out of our staff's reach. As a company, we still do wire framing to help with usability issues and also to help us assess functionality. But as far as design goes, we are trying to quash the wire frame entirely.

Instead we are now working with a document we call a PDD... or Page Description Document. These PDDs help up prioritize the information required on a page, but do not imply location in any way. The PDD is created with columns that are set up to allow the project manager or account exec to set PRIORITY levels for various elements. In this way, we can use our ability as designers to create a usable interface design while keeping the client's needs in mind with the relative priority of each element.

I am curious to know what other design firms are doing in the realm and how they use various documents to impart information to designers without implying design. If you have any thoughts or feedback on this, please drop me a line or respond to this post.

Building the Social Media Newsroom

One of my former coworkers used to call himself a "recovering attorney". He had realized the folly of his way and at some point escaped the grip of "The Firm".

I am a recovering journalist. I have a degree in journalism, worked at that profession for a decade and finally escaped it a fews years back. What I learned from that decade of experience has really helped shape work I do now for clients. But as I sit here today, I wonder if we haven't been missing the mark all this time.

Recently I have been involved with part of a team here at Optiem that has been working on the concept of a social media newsroom. The idea is actually a very simple one, but one that for some reason has eluded many of the web clients I have dealt with over the years. And although I have been looking this solution right in the eye now for a few weeks, I still marvel at the simplicity of the idea. And I keep asking "why didn't we do this before?"

We have been seeing a lot of buzz about this concept and we have been sharing a proof of concept (see the link above) for this "social media newsroom." We are currently working to make these social media newsrooms reality for several of our clients. They are very excited about it.

So what IS a Social Media Newsroom? As my coworker, and fellow "thought leader" Vince Bank puts it...

"A social newsroom is about tearing down barriers between companies and respective publics, including members of the press. It's about fostering seamless, simple communication between media and organizations. And it's about organizational transparency, responsiveness and accessibility."

And quite honestly these aren't high and mighty words or concepts. These are in fact really easy and simple things to achieve. All we are really doing is providing an aggregation of all the relevant information available about a company on ONE web page. And you probably wouldn't be surprised to hear that these kinds of pages do REALLY well in the search engines.

So what kinds of things can one find in a SMNR? Here are but a few of the items you might find...

• Easy to use and locate directories, bookmarks and other social sites such as de.lici.ous, Technorati, and Flickr.
• All kinds of rss feeds available from the company
  
• direct access to top-level management through several social channels such as LinkedIn
  
• Press Room materials such as a repository of print-ready documents like high resolution company logos and photographs, whitepapers, and brand guideline documents
  
• a firm's blogs and blogroll
• access to company events, schedules and calendars, and
  
• a highly adaptable format, easily customized to a client's goals and needs

We at Optiem are excited, obviously, about the idea. And our clients are actually chomping at the bit to get their social newsrooms up and populated.

This is just another one of those examples where the simplest of ideas may indeed be the best. And I'm happy to say that we are among those leading the way in this simplicity.

As a journalist, finding accurate, easy to digest information was always the hardest part of the job. Social media newsrooms make it possible for anyone looking for information about your company to get it all... in one-stop-shop style.