Sitepoint is offering a free PDF guide to Photoshop. The Photoshop Anthology: 101 Web Design Tips, Tricks & Techniques can be downloaded from here.

Brian Yerkes has written a useful summary of shortcuts and time-savers called 5 Ways to Work Faster in Photoshop.

Don’t forget that you can upload Photoshop files directly into ProofHQ for proofing.  Reviewers don’t need Photoshop on their Macs or PCs.

We love Tom Fishburn’s Brand Camp cartoon series.

Tom has also published the full collection in his Brand Camp Cartoon Book which you can find in his CafePress store.

Tom is helping launch Method Products to the UK as Marketing Director.

Perhaps demonstrating the need for proper review and approval processes, is the UK’s Office of Government Commerce.

This UK government department is responsible for monitoring public sector purchasing in the UK. A laudible aim and one worthy of a new logo.

£14,000 ($30,000) later and a new logo is rolled out.

All well and good. Nice font usage, clean look, efficient…. until you rotate the logo 90 degrees. Ooops!

Someone really did need to get a grip on proofing that one.

If a recession is on its way… and let’s be positive, it is still an “if”… then marketing is likely to get hit as hard as any sector. Here’s why, and a couple of ideas on how to limit the pain.

“Let the good times roll” – it’s a mantra in marketing. We’re the party people, right? We love it when the economy is expanding. More marketing budgets, more work, more people. Busy, busy, busy! Naturally we are completely surprised when the economy wobbles (or worse). “How can they be axing my lovely budgets”, we cry. Who would have thunk it?

We expand quickly when the economy is booming. Like many other service-oriented industries economic growth leads quickly to new business and new business leads to hiring. Service industries scale by adding people. They need to add staff to win their share of the new business out there, to deliver new projects and to service all those lovely clients.

Unfortunately, whilst adding people marketing organizations don’t tend to think about more efficient processes. Times are good, right? Let’s just throw resources (bodies and time) at problems in order to get projects “out of the door”.

When a period of growth comes to an end, the “more people – no process” way of doing things bites us hard. New work begins to dry up, expansion stops, revenue stalls or shrinks and you are far less efficient with all those new people. So what can be done?

This point in the cycle is just when marketing teams should be thinking about increasing productivity and cutting costs. One of the best ways to do that is by automating time-consuming tasks with software. And a classic time-sink for marketing is managing the proofing process. Just think of all the hours wasted chasing reviews and proofs when you could be producing fee-paying work and making more of your time.

And if you are an agency, providing your clients with a proofing portal makes their lives easier and saves them time and money. Just what you need when you are looking for every point of competitive advantage.

So in a recession, investing in some time-saving software like a proofing portal could be the right move.

“Ah!” I hear you say, “but doesn’t software require a big investment?”.

Well folks, it used to. In the bad old days buying a proofing system cost big bucks. On top of the up-front software licenses you had to buy servers, consulting time, maintenance, etc, etc, etc. Lots of investment.

But things have changed. Web based software systems are growing like wildfire. Companies of all sizes are realizing that it doesn’t make sense to buy software any way except as a service.

Reasons include:

• You can try before you buy. Most systems give you a free trial. Usually 30 days
• No upfront costs. You just pay monthly as you use the service
• No hardware to buy. The service is delivered over the web direct to your browser
• Quick launch. Services are designed to be usable so you can be up and running quickly. Sometimes in just a few minutes

So, yes, the downturn will affect marketing. But it is also an opportunity to innovate and create efficiencies for agencies and clients alike.

Party on!

Great post from Thomas Stephan on Business Of Design Online (BoDO) called From the trenches of in-house design.

Best quotes:

“It’s not purpley enough?” That’s your answer to the question as to why you didn’t like it, and why it’s been a coffee cup parking lot for a week? “You just don’t like it?”

“Okay, stop. Just…just stop…step away from the Microsoft WordArt toolbar right now. I mean it. That’s right. Put the mouse down, buddy. Now what exactly were you trying to do here?

You’re trying to show me how this brochure should look? Wow. Okay…I can accept that. I get the idea. But if I recall right, I left a proof of the brochure on your desk a week ago. You were supposed to get back to me about this because it was vital and super important.”

Been there, done that, got ProofHQ.

One of the main uses of ProofHQ is brand management. That’s making sure that new design meets the brand guidelines set out by the client.

However, branding is more that just the design of makreting material or a web site. It’s more than “look and feel”.

Chris Wilson at Fresh Peel just posted a great piece on what constitutes branding. See here. He quoted a number of leading lights from marketing with their definition of what a brand is, but I liked his own definition:

A brand is a short-cut that connects the consumer-mind to a product, service or company.

He added “It’s that first, quick, burst of emotion that’s stirred up when a person thinks about a product, service or company.” I like that.

On the same subject, Matthew Stibbe at Bad Language has blogged about the part that great writing plays in branding. See here. To quote:

I believe that writing is a fundamental part of a brand. Finding a corporate voice and using it consistently adds weight and distinctiveness to a brand. Companies that neglect their writing risk short-changing their brand.

I have always believed that a brand is a perception that’s in the mind of your “stakeholders” (I hate that word, but I’m talking about customers, prospective customers, partners, employees and so on). Brand building is what you do to influence that perception. Great brand builders influence greatly, but invisibly.

What is soft proofing?

I have been doing demos of ProofHQ over the last few weeks and quite a few people have asked me to explain what soft proofing actually is. Good question. Here’s my definition.

Soft proofing is a catch-all phrase for proofing files on your monitor rather than using a good old-fashioned paper proof. There are broadly two types of soft proofing:

1. Content and layout proofing
2. Contract proofing

Content and layout proofing is used for a wide variety of media, whereas contract proofing tends to be for print only.

Content and layout proofing

Content and layout proofing does what it says on the tin. Is the content correct? Are there any typos? How does the layout look? Have the correct images been used? Is everything on-brand? And so on.

Content proofing is (or should be) used by agencies of all types, marketing departments, designers, web site developers, in fact anyone who produces a graphical image or text for approval by someone else.

Tools for this type of soft proofing include:

• PDF files sent via e-mail
• FTP sites for upload and download of larger files
• Desk based proofing software
• Web based proofing systems (ProofHQ falls in this category and we think it’s the only way to go, but that’s not the point of this post!)

Content and layout proofing takes place earlier in the design and production cycle. It should be highly collaborative, so that the creator works closely with reviewers to make sure that the brief has been met.

Content and layout proofing often requires a large amount of project management to make sure that reviewers have received their proofs, that they respond on time and that their comments are acted on. Version control also becomes important to ensure that changes are tracked through the various iterations of a piece of work.

Contract proofing

The second type of soft proofing is contract proofing. This uses more complex color-management systems that try and replicate the exactness of hard-copy proofs on the monitor. Contract proofs are called that because from a legal perspective, an approved proof is a binding contract. By signing a contract proof printers and customers are agreeing that they accept the quality of the reproduction on the specified paper using the specified ink. They are saying that a print run will be acceptable if it matches the quality of the contract proof.

Common features of both types of soft proofing

Common features of both types of soft proofing include:

• Viewing a proof it for content and colour
• Letting several people view the proof simultaneously or consecutively
• Marking up a proof to show changes
• Viewing old versions and new versions together
• Providing electronic sign-off
• Archiving the proof for later viewing.

Is it a form of flattery, mild “inspiration” grabbing, or just blatant commercial theft?  The subject of design rip-offs keeps bubbling to the surface.

Larissa Meek blogged about rip offs here, citing a direct but “crappy” copy of the AgencyNet web site.

Elliot Jay Stocks also recently blogged about the rip off of one of his designs and got down and dirty by naming and shaming the culprit.

Jacob Cass exposed 22 rip offs on his blog in February and promises to dish more dirt.   Here is an example from his blog of a ripped off Christian Louboutin design:

Googling “design rip offs”  lists 780,000 posts on the subject.

So what to do about it?

Legally, it’s fairly difficult, time-consuming and costly to go after a rip-off artist.  Most designers don’t have the financial resources to take the legal route, and most “perps” aren’t worth persuing financially.

The best way seems to be to raise merry hell online.  Naming and shaming someone who has blatantly copied a design appears to be the most effective way to get a design taken offline and discourage a repeat offense.  That said, you need to be very sure that the person in question has copied your work as naming and shaming could become libelous itself.

When all is said and done, perhaps the best approach was summarised by Jefferey Zeldman “Don’t worry about people stealing your design work. Worry about the day they stop.”

This cracked us up.

You can download a PDF of these cut-out-and-keep Design Police stickers here.