creativejunk

Thanks

That's more of a blog with some showcase articles. The project I'm working on is to allow users to collect their own items of inspiration and collate them into the one place (where they can organise, group, tag, share etc). So, you can effectively build up a profile of things you want to keep, websites, images, videos, quotes - anything really, and then share them with other designers or just store them for your own record. and yes, it will be free

I'm currently working on a project for collecting and sharing visual inspiration on the web, if anyone has a few moments spare to answer a few short questions, it would be most appreciated: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/57M25PH Also, feel free to discuss the matter, I'm interested in hearing everyones methods of cataloging items of inspiration.

Being artistic would help, I do think you need to know the fundamental principles of graphic design before you can do anything decent.

Thanks, I will give this a go

Hi there, I'm fairly new to using jQuery and I'd like to achieve the following effect of having a content div sliding: http://www.rehabstudio.com/work/thumbnails I've had a look around and found this slider plugin: http://bxslider.com/demos.php Although I've read on a few sites that I need to have an easing plugin installed to get the effect I am looking for, but I'm struggling to get my head around how exactly I would set this up. Any help appreciated, thanks!

I know there is a lot of controversy surrounding this issue and I have read about people having problems in the past regarding hosting MP3 files - but can anyone recommend some hosting companies that will allow .mp3 files on there servers? This is required for hosting podcasts, and is by no means illegal or untoward - I just don't want to shell out the cash on hosting to find other a month down the line the site has been pulled for hosting mp3s. On a related note, what kind of plans would I need for this kind of thing to host regular podcasts on a variety of channels - as this will be starting out as quite a small project, it's unlikely the funds will be in place for dedicated hosting etc, but it would require decent download speeds and monthly bandwidth.

I believe IE7 isn't available on OSX - is there an alternative to testing websites on OSX without having to install Windows on my Mac.

As far as I know you can't sell a copyright or transfer it, if you produced something, you own the copyright untill 70 years after your death.

I posted about this situation some time ago, but now it's got to the stage where I have mentioned taking legal action against these people, I'd just like some opinions on weather or not it's worth it as there are some issues; such as not having put a contract in place and also failing to invoice them (they were only prepared to pay up if I sent them Illustrator documents first so I didn't see the point). Sorry for the long winded story below, but I typed it up as a reference for a solicitor and to make sure all aspects of the story is covered. Where exactly do I stand legally with this? and what can I do about it? I feel ripped off they have used work I developed, and potentionally sold it on to their client at a profit, I am fairly new to freelancing, hence the need for some good advice. I guess I should have invoiced them anyway, but they were never going to pay it without the sourcefiles first. Thanks in advance to anyone who takes the time to read. Case: **** Studios Copyright Violation Initially Alex ***** from **** Studios met with myself on the 19/02/09 to discuss the rebranding of the *** ******* logo (www.**********.com), at this meeting he provided a basic brief for the project and requested I produce some ideas in sketch form over the weekend. I produced a series of sketches, which were then Illustrated in a digital format and provided to Alex, he seemed content with these and stated he would be meeting with the client later in the week to present the designs. It's important to note here that I presented Alex with an idea incorporating a mountain for the logo design. Weeks passed without any contact from Alex or Lee ******** (**** Studios partner) - on the 29/03/09 Lee emailed me requesting I meet up with him to discuss some ideas for the design of the *** logo. During this meeting with Lee, he put forward some ideas for the logo design (my previous work had been completely discarded) which where then discussed at length between myself and Lee. Some of these ideas where discarded or adjusted during the briefing, my own ideas where also provided for the project at this point and were added to the brief, I should note that Lee provided an idea incorporating a similar mountain design as I had previously submitted to **** Studios. Lee then began to very roughly sketch some of his ideas on paper, I also contributed to this activity, adding my own ideas and sketches. Upon conclusion of this briefing, Lee gave me the go ahead to develop the logo based on the combination of his ideas, and my own. I should note at this point that unfortunately no contract was produced during the briefing by either party to detail what work was to be completed, required deadlines, or payment terms. The same afternoon as the briefing, I developed a series of variations on the logo discussed earlier in the day, these were then provided to both Alex and Lee via email that evening, at which point Lee stated the ideas discussed had been transcribed perfectly, and he was more than pleased with the design. Over the following weeks, Alex then took over the communication of the project with myself, and requested various changes and variations, such as colour, text adjustments etc... He stated on 09/04/09 that once these adjustments were completed and presented to the client, I would be payed for the work done so far. It is important to note that all the development work at this stage was produced entirely by myself, Alex was merely just requesting changes via email that had been passed on from the client and had no involvement in the actual development of the logo. Over the next few weeks, more changes where requested, with no sign of the promised payment for the work completed so far, I produced a series of variations of the requested changes and provided them to **** Studios in a low quality PDF document for previewing purposes. On 28/04/09 Alex sent me an email showing a series of changes he had made to the logo, to do this he had extracted the original design from the preview PDF documents I had originally sent and adjusted the designs himself - this was done entirely without my permission. Several weeks passed around this point with no contact from either Alex or Lee, despite having tried to contact them both via text and email, I had still received no payment for the work completed thus far. On 26/05/09 Alex emailed me requesting the original source files for the *** logo design, stating he needed to make some changes himself, and it would take too long to communicate them via email. At this point I insisted the files where too large to send via email, and I was happy to make the changes myself. On 27/05/09 I requested payment for the work if I was to hand over the source files, Alex said it would be no problem providing payment within 2 weeks. I stated to Alex at this point I was not prepared to hand over the source files without payment for the work completed over the past 4 months, he then assured me that the industry does not work like this and I would receive my money when they got paid for the work - despite having stated in the past I would receive payment for the work so far. Alex offered me £65-75 pounds at this stage for the work completed over the previous 4 months, stating it wasn't up to standard, and a lot of the ideas had been their own concepts. He then suggested paying 50% of this payment upfront in exchange for the source files for the logo design. Quoted Alex ***** 01/06/09: "If you can send across the invoice, along with the original files I will send a cheque out to you in the post tomorrow morning for half the balance" I refused this offer, not wanting to make the mistake of handing over the work first without any form of payment or contract to date. Alex then stated that Lee was finalizing the design for presenting to the client, I informed Alex that if my work were to be reproduced elsewhere without permission, this would be in breech of copyright. **** Studios argument to this was the concepts and ideas for the logos belonged to them, and they had communications documented showing requested changes. However, the technical development of the work was entirely carried out by myself, with no input from either Alex or Lee, asides from requested changes provided via email. The *** logo design has now appeared on **** Studios portfolio website (www.***********.com) and on the client website (www.******************.com). The logo design has been extracted from initial preview files I sent to them months ago, and they have placed the design onto a textured background. From day one to present, I have documented an entire history of communication with **** Studios including all their requested changes to the design, PDF previews, hand drawn sketches including scanned copies with creation dates and a series of original Adobe Illustrator source files used for the development of the logo - each one date stamped by the operating system showing when the file was created and last modified. To date I have received no payment from **** Studios for work dating back 5 months, and have now reproduced the work carried out by myself elsewhere, and potentially sold this work on for their own profit.

Thanks

Anyone know the name of the font used for the "Paper Jam" logo on this website: http://paperjamdesign.com/site/page/home Thanks

Not so much web design related - I've just switched to OSX, and copied files across from my external HardDrive, although I can only have read access to my external for some reason? Also, some of the folders I've copied across are locked and I can't edit them? I've went to "Get Info", but it says I have read & write access here? :S

Thanks for the suggestions, decided to give Smultron and it's perfect so far, simple, compact and easy to use! Although, I can't seem to get it to change color for html tags - is there a way to set this up, or does it only colour element when using a programming language?

Having recently switched to using Photoshop on the Mac, one feature I did like on the PC was being able to click to select the layer styles list box, and then use the arrow keys to scroll through the availible styles - I dont seem to be able to do this on the Mac however, and have to click each style seperately to apply them, is there a way around this?

Just bought my first mac and would like someone to point me in the direction of a nice text/code editor. I don't need anything too fancy as I'm used to working with Windows notepad, but perhaps something that colours different html tags would be nice, and something which is free

Well, I've had my mac for several hours now and I've no regrets, it was definatly a good decision - even got an IPod touch for £20! The quality well justifys the price tag, the whole thing just oozes quality, the OS is so simple to use it is unbelivable, theres virtually no getting used to it, everything is just so straightforward it makes Windows look like an over complicated spaceshuttle control. So in short - great decision, great piece of hardware & software, Im well happy

I think I'll just go for it, I need a laptop regardless and it seems senseless getting another Windows machine. Plus, it's good experience for the likely event of going to work in a mac based design studio in future! Heading into town tomorrow afternoon so will report back once I've had a fiddlle about with it, hopefully it doesn't take too long to get to grips with so I don't look like a fool when I start this new job and can't use my laptop haha

I will be running it off the mains power supply 90% of the time I'd imagine, I'm assuming this won't affect the battery life? I'd agree they are quite expensive, but if it turns out to be as good as it looks on the online demos, then I am happy enough paying for it, I think if I did get a standard PC, I'd always feel as though I'd settled for less, something about me just wants to have a mac - that is partly due to the asthetic quality, but the whole user experience in general just seems to much more appealing, plus I can finally use Logic. OSX just looks so much more enjoyable than Windows (although I do love XP), and some of the features such as the new trackpad look incredibly useful. Although I have seen cheaper laptops with equal processing power, one of the things that is somewhat justifying the price to me is the spec of the graphics card - which is beyond anything I've seen included in standard PC laptops. 90% of me is saying just go for it, I need a laptop for work etc, and I already have a quite usable Windows desktop machine I can run on the side for a while as well, although if I do decide to go fully mac based, I will be investing in the 24inch cinema display to hook the laptop upto. The other 10% is saying it's alot of money, but I guess this is natural doubt when spending such a sum of cash, and the only thing thats worrying me is I might not like it or be able to get used to it, realisticly though I will probably bring it home tomorrow, turn it on and wonder why I ever had any doubts about it.

OK, so for the past few years I have been running a XP machine (1GB RAM, 3GHz HTT Intel CPU), now I'm thinking of getting a MAC, but it's alot of money to consider. I have my eye on the 17" Macbook Pro - will this offer much more power than what I am currently using, what does 2.86 core duo actually mean? I would like a laptop so I can use it other than sitting in the one spot, and I need a laptop for a new job I'm starting in a few weeks, but I could get a Windows machine at the same spec for a 1/3 of the price - I've watched the OSX demo on the apple site and I was very impressed, it has lots of quirky features which Id like. Can I use it outside? lol - i.e will it be difficult to see the screen if it's a good day? I've read the new 8 hour battery lasts for 1000 full recharges - what happens after this? I love using Winamp for my audio - is there any good media players on the Mac? I guess I am just looking for someone to tell me I am making the right decision, I think I will love it when I get it, it's just a lot of money to be shelling out.

This is the only thing that's bothering me about it all, although there are two sides to every story. I've contacted other students from my course I know are working for them, one said they were having the same problem with regards to payment (all the work must be handed over first etc) - and I've also contacted my university for advice and to make them aware of the problem since me and several other students where recruited after this company came to the university to seek out new talent.

They gave me a few very, very rough sketches scribbled down on paper to get the ideas across - they handed these to me, and I still have them in my possession. Everything else, I created myself in Illustrator. It's beyond the point of coming to some kind of agreement over it now, so it's best to just let it slide I think, they've told me there going to recreate the designs themselves - and I've made them aware of the copyright issues if they replicated the PDF documents I have sent them exactly. I guess the only thing to do is just ignore it now, and perhaps check in a few weeks to see if the designs I've developed are being used somewhere, at least I havn't been ripped off, or lost any money. Reaper - Yes the placement is for a webdesign firm, starting at the end of the month for a year, hopefully I'll have learnt enough working with them to avoid these kind of bad situations in the future lol

It's all starting to turn a tad sour lol They have now informed me if I am to use the designs in my portfolio, I am in breach of their copyright, since some of the concepts were their idea, plus they have copies of the fonts used, and records of emails asking for requested changes. I thought this would be irrelevant though seeing as I produced the design in Illustratior, for one, they surely can't claim copyright on a font they have downloaded off dafont, and also, can they copyright the ideas they have communicated over email? I have read the sticky on copyright, which states the copyright applies to the fixed material created, not the idea - so wouldn't I be the copyright owner of the design, even though they requested some colour variations and ideas? I have been called unprofessional for creating tension with industry professionals, and they said I have made my first major mistake in this business, the whole situation kind of sucks, especially not the emails are rather sour, but I reckon I'd feel alot worse right now if I'd been ripped off. I guess the only thing to do is learn from the experience and get myself sorted with a contract, I'm starting a years placement in 3 weeks so likely won't give them a second thought by then - it's just the feeling of having some kind of bad stigma attached to my name before I've even really started in the industry, but I don't believe I am in the wrong regarding any of it and handing over artwork with no contract or payment is incredibly risky. My only mistake is not having a contract, but they failed to produce one as well.

Very helpful Thanks very much!

I do indeed, just re-developing it at the moment, so will get them up there - any links to good sources that will help me in writing terms & conditions - and also developing invoices? I have spoken again with them, and they won't shift on the deposit, they have called me unprofessional etc in how I am acting towards this and are again assuring me this is how the industry works - which I know is total rubbish. They are saying now they are going to reproduce the designs themselves to meet their deadline - isn't this a breach of copyright though if they produce an exact copy of the previews I have sent them previously? It just feels as though they are trying to take advantage of students doing work on the side of them - perhaps I am wrong, but if someone has seen numerous previews of the work and know's it exists and is what they requested - I just can't understand what their problem is handing over a deposit for the source files. Especially if they are now going to reproduce the work themselves; costing them time & money - it would be much simplier to just send across the payment, and I'll send the work across to them straight away. Where do I stand if they do reproduce the designs exactly? Originally they provided me with a few ideas and concepts they wanted produced digitally and breifly sketched them down on paper, they also specified fonts to be used in this. I then developed these ideas in Illustrator, and provided my own variations on the layout, colour scheme etc - I still have all the original source files with the dates they were created & modified, along with pages and pages of more detailed sketches and additional ideas.