Design-Design » Online

YouTube Video Editor

Peter Simcoe — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 09:30:52 +0000

Overview

The YouTube Video Editor is free to access and use to edit clips together if you have a YouTube account. I created a Simcoemedia YouTube account and channel for my video portfolio and a hidden channel called VisualSnippet for my experimental videos. These hidden videos give me opportunity to try out some of the YouTube features without the risk of interfering with a channel I use as a portfolio of Simcoemedia commercial productions.

If you upload some videos to your YouTube Channel you can view them and edit them together with the YouTube Video Editor using a variety of transitions and titling tools. In addition you can add a soundtrack and even incorporate creative commons video to add additional clips appropriate to your narrative.

During experimentation with the system these features were tried out and 1080p HD video edited together. For maximum compatibility I used Google’s Chrome browser.

Advantages

The YouTube video editor will handle video up to 1080p and will edit clips together with a variety of transitions, most of which I would not recommend for the majority of video work. However, having used the fade and horizontal wipe to join clips these provided some useful alternatives to cutting clips directly.
Titling is simple but reasonably stylish if used carefully, though the choice of a single font and centre alignment of text does prove limiting if text goes onto two lines. The titler will only handle three lines of text.
The built in royalty free audio library is extensive and varied. With a bit of patience a suitable soundtrack can be found for the majority of circumstances. As audio makes up a significant proportion of the video experience, it is worth spending time selecting the best track.
Video is created on Google’s own YouTube servers therefore rendering 1080p video quickly and without using your own computers resources which is valuable if you need to get on with other tasks and onlt have one PC. Usually a 5 minute video can be ready within 40 minutes.

Disadvantages

When adding a soundtrack to the edited 1080p sequence, the audio noticeably stuttered and restarted within the first 10 seconds which essentially made it unusable. This problem was replicated several times.
Fade transitions were not completely smooth. The final part of the fades on 1080p video noticeably seemed overcompensate on the bright areas of the video creating a distracting oversaturation on bright areas just prior to completely fading.
When using both fade transitions and audio an internal server error occurred when I tried to publish the video. This occurred on all attempts until the music track was removed and only the original audio used. Audio can be added once the clips have been edited together but this is not clear during the main editing processes.

Conclusion

The YouTube video editor provides a useful tool for those people who want to create video but do not necessarily have the processing power to deal with the high volumes of data used when processing HD.

The online editor is not without its problems such as dubious transition accuracy and some of the fine tuning related to audio but overall it makes editing 1080p or 720p video accessible to those users with severely underpowered machines by allowing ‘The Cloud’ to do all the work.

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Your Digital Footprint

Peter Simcoe — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 13:22:29 +0000

Digital footprint in this particular article refers to the breadth and depth of web content produced by a company or individual related to relevant subjects – though it is usually used in reference to a trail of logins, web locations and cookie data that can be used by companies to target advertising. When we talk about web content we could be discussing static web pages on a subject such as design eg basic overview pages of a company website or dynamic news based content such as latest product updates on a content management system. We can also be talking about the use of social media to contribute to information about us as individuals, a company or brand – so our tweets, contributions to LinkedIn, our input on Google + and Facebook add to the extent and image of our footprint. There are also other forms of digital content such as photography, audio, video and even PDF documents that can be linked to our brand or personal information – so sites like iStockphoto.com, AudioJungle.net, YouTube.com and individual sites such as www.audio-echo.co.uk [a Simcoemedia website] all help in contributing to a network of documents, MP3 files, videos and images linked to the Simcoemedia brand and image as a creative multimedia company.

Momentary Lapse of Reason: A Quick Warning

The proliferation and ease of publishing content in the public domain throughout the web should also be considered too – a momentary lapse of tweeting can lead to some serious offence, such as Jimmy Carrs recent lack of judgement in making “car crash jokes” around the same time as a tragic event on the M5 near Taunton. The result of your own lack of judgement could be potential loss of business or even something more serious events such as investigation from the police as two seventeen year old boys found out recently when they added racially charged comments to their Twitter feed and were subject to legal action.

The examples given are fairly extreme but with the power of the web, and ease of access to it in the western world, comes responsibility to ensure that what you publish is in line with your own strict [or conciously liberal] policies on what is appropriate within the law and within your public image.

An Example: Simcoemedia Design Consultancy

Over the last 10 years Simcoemedia has built up a solid reputation and brand as a creative multimedia agency which both reinforces company values to existing clients and attracts new work. Much of the work in establishing this has been built up online through the use of the following media:

Portfolio or bloging websites

Simcoemedia runs several independent websites containing design portfolio items, design articles, audio-soundtracks and film reviews. The content on these sites are all original and generated by Peter Simcoe as part of ongoing creative output in one form or another. They are particularly valuable in that the direction, management and contribution to Simcoemedia branding are completely unique – there are no other companies with vested interests in sharing any revenue or search listings. On the downside, they take time to establish, optimise for SEO and populate with appropriate content and links before they are noticed by search engines as having any importance. Here is a list of these sites:

Simcoemedia Design Consultancy – design portfolio items
Design-Design – design articles for business and academia
Audio-Echo – audio porfolio with shopping cart and film reviews
Simcoe-Shop – photographic portfolio with shopping cart

Stock Websites

For creative people, uploading audio, video and images to stock websites to sell to the public [they may be other designers, video producers or publishers] provides another channel of exposure for your work. Being part of a large online shop in one form or another does group you with the rest of the creatives and community so it is harder to stand out amongst the crowd but with larger numbers of people involved comes larger budgets and more investment in advertising with a greater reach. iStockphoto has a worldwide reputation with creative networks such as The Envato Network gaining ground in popularity. As a contributing artist to these global network websites I am able to have a profile page with links to my other portfolios that provide SEO value through the ability to add a profile page and link to pages with a good page rank [and even if theres a no-follow tag disallowing 'link juice'*, external links are still important], increase in my digital footprint and provide reassurance to potential buyers by the fact that I have passed the rigorous standards of websites such as iStockphoto.com.

* Link Juice, in simple terms, is the value search engines place upon the recommendation or linking of an external site to another – eg if Microsoft or Apple were to directly link to my website without the addition of a ‘no follow’ tag, then search engines would think that I must be an important site because I ve been linked to by a very important site and will increase my Page Rank [importance on the web] and therefore my search engine rankings.

Simcoemedia on iStockphoto.com
Simcoemedia on AudioJungle.net
Simcoemedia on Photodune.net

Social Media and Other sites

As we get closer to social media in our discussion regarding digital footprint, the lines between professional and non-professional activity can more easily be crossed and therefore more caution is urged. Just because something is freely available and can publish any thoughts you may have on any subject does not mean it should be used. I have a pretty strict policy on social media use – ie do not allow anything to be published that you would not be happy for your clients to read or view. The list of social media below is in order of priority and preference I place on it along with a brief summary of its use:

Simcoemedia YouTube Channel – video portfolio
Simcoemedia Twitter Account – design related tweets
LinkedIn – online resume and updated business related news
Simcoemedia Google + Page – interesting photos and basic company updates
Simcoemedia Facebook Account – linked to twitter with less formal design commentary

Digital Footprint Diagram

Below is a diagram of Simcoemedia’s digital footprint – you can also download the Simcoemedia Digital Footprint Diagram in PDF format. Larger circles indicate priority in time and content whereas smaller circles are considered to be of lower priority. Twitter is linked to many of the sites and can be seen on the footer of Simcoemedia, Design-Design, Audio-Echo as well as being fed into Facebook, Linked In and other sites – you can see Twitter’s main stream as a dotted line connecting many of the sites together. RSS feeds are broadcast from WordPress based websites and are fed into sites such as Linked In – titles also appear in the footers of all Simcoemedia WordPress based sites.

Simcoemedia uses many different sites for different purposes and goals. Some sites require updates and effort put into creating content more than others – others remain static for longer. Design-Design, the blog you are reading is updated once each month at least and new articles require detailed attention and significant time to produce. Simcoemedia Design Consultancy website is updated when certain projects are completed that add to the overall portfolio breadth and depth – not all projects make it to the porfolio as some skills, design styles or methods are already covered.

Conclusion

Expanding your digital footprint in the ways I have described and illustrated above assist your business in the following ways:

Allowing you to expand the different types of relevent content around a subject such as design and optimise these pages through the use of keywords and titles so that you can be found in as many search engine results as possible. Using different websites is a good way of keeping a focus upon different ‘angles of attack’ in terms of appearing in search engine results
Allowing you to exchange the maximum number of focussed, relevant external links between sites to improve Page Rank and search engine results for specific subject areas
Allows users to find your content by having a presence on channels that different groups of people may be familiar with eg many of the Facebook users I link to as friends do not use Twitter and would not necessarily know about certain design activities unless I linked them together so that my Tweets appear on my Facebook Wall

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Encouraging Keen Readers

Peter Simcoe — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 14:59:33 +0000

The web is full of content ranging from interesting and valuable insight to all the way through a sea of bland generic information and detail to outright lies and cynical speculation. Keeping up to date with information and making the most relevant information available through various channels to your audience is crucial to firstly, respect, secondly, attention and third and most importantly, customer / reader loyalty.

Existing Example

For the benefit of providing a good example for this article, we will take the example of a client of mine – Torse Ltd – as they have a particularly tricky dilemma in the way they present information to their current and potential future customers. Torse Ltd is an energy broker based in Nottingham in the East Midlands of England. Their ongoing struggle is with 4 aspects of providing information for their customers:

Dealing with the tarnished reputation that energy brokers and similar services have across the UK. Torse Ltd happen to be an honest, straightforward, straight talking company with a loyal customer base. However, when dealing with potential customers they must wrestle with the generally corrupt and devious reputation these type of services have acquired.
Providing a detailed and customised individual response to the energy requirements and recommendations for each client, ensuring that the right energy contracts are provided for them. This means that it is very difficult to create an online energy assessment form where ‘one size fits all’ – a contract is assessed and finalised using human judgement and experience. The problem here is that on initial impressions Torse are then at a disadvantage because they cannot offer an immediate web based answer to the question “how much can I save with Torse?”.
Generating high quality and useful output from the media channels available to the company. The energy market is a notoriously fluctuating beast with sensitivity to changes in world affairs and economics. Keeping up with all of this and generating good quality content is a difficult task.
Producing content that is relevant to business owners with varying degrees of knowledge and understanding is a skill that requires a deep understanding of the activities, motivators and range of knowledge that your audience will have and providing a medium level of depth for the majority whilst catering for those who need to know more about specific aspects of the subject to make an informed decision by providing access to these. The browsers and HTML were designed for this purpose amongst others.

Opportunities

Website static content

Generating web content describing your aims, services, products or even terms is usually at the very least a time consuming task, but is also usually a very difficult task in that taking the principle of not wasting potential clients time – you want to provide the least complexity that provides maximum results. Almost every product or service we use has a level of complexity beyond our desire or need to know and so we pick and choose the elements we read to ensure we know the most in the shortest time. This is where it becomes tricky – where do people begin to switch off and either lose interest or experience information overload?

News items and dynamic content

Quality news items for the purpose of blog pages on a website, or even in a PDF newsletter, are tough to write – no matter which sector you work in. Why? Because a really good news item delves into a subject that is either brand new or provides a different perspective for consideration whilst reaching directly to the audience. If you are writing bland, generic, self congratulatory news items for the sake of writing then you are doing more harm than good both in terms of your time and effort and the reputation you are trying to establish – provide news items clearly targeted for your audiences needs, aspirations and expectations and provide a unique style or perspective to ensure that they begin to pick you out from the wealth of web pages clambering for attention. Essentially, do alot of in depth research and ensure you can be bold, daring and get your facts right all at the same time!

Short messages and pointers

I am really talking about the power of Twitter here – limited and overrated as it is, it does have a place. It is the marketing answer to a quick heads up about the latest goings on in a company and if written intelligently, can provide the public and followers with an insight into completed projects, upgrades, new offices, news items worthy of attention – communication that your audience wants to hear that could impact upon or benefit them or communication that relays your honesty and commitment to a specific product or service.

Other websites recommending your services

Carefully selected partnerships or lists of ‘friends’ can really be an advantage in sharing good quality sites – the visitors of one site are recommended to the other sites of a similar or ‘of interest’ nature. These are often found in a footer or sidebar of a website and almost act as mini-ads for the partners / friends. Facebook has not been mentioned here yet and for many in business to business based services it is not an appropriate or particularly productive channel in my opinion.

Affiliate marketing

Affiliate marketing on the web has the potential for increasing traffic and sales from your website via groups of people online who are given the task of selling your products via blogs, adverts, links and other methods familiar to those browsing the web. However, I personally think that in certain circumstances this can lead to the web being populated with biased reviews and misleading or exaggerated information. Why? Well, if you are paid to review a product or can make money from people buying a product or service you are more likely to write a dishonest or misleading review unless you have the ability to only sell those products or services that you rate the highest. Affiliate marketing is a method that works but there is no doubt it is open to abuse and tends to populate the web with exaggeration or misinformation.

Other media types

If there are other methods for communicating your message then these may be attractive to returning viewers. Creating episodes of video content, a series of exhibition or a podcast can ensure that returning readers find something of benefit to them each time therefore increasing the real value of the site.

Measuring Success or Failure

The key to keeping customers interested in coming back to the example site, www.torse.co.uk, is to make it of value to the reader. How do we measure what is of value to customers? There are various tools and techniques that could be employed to establish where customer value could be attributed:

Web Statistics

There are many ways of obtaining webstats including the use of Google Analytics and most web hosting companies will have their own statistics generators from log files on your site. How are these useful? Well, you can establish where people are spending most of their time and which pages tend to get overlooked. Then it is a case of analysing whether it is because the information is buried or simply not of interest. Once these trends have been analysed it is down to the analyst to provide insight as to recommending change, removal or redesign of a page.

Voting via Google +1, Digg, Stumble Upon [or other]

Allowing your readers to easily “like”, “+1″ or “digg” a news item, page, gallery or portfolio could generate a whole raft of interest from other sites designed to highlight or promote popular news items, useful websites and those pages that are of particular interest to internet groups. The traditional “like” system on Facebook is currently facing a small but growing challenge from Google’s +1 and with Google having such dominance over the web, it is important to take note of this development.

Direct feedback via survey email or phone

This has to be handled fairly delicately in many ways so as not to annoy your existing / potential clients or even use data you have access to in the form of email addresses, phone numbers or addresses in an illegal or inappropriate manner. Sending simple customer surveys through phone, email or even postal channels can provide an insight into what aspects of your content were useful to them and what they as readers or customers would like to see on the site in the form of articles or frequently asked questions. In many instances a guide to content can be found by assessing the enquiries made via web forms or phone and looking at how these can be covered on the website to answer these questions.

Increase in sales

Another indicator of success can be an increase in sales. However, attributing this to web content can be a difficult task though using tools such as Google Analytics, iMapt and other similar tracking tools can provide an insight into the popularity of your content and consequential activity. Paid for tools such as iMapt do provide additional insight into activity on your site and in some cases provide live warnings when someone enters the site.

Conclusion

Web content should be very carefully researched in terms of what your audience need to know to enable them to make a purchase or agreement to use your services. The methods for assessment listed above should provide guidance as to the value of certain sections of your site. Where appropriate, senior members of the company should play a reasonably large part in writing text, selecting images or at the very least proof reading prior to release [if a marketing 'expert' does the majority of creation] – no-one knows more about the company as a whole than those involved directly with its running. A copywriter could be consulted for additional evaluation of your content, further distilling the message to something direct, meaningful and making conversions to purchase or sign a contract an easy and informed decision.
There are both free and paid-for tools available to make assessment on how your existing and potential customers are using your content. These should be used in conjunction with a process of content distillation to assess points at which customers pursue or abandon your message. Just because people are moving through your site does not necessarily mean they value what you have to say.
Use external affiliate networks and telemarketing companies with care – they can do more damage if not correctly vetted in that their interest in receiving commission and further work from the companies they are promoting could lead them to exaggerate, omit or make misleading claims about the benefits or terms. I’m not against using external resources in this way but remember that an external company will never have the same dedication to your company principles and ideals as you even if they say they do.

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Creating A Social Network

Peter Simcoe — Tue, 09 Aug 2011 11:16:06 +0000

Before the internet a person wanting to join a society, interest group or even a professional body would usually find that their means of finding other interested parties, communication and news would be through the physical world – noticeboards, publications or letter. Now, with a significant proportion of the developed and developing world connected together via the internet, the process of finding like minded people or those with similar goals is much easier. Here are some of the benefits to creating or joining a community online:

The ability to promote your group or network across the globe and encourage people from beyond your physical community to become involved
To create interactive experiences where members can login and share information such as video, images and relevant articles
To use online calendars and planning tools to organise events and meetings with the ability to present media from the events
To allow online payment via Paypal or other web technologies for products and services related to your network
To allow members to post information about themselves, their motives and interests, enabling others to establish effective links or connections with people and their projects or activities
Deliver news and information to your group immediately
Provide an internal communication system separate from the users own personal email system should it be beneficial to keep more personal details private or distinct from professional details

Success or Failure

Should you choose to start your own community you will need to consider a variety of issues from your available time to the quality of information flowing through the online space for your users. The success of a community or network is significantly influenced by the following factors:

Your reach to the relevant groups or people who may wish to become involved. Do you have access to people on the web such as bulletin boards, forums or even a large and keen Twitter following, or in the physical world such as printed adverts, noticeboards where your information can be posted and taken notice of? If the answer is no, how will your message be read or even found? Word of mouth? Email? Getting enthusiastic responses via blog posts, responses, retweets or recommendations is the key to kickstarting your community.
Do you have a reputation that encourages people to act upon your recommendation? Or do you know someone who has a good reputation in your activity area who would be willing to put their name to your endeavours? If you want people to join a community, this can be a significant pull towards establishing the group. A reputation is not vital but does provide support in your message to the world.
Once you have overcome the first hurdle of establishing the interest of a few, or even many interested parties, have you or other contributors the time, inspiration and resources to consistently create quality interesting content for your network? Do you have a policy related to the regularity and style of your contributions whether it is through video, written blog items or even audio?
Are you, or others in your community able to monitor the quality of the information put onto the site. How will you deal with the inevitable abuse of the system and spamming?
Can your website sustain a reliable, effective service should there be a sudden explosion in readers or contributions? Consult your ISP or your IT service to work out the capacity of your webserver and assess how much data and bandwidth you have available.

Example – Drawing Research Network

As part of my work for the Open University, in 2003 I set up a website for the drawing community – The Drawing Research Network otherwise known as the DRN. The most recent version of the site was upgraded from static HTML to WordPress back in 2009 with social network plugins such as Mingle as with the traditional blogging features allowing users to create their own visible profiles and Twitter style timelines as well as upload articles with images to the site for viewing by other members. During July 2011 management responsibility of the website was given Loughborough School of the Arts who have funded an administrator [Pete Simcoe] to ensure the quality of the articles is high both in content and formatting and the content is as useful as possible to a worldwide community of academics, artists, designers and other people with a passion and interest in this subject.

As of August 2011 there are around 210 listed members with many others reading and referring to the site. Below is a summary of some of the functionality of the site in video format, designed to demonstrate some of the capability to new users. Some of the functionality has been slightly altered, in that you now need an invite similar to Google Plus to become part of the group with reasons given below the video:

Benefits of WordPress

The main benefits of using the WordPress system on the Drawing Research Network are the fact that WordPress is designed for this sort of group activity – a series of bloggers can contribute to a continual stream of online discussion. It is also an online software system that is free and has a worldwide support network as well as many custom designed templates. The template for the DRN can be seen at Themeforest.net where for $35 much of the programming and layout is complete – it is down to the administrator or IT support unit to customise and style the blog as required.

As previously mentioned, a variety of plugins provide additional functionality for the blog including the ability to pull photos from the Drawing Research’s Flickr account.

Spamming Hazards

The main problem with most blogs is that unless steps are taken to prevent abuse, they are open to spamming, abusive comments and other unpleasantness. The Drawing Research Network is no exception. However, an effort has been made to reduce the number of spam comments and timewasters by using the following:

Askimet Anti-Spam system available to WordPress users which reduces comment spam
SI CAPTCHA Anti-Spam plugin creating a barrier to spam-bots by using keyboard input
Secure Invites plugin meaning registration can only occur via an invite from another user

It has been an uphill struggle to resolve the spamming issue on this and other sites and whilst Invite Only websites have their limitations, the individual users of the DRN now have the ability to invite up to 10 other users which does create a kind of vetting process with shared responsibility in only allowing people with a genuine interest in drawing and drawing research onto the site.

Real Names and Photos

Recently there was outrage at Google’s decision to remove users on their new Google+ account that had not used their real names and one thing the DRN team have tried to encourage is the creation of realistic profiles. By this I am referring to the input of full names and legitimate email addresses along with a photo or example of artwork – the theory being that this firstly enables the detection of spam-bots or fake users more easily and secondly encourages responsibility and accountability on the site. If people are not happy putting their details online then they still have access to the main articles, the gallery and any downloads associated with these. It is also useful to note that the members list cannot be accessed by anyone other than the registered members themselves which provides additional security for users.

Conclusion

If you belong to a group, society, club, organisation or in the example given, a group of professionals with an interest in an aspect of art and design, and that group or organisation does not have a community website then considering using WordPress or other social networking sites to provide content and keep people in the loop is worth considering. For a list of all the social networking sites see Wikipedia’s list of social networks

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Social Media Experts?

Peter Simcoe — Fri, 27 May 2011 16:08:25 +0000

I recently read a scathing online blog article about Social Media Experts by Peter Shankman, who describes himself as a Social Media Entrepreneur, Angel Investor, CEO, Speaker, Consultant & Adventurist – which is quite a statement considering he points the finger at those who over inflate their role in industry and commerce. Hopefully he lives up to his own hype because he certainly does not hold back on criticising those working in Social Media as a full time job.

Constructing An Argument

If you read his article, “I Will Never Hire a “Social Media Expert,” and Neither Should You“, then you might be able to identify with the sentiment but if you describe yourself as one of the experts, then maybe not. The problem with the article is that Shankman has not spent time considering his argument in terms of intellectual content and it ends up sounding like a slightly insane rant:

…..Being an expert in Social Media is like being an expert at taking the bread out of the refrigerator. You might be the best bread-taker-outer in the world, but you know what? The goal is to make an amazing sandwich, and you can’t do that if all you’ve done in your life is taken the bread out of the fridge [...] “It’s not about building a website anymore! It’s so much cooler! It’s about Facebook, and fans, and followers, and engagement, and influence, and…”. Will you please shut up before you make me vomit on your shoes? [...]

The irony is that part of me that thinks the guy needs someone who deals with social media [but not a 'professional expert'] to help him write his blog article because he tends to discredit anything useful he is saying by writing what appears to be the first thing that comes into his head. However, I do think Shankman is onto something and I can see where this article could have gone with a bit more care and attention to detail [and arguments sounding less 'foaming at the mouth' shall we say]. This whole issue could be broken down into the following arguments:

Knowledge of the way Social Media works is not necessarily going to go hand in hand with the ability to apply that knowledge respectably or effectively in business.
Understanding marketing power and the way social media can influence this should come from a sound level of research and experience in branding and user interaction within a company rather than allowing social media to drive a process because ‘everyone is doing it these days’.
Experience and maturity should be applied to strategy and action taken when making yourself heard online. If you have something of value to offer customers then social media should be treated with delicate care and those who access your tweets, blogs or Facebook page should be under no illusion of how they can both ‘make’ and ‘break’.

My interpretation of Shankman’s dubious ranting is that he is enraged by the tidal wave of young, inexperienced social media ‘experts’ with little or no knowledge of business methods or processes. Where the article does fall down is that he does seem to dismiss any value to having followers on platforms such as Twitter, Facebook or other. In some respects he is completely wrong – blogs, Twitter and Facebook do have value but the level of importance to the business, the time allocated using social media and appropriate use or tone are the issues. Maturity, knowledge and business experience will dictate how much value is assigned to this in increasing sales or strengthening a brand but it is the knowledge beyond the hype [ie understanding the real advantages and disadvantages of these tools] that many business owners struggle to see and end up giving credit, in a respect and financial sense of the word, to those who deserve neither because there’s limited or no guidance / benchmark made accessible to them. Where business owners will also struggle when making decisions on spending time using social media is in the statistics – it is difficult to accurately assess how many of these social media tools really do or could affect the income a company or individual product could achieve and like all web based ‘booms’ for every success story there seem to be many other examples of failure or wasted effort.

You’d never give the intern permission to write the corporate press release to accompany an earnings announcement, so why the hell are you listening to the 22-year-old who says “we’re going to do this social media thing because it’s cool?”
- One of the more sane rants from Peter Shankman’s article

Characteristics Of These ‘Experts’

In my own experience I’ve often read the output of these so called experts. They do not usually last that long on Twitter [where you can prove you've little to offer the world in less than 143 characters] before they are removed – but their dross and the overall weight assigned to it seems to thrive – with the ‘icing on the disappointingly demoralising cake’ being the tragic thrill that most newsreaders on the BBC or Channel 4 news seem to get by giving Twitter or Facebook a mention during their broadcasts. Those with little to contribute easily outweigh those with valuable input and the ability to hide behind their computer along with the immediacy of the internet when commenting or blogging brings out the ‘inner stupid’ and prejudice in many. The way to identify a social media idiot is that they usually have at least two or three characteristics from the following [and you know you've met them]:

A career in social media promotion in one form or another is all they have ever known
They do not understand the businesses they work with and propose ideas that are short sighted and superficial
They have an over inflated opinion of their self importance and casually mix personal with business without thought
Their contribution is weak or limited in value and lacks mature judgement
They make recommendations that rate ‘rating’s over user experience eg number of followers vs quality of tweets

Conclusion

What much of my argument comes down to is that an understanding of social media technology and real influential value can help business owners weed out the useless people themselves – it is a case that businesses throughout the UK and the world would benefit from workshops telling you how to identify quality social media, SEO and blogging experts in conjunction with a little more education illustrating the genuine financial gains and losses that social media has provided.

ps – here’s the photo from iStockphoto I did want to use for this article [but was too expensive]

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Finepix Real3D printing

Peter Simcoe — Thu, 07 Apr 2011 14:28:45 +0000

Design-Design has recently reviewed both the FujiFilm Finepix W3 3D Digital Camera and the lenticular printing technology used to create the visual illusion of depth when printing 3D images. One of the services provided by FujiFilm is an online 3D printing service where .MPO files can be sent via the web interface at http://www.fujifilmreal3d.com/. The files are printed onto special lenticular sheet, a semi-transparent sheet that displays the image by splitting the two halves of the MPO image [one from each lens on the Finepix camera] and digitally printing it into the relevant strips of image information so as to give the illusion of 3D depth. See Design-Design review of lenticular printing for more information.

According to FujiFilm, the images are not a direct translation of the MPO files to 3D effect as the images must be converted to 12 seperate levels of depth [as opposed to the very high levels of depth provided by anaglyph and digital TVs that create realistic 3D] and the illusion is enhanced by creating areas of focus. This adjustment is mainly completed by the software with enhancement from the operator.

Cost Comparison

Images are around £5.00 each and with an additional £5.00 packaging and delivery it is worth grouping several images together. At this point it is worth mentioning that it is currently very difficult, if not impossible, to find any print company using lithographic techniques [high quality printing method] who will print low quantities of lenticular lens images for this sort of price. Most companies are quoting in the range of £400.00 – £600.00 each for 10 x A2 lenticular images of products. This should provide some perspective as to how flexible and low cost this process is.

Test Images

During March 2011 I sent around 20 different images to FujiFilm ranging from desert images to skaterboards performing midair stunts to products such as Playstation 3 controllers and guitars. Essentially, the range demonstrated a full range of scenes from close-up macro style to items in the distance.

FujiFilm’s website does contain some advice on the type of images that work best on the Real3D printers at http://www.fujifilmreal3d.com/printguide. The website makes various recommendations through the use of example photographs which in the end limits the user to arrange objects and scenes within around 10 – 200m for optimum results.

Print Quality

Having discussed cost and convenience, of which the process wins on both accounts, the quality of prints is what will make or break this service. To be blunt, whilst the images do give an impression of 3D the quality is disappointing on several levels:

There are significant errors on the images – some areas are poorly selected by the software so that objects like trees or flowers with branches that form a connected shape around the background are not all filled with depth on the level. Other images have odd inaccuracies such as the guitar strings on the electric guitars I photographed and large blocks around people where they had not been selected accurately – even with people in high contrast to the background.
Taking images close up to objects is difficult with FujiFilm’s camera and printing does even less justice to the image. I was testing the service out with a view to creating images for Loughborough Design School’s Degree Show in June 2011 and New Designers.
Images do not display the same colour accuracy as the original – they are much higher in contrast and lacking much of the detail. The resolution of the lenticular sheet also plays a part in reducing the quality – there are only so many lenses that can fit onto the sheet for the pricing bracket they are within and so images are degraded by this also.

Images do not show depth in a similar way to the camera by a long shot and is fairly disappointing when you have been amazed by the results on the camera screen, television and in anaglyph images.

The 3D effect seems to be more realistic on the Real3D print when images include elements that are too close to the camera and out of focus on the camera screen and anaglyphs. The example MPO on the right demonstrates the type of image that seems to work well. The water close to the camera is blurred – this seems to enhance the 3D effect.

Conclusion

Overall, whilst the images are novel for a short time and the price makes the printing accessible to many, the 3D effect is weak and there are too many errors in the images which demonstrate that the software needs further development to improve accuracy. The range of sizes that can be printed is very limited and this reduces the potential for presentation purposes.

3/10 – novel, relatively low priced, but disappointingly flawed. Not recommended.

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Finepix W3 3D Review

Peter Simcoe — Sat, 02 Apr 2011 12:20:46 +0000

Following the review of 3D lenticular technology in the last couple of weeks, here is a review of FujiFilm’s Finepix W3 3D camera. I was recently loaned one of these cameras by Tony Hodgson, Head of Department at Loughborough Design School and asked to explore how far the technology could be pushed with a view to making recommendations in terms of using it to display student projects. I took the camera on a trip I had planned and tried out the various features of the twin-lens system to see what this 3D technology could really do.

Entertaining and Fun

This camera pushes the fun factor when taking photographs to the limit – it is an amazing new product based upon an old principle. There’s no need to strap 2 cameras together to get the results you want for your images or even labour over getting your images to overlay accurately and with a HDMI interface, high speed USB port and compatibility with many 3D televisions as well as its own 3.5 inch display system, theres hours of entertainment in this device. See FujiFilm’s video presentation on this technology.

Shape and Design

The camera is compact and fits into a coat pocket and it is simple to start by simply pulling down the cover on the front. However, one of the main problems with the design is that it is very easy for the user to accidentally put their fingers over, or worse, onto the lens. The camera will warn you when one of the two lenses are being blocked by a rogue finger, but thats not the point – fingers on lenses is bad. People I showed the camera to were the worst culprits for wrapping their hands around and covering the open camera lenses and you WILL want to show people the screen on the back of the camera as the images do leap out! Having a display mode that works when the camera is off would probably help.

Range and Flexibility

The Finepix camera has a fairly limited range of shots it will display in 3D that your eyes can deal with. It works best when shooting images such as landscapes where there are a range of objects or people spread over a distance of 20 – 300m. In these circumstances you will see the product working at its best. However, even in Macro mode, the camera will not cope with products, people or other objects less than 1.5 metres away which is quite disappointing – especially as the primary purpose for being given the camera was to research its potential to display products at Loughborough Design School‘s degree show in June 2011 and the New Designers Exhibition in London in July 2011. You know when the camera is too close to an object as the display sends you ‘cross-eyed’ with painful results when viewing longer than a few seconds and in many cases this cannot be resolved by adjusting the parallax using the the easily accessible controller on the top of the camera. The only thing to do is to move away from the object until the image is satisfactory – in many cases this does reduce the 3D effect.

The camera can be manually set to take 3D images and this does prove useful in certain circumstances but the reality was that the camera was often left in automatic mode as this was the best way for exposure, parallax and composition to be most effective in the final outcome. Essentially, the camera is most effective when left to work out the 3D settings itself.

Picture Quality

The quality of the images produce FujiFilm 3D MPO files and JPEGs [though JPEG files can be switched off to conserve disc space on the SD Card]. The image are often lacking in clarity and grainy for a digital camera in the £350 – £450 bracket – however, remembering that there are two lenses then the camera still pushes its luck even at £200 per lens! Some of these problems can be rectified by using manual settings to set the ISO to 100, but this does not change things much and the automatic settings set the ISO to 400 which is a little too sensitive for outdoor shots on a sunny day.

The lenses themselves are not really suitable for very wide shots and this can be frustrating when trying to capture architecture or other large sized objects. This will mainly be down to remaining faithful to the way our eyes see in the natural world. The digital zoom feature is limited and reduces image quality to a degree but does a reasonable job of digitally zooming into a scene – it does not improve the depth of the image but does allow for more accurate framing.

There are some additional features such as the ability to take the two frames making up the 3D image independently [ie one shot that is then overlayed as you set up the next shot] – however, this is much harder than allowing the camera to adapt the 3D settings appropriately. Other settings include the ability to set up each lens independently to take the same shot – this way you end up with the same moment in time but, for example, one image with telepphoto settings and one wide angle or one black and white with the other in colour. Interesting but not particularly useful.

3D Effect

The sense of depth and space is definitely one of the plus points of the camera. When viewed on a 3D television the images are crisp and clean and when converted to red/cyan anaglyph images using free software such as Stereo Photo Maker they accurately translate. This makes for hours of fun enjoying the illusion of 3D within the images you have taken. The ability to convert to lower budget options such as anaglyph format as well as viewing on the FujiFilm V1 Viewer [if you bought one before it was discontinued recently], 3D TV or the back of the camera is a definitely a positive – though conversion to anaglyph [red / cyan] video using FujiFilm software bundled with the camera rendered very poor results which was disappointing.

Video

The video feature is limited in many ways but mostly for the lack of good sound recording due to the compact nature of the product’s stereo microphones and the lack of image stabilisation which means that camera shake is evident in most shots – even at its widest settings. Anything more than a slight breeze and wind distortion will occur and the camera is deceptively not true HD. Realistically the video feature is worthwhile as an experiment and provides as much entertainment as the images but don’t expect to be recording anything of importance or presentation material.

Conclusion

The FujiFilm Finepix W3 3D camera is a great toy and useful product for experimenting with 3D on a relatively low budget. However, don’t expect this to be the answer to creating quality video and images that require fine detail to be clearly defined as the standard here is relatively low compared to other cameras around the same price. What you can expect is alot of fun exploring the third dimension in your photography and simplifying the process of creating content for 3D televisions and anaglyphs for viewing on screen or printing.

As far as my original brief for Loughborough Design School is concerned, the ability for the camera to create good quality 3D images of products is very limited due to the lack of macro functionality. It is very difficult to get products less than 2 metres away to work effectively on the screen and when printed out using FujiFilms Real3D Printing service the results were even more questionable. A full review of the lenticular printing based Real 3D Printing service will be available on Design-Design in the next few weeks.

Overall Rating – 6 / 10
Overall Comment – Has potential and is alot of fun in the short term but long term this product is not versatile enough to maintain interest and production of some crucial accessories such as the FujiFilm V1 Viewer, an 8 inch lenticular lens based viewing screen, have been discontinued..

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Augmented Reality Review

Peter Simcoe — Thu, 11 Nov 2010 12:30:14 +0000

Augmented Reality can be defined as

…..a term for a live direct or indirect view of a physical real-world environment whose elements are augmented by virtual computer-generated imagery. It is related to a more general concept called mediated reality in which a view of reality is modified (possibly even diminished rather than augmented) by a computer. As a result, the technology functions by enhancing one’s current perception of reality. – Wikipedia

I have recently been asked to look into creating an example of Augmented Reality to promote the Design School at Loughborough University. Specifically the Industrial Design and Product Design courses. The promotional item brief was that a marker would be sent out to potential students on a sheet of A5 card and when the user clicks the link on the website and places the card in front of a web camera, elements will appear to rise from the card and give the impression of appearing in the real world. Here are a couple of excellent examples of AR that have inspired the research undertaken:

The advantage that Augmented Reality has is that it is new and novel enough to get people interested in viewing promotional material that features the technology but is accessible enough through the use of Adobe’s Flash Player, which is loaded onto around 95% of computers, for many people to view it. So in a way, now is the time to explore and take advantage of the buzz surrounding this novel concept.

There are a variety of companies involved in the production of Augmented Reality products and they do vary in cost. For example, FLAR Toolkit is freely available for programming your own creations – it does a reasonable job of optimising your PC or Mac to support Augmented Reality through the use of Adobe Flash Player.

However, if you are looking for a more bespoke solution with dedicated programming and development and do not want to use basic Flash open source programming, I recently got a quote from AR specialists Total Immersion for an academic promotional item that would have cost £17,000.

So there are some differences in terms of expenditure….but ensuring that the majority have the correct player to allow your creation to work may simply come down to a cost / distribution calculation that can quickly be made!

Gaming Experience

Particularly relevant is the release of Playstation’s Move and Microsoft Xbox’s Kinect technologies. These will, in their own way, promote the AR cause through examples such as EyePet, where the user can interact with a 3D animal that appears in the same room as you or Sports Champions where the user can hold and manipulate sports equipments with great accuracy [ie it maps the movement of the user perfectly] and Start the Party is the closest example of Augmented Reality gaming with the user appearing on the screen with the other interactive elements [similar to EyePet].

Lets take Sony’s Sports Champions as an example. Whilst it does lack the polish and style of other Sony releases and plays like a series of minigames that were used as a demo for the Move…. so does the price tag. At £25.00 on release, this title provides the user with an interesting immersive experience in Frisbee, Table Tennis, Archery, Bocce, Beach Volleyball and Melee. The most flexible and natural experience is the table tennis where I would estimate 70% accuracy to real life. There are some glitches that detract from gameplay but overall its an enjoyable experience way, way superior to any Wii game due to the complex data transmitted from the Move controllers to the software. It really does allow you to get involved with the action.

Mobile Experience

Augmented Reality Apps on mobile phones use similar technologies to the PS3 Move in that the hardware must detect the orientation and direction of the user and then apply appropriate data [usually graphics] to the viewport. Mashable.com have provided a series of examples of mobile phone apps that provide the user with additional information in their viewport [often on Android or iPhone based hardware] ranging from viewing the nearest tube station in London to understanding the approximate location and direction of people tweeting nearby.

Mobile phones do lack the hardware power that larger desktop PCs and Macs have but are able to handle some basic AR features that provide information or entertainment to their users.

Conclusion

FlarToolkit, Mobile Phone Apps and the development of console gaming technology allowing immersive experiences all help to push the technology forward and explore the idea that users can physically interact with their worlds with more than their keyboard, Mobile Phone browser or PS3 / Xbox control pad. It allows the user to recognise information in a spacial context – siting direction and distance in many cases. There has even been some development work in vehicle design where simple AR is used to enhance the users view of a road or to make data about the surrounding area [such as navigation elements] more convenient by presenting them as part of the windscreen view.

As computing power and the quality of webcams increases, so will the capability of augmented reality to truely help us explore new dimensions and spaces from the comfort of our own home or office.

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Cafepress.com Review

Peter Simcoe — Mon, 18 Oct 2010 17:06:15 +0000

The first point to make is that Cafepress.com is an easy way for home users with basic software and computer to create designs and get them printed onto cups, coasters, t-shirts, clocks and other accessories for friends, societies, clubs or events. I personally designed and printed 2 t-shirt designs, a couple of clock designs and four mug designs as complimentary samples for some clients, allowing me to see what the quality would be.

Quality

The quality varied depending upon which product you ordered – the t-shirts were excellent quality with crisp edges and flat, solid colour – even on black t-shirts [though I haven t yet washed them a number of times to see how the colour will handle detergent]. The cups were pretty good considering that they were single custom printed items [though sharp edges were a little more blurred than I expected them to be]. However, the clocks were fairly mediocre to poor due to the cheap plastic used and poor design style [the printed element of the large clock I purchased was bubbled due to heat or moisture.]

Customer Services

The second point to make is that the level of customer service is pretty good. There were two or three products out of the 12 ordered that were either broken [eg cups] or were not to expected standard [I could not access the "bubbled" area of the clock to flatten the raised areas]. When customer services were contacted they readily provided replacement items in the case of the broken mugs or a refund in the case of the clock after I supplied images of the problem.

Wasting Resources

The third and most important point is that the whole process generated a huge amount of packaging and waste which, although the process was alot of fun and the results were pretty good in the case of the cups and the t-shirts, was quite a shock to me and a disappointment. As a designer I need to be aware and concerned by waste and in this case it was something worth thinking about. The problem is that it would be near impossible to provide Cafepress services without the incredible amount of packaging and processing.

Many of the products were created in the Czech Republic then delivered to the UK and the cups, for example, were made in China – which again, takes incredible amounts of energy in terms of shipping transportation.

I was keen to explore alternatives to this process and in certain cases, products may be more efficiently produced in terms of time, packaging and energy waste by purchasing locally. For example, KallKwik in my home town of Chester, create custom designed cups for approximately the same price and the covered area of the cup is larger than Cafepress’s.

Testing

Tested products in terms of their quality and style:

T-Shirts – 80% – nicely finished though unclear how much washing they will withstand
Mugs – 60% – pretty good, though due to the printing process, sharp edges are blurred
Coasters – 40% – reduced colour palette created colour banding on constant tone
Clocks – 30% – poor quality plastic and construction let this idea down

Conclusion

Cafepress.com is an interesting idea, well executed and carefully marketed. It is a website I will look to when creating one off gifts and novelty items – for example, designing a custom styled t-shirt is far easier, less messy and more efficient using Cafepress than buying a home made silk screen t-shirt making kit and producing it yourself. However, it is worth noting that the amount of packaging required to ensure that your product reaches you in one piece and the quality of some of items [noting the cheap and 'tacky' large plastic clock] should make you think twice.

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Is printing redundant?

Peter Simcoe — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 08:48:17 +0000

With the recent launch of Apple’s iPad, some people will begin to question once more whether such technology will replace the need to print onto newspaper at all. In fact, personally, I consume news mainly through RSS feeds from various sites and less through TV. I never buy a paper to see what is going on in the world [but have occasionally read other peoples].

Ubiquitous Internet Access

Whilst iPad users and other media techies would love to live in a world with ubiquitous internet connection and immediate updates where ever they may be, we are still a way off this due to cost and technical capability – which makes a journey on the London Underground feel like a retro flashback to those pre 90′s days when mobile phones either did not exist or could only be found in cars. So, why are we still using print and not investing in creating a free, universal internet connection for all to download and consume content? Well, in short – it is still difficult to replace the trusty, versatile, battery-less, relatively low cost book, magazine or journal with an electronic equivalent with such desirable tactile and convenient features, though modern internet browsing products such as Smartphones, iPhones, Kindle and the Netbook are becoming less expensive, lighter and thinner. Advertising, printing photographs or creating physical bound books will continue to be a viable option for many businesses or authors for the foreseeable future.

Personally, I do not invest a huge amount of time and effort into print design as it does not fit with the business model I have for creating new leads or promoting projects. However, I do have 2 business card designs for different situations – one with a focus on my primary design business and the other with a focus on the network of portfolio, blogs and social networking sites I use such as YouTube and Flickr. I also designed a printed brochure to promote my business back in 2007 which I still use and refer to for some of my previous work.

Greenbarnes Ltd, a client of mine, uses a variety of promotional formats including a large amount of printed advertising and so I asked director Mike Barnes a few questions about his perspective on print – with particular focus on promotion of a business or product.

Interview with Mike Barnes, Greenbarnes Ltd

Is printing redundant?

I suspect that the answer to this depends largely upon your target audience. I recently read that, on average, it takes 7 contacts before a new customer is persuaded to purchase. In our own case, at least 2 of these are likely to be in printed form.

Do you use web technologies to promote your products?

We have what I believe is an effective website and e-shop which are promoted via a number of online directories plus a Google Adwords account. We spent some serious quality time getting the Greenbarnes website user experience right and feedback would suggest that we got this spot on! However, something like 50% of those arriving at the site do so by typing the address into their browser because they have seen our ad in one of the wide variety of trade and specialist publications that still form a significant part of our marketing mix.

Any ideas on why this might be the case?

A significant part of our client base is made up not of individuals, but of committees such as parish and parochial church councils or architects and designers who need to convince their clients. These are not people who can be persuaded to part with their credit card details and buy on impulse. They will inevitably end up sitting around a table and discussing the purchase before making a decision. This is where a second form of print, be it a glossy brochure or a printout of a pdf file downloaded from the website comes into its own. Sitting round a laptop to study detailed information online is simply not as convenient in the majority of cases.

So have there been any noticeable changes since the internet?

Whilst the volume of printed information that we mail out has declined sharply over the last few years, there is evidence that this trend has begun to plateau. There will always be a significant majority for whom print is the most usable medium. And let’s not lose sight of the other opportunities it offers. We have recently embarked on our first trials of large scale e-marketing, but seem to be getting results by following up the hottest prospects with direct mailing of brochures. In another first, we have also embarked on a campaign to include printed inserts in magazines as this not only affords the opportunity to try new publications without committing to series of ads, but also allows us to create extra impact in those publications that we have inhabited for many years. We may ultimately produce less by way of volume, but as part of an overall marketing mix, I believe that we will be producing better targeted and more tightly focused print in combination with the newer marketing technologies available.

You can see Greenbarnes products by visiting their main ‘brochure’ site or visiting their e-shop where a selection of their standard products can be purchased swiftly, securely and efficiently over the internet.

Effect of your work

One thing that is more difficult with printed promotional material is the ability to gauge the effectiveness. How many people saw your article, promotional photography or call to action and directly made a move? How many people even read the page the article was on? This is where internet technologies are much more useful – a writer or advertiser will have access to information related to who saw the page the information was on? what browser they used? the city they were in? what pages they came from and how many people moved on to other pages and after how much time?

Another client of mine, picture framing company Gesso and Bole Ltd, use print in a slightly different way – print is part of the complete product rather than the means to selling or advertising. I caught up with Jim Anderson and asked him a few questions

Interview with Jim Anderson, Gesso and Bole Ltd

Is printing redundant?

For us, printing is pretty fundamental; if printing was dead then we wouldn’t have anything to put in our frames. Obviously this isn’t the case – and we’d argue that rather than becoming redundant printing has just changed tact.

How has printing changed?

For many picture framers, printing is now something that’s done in-house. Many framing shops and galleries now have their own wide format digital printers which enables them to print exactly what their customers want, when the customers want it. Traditionally if an artist was going to produce a run of prints, the whole run would be done at once and the artist would often be left with hundreds of prints languishing in a warehouse somewhere. Now, these prints are done on demand when a customer orders them.

Is this change a good thing?

Yes! As well as being more cost-effective, printing on demand is far less wasteful than speculative printing. It also means that picture framers have more control over the whole process, as sizes etc can obviously be adjusted if printing is being done in house.

Gesso & Bole Ltd is a bespoke picture frame maker based in Derby. You can find out more about Gesso & Bole at www.gessoandbole.com or by following them on Twitter @gessoandbole.

Smelly Internet?

Another factor is the limited interactivity or media that paper will allow – though it does allow olfactory senses such as perfume samples, the smell of a quality paper or where the internet does not. Internet advertising allows for animation, audio, video and the ability to be tucked away, to suprise or to provide sequential information within a small space.

The basics

OK, taking this to an intellectual low – can you roll up an electronic ‘Guitarist Magazine’ digital subscription and place it in your back pocket like the paper equivalent – ready to read later on a lazy Saturday afternoon by the river? Not really, though some might like to try it. If you find that annoying fly sitting on the window [the one that's been buzzing around all afternoon] – do you hit it with the iPad, Smartphone, or the paper newspaper?!

All this aside, the book, the magazine, the paper is still the lightest, physically most accessible medium available. People often have a desire to remove themselves from the computer screen to more natural surroundings without the glare of an LCD monitor, phone screen or the general electronic buzz of electronic equipment. It seems that print is here to stay for the foreseeable future.

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Design-Design » Online

YouTube Video Editor

Overview

Advantages

Disadvantages

Conclusion

Your Digital Footprint

Momentary Lapse of Reason: A Quick Warning

An Example: Simcoemedia Design Consultancy

Portfolio or bloging websites

Stock Websites

Social Media and Other sites

Digital Footprint Diagram

Conclusion

Encouraging Keen Readers

Existing Example

Opportunities

Website static content

News items and dynamic content

Short messages and pointers

Other websites recommending your services

Affiliate marketing

Other media types

Measuring Success or Failure

Web Statistics

Voting via Google +1, Digg, Stumble Upon [or other]

Direct feedback via survey email or phone

Increase in sales

Conclusion

Creating A Social Network

Success or Failure

Example – Drawing Research Network

Benefits of WordPress

Spamming Hazards

Real Names and Photos

Conclusion

Social Media Experts?

Constructing An Argument

Characteristics Of These ‘Experts’

Similar Problems in SEO

Conclusion

Finepix Real3D printing

Cost Comparison

Test Images

Print Quality

Conclusion

Finepix W3 3D Review

Entertaining and Fun

Shape and Design

Range and Flexibility

Picture Quality

3D Effect

Video

Conclusion

Augmented Reality Review

Gaming Experience

Mobile Experience

Conclusion

Cafepress.com Review

Quality

Customer Services

Wasting Resources

Testing

Conclusion

Is printing redundant?

Ubiquitous Internet Access

Interview with Mike Barnes, Greenbarnes Ltd

Is printing redundant?

Do you use web technologies to promote your products?

Any ideas on why this might be the case?

So have there been any noticeable changes since the internet?

Effect of your work

Interview with Jim Anderson, Gesso and Bole Ltd

Is printing redundant?

How has printing changed?

Is this change a good thing?

Smelly Internet?

The basics