Finally! An email from your designer with an attachment. She said some stuff in the email but screw that – let’s look at this sucker first! C’mon, c’mon…open. open… OPEN!

Huh.

Hmmm.

Err… is that…?

Huh.

Well darn. That wasn’t quite what you were expecting. So. Now what?

But we did everything right! Didn’t we?

Very recently, I was helping a client create her brand-new-from-scratch logo for her brand-new-from-scratch business. She had been referred by another client of mine, so we were able to break the ice early on and jump into discussing what she needed. We hit it off pretty well in our initial conversation. We weren’t planning a joint family vacation to Bali, but we communicated well. We understood each other.

The best logos I create have a strong illustrative element to them. In this case, my client was looking for an image of a woman with her finger to her lips as if to say, “Shhh.. it’s a secret.” She told me a lot about what she wanted her business to be and what kind of customers she wanted to attract with her logo. We also talked about style and decided on a simple brush-stroke in black with just a hint of color.

With that, I was off to the races. After a few days researching and doodling in my sketchbook, I started creating the final art. I also spent a few hours in the “lab,” experimenting with a real brush and ink to see how those brush strokes might look when I made them in the computer.

When the actual design was done, I sent a PDF to my client and waited for her to admire the finely crafted art that would soon grace her screen.

A little less Stepford Wives, please.

As a designer, it’s good to have a thick skin. It’s also helpful to maintain a vast library of pop-culture references in your noodle. That way, when a client tells you the logo you sent is a little too “Stepford Wives,” you know what she means without resorting to Wikipedia.

For our purposes here, let’s just say that I missed the mark. It happens. Sometimes I create something a client loves on the first try. That’s pretty cool for both of us. Mostly, it’s a longer process: No. No. Kind of. Almost… Maybe if you tweak… Hey, looking good. Wow, I really like that. Can it be red? Awesome! I love it!

In this case, I nailed a few elements and had to rework more. Thankfully, I knew exactly what she meant and where I needed to go from there. My client was looking for something sexier, rougher… more aggressive. Check. We even shared a few jokes about the whole thing.

You suck! I quit!

There’s something hugely important to understand about this. After seeing my initial take on her logo, she didn’t see it as a failure. She didn’t fire me, or tell me “Nice try. I’ll find someone else.” And I didn’t send profuse apologies about making it suck. I didn’t put my tail between my legs and give up.

It’s because way back when we started, we decided we would be working on the project together. We clicked. Rather than see this project as an I-pay-you-make-it transaction, my client invested in our relationship. I invested myself in her business and making it look good.

I’ll have another round

The second version I created was spot on. She loved it. Then we got to talking. What if…? We talked about her customers some more. We decided to make some changes that would push the thing into another level of awesome.

This is also why I charge a flat rate. You get better results when creative decisions aren’t being directed by a clock.

At the end of the third round, we were done. We were both happy with the final logo and having worked together. Since then, I’ve checked in on her progress and she’s actually referred people to me. When she opens up shop, I’ll be sending business her way, too.

That’s how it’s supposed to work.

Except when it doesn’t work

The scenario I just described is fairly common. The design process can be a lot of give-and-take. So if you’ve hired someone based on the quality of their work or even a referral, have a little faith in the process. It can start out messy and end a masterpiece.

I make it all sound so easy, right? Faith. Trust. Pixie dust? You might be wondering:

How many rounds do I go through before I decide it’s never going to work?

I wish I could snap up a top ten list on this one. I don’t really want to, because there’s no formula to follow here. It’s a lot of intuition.

Ideally, you want to have a relationship with your designer that allows you to communicate what you need and what’s best for the project. That way, when what you see isn’t quite what you’d hoped for, it’s a discussion-starter rather than a relationship-ender.

Sometimes the communication isn’t happening. For whatever reason, you’re just not connecting. It doesn’t matter why. You could be ultra conservative and not appreciating a laid-back approach. Or vice versa. Maybe you’re having trouble articulating what you mean in a language the designer speaks.

When you’re there, you’ll feel it. And you’re justified in ending the contract and finding another designer. Even if the quality of the work is top-notch, you need to be heard and understood. Otherwise, you could wind up with a gorgeous design that’s totally wrong for your project. That’s why it pays to spend time finding a designer you really connect with.

Incidentally, this has happened to me… once in three years. Sometimes you go through all the “right” steps and still doesn’t work out. That’s life and business. You balance those out with the times it just worked like magic. You do the best you can.

Hey, wouldn’t it be great if there were guarantees on everything? Then again, that sounds like a recipe for boring.

Hey! If only there were a guide to all this working-with-designer-stuff

Next week, I’ll be making available a guide just for small business people who need help finding and working with designers.

It’s called Get Great Design. It will be a resource you’ll be able to access any time you need it from your desktop or mobile device. What the heck – I’ll make a print version available, too.

This guide is created to save you tons of time and money on design. In fact, it will be required reading for new clients – that’s how important the information is. I might lose a few projects, but I’ll still be helping people get the right thing for them, which is way more important for both of us. Plus, some designers are gonna hate me for giving out a few secrets about working with us. That’s cool. I’ve got my life preserver on so I can rock the boat a little.

I’m going to offer the digital version of the guide at the ridiculously low price of $9. $27

As soon as it’s live, you can get the guide here. You can also sign up on my advance notice list below. So you’ll be among the first to hear when the guide is live. You’ll also be invited to an exclusive, invitation-only, free private call where you can ask me anything you want about working with a designer. Really.

Sign up now

Update 07-18-10: The list is now closed to the public. Future discounts on guide-related workshops and teleclasses are available for people who purchase it. Do that here.

Sometimes those projects are other people’s stuff, so even if you decided to leak a bit of your work it wouldn’t be fair – or sometimes legal.

What can I say? It’s no secret that I love the work I do. I can get pretty annoying about it, actually. I’ll do something like post a video of The Captain & Tennille, which is like eating Skittles and Coke at the same time. Sweet and yummy, but you can only handle so much. Yeah, I’m aware.

But that’s what being inside the magical land of I Love My Work is like sometimes.

Take Pam Slim and Charlie Gilkey’s Lift Off Retreat. They asked if I would create an illustration for some retreat materials and I said, “Hell, no. I am way too busy. Try elance.com.”

Right.

I had been kicking myself because the retreat was perfect for me, but I already had commitments in Portland. So if I couldn’t go, at least I could contribute. Hell, yes. Once I accepted the mission, a few problems arose:

1. They told me what they needed and then let me “run with it.”
2. I had way more fun working on this design than people should be allowed.
3. I couldn’t show it off until after the retreat.

Alright, so only 3 was an actual problem, and only because of 1 & 2. Dream clients, they were. Free rein. Read about our retreat, do something cool. So I did:

I hear there’s another Lift Off retreat happening in August. I also hear that this last one was an experience to be treasured. So. August. Calendar. Reserved.

So what’s next?

So much stuff. I’m working on another Highlights High Five illustration… that I can’t show you. I created a header illustration with a magical creature and a real creature that you will have to see to understand. But you’ll understand and you’ll probably squirt Coke & Skittles out your nose. But I can’t show you.

Then there’s the ultra fantastic semi-custom web site help project that Tzaddi and I have been cooking up. She showed me the site this past weekend. If I was a little girl, I would have squealed. But I am not a little girl, I am a Very Strong Heterosexual Male, so I did not squeal. Not that you could hear, anyway. Stop looking at me.

And… I can’t show that to you, either. But my nuclear noggin is bursting. I want to, badly. Soon. In fact, if you’re at sxsw, you could probably twist Tzaddi’s arm to tell you about it. If you’re even slightly thinking that you need a web site, it’s going to be amazingly useful.

This is the first real team project I’ve been involved with over the past few years and I can tell you I picked a winner. I suspected that Tzaddi had some skillz, but I’ve been blown away by the work she’s done. When we combined our super powers, it was like Bam! Pow! Awesome! It’s one hell of a package.

Like I said, I can’t show you yet (after all that bam-pow-awesome stuff, I know, I know). I’m not sure exactly how or when I’m going to let people know when we officially launch. Maybe here, likely Twitter. If we run into each other at Starbucks I’ll probably blab all about it. If you would like to get the inside track, steal some sneak peeks, and wrangle advance discounts, you can get email updates. Just use the form below. Your info is top secret and the only thing you’ll hear about is this special package from Tzaddi and me.

Sign up for advance discounts and sneak peeks:

What else can I not show you? Plenty. It’s like trying to stand in front of a ginormous circus tent, saying, “What circus?”

You know, like in a computer. Pixels, vectors, Adobe products, Apple gear, WACOM tablet, LCD, external drives. Electromagnetic Hell.

So some students will find it odd that the first thing out of my mouth when I talk about method is, “Don’t create your art in the computer.”

This coming from the guy who makes his living with a computer. I didn’t always make awesome digital illustration. In fact, it kind of sucked.

A little backstory.

The first time I sat down at a computer was at my dad’s office at O’Hare airport (riiiight. try that nowadays, kids). It was a green-screen airline reservations system hooked up to a dot-matrix printer.  I was seven years old. My first thought was “This is just like Star Wars.” My second thought was, “How can I make art with this thing?” My sister and I had all kinds of fun making rocket ship patterns with numbers and letters. Weee-hoo!

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Years later, when Windows 3.1 became the hottest thing since 10-lb. mobile phones, I started creating art in the computer again. It was terrible. Pixelated nightmares of birthday greetings and mutilated self-portraits.

When a friend loaned me a copy of CorelDraw, I created some equally bad art in the computer. The fact that I had a more sophisticated vector application did nothing to improve my digital work. Why?

It’s because I strayed from the wildly fun and inspirational process of drawing and doodling and focused on just making it all up onscreen.

My digital work has improved considerably since I “went backwards” and started sketching again. When I work on a project now, my first step is to move away from the computer. Even though the final art is all digital, it always (always, always) starts out with a #2 pencil and plain ol’ paper.

Copylicious was delicious

Here’s an awesome real-world example of my method. It’s not brain surgery, this method of mine. I didn’t file a patent on the process. It just works.

Kelly Parkinson is a copywriter extraordinaire. If you visit her copylicious web site, you’ll soon find yourself inventing excuses to work with her. She’s just awesome, and she’s also my ideal client. She’s independent, knows her business, and enjoys talking about it. That made it incredibly easier to get a handle on how I could help her with some illustrations.

Kelly has a pretty cool product called the Web Site Jet Pack. The design of her site is simple and fun. She just needed a simple bird illustration. A birdie wearing a jet pack. When I hear something like that you can’t pull me away. A bird wearing a jet pack. This is what gets me excited, what can I say?

Let’s make some birdies!

After Kelly and I talked about her site, I went to Step 1: I put my computer to sleep and started doodling little birdies. I just had fun with it, let loose. No high art here, no polished Leonardo DaVinci renderings, just some messin’ around.

Then I went away and had something to eat (that’s Step 2 if you’re keeping track). It’s good to go away for a bit because I find I overfocus and lose sight of the big picture.

When I came back I narrowed down my doodles and made some more finished drawings. Below you can see a few examples. I do this every time.

Digital Illustration Unplugged: pencil and paper.

You’ll also see the final drawing on the tracing paper (upper right, by the pencil point). That’s the thing I scan in and use as a reference in the computer.

I’ll get into that in more depth another time, I promise.

For now, the thing I want to stick in your mind is the idea that creating digital illustration does not always start in the computer. For me, it starts where all my better illustration starts, which is in the noggin and on paper.

Another interesting point is that I never sent Kelly my doodles and scraps. How much fun would that have been for her?

Ummm… what the hell is this? I thought this guy was good, I don’t want this sketchy crap on my web site. What is this, like, half a bird? Oh my god… is it too late to get my money back?

It would be the equivalent of Kelly sending one of her clients a torn-up notebook page of shorthand and saying, “It will be kind of like this.”

Disaster, right? So instead they just get awesome copy that works. Kelly gets a polished-up birdie in a jet pack. Everyone’s happy.

So again, the lesson for today, Kids? Turn off the computer. Give that pencil a workout. You’ll be very pleased with the results and you might just have a blast in the process. Isn’t that why you do this anyway?

Did you know there are hidden rewards in a freelance art career? Rewards that take you farther than the ability to buy tonight’s keg, that is. If you’re new to freelancing as an artist, you need to hear this. I wish they taught this stuff in art schools. It’s about sustaining your career in the long term. It’s about building something more than a permanent “side” business. It’s about truly going out on your own and feeling awesome about it. Read on!

The Perspective

As a freelancer, I do my share of one-off projects. There’s that package design illustration for a kid’s snack container. There were the custom avatars, a few icons, a web site header. They’re nice, these one-offs. I enjoy them (because why else would I fire up my computer every day), but the projects I do my best work on are the ones that require lots of chatting, e-mails, and idea-tossing. Those are the ones that blossom into an ongoing, mutually beneficial relationship.

Womb to Bloom is one of those relationships. 

The Womb to Bloom web site is an online community and resource for new moms and moms-to-be, “Maternity and Beyond.” Awesome concept, amazing potential for growth.

The Client

The Womb to Bloom founders (Greg and Heather Zellers) and I reached each other through a gig-type site about some animation work they needed done. It’s no secret that I love to talk with people about their projects. First, it’s just fun (I geek out on web and TV development). Second, it helps me frame my portion of their project with a reference that controls the budget. It’s also easier to offer new ideas without going off on crazy tangents.

So when they called, we talked a lot about what the animation could be. It also happened that they needed some simple illustrations and icons that would tie everything together. This is where I started drooling on my phone because I loved the site concept, they had a great logo already, and the web development was already flowing.

The Concepts

The initial concept was to have a central “mom” character to base everything on. Once we nailed down that character design, the icons and other illustrations would flow. I was already loving this project because it made sense before I even got out my pencils. It was also very easy for me to create a project plan that worked with their budget. 

Although we had some great early chats about concepts, I have to admit that the initial brainstorm sketches I created were a little… off. The style of my first sketch was just somewhere between Family Guy and Rugrats. But this is the part that makes my job awesome, because we were able to use those sketches as a jumping-off point and keep the conversation going.

So we chatted in greater detail about Greg and Heather’s ideas. What they wanted was an attractive, hip, and fairly trendy woman who could transition easily from pre-pregnancy to new mom. The next sketches were right on target and ready for vector illustration and color. Below is a final concept image:

Incidentally, I created all the final art for this project in Adobe Illustrator CS3. In the very near future I’ll be providing step-by-step instruction on how to create this kind of work, so graphic designers, web designers, and traditional artists can reap the benefits of my experience. Yay!

A few things made it easier to create the final art for this project. They already had a logo, so I had specific colors to choose from. Greg and Heather really knew what they wanted to see. They couldn’t always sketch out an example or articulate a style, but once I gave them a sketch to go on we had a basis for conversation. They knew their demographic, which translated very well to visual goals. 

The Work

I know, I know. You want to see sketches. I hear ya. Here’s a great, simple example of how an illustration concept developed. One of the sections on the web site is for contributors. We started out with the idea of a smart-looking woman (new character) in a cafe with a laptop. I sketched it out and hit the mark, woo-hoo! However, we did decide to go with the main character after all, and you can peek at the results:

As an even better demonstration of how a project can progress and a great relationship can generate even more fun ideas, take a look at what we finally used for that section of the site. I think it worked out nicely.

Another favorite illustration of mine from the project is the community section. The whole idea was to get moms together from all over the country and have them chat online, as if they were in someone’s living room. Pretty cool, right? I knew I had to thinkify something unique and fun, but also instantly communicate that idea. My first sketch:

The question became, how do I divide this cozy little scene into sections that show that cozy closeness and distance at the same time? It turned out not to be so difficult with a little sleep and some coffee. After seeing the final art, they added a new wrinkle; let’s see an image of the U.S. behind them to really hit home the idea. Not one to shy away from a challenge, I came up with a funtastic solution. You can see the progression. I still like both. Good thing I didn’t have to decide.

State of the Iconomy

The web site also needed some icons. About a hundred of them, in fact. I loved that I was able to work on this part of the project because I could take everything we had developed in the illustrations and use it to create the icon concepts. It worked out beautifully because we already had a flow going and could reference previous conversations. It turned out to be a lot of work, but also a ton of fun. You can see the icons all over the site, but here’s a sample page of a few I really like:

Wrap it Up

This is the best part. We haven’t wrapped it up. The working together part, that is. After getting to know the Zellers through working with them, we’ve shared information, links, and even referred business to each other. It’s the ideal b2b relationship, where we mutually benefit beyond the exchange of service and money.

The truth is, I did find this client through a bid-type freelance gig site. I don’t love these sites because typically you’re bidding on projects in a vacuum. My whole method of working revolves around many conversations and lots of information exchange, which the bid sites make very difficult.

The thing that I took away from this is that bid sites can yield some good projects, but you have to be prepared to build a relationship beyond the one-off. If I see a project posted and I don’t feel that’s possible, then I move on. It’s just not my cup of chai.

If you’re new to freelancing, I can’t stress enough that long term relationship-centered business is one of the major keys to your success. You can work on a hundred one-off projects through a crowdsourcing site and make a little cash. That’s great. You can throw your artwork up on a stock site and make a few dollars for every download. Awesome.

Those activities will not sustain you for very long because you only come away with cash. I say “Big deal, Dude.” Anyone can make some quick cash these days. Create a free blog and stick a PayPal Donate button on it.

Remember that rewards thing, kids. If you want to keep the art thing going and get Mom and Dad off your back, listen to your Uncle Sparky.

Typically I work with small to medium-sized businesses, helping them create visuals that complement their own words, ideas, and products. When Nick Collins got in touch with me and explained what he wanted, I knew it was already right up my alley.

Nick had an existing logo that was serviceable, but he wanted to get something that really popped, with some energy to it. He also wanted to keep his current color scheme and stay within four colors. In addition, he needed the logo to be available in black and white without changing the whole design.

When we first talked on the phone, my excitement was building because this is exactly the kind of thing I specialize in and I just love to do it. Nick is an excellent designer himself, but after explaining what he was looking for, he pretty much left it to me to come through with something cool. It’s tough for an artist to let go of that control ( I should know, I’m terrible at it).

One thing I like to keep in mind when creating a logo is the myriad types of media it will be reproduced in. I started my career in a sign shop and that experience has always helped me in thinking practically as well as creatively.

For example, at our sign shop we were often tasked to reproduce a company’s logo on one of those huge back-lit signs you see in a strip mall. When we would ask for the logo file, many times we would get a teensy 72 dpi gif image that was grabbed from a web site. Seventeen colors, gradient fills, and a complex bitmap image of an eagle looks great on screen, but at 48″ high it’s virtually illegible.

Clients would get upset (and rightly so) because they paid big bucks for a graphic designer to create their logo, only to find out that:

1. The designer now lives in an ashram and can’t be reached.
2. They created the original art at 72 dpi, 8″ x 10″. All they have is a color printout on inkjet paper and the web graphic.
3. It’s going to cost them a lot of money to have us recreate their logo for them.

As a small business owner, that kind of unexpected news is sort of, well, unwelcome.

Thankfully we had a few tricks up our sleeves (software) that would make things less painful, but the process was tedious. If they had only sprang for the pro designer and a versatile, scalable logo (or camera-ready art) in the first place, it would have been easy-peasy.

So with See Nick Design, I found myself on the phone with a business owner who new all of this. Very refreshing and very smart on his part. Doing his homework saved him a pile of money and at least one headache.

The challenge was up to me to create it. I started by sketching out a few concepts with my fancy… pencil. It’s true. I work digitally, but everything starts the old-fashioned way with a nice, sharp set of pencils and some good ol’ paper on a drawing table.

Here’s a sample of the concepts he had to choose from, based on our conversation:

We talked about these and there were parts of each that he liked, so I made a set of revised sketches and we went through the review process again. Nick was really clear on what he liked and didn’t like about them, so I didn’t have to guess if I was going in the right direction.

Once he decided on one image, I set to work creating it in Adobe Illustrator. Two reasons for using Illustrator vs Photoshop in this instance are:

1. Scalability of vector art
2. Drawing tools in Illustrator are more flexible for this kind of thing.
3. I could export an EPS file that any other vendor could work with.

Once I’ve pasted my sketch into Illustrator I’m ready to trace. However, it’s not quite that easy. Before I even get out my bezier tool, there’s a thinking process involved. Sure, I need it look nice, but I also need to think about how to create certain looks without using effects. There are some amazing effects in CS3 now, but if I use them to create an image, they may be wasted if a vendor has an older version or a different design program. Also, if I use the transparency tool on one area, what happens if Nick wants embroidered shirts at some point? This doesn’t mean it’s impossible to utilize the great tools in Illustrator, but I do need to consider those factors.

For brevity’s sake, we’ll say I considered everything from fonts to how long it takes to get around the moon with only one oxygen tank. Cool?

This was one of those magical projects that require minimal revisions. It was really a matter of tweaking the final art, and Nick gave concise directions. I kind of wish it was more difficult so I could chronicle the drama, or that Nick worked for SD-6 and demanded I fly to Belgium for clandestine client meetings, but alas, it was smooth sailing.

Where are those clients with nuclear weapons and nasty tempers, anyway? I have a blog to write here.

I joke, but this project was really rewarding because the focus was right where it should be (on the concept and execution), and Nick left me alone to do my job.

There was a nifty thing that happened on this job. Nick described himself to me and said that he wanted the guy in the logo to resemble him if possible. Funny thing is, after I did my initial sketch, he sent me a photo of himself(R).

Eerily close, no? That was pretty fun to see.

One change we made was to add a slight smile to the face. He wanted a happy look, but nothing goofy or silly. Done!

Here are the completed logos, in color and black and white:

That was it, and I was almost sorry to wrap this one up. Hopefully there are more clients and projects floating out there, waiting to be taken in hand.

Don’t forget to check out the See Nick Design web site and find how Nick has implemented the logo. Besides that, he does some very interesting work that you may have seen before.

I’ll be posting more client profiles over time. There are a few in the wings, and I’m only waiting for publish dates. Stay tuned!