The unimaginative and not-so-bright "designer"

It bugs the hell out of me when a so-called "designer" claims as their own a design concept, or actual work, of a true design professional. I'm not writing about situations where existing work is used as "inspiration" for new work. I'm referring to blatant rip-offs.

Years ago a local Portland designer, when interviewing for jobs, actually included printed pieces of my work in the portfolio she was showing potential employers. Fortunately, in this pre-Internet case, she made the mistake of presenting the portfolio to a creative director who is still one of my best friends - and the "designer" was busted big time by my friend recognizing the work. In another situation, I almost drove off the road one day (here in Portland as well) when I saw signage for a building represented by a logo I had designed for a client in an unrelated business. The typeface hadn't even been changed on the sign. Yet another "designer" was caught red-handed due to their own stupidity.

Recently I was informed of a situation where a theatre company had "borrowed" a logo I designed for a play. The identity, now being licensed by the Theatre Logos Agency, had simply been copied from the TLA site and pasted into the theatre company web presence - complete with the "©" watermark of TLA. In other situations, I have been informed by eagle-eyed design professionals about examples of my work being included in the online portfolios of other "designers," or displayed as submissions on so-called "logo mill" or "logo contest" sites as the original work of someone else.

More and more often I am reading online forum posts about designers' identity creations, web designs, or code being blatantly stolen by others. The good thing is that a knowledgeable and vigilant online community of designers is often catching the rip-off "artists." I think my friend, designer and illustrator Von Glitschka, has got to be one of the most often ripped-off professionals around. Luckily, with his highly recognizable style, others in creative fields have discovered and reported the stealing of his work by individuals around the world. The Internet seems to have made it a bit easier to catch the unimaginative and not-so-bright "designers."

In reading the How Design Forum this morning I came across a thread about yet another so-called "logo contest" site, where "clients" post design requests, with ridiculously low possible payouts, for speculative logo design work from obviously not-so-bright individuals, in a quest for the ideal identity created by "the most talented designers in the world" (the site's claim - not my personal opinion). I'm not going to even bother including the site's name or URL in this bLog-oMotives entry. I don't need to do so all; Steve Douglas, HOW Forum member and Creative Director of The Logo Factory, did that for me in his own blog post "Why logo contests don't work" - documenting the fact that two of his own company's designs were ripped-off by two different "designers" making "logo contest" submissions.

Douglas' blog, and a HOW Forum mention that someone using the screenname "LogoMotives" was posting submisssions, piqued my curiosity enough to make a visit to the "logo contest" site myself. Sure enough, someone is posting "contest" entries as "LogoMotives" - which I assume is nothing more than an attempt to ride the coattails of my 30 year career as a logo designer.

Then I saw the unimaginative work of submitter uptowngirl92 - her rip-off of my award-winning Seacoast AIDS Walk identity (above). As I mentioned in a HOW Forum posting "I'm not sure what is worse, being ripped-off exactly, or having your original concept ripped-off and executed incredibly poorly (I think you can tell which design is mine)."

In marketing and promoting your design work, you need to put it "out there" for potential clients to see. My work is on numerous portfolio sites, in profiles on other online presences, published in over 100 books, and featured on the Jeff Fisher LogoMotives blogfolio. Such Internet promotion brings a great many clients my way and the benefits far outweigh the negatives. I also appreciate the many kind comments received from students and professionals who see my work as inspiring in regards to their own efforts. However, I'm far from a fan of the unimaginative and not-so-bright so-called "designer" who feels they have the right to use and abuse the work of others, and then claim it as their own. In fact, it really pisses me off.

I'm thankful that the design community does such a good job of finding these rip-off "artists" and calling them on their unprofessional and unethical activities.

© 2008 Jeff Fisher LogoMotives

Nothing like a slap in the faceto wake up a design community in the morning

Yesterday the discussion on the About.com Graphic Design forum was primarily about the poor ad placement on the Graphic Design home page. Mutiny was being discussed - and, to be honest, I don't know if I want to be supporting a site that obviously has little concern or respect for their professional graphic design community. It's unfortunate, especially as I have been an active member of the valuable discussion forum for nearly a decade. The rotating ads were popping up again on the site this morning:

Even odder, and on the same general topic, was the email I received a few weeks ago from a marketing representative of HP. She explained that following a visit to my website she was wondering if I would be interested in a link exchange with the recently acquired "logo design" division of the HP company.

Huh?

© 2007 Jeff Fisher LogoMotives

HOW Forum HOWies create HOWie wowie poster

The HOW Design Forum is one of my favorite online communities. I've been a participant for several incarnations of the cyber forum to date. Those who participate in the daily design networking activities are commonly known as "HOWies." If the name conjurs up a sense of some off-the-wall cult members, it's not far from the truth - the forum is kind of a design cult that sucks you in and will not let you be free to take care of your necessary daily work tasks.

Over the years the online community activity has occasionally strayed into the "real" world. HOWies have congregated at the annual HOW Design Conference (with special custom HOWie attendee I.D. badges), and in more casual gatherings around the country, to form real friendships. In a step beyond the normal forum avatar identitifications, The HOW Forum Member Picture Show A-Rama gave real faces to many of the regular visitors. There's even a HOWie group on Facebook, and a gaggle of HOWies can be found of Flickr and elsewhere on Internet social networking and design-related sites.

The forum participants have also moved beyond socializing to collaborating on design projects. In recent years there have been a series of HOWiezine projects, each with a different theme. Participants are responsible for designing, producing and submitting their zine pages, which are then compiled and distributed in complete magazine form by hard-working little HOWie elves. I'm usually too involved in writing or design projects to play with the other kids. However, I did participate in a HOWie cookbook project a couple years ago.

Late last year the HOWie poster project idea hit the pages of the forum. Through months of forum posts a theme was selected, forum visitors were able to sign up to participate, rough concepts were presented and all aspects of the project could be followed by all participants. HOWie poster diva (and that is meant in the best possible context) Jas Wabbington (Screen name: WabbingtonDesign) led the troops through the process and deserves a huge "thank you" for her efforts in herding 37 designers on one project. She also art directed and illustrated the poster in which HOWie participants show "Our True Colors" as color chips growing on a beautiful tree. HOWie poster project manager "jroz" deserves a tip of the HOWie hat, too. As does HOWie "mathias' for coming up with the initial concept. Ryan at Direct Edge Media deserves a "toot!" for the great printing job.

My HOWie poster arrived in the mail yesterday. The end result of the fun collaborative effort will find a special place on my studio wall - when the organizing of 30 years of design files/books is completed and I can actually find a wall.

© 2007 Jeff Fisher LogoMotives

Toot! Toot!*:JumpUp.com spotlights Jeff Fisher LogoMotives

The design firm Jeff Fisher Logomotives is featured as a new Small Business Spotlight on the business resource website JumpUp.com. JumpUp, "the place to start a business," allows members to post a business profile, make use of a variety of site resources, and interact with other businesses owners. Jeff Fisher LogoMotives uses the web presence to promote identity design services to potential clients, as a business research source, and in networking with other companies.

Jeff Fisher, the Engineer of Creative Identity for the Portland, OR design firm, is featured in regards to the business challenge of the sense of isolation felt by many home-based business people. The spotlight includes a photo of Fisher working from the "summer office" of his garden. As noted in the feature, the Internet provided solutions to the challenge through graphic design industry networking forums such as the HOW Design Forum and the community at About.com Graphic Design. The website CreativeLatitude.com also introduced the designer to other creative professionals around the world. Fisher found an opportunity to network with other business owners through the site StartupNation. A fairly recent addition to his resource list is BoDo: Business of Design online. Designers Who Blog has provided an additional outlet for interacting with others in the design field.

JumpUp.com was created by Intuit - the maker of Turbo Tax, Quicken and QuickBooks - to help new businesses and business owners get up and running quickly and successfully. The site provides a wide variety of resources and methods for entrepreneurs to connect with other business owners. Membership and participation on JumpUp is free.

Fisher makes use of Intuit products in the operation of his own business.

Jeff Fisher has received nearly 570 regional, national and international graphic design awards for his logo and corporate identity efforts. His work is featured in nearly 100 books on the design of logos, the business of graphic design, and small business marketing.

Fisher is a member of the HOW Magazine Editorial Advisory Board, the HOW Design Conference Advisory Council and the UCDA Designer Magazine Editorial Advisory Board. His first book, The Savvy Designer’s Guide to Success, was released by HOW Design Books in late 2004. His new volume, Identity Crisis!, will be on bookshelves in late 2007.

(* If I don’t "toot!" my own horn, no one else will.)

© 2007 Jeff Fisher LogoMotives

Enjoying the outdoor office...

The past few days have been beautiful in Portland. As the annual Rose Festival event schedule begins many locals head out of Dodge or find a way to hibernate in their neighborhoods to avoid the parades, extra traffic, and bridges going up and down on "the moat" as the ships arrive/depart for the festivities. I will not leave the home studio much this next week - but, with the nice weather, I have moved out to the "summer office."

Yesterday, on The Serif - one of my favorite blogging "side tracks" - Jim and the gang were having some Friday fun posting shots of their work spaces. I sent over a photo of mine and succeeded in making eveyone a bit jealous. They even ended the day with a photo of Al Gore's office. (On the HOW Design Forum there's also been an ongoing workspace thread.)

The only drawback to working in my outdoor space is that I'm often distracted and end up playing in the dirt. Not a bad thing for digging up a little creativity...

© 2007 Jeff Fisher LogoMotives

Logo competition upsets local graphic designers

I was pleased to read of the position being taken by 11 graphic designers in Cleveland in response to the Cleveland Foundation conducting a "contest" to select a new logo. HOW Design Forum member "dougler" brought the article Logo competition upsets local graphic designers to the attention of forum visitors earlier today.

I think many in the design industry have reached a point of "we're mad as hell and not going to take it anymore" in regards to calls for speculative work being masked as "contests." The NO!SPEC movement was launched for the purpose of taking on the issue of graphic design industry "spec" work. Some argue that "spec" requests have always existed in the design industry. That doesn't mean such situations are acceptable or should continue.

The letter written by the designers to The Plain Dealer newspaper, and the follow-up article, are a welcome addition to the ongoing design industry effort to educate businesses, organizations, other designers and the general public about the value of professional graphic design and the processes that may help any design client get the best end result. My previous well-circulated article and bLog-oMotives post, When a "contest" is not a contest, and efforts such as the Graphic Artists Guild's published Suggested Guidelines for Art Competitions and Contests, also are part of that education process.

I seriously doubt that the Cleveland Foundation intended, or expected, to find themselves in the middle of a controversy when announcing the organization's logo design contest. Perhaps the "contest" should have been researched further before putting the specifications out to the public. The newspaper article comments of James Lubetkin, senior communications editor at the foundation, suggest that the organization does have a sensitivity to the situation - after the fact.

I've been involved in situations in the past where an entity seeking a new identity has initially reviewed a great many portfolios. From reviewing past work, a few designers/firms are selected to submit presentations. Those design professionals are compensated with "x" number of dollars for the time spent in preparing and presenting proposals. The business, agency or organization then bases their hiring decision on those presented ideas. I appreciate the search process being conducted in such a manner. As a designer, it conveys to me that the potential client understands the value of the professional graphic design process and the results.

Congratulations to the "Cleveland 11" for putting a public spotlight on the issue.

© Jeff Fisher LogoMotives

Designer interaction, professional resources,time-wasters and imaginary friends

In a current thread on the Graphic Design Forum, member Juggnoxalo asked others to post links to other forums they visit. I shared my forum list and thought it might be a good resource to post as a blog entry as well.

In a past bLog-oMotives entry I mentioned my Creative Latitude article Funny Things Happen on the Way to the Forums, in which I interviewed three moderators of online design forums. The Internet opened up a whole new world of interaction for designers - especially for the somewhat isolated one-person design shop like my own home-based studio in Portland. The forums are often an incredible information resource for designers, a great "time-waster" for the daydreaming design professional, and an excellent way to make what my partner refers to as my "online imaginary friends."

With many recent emails from designers wondering how they can interact with others in the graphic design field, I am posting links to some of the forums I visit as a reference. (Those in bold are the ones I frequent most often):

About.com Graphic Design • Anticubicle • Communication Arts • Core77 • Designate Online • designers4m • Designers Lounge • DesignersTalk • Designwire • Dexinger • Graphics.com • Graphic Design Forum • HOW • Lounge72 • Rookie Designer • ModMinds (fairly new) • The Creative Forum • The Designers Forum • Typophile

In addition, an excellent business-related forum is Startup Nation.

© 2006 Jeff Fisher LogoMotives

What advertising is working?: Perception vs. reality

I recently asked a new Portland client how she tracked the success of her advertising, marketing and promotion efforts. She told me that she didn't. I then asked how she knew what was drawing customers to her business. She told me she "didn't have a clue." This woman was spending beaucoup bucks each month to promote her business. She was doing radio, television, print (magazine image ads and newspaper "call to action" ads) and outdoor; yet she didn't have a clue what was working. However, she did seem to have a problem saying "no" to any advertising representative calling on her business to present promotion possibilities.

As she was stuck in contracts of several future months with most forms of media, I immediately suggested that she only promote certain specials on one given media at a time. Potential customers seeking the special for a specific service would help her start the process of being able to track what was best serving the business as an advertising vehicle. I also suggested that she educate her entire staff about the specials being featured each week. Previously, most didn't know what was being advertised at any time. In each weekly staff meeting employees began to receive printouts of all ads being run and a schedule of broadcast media efforts. A notepad was created, providing a checklist of all advertising being done, for personnel answering the phones. When the phones were answered, the caller was first asked how they had learned about the business , with the response being recorded on the notepad. Far from an exact science, this did help the business owner begin to get an idea of what advertising dollars were bringing clients to the company. When her current contracts expire it will not be necessary for some to be renewed.

This whole excercise reminded me of the experience of a friend/client who owned a high-end men's clothing store in Seattle some years ago. We had the opportunity to make use of the talents of a great fashion photographer for a photo shoot of models wearing the clothing while walking through Pike Place Market. I developed a series of print ads to run every other week, in only the freebie publication Seattle Weekly. The business owner was quite savvy when it came to his marketing and promotion. He decided to make sure his employees asked each customer how they learned about his store.

Over a period of a couple months, the majority of customers said store advertising had resulted in their first visit to the establishment. (The other top answers were word-of-mouth and simply walking by the store) Most then said they first learned about the store through ads in one of the city's daily papers - in which no ads were ever placed. Many others recalled seeing television commercials or hearing radio spots - no broadcast media was ever used. Others commented on seeing outdoor signage or bus boards promoting the store - additional vehicles never even considered in the original advertising plan. A somewhat small number accurately remembered seeing the ads in the Seattle Weekly. Still, most of those seemed to remember the ads running every week, when the placements were actually only every other week.

Although the answers were not what he expected, my client/friend was thrilled that he was getting such broad perceived advertising exposure for the reality of a limited advertising dollar expenditure.

How are customers/clients finding your business? What is the perception? What is the reality? How do you track the results of your advertising efforts?

Note: This piece originally appeared as a forum posting on the StartupNation community forum.

© 2006 Jeff Fisher LogoMotives

R.I.P. Commpiled.com

Sadly, the web site Commpiled.com - The Marketing Communications Network - notes today that "The Commpiled Network has been closed and is now for sale." For many the site was a great source of information and inspiration. Articles about various aspects of advertising, marketing, promotion, design and creativity were staples of the web presence. Over a dozen of my own articles appeared on the site since 2004. Thanks to Howard Theriot, and others who were involved, for all of their efforts on the site. It will be missed.

I've already received a few requests for links to my articles that appeared on Commpiled.com. If possible, the pieces are linked below. Some of the articles have also been blog-oMotives entries, published in How Magazine, or posted on CreativeLatitude.com, Graphics.com, and the former StickyIdeas.com. I will get others posted as soon as possible.

• The proper care and feeding of the in-house designer (January 2006)

• These are a few of my favorite things - from the world of identity design (December 2005)

• Designs on your own neighborhood (November 2005)

• Designs on dining: Restaurant logos as a graphic invitation to a meal and an experience (September 2005)

• Tooting your own horn: How designers can get the word out (September 2005)

• Profiting for pro bono creative efforts (August 2005)

• How much should I charge? (July 2005)

• Designing identities for faceless clients by way of the Internet (June 2005)

• A winning strategy: Industry awards as a design tool (May 2005)

• Preaching what you practice: Speaking in graphic tongues to the masses (February 2005)

• Don't shoot the client (January 2005)

• When a "contest" is not a contest (November 2004)

I hope this helps those looking for the articles.

© 2006 Jeff Fisher LogoMotives

New HOW Design Forum goes live

The long-awaited launch of the new-and-improved HOW Design Forum took place this morning. How Magazine created the forum to serve as an online community that offers support and advice for and from creatives around the globe. Monitored on a daily basis by the HOW staff, the forum is an online home-away-from-home for many professional designers of all levels.

Online design forums have become a valuable education, business and therapy resource for many graphic designers around the world. At Creative Latitude you can read my most recent article Funny things happen on the way to the forums.

© 2006 Jeff Fisher LogoMotives

DESIGNWIRE: A new design forum for the new year

An email this morning, from Australian designer Dale Harris, announced the introduction of a new graphic design forum - DESIGNWIRE: a design community. It is sure to be a great international resource - and already has members from Australia, the United States (California, Georgia, Oregon and Texas), Belgium, Canada, the Philippines, Singapore and the United Kingdom. Check it out for interaction with designers from around the world.

Creative Latitude has already added DESIGNWIRE to the listing of forums at the end of my latest article Funny Things Happen on the Way to the Forums. The piece is a question and answer session, on the topic of forums, with Judy Litt (until recently the guide for the About.com Graphic Design Forum - see previous blog entry), Bryn Mooth (Editor of HOW Magazine and a moderator of the HOW Design Forum, Gavin Laking (Administrator of The Designers Network Forum, and Bob Nicholl (Lead Moderator for the Graphic Design Forum.

Have a safe (and somewhat sane) New Year's Eve!

© 2005 Jeff Fisher LogoMotives

Funny things happen on the way to the forums

In late 1998 I finally joined the online design community from my home-based design studio in Portland, Oregon. Having been a one-person operation most of the 27 years I have been in the design field, I did occasionally experience bouts of isolation from the rest of the world. That was about to change.

Judy Litt (until recently the guide for the About.com Graphic Design Forum - see previous blog entry), Bryn Mooth (Editor of HOW Magazine and a moderator of the HOW Design Forum, Gavin Laking (Administrator of The Designers Network Forum, and Bob Nicholl (Lead Moderator for the Graphic Design Forum graciously agreed to answer a series of questions from me about the forums in which they are involved, and forums in general.

Read the entire article, Funny things happen on the way to the forums, at Creative Latitude.

© 2005 Jeff Fisher LogoMotives

Judy Litt: Thank you, you will be missed, and good luck in the future

Judy Litt, the guide for the About.Com Graphic Design site, posted the following on the web resource's home page this morning:

Thanks to the graphic design community

"It has been my great pleasure and privilege to guide this site for 8+ years. It has given me many opportunities I never thought would come my way, and allowed me to meet a wonderful community of graphic designers from all over the globe. It is time to move on, and turn this site over to someone who will come in with fresh, new, exciting ideas. I hope that you will give whoever takes over this site the courtesy and respect you've always given to me. I want to thank all my community, because the simple truth is this site isn't successful because of me. It's successful because of you. Thank you for helping me to make this site one of the best graphic design sites on the Net."

The About.com Graphic Design Forum was the first such site I stumbled upon when I first went online in 1998, and Judy was an incredible welcoming force. Throughout the years she has been a very valuable resource to anyone coming to the forum seeking education advice, career recommendations or project suggestions. When necessary she was able to get forum threads back on track, don her "referee's shirt" to settle disagreements, or politely put an annoying "troll" in their place - all while running her own design business. In addition, Judy was a contributor to my book The Savvy Designer's Guide to Success. I'm so pleased that I had the opportunity to meet her in person at the HOW Design Conference a couple years ago. In the online graphic design community Judy is someone for whom I've always had a lot of respect. Judy, you will be missed greatly as the forum moderator. Thank you for your contributions to the profession of design. Best of luck in all your future ventures.

© 2005 Jeff Fisher LogoMotives.