Goodies

Toggl Timetracking Tool

As freelancers, one of the best tools at our disposal is the ability to track time. Tracking the time you spend on projects and on different parts of a project helps you understand how you work and how much to charge for your work. If you're billing hourly, it's obviously important. But it's more important if you're not billing hourly. You need to understand how you are spending your time, where you can be more productive and how much time you're actually spending (and most of us spend way more than what we estimate). This all helps you to better estimate project timelines and budgets which ultimately means you are compensated fairly for your time.

There are so many tools out there for time tracking and the thought of learning yet another tool for my day-to-day seemed absolutely exhausting to me, but my friend Christina Truong recommended Toggl and let me tell you, I love it! 

First, the learning curve was nothing. It's dead easy. You just type in what you're working on and hit start. Just like that the clock is running. If you want to get specific, you can add clients and projects so you can track specific tasks and file them for each project/client. At the end of the week, Toggl sends you a report of how you spent your time. You can also look at your day, week or month and view reports on how you spent your time.

Best of all, it's free!

Radiolab Audio Show

I absolutely love podcasts! I get bored listening to music most of the time and listening to a podcast helps me stay at my desk when I'm working at home and keeps me entertained and intellectually stimulated. That last part isn't always true but there's a few podcasts I come back to time and time again, one of my favorites being Design Matters by Debbie Millman. But recently I found another fantastic podcast, Radiolab. Radiolab is a "show about curiosity" or so they say on their website, but it's true. Their topics range from scientific to creative to social and really explore the human experience. It's a thought-provoking show that is digestible (approx. 30 mins in length) and not at all boring.

My favourite episodes so far are: Speedy Beet (did Beethoven intend his music to be heard differently?) and The Trust Engineers (is Facebook tweaking our behaviour?). I've only just started listening to this but I already know that I'll have many more to add to this list.

Illustrator Lisa Congdon on Getting Older and owning it!

After hearing Lisa's story on The Great Discontent, I stumbled through her site and found this post she had written early this year about getting older and it made me love her more. She talks about realizing that her age was now showing (a fact that we will all encounter) which may be a hard realization for most of us.

I'm not at a point where I feel my age is showing and I am still young, relatively speaking. And the little of what I have seen, like my first gray–no white hair and the start of laugh lines on my face, has not shaken me. But I am keenly aware of our mortality and how aging is one of the hardest things we all have to experience. I admire women (I don't know if men worry as much as women about aging and having that show) who own their age, especially those who rock silver or white hair. I hope I become one of them. Perhaps I'll look like Storm... hmm.

Anyway, Lisa's post was eloquent and honest and it's worth a read. She describes herself as a late bloomer, having discovered her art in her early 30s and finding it as a career (after a successful first career in education) in her 40s. That simple fact–that she was able to find her art and make a living from it was a nice contrast to the top 30 under 30 lists or top 20 under 20 lists of the talented youngsters we see. Talent and discovery can emerge at any point in your life. It's your choice to decide whether you want to grab hold of it, no matter what age.

Give Yourself Permission

I've been doing #The100DayProject for 60 days now. That in itself makes me happy. When I first started I had my doubts that I would be able to do something each day for 100 days. But now, past the half-way point I know I'm capable. I think we alone can give ourselves permission. And for me this project gave me permission to set aside time each day to create. It doesn't have to be perfect. Consistency is the key. Discipline is the key. Permission is all we need.

When you keep your head down working or creating each day, no matter how inadequate it seems, when you come up for air you realize that a body of work emerges. That is how careers are made. That is how an artist develops herself. That is how a life is made. After all, how you spend your day each day is how you spend your life.

Do today's work today. Tomorrow, do tomorrow's work. One step at a time, we realize what we are capable of.

Check out my project #100DaysOfLineDrawings on Instagram.

FITC 2015 Post-Mortem

“Chase the things that excite you, otherwise what’s the point?”

— Gavin Strange

Last week was FITC Toronto 2015 and I had the pleasure of going again through their Women's Initiative. It is a 3-day conference jam packed with creative and innovative tech talks. I always leave this conference on such a high having been introduced or re-introduced to artists, designers and creatives that do amazing work and share wonderful insights. Thank you to FITC for allowing me to attend!

Here's some of my favorites and standouts from the conference:

1. Gavin Strange a.k.a JamFactory

Image from JamFactory

Gavin is a graphic designer from Bristol, UK. He opened the conference with his Keynote presentation and went through some of his work and his path to being a designer. He is an incredible speaker who manages to make every one in the room feel like a friend that he's talking to over pints at a pub. He is Senior Designer at Aardman, the studio behind the Wallace & Grommit franchise among others. By night he runs his own independent design studio JamFactory where he creates both personal and client work. His outlook and work comes out of a genuine appreciation for his craft and the ability to design for a living. He says time and time again that we're the lucky ones–we get to do this for a living! 

Gavin's work is fun, quirky, lighthearted but has so much personality. You can check out his impressive portfolio and see that this guy just loves what he does and constantly gets shit out. On top of his day job he does so much personal work that's opened up opportunities to him. For example, he was able to turn some of his personal characters into actual, tangible toys. His enthusiasm and love of his craft is contagious and makes me realize the importance of play and personal work.

“If you compare yourself, then game over!””

— Gavin Strange

I took so much away from his talk, all of which stem from his excitement and positive outlook on life and his work:

• Just do the work, there are no shortcuts.
• Care about the things you can control, don't worry about everything else.
• The reason we struggle with insecurity is that we compare our behind-the-scenes with everyone else's highlight reel.
• Work can be enjoyed, not endured - We're the lucky ones that get to do work that we like!
• Be the change you want to see - don't complain, do something to change it
• You don't stop being great at 5pm. Seek creative satisfaction wherever/whenever you get it.
• Don't worry about being original, just be true to you and that in itself is unique.
• Make time for the things you want that excites you.
• If you can make things, make it. We live in a time where producing things is inexpensive.
• Be silly. Make silly graphics & mashups just because it's fun!
• Put your work out there.
• Be positive. We can make people feel good with our work, exercise that ability!

If you don't know him, check his work out. It's fun, lighthearted and makes you smile!

---

2. Shantell Martin

“Find your way to yay.”

— Shantell Martin

Image from Shantell Martin

By far, my favorite talk this year was Shantell's. It wasn't just her talk, I just love her. And I can't believe that I didn't know of her until now. She is an incredible artist who stays true to herself and encourages everyone to be true to who they are.

Her path to being an artist started when she was young. She grew up in Thamesmead in Southeast London. She always doodled and wrote poetry and she went to art school. She spent a few years in Japan which is where she began to develop her drawing style. She was a Visual Jockey and would perform live drawing events with music. She began experimenting with digital techniques and spontaneous performance art. She drew for the moment and let the atmosphere drive her drawings.

She moved to NYC in 2008 and literally had to start over as no one knew who she was. So she began making things for herself and made work wherever she could. She left the digital techniques and reverted back to analog, using just her pen to perform spontaneous live drawing performances. She drew on everything, cars, circuit boards, walls, etc. She hustled and she stayed true to herself and continues to do so. Her work has been exhibited and featured in so many places including Hong Kong, New York, Toronto and London. She continues to draw on literally everything, collaborating with other designers and technologists to draw on people, walls, furniture, shoes, circuit boards, buildings, etc.

I had the pleasure of talking to her briefly after her talk and after the panel about making money that she participated in and she is genuinely nice, personable and helpful. You get the sense that she genuinely wants to help people, taking a moment to talk to everyone who wanted to talk to her and giving them her undivided attention. I just love her!

Some takeaways from Shantell:

• Find your way to yay. Just keep finding your way to what makes you feel happy and fulfilled.
• It's not precious. It can be scary to start with a blank canvas, what happens if you make a mistake? But really, everything is a mistake, so just enjoy the process.
• She realized after having to start over in New York that she needed to make work for herself and that's what she focused her energy on.
• You can't please everyone.
• Say "No" to people who want you to work for free or for exposure. Your ideas, your work, your time is of worth. You wouldn't ask this of photographers, marketers, etc. so why you?
• Saying "No" will bring respect and people will come back to you.
• She spent 1 - 2 years struggling, sleeping on friends couches and hustling trying to do work and lived month-to-month, but when she started imagining what her life would be with steady work and money to live on for loner than a month, somehow things started to change.
• Be careful when working with people, even and sometimes especially larger institutions who have bigger contracts. Charge them for your lawyer fees to go through their contract. If they want your work, they should value your work and your terms.
• If you approach everything with good intentions, then it could never be a mistake.

---

3. Ash Thorp

“Visualize the person you want to be. What is your dream day? Write it down.”

— Ash Thorp

Image from Ash Thorp

I knew nothing of Ash Thorp before FITC, but his motion graphic designs, UI designs and art direction can be seen in many popular films including Ender's Game, Total Recall and Prometheus.

This talk was really fantastic for me because Ash seemed really keenly aware of how he works, his strengths and weaknesses and I think identifying that in ourselves, especially as designers, is extremely important in order for us to understand how we work best. Ash writes down his daily habits to help break out of creative block. That's helped him identify what his patterns are. His daily routine seemed very structured and that's what's worked best for him. He writes down his talks every evening for the next day and prioritizes them. This allows him to block out time for each task and stay focused. It also let's him think about what he needs to do as he goes to sleep and he starts to visualize how he'll do everything. The result is when he wakes up he already has an idea of how he's going to do everything. He sets goals for each week, a month, 3 months, etc. That way if he sets a date or timeline, he gets things finished and stays focused.

He's battled self-doubt, analyzed his daily habits, grown to understand the need for rest and recovery and play. He shares all of this in his talk.

Some takeaways:

• Don't wait for inspiration, create a framework for it. Take a break, exercise, take a walk, do what you need to to recharge.
• "Just for now." You can do anything just for now... for the next 30 minutes, for the next 1 hour. It's a good way to break down a big project that otherwise might overwhelm you.
• Visualize the person you want to be. What is your dream day? Write it down.
• Value Time.
• Play! It helps you mentally and spiritually recharge.
• Take care of yourself. Exercise, rest. It makes a difference!
• Stay humble, stay hungry.
• Keep your work at a certain quality level, be great at communication and be on time! These are most important especially when you're a freelancer!

Re: work and his process:

• Write down everything, even if you don't know where it'll go and sketch!
• Identify things that stand out and clarify them.
• He takes his sketches into illustrator and goes with the flow, letting the idea and process take over. This allows him to get all his ideas out.
• Then he brings it into Photoshop trying colors, textures and effects.

---

4. Sheena Matheiken

“Being an unemployable shouldn’t work but maybe the traditional way doesn’t always work either.”

— Sheena Matheiken

Sheena is a self-described certified unemployable. She did work in the advertising industry for a time after moving to New York from India, had good pay, stability but it didn't fulfill her. She didn't want to just make a living or do the sensible thing. She realized that she likes doing many things, wearing different hats. That makes it hard to find work, but she pursues the things that she wants to do and figures out a way to make money for it and a living from it. She is probably unusually comfortable with instability and uncertainty which is why I was drawn to her. I am not fully comfortable with uncertainty but I'm learning to appreciate it and embrace it, so hearing Sheena talk was refreshing to say the least.

Her work varies from film, to design to production and digital projects. You can't define it in a few words and that's just how she likes it. She's not about the definitions, the predictable or the usual. It's just how she is comfortable living her life. Her work explores and questions ideas and she does it for the journey. Many of her projects always involve community in some sense, whether that's an analysis of it, involvement or any other form. The moment people want to turn her projects into something profitable, it looses it's spirit and she usually ends it or converts it into something that will in turn contribute to the community in a meaningful way.

I had the pleasure of talking to Sheena about her work and random things at the after party and she was lovely to speak to and incredibly honest. She also shared some insights in the 'art and making money' panel where she openly admits that she doesn't value money in the usual sense. She is driven by doing the things she wants to do and spending her time doing the things that are valuable to her.

Some takeaways from Sheena:

• There are many of us certified unemployables but not all of us are comfortable in this role.
• The unemployables don't necessarily make a living or make sense but they have many callings and pursue them.
• Being an unemployable shouldn't work but maybe the traditional way doesn't always work either.
• Laws of nature and creativity look very similar to each other. There is chaos, flux and impermanence.
• We are used to packaging everything and turning everything into a profit, into a definition, but the employables fail at this because the chaos works, making sense of things doesn't work, they don't thrive on structure or doing things the 'right' way.
• If you're unhappy with a job, quit! Always.
• Do what works for you.
• Don't worry about what other people think of your decisions, be true to you.

4. Jason Theodore (jTed) and The Working Dead

Image from Jason Theodore

Jason's talk titled The Working Dead explored the traditional ways of working and how they're just not working. He unpacks the traditional work ideas, routines and attitudes and how they breed a culture of cynicism, politics, mistrust. I found his talk so incredibly eye opening. It's easy to say do work that you love or don't work in a cubicle. But have we actually sat down and thought about why some of the traditional maybe corporate working environments don't work? We know somehow in our gut that it doesn't feel right but do we know why? Well Jason breaks it down in an incredibly enlightening way. He takes us from "Workpocalypse" to "Jobvana". You can actually read the article he wrote that birthed this talk of the same title on Medium: The Working Dead.

Enlightening takeaways from JTed's talk:

• Rid cynicism by creating an environment built on purpose rather than preservation.
• Mission statements are great but they can turn into dogma. It should be intrinsic not imposed!
• Earn respect through collaboration not through cliques. Collaborative leaders rather than traditional leaders. It's not about getting your job done, but about learning, adapting and collaborating. Note: you need people who can collaborate and let go of egos to do this!
• Trust people rather than breed paranoia. Let people do their jobs and take ownership. Give people respect and they will want to do good work for you. Responsibility drives ownership.
• Real time feedback is more important than yearly performance reviews. Be transparent and work out loud.
• Don't hold people to defined ways of doing things but allow them to adapt and be an active participant. Play to their strengths.
• Purpose drives people.
• Find your own purpose and find a company that links to that or partner with someone who believes in the same values.

“Be soft.
Do not let the world make you hard.
Do not let pain make you hate.
Do not let bitterness steal your sweetness.
Take pride that even though the rest of the world may disagree,
you still believe it to be a beautiful place.”

— Kurt Vonnegut

Other notable speakers:

• Shawn Pucknell gave a really honest talk about the ups and downs in his career and how he came to create FITC into a worldwide event.
• Jason White of Leviathan shared some of his work and some advice: document everything. People hiring you want to know what the story is that you're trying to tell and your thought process.
• Chip Kidd. I don't know what else to say about this man, but he is a great speaker and an incredibly talented designer. He's beautifully designed so many books to count.

#100DaysOfLineDrawings

In my Goodie bag last week I wrote about #The100DayProject that I'll be participating in (check out the post here). I've committed to creating a line drawing a day for 100 days straight from April 6th - July 14th. The project kinda scares me because that's a lotta days but I'm excited for it. I have so many ideas at any one time and for years I write them in my journal or sketchbook. This project gives me a reason to at least tick some of those illustration ideas off the list.

I chose to do line drawings because 1. I want to be able to do something quickly and with little tools (no computer, photoshop or illustrator here!) as I will be travelling mid-way through the project, and 2. although I like finishing and polishing my designs or illustrations I think it's more important to play and experiment and the quickness and simplicity of the line drawings will help me do that. I want to let go of the control and need for every illustration to be perfect. I believe there is beauty in the imperfect but I have a hard time letting go of perfection in my own work. This project will help me get over that. I also have a gut feeling that something great will emerge from it. I think there's something in this way of illustrating that really suits me. If nothing else, it will give me the fulfillment of having finished a project from start to finish, developing a series of illustrations in the process and pushing through no matter what.

You can find all my drawings on my tumblr but the best way to keep up with my progress is to follow me on instagram. You can also follow my daily drawings using the hashtag #100DaysOfLineDrawings. To follow what others are doing check out the project hashtag #The100DayProject. It's not too late to join–anyone can join at any point in the project, just count your 100 days from when you start.

Goodies

The Great Discontent interviews Michael Bierut
I love TGD's interviews but this one is one of my favorites, partly because I admire Michael Bierut but I also found a sort of kinship in his outlook on life and this interview was a nice window into that.

After I read that interview I stumbled across this post from Tina of Swiss-Miss (Side note: Tina is the inspiration behind these "Goodies" - part personal archive and part sharable goodies of interesting things that I come across)...

Michael Bierut on the power of logos via Design Indaba
I'm always intrigued by how people perceive things and how design can help shape that. The power of a logo is dependent not just on the design but also on the business, it's values and how the entire brand shapes itself.

Tina Roth Eisenberg on using values to thrive in work and family
Tina Roth Eisenberg a.k.a. Swiss-Miss is a designer and founder that I've admired from afar because it's clear that she leads her business and ventures with her heart. Her creations have come organically from her needs including Tattly and Creative Mornings. Tina talks about how she runs her business with values, heart and a bit of confetti in this podcast episode.

#The100DayProject
Michael Bierut created a project called the 100 Day Project for his MFA students at Yale as an exercise in discipline and creative thinking. The idea is simple, think of an action that you can do every day for 100 days. Cool right?

Now artist Elle Luna, along with TGD, is launching the #The100DayProject with the goal to encourage people to show up day after day and celebrate the process of doing. 

April 6th is the launch date and anyone can participate - I will be. I'm not yet sure exactly what action I'll do but I'm narrowing it down.

You can join me by signing up here and showing your process on instagram every day starting April 6th. See you on the instas!

Image via The Great Discontent

Elle Luna & The Crossroads of Should and Must
Elle Luna is a designer turned artist who I admire for taking risks, being honest and putting her heart out into the world. Her post on The Crossroads of Should and Must is a MUST read for anyone who has a free spirit. AND she's turned it into a book due out on April 8, 2015. I'll be getting my copy for sure–I am a sucker pep talks, especially one's that encourage you to find and follow your callings (yes plural).

Image via Elle Luna

Your long term is not the sum of your short terms
And finally, in the spirit of doing what you need/love, here's some food for thought from Seth Godin:

“How long is your long term?

A simple question with an answer that’s difficult to embrace.

What are you willing to give up today in exchange for something better tomorrow? Next week? In ten years?

Your long term is not the sum of your short terms.”

— Seth Godin