David Seah - Design, Development, Inspiration, Empowerment

Design Agency Process Diagram

2010-01-27 06:07:22+00:00

In Monday's post I went through a process of recentering myself, and identified four areas to focus on and track. The trickiest one was DESIGN AGENCY, because there are a LOT of different tasks.

I just finished creating a "process diagram" that outlines a high-level roadmap of agency operations; just about any task I can think of fits somewhere the diagram. You can read about and download the PDF over on the Agenceum Blog, which is where I am running my "open design agency" experiment. Although this diagram is labeled for Agenceum, it really is for ALL of my design-related business activities.

Read more about the diagram on the Agenceum blog.

Artistic Integrity and Profit

2010-01-19 21:04:32+00:00

SUMMARY: I expand my "create then show" mantra to include the means of producing products and distributing them. Maybe this is the way to sell out with integrity.

Recently on BoingBoing, I saw this video of cult-favorite animator Ralph Bakshi at San Diego ComiCon (SDCC) on the subject of dealing with the shrinking animation industry. Bakshi, not mincing words, basically tells his audience to stop crying, get some guys together, and spend a year starving and making something. It's quite an inspirational video as a kick in the pants. There is nothing in your way, technically speaking, except your own ideas of how you achieve success. Bakshi is known for making provocative non-mainstream animation, and in the video he outlined his strategy back in the 60s-70s as looking at what Walt Disney was not doing.

What's appealing about this video is that it confirms what is behind my own progress: make stuff, show it to people. This is my mantra, and it's it's the reason I keep sharing all those productivity forms. By comparison, many people follow the mainstream mantra of get hired to make stuff. There is nothing wrong with that if you are satisfied making what you are told to make, but if you have creative aspirations it comes right back to those two things: making what you have the crazy vision to make and showing people your expression of that vision. And you don't have to be a freelancer like me to do that. The workplace is receptive too, if you have guts and have a credibility amassed from a solid record of production. It's actually pretty hard to get fired from a job for demonstrating a new idea, but the potential for embarrassment and political fallout keep many from even trying it.

I'd be closing this blog post right now, self-satisfied at making a connection between Ralph Bakshi and what I'm doing with my life, if it hadn't been for two recent experiences:

Last week, I had a really interesting chat with my friend Gary, who is a successful self-made industrial designer, about his continued befuddlement at what I'm NOT doing. He sees what I'm doing as the precursor to creating a line of products, which is something I'm taking my time with, but the really interesting observation he made was that I was a new product creator with a team of associates, not a solo writer/designer. I apologize to Gary for perhaps misrepresenting the specific tonality of his observations, but what I took away from it was yes, it is possible for me to create a package but I'm not doing it and I don't have to do it alone.
Talking to my bud Sid this afternoon about some of the comments on Bakshi's YouTube video, I made the observation that some of the naysayers who said Bakshi hadn't achieved anything near the kind of success that Walt Disney did were poop-heads, but they had an excellent point. Walt Disney created a package experience for a market he envisioned, and he built a business to make that happen. Can't take that away from him.

About an hour ago I realized that my mantra was incomplete. From the conversation with Gary, I realized that my intention to create packaged versions of my work were half-assed and incomplete. If I wanted to stop waiting for success, I would have to engineer it for a specific market. That would take my vision even further into what might be actual success. Then, if I am totally serious about this, I should follow what Walt Disney did and create the process to ensure that what I package makes it to the market; in other words, that's creating a business. It's a different mindset.

So I'm expanding my mantra into a two-step theory; consider this version 2.0:

Step 1. The way to artistic integrity through self-discovery is making what you envision and showing what you made to people in-person. If you keep doing this, you'll grow in unexpected and interesting ways, guaranteed. You can stop at this step if all you're looking for is artistic integrity and finding out who you are.

Step 2. The way to financial success through artistic integrity lies a few steps beyond: apply the experience you gained in step 1 to create a beneficial package for people and then find a way to reliably deliver that package to the masses. At a reasonable profit.

I've practiced Step 1 for the past five years, and have been wondering what was next. Now I know: Practice Step 2 with the same aspiration to integrity I did Step 1. What is interesting is that both steps are actually the same, except the emphasis is different. In both steps, you are "creating then showing". In Step 1, however, it's mostly about you building a body of work that is refined through exposure to a critical audience; from each iteration you typically gain a small percentage of new opportunities. In Step 2, it's mostly about you creating a "product" that is refined to meet a particular need, and then shown to a consumer audience whose needs are addressed; if your audience gets it, a certain percentage will buy.

In other words: Create and Show. Package and Distribute. Each complete iteration produces results that can be applied to the next one, which results in a refined product. Seems so obvious, but I had to learn this the hard way for it to stick :-)

Yup, I’m Releasing The ETT Online to Creative Commons

2010-01-05 05:20:07+00:00

SUMMARY: I release the Flash 7-ish source code to the Online Emergent Task Timer under Creative Commons, after getting a couple of requests for it. Details follow.

Back in June, 2006, I released a prototype version of the Emergent Task Timer, written in Flash. This was alpha-quality code, meaning that it was designed to test concepts but was not actually feature-complete. Still, it proved to be pretty useful for the day-to-day, and I put enough features in it so that was useful. A particularly-nice feature was Flash's ability to save data in case you accidentally closed the browser window; back in 2006, this was pretty cool. However, I never got around to improving the interface to add features like scrolling and server-side data storage. After over three years of sitting on my ass (and more than a few requests), I've decided to release the source code under Creative Commons, specifically the Attribution Non-Commercial Share Alike license deed:

This license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon your work non-commercially, as long as they credit you and license their new creations under the identical terms. Others can download and redistribute your work just like the by-nc-nd license, but they can also translate, make remixes, and produce new stories based on your work. All new work based on yours will carry the same license, so any derivatives will also be non-commercial in nature.

I have a lot going on, and I don't foresee taking the time to relaunch myself into the current Flash Actionscript environment. This codebase dates back to Flash 8 Professional using a blend of ActionScript 2 and timeline-based scripting to handle simple graphics state changes. While not as bad as some Flash coding practices common back then, it still might make your eyes bleed today. A thorough knowledge of AS2 MovieClips, Flash events, the Flash IDE, and object-oriented programming is probably mandatory to make sense of this code.

There are a few features we'd all like to see:

The ability to save data on a server
Additional lines of entry
Easy navigation of past days data

The internal data representation is based on unix epochs and hexadecimal strings, which should be friendly to databases. I am not, however, a server-side programmer or a database programmer, and I never got around to learning how to write such code cleanly. I'm sure there are plenty of people out there who could write that in their sleep. With this release of the source code into the Creative Commons, I'm hoping to see someone add some new features. I'm also curious to see how people deconstruct and refactor my code, though it's been so long I've kind of forgotten how it works. I'm also curious to see what happens to the code as people have their way with it.

Download Source

You'll need Adobe Flash CS4 to open this file, since I did some slight editing to static text and had to resave it. You'll also need to be an experienced Flash ActionScript 2 programmer with an understanding of the Flash IDE and MovieClips. See the License Notes in the archive for more information.

» Download ETT Alpha Flash CS4 Source Code (ZIP 336K)

Enjoy! I'll be happy if I see someone make a meaningful change and shares it with the rest of us. Fingers crossed! Feel free to discuss approaches to modification and ideas in the comments here.

Logos for Agenceum

2009-11-19 21:17:14+00:00

In the meantime, over at Agenceum Intranet, I've been working on logos and sell sheets. Agenceum is the pseudo design agency I'm working on to give myself a focus for targeting super low-budget clients. My main focus at the moment is to just create some sellable templates that I can show to a few people in my local area; for that, I need to have a handout (the "sell sheet") that makes sense to them. Of course, such a handout should have some kind of logo on it! Whee!

Logo Round 1 - the first pass at a "column" idea
Logo Round 2 - a wrong turn, and a new design idea
Sell Sheet Draft - pulling all the information together

If you're interested in process and how I am thinking about the design business, check it out and leave some comments.

Vectorizing Photos for Productivity and Fun

2009-07-22 01:48:45+00:00

SUMMARY: The point of being more productive is making stuff, right? I recently was able to overcome my procrastination tendencies on a long back-burnered scooter club card project, and produced something that feels real. Result: I’m feeling productive! Second result: by writing about it, I can see some of the patterns that helped get me through the project.

Bonus: lots of pictures.

My buddy Sid started a local scooter club a while ago, and we really haven't done very much with it. However, that doesn't stop me from telling people about it when I come across another scooter rider. Problem: we don't have cards to hand out. I finally got off my butt and made an illustration for the front of the card, motivated in part by the insights I had in the Brutal Simplicity post.

It ended up being a rather fun little project, so for a change of pace I'm going to share the creative process, interspersed with productivity insights.

Photoshop versus Illustrator

Sid had already produced some card concepts, but had used Adobe Photoshop to create them. Photoshop is just fine, of course, but I like to work with vector graphics as much as possible, which provide practically infinite resolution if you do them right. This is important when making a big poster or a tiny business card, and it's easy to rotate and layer vectors on top of each other to get interesting effects. So, I was determined to make some vector graphics clipart for use of our card by hand tracing a photograph. This can be pretty tedious work, precisely the kind of thing I'd procrastinate doing. However, I'd had the "scooter cards" on top of one of my index card piles for a week, and it just seemed like time to do it.

The Tracing Process

The first step: open the Illustrator program, import the photograph, and be ready. This meant I had to turn off my brain (ordinarily intrigued by surfing the net and pondering exciting things going on away from my desk) and really stare at what I had. I started assessing it and letting my brain (now unoccupied) start to assess what was there for the first and easiest and highest payoff stroke I could make.

Sid happens to ride a Honda Metropolitan, so I started by tracing the photograph above. Illustrator has some automatic tracing tools, but I never use them because the resulting trace requires considerable cleanup. Plus, I learned to create vector artwork by imagining stacks of cut paper lying on top of each other, and like creating my own clean curves. The immediate challenge: find the biggest pieces of color that convey the shape of the image.

Scooters have luscious curves, and making those curves "flow" is important to capture the spirit of the illustration. I was also shooting for a cartoony-looking scooter (this is for fun, after all). So, defining areas of flat color was my primary goal, not photorealism. There would have been a lot more blended curves and fancy gradient meshes otherwise.

Here you can see the flat colors applied. The colors and highlights were eyeballed by myself based on the original source photo and what I thought would look good. Choosing good contrast between the tones took some back and forth.

Next I did some quick "layered paper" shading. This isn't realistic, but it adds some depth cues that add a bit of dimensionality without having to carefully paint in shadows and reflections, which I'm not good at.

And here's the final 3.5 by 2 image, which is designed to fit on the front of a business card:

Since the source Illustrator file is all vector drawings with real-time shadow effects applied, it can also be scaled to any size and the curves will remain sharp. If I'd created this artwork at the business card size in Photoshop and tried scaling it up bigger, I would have been screwed, and would have had to redo the whole thing from scratch. Alternatively, I could have worked at a very high resolution in Photoshop, suitable for a large poster, but then I would have had too much data to comfortably work with and it's a pain in the butt for several reasons.

The productivity payoff: creating a vector graphic was a two-for-one, which helps overcome the procrastination bug. Just to feel really good about it, I also then created an official master file for the graphic assets:

This "packages" the graphics so I can reuse them again in other contexts. Because I know my memory will fail me, I included reminders about what fonts I needed and additional processing might be necessary. The big payoff: I've just created an asset. This makes me feel productive. After all, it's easier to feel productive when you have something to show for it. Remember that!

Productivity Notes

I'm always pleased when I can make something that is persistent in the world. The graphic I created, while kind of on the simple side as far as illustration goes, can be used to evoke an emotional response AND be reused. That makes me feel great. Getting here, though, took some time.

Defining the Project: In this case, I wanted the superiority of vector graphic sources before I started making the card. This was the right way in my mind (perfectionism in process). However, I also needed to do the photo tracing task itself, which I don't find pleasant with Illustrator's gimpy pen tool and was guaranteed to take a few hours of eyeball-searing work. I didn't start for weeks.

Taking the First Step: After sitting on this for a while, I arranged to go to Sid's studio and sit next to him during a work session. In essence, I used his presence and interest in the cardsto give me the motivation to start. First, I set up the photograph in a new Illustrator document, and traced the easy big shapes. This took an hour or two to get the main shell and fender before I ran out of battery juice and had to go home. Then I back-burnered the project for several more weeks. This wasn't intentional, but that's the way it happened.

Taking the Second Step: When I opened the file again a few nights ago, it was good to see I had the rolling start to get me going from where I left off. Each curve I filled in completed the overall shape of the scooter, and I started to get excited about seeing the whole thing complete. This anticipation plays against the sheer tedium of getting everything I needed in place. Once you have the elements in place, though, it's fun and easy. I don't know if this is a common experience for other procrastinator-perfectionists, but it suggests that reducing the difficulty in capturing the elements we need to create perfection, we might lower the activation barrier.

Getting into the Zone: After all the shapes were in place, I could to refine the proportions and curves, while playing games with colors and shading. This is where I start to lose track of time...it probably took 4-6 hours total, plus the 2 hours from the studio session, to get to the point where I had the basic graphic set.

Finishing: When it was done, I looked at it and refined it until I could refine no more. I couldn't leave it alone, and spent another 8 hours adjusting shades, making mockups of the scooter club card, and fixing little "bugs" in the illustration. Because of the way I have the files set up, it's relatively easy to re-generate the images and re-export them. At a certain point I just go too tired to continue, so I called it a night at 6AM. Maybe this is just the way I create.

Showing People: The next day I made these process documents. You can see the complete set on Flickr with detailed design descriptions. I've posted notes on Facebook, Flickr, and now the blog. I even dusted off Flash CS3 and made a quick dissolving MPEG video, which I uploaded to Flickr Video (a first). I've essentially reused the same content 3 times, which gives me a happy little productivity burst each time. And by making it available to people I'm ensuring that it actually feels like I finished something. That is a big payoff. It's kind of scary to put the work out there, but accepting that not everyone is going to like it is part of the training: you finished something, and had the guts to show it.

This is pretty much how many of my more intense projects go. Actually, I can't think of a project that doesn't go this way; just about all the memorable ones are intense periods of working after the initial spark somehow gets me moving. Lowering that threshold through basic trickery like agreeing to start with other people helped in this case, and the project was short enough that I could get the satisfaction of showing Sid something immediately. The other trick was to just empty my mind before starting, quelling thoughts that it was too late to start. I shall have to try this again tomorrow.

Task Index Cards Revisited

2009-06-22 21:03:36+00:00

A few days ago I posted the latest progress on the Day Grid Balancer forms, a line of inquiry that has attracted very high-quality commentary from you all. Special kudos go to John Ballantrae for using Tarot cards as a tool for design reflection. Instead of using the cards to "read me", he used them to reflect on the direction that the Day Grid Balancer might go. Despite what you might believe or not believe about the "psychic power" of Tarot Cards, the symbolism nevertheless does span a variety of human desires and anxieties; just by considering the interpretations of each drawn card, one can gain some insight by seeing how the symbolism might fit with the situation on your mind.

John posted his video tarot card reading for everyone to see, and in his 12-minute video he came up with several interesting insights. One that resonated was the sense of anxiety and frustration that is driving the development of the Day Balance Grid; he suggested that perhaps focusing on that would provide some new direction. It is very true that I have been feeling that I've not been keeping balanced, and that I was potentially forgetting important things. I had started to write up everything that was on my mind, which works fine when I'm doing it for other people. This time, though, I was stuck. The thought of seeing all those unfinished tasks and unfulfilled dreams was incredibly demotivating. Nevertheless, it had to be done.

When I went to re-watch John's video, the first three minutes suddenly stood out to me. He's doing nothing but shuffling his cards as he's explaining his approach to the reading. It's rather mesmerizing to see someone who is adept with cards shuffle and spread a deck, and several thoughts came to mind regarding the appeal of a card-based form factor:

There is something cool about manipulating a deck of cards so much that they become familiar friends. John's Tarot deck is obviously well-used, and he's quite familiar with how it handles.
Tarot cards use strong symbolic language that carry the power of self-reflection in them. The Rider-Waite Deck, with its illustrations of the various meanings of each card, is particularly fascinating to look at.
Physically, cards are very easy to group, sort, and flip through. This is a huge boon to organization, and you don't have to rewrite anything.

I also just happen to like cards. A few years ago I had made something called the Task Order Up! that included index card versions of task cards, though the system was originally conceived in the spirit of order checks and check rails used at fast food restaurants. This system assigned a card to each task, which you could then array in front of your desk so your coworkers could see what you had going on. You could also prioritize task cards by putting them all the way on the side. But really, the driving force behind the Task Order Up! was that I thought check rails are cool, and I built the process around that.

card stacks versus to-do lists

What I have so far is a deck of personalized task cards for everything I had going on. Instead of standardizing the look-and-feel of each card (as they are in the Task Order Up!), I am allowing them to have individuality. My thinking is that the cards will take on greater representative power the more I scribble and draw on them.

One issue I had come across in the use of my Emergent Task Planner was that I had so many outstanding tasks that it was getting hard to review them all. I am going to make this easier in the next design by reverting to the "right hand side for notes" layout; this will allow me to fold the "to-do" list backwards so I can transcribe it more easily into the next day's task list. However, even in this case I'm forced to retranscribe data, which is a design no-no in my productivity form philosophy. With index cards, I can keep a master list in the form of a hand-held card deck.

Previously, I have maintained a master list electronically. For example, I recently used Google Tasks with Google Calendar. Results were mixed; Google Tasks is a little simplistic at the moment. An even older system I have used was a text editor to-do list, but since this is a local file I can't share with other computers. However, web-based to-do lists have the requirement that I am connected to the Internet, which limits the places where I can access them.

The advantage of electronic media over paper, of course, is the ease of reordering data. However, electronic media suffers when it comes to direct manipulation of overlapping data; there is a lot of clicking and dragging of the mouse, which is slow and makes comparison of data sets cumbersome. Cards do not have this disadvantage, and their tactile qualities make manipulating them a pleasure. They naturally lend themselves to manipulation; when you're dealt a hand of cards, the first thing you do is order them according to your strategic intent. Cards can be grouped, stacked, stuck together, taped, glued, and shuffled. Cards are also more pictorial, more solid, and make soothing noises as you shuffle them. Cards also afford a far richer repertoire of physical manipulation than the mouse, which I think is more helpful when thinking (I don't have any kind of citation for that, unfortunately).

design and process

I sat down with a blank pack of index cards and wrote out everything that I could think of that I needed to do.

I am starting to develop a visual vocabulary for the different kinds of tasks. Some cards are reminder cards that I will come across when I want to keep something on my mind. The "WAAH I'M FAT" card, for example, reminds me that I want to do something about that. There are some cards that I've marked with a symbol that means this moves you toward completing a strategic goal, and there's another symbol that means this supports other things you are doing. Some cards just have the names of people and projects on them. Some of them are process cards that describe how to do the laundry, and assign point values to the card.

There are lots of ordering and prioritization possibilties with a deck of cards. I can extract cards to prioritize tasks, putting them on the top of the deck. I can also group cards with small clamps or paper clips, which gives me a sense of the magnitude of a multi-step project. I can sequence cards in the order they need to be done. I just started this on Sunday, but already I find it comforting to know that everything that's on my mind is in this deck; I've found myself just shuffling through it seeing what was in there. It is like a portable version of my pickle jar. And I haven't even scratched the surface of the gaming possibilities around a custom-designed deck of cards. Collectible Color Card Task Management Gaming, anyone? Balance your Day by trying to get a Three-Of-A-Kind or Straight Flush? Unique Cards, with Webkinz-style Card Tracking and Social Media Integration via 43Things? Oh, my goodness.

Right now, the process I'm using is very simple: I'm just writing down stuff on index cards as they come to mind. The designs are sparse, but are already functionally evolving into distinct uses. When a task is completed, I'll pull the card from the deck and retire it. There are all sorts of neat index card hacks out there that could help as well. There's a nifty index card board on Unclutterer, for example, and Levenger makes those sweet index card holders and docks. However, what I'm more interested in doing is making a deck of beautiful, personalized cards that can be manipulated in my hands. We'll see where this goes.

Day Grid Balancer: Draft 2 Progress

2009-06-17 06:45:53+00:00

I've been redesigning the prototype Day Grid Balancer based on the excellent feedback on draft 1. The overall consensus was that while the color and grid were very playful and attractive, their use as a day-to-day tool was limited. And confusing, because my categories don't line up with other people's categories. What seemed to work, though, was the idea of weekly balance. I guess the name of the form will have to change eventually, but the implication for right now is that this creates a LOT OF ROOM to play with on the left-hand side.

I was thinking of biorhythms, DNA spirals, and other patterns, so I drafted a version of the balance grid that, well, is kind of a mess but might give y'all some ideas in brainstorming an approach to make the thing work. I think there needs to be some kind of auxiliary marking within the grid itself, and some obvious place to leave notes, but I haven't gotten that far ahead. I'm planning on printing this out and just scribbling it on it sometime to see if anything pops up.

Thoughts? Here's a editable PDF file to play with, saved with Adobe Illustrator CS3. Creative Commons license applies, as before.

Spackling My Brand Identity: New Website Header!

2009-06-10 20:13:22+00:00

One of the great sins of my personal branding effort has been to let a temporary photograph stand in as my website identity for so long. If you're reading this article through RSS you missed the new header image that has replaced the old collection of scotch bottles. I just didn't see the bottles anymore because I'm too close to the website, but every once in a while someone comments that they just assumed that my website is about drinking. I've resisted changing it until now, because I liked the photo, but I'm finally starting to define my design methodology and the image is incongruous with respect to a respectable practice. It's time to put my childish preferences aside.

The visual history of my website header is documented in my post Inadvertent Branding, but the short version of the story is that the bottles (see below) were a joking commentary on my cavalier attitude about moving my website between servers, live, without doing a whole lot of testing. At the time I was also rather fond of the colors in the image, taken with my previous-previous digital camera (a Canon PowerShot G2). Looking at the image now, I can see the nasty contrast issues. Check it out, preserved below for posterity:

The picture in the new header was taken at Starbucks with the 40D to illustrate a blog post, and was serving as (wait for it) a placeholder in my new website design. The new design, sadly, has not been going anywhere since January, so I decided to just grab the image from it. At least the new photo is somewhat informational in its subject matter. Plus, it has my two favorite pens in it (a Lamy Safari and Al-Star) laying on my favorite notebook (a Cachet Classic Graph). The eventual plan is to shoot a new header image depicting a ton of my favorite bits of gear used in support of my identity and design agency philosophy. But first, I've got to write it. So for now, this header will serve as a transitional brand image. That probably is some kind of no-no, but as I am also in a transition period, I am allowing for poetic license. So there. So much for growing out of my childish preferences.

Another transitional element I've deliberated added is the shift in colors toward the orange-blue palette that my latest business card is using:

The evolution of my business cards has never really matched the evolution of the website, but there's no more excuses now that I'm settling in a "design niche" I think is suited to my peculiar skillset and personality. To help, I'm using some language from the cards ("investigative designer") while retaining some of the keywords that the site has become known for ("productivity"). I also am using the gestalt dot story as a bullet for the design portfolio" button, which is now a little more obvious than before. I'm not sure if I like the bullet, but at least we're starting to get some repetition of elements between the business card and the website, which helps make it seem more like a "brand". It's not great consistency, but then again my so-called brand identity has always been somewhat "ambient" as opposed to "direct". Certain elements like proportions in my design work, color choice, typography, and use of photography have been fairly consistent over the past few years. The explicit use of my name has also been consistent; I demoted the original name of the blog, Better Living through New Media, to a subheader quite some time ago. This probably was a lucky decision, as I've discovered that I really do prefer to engage with people one-on-one, representing me-as-me.

So that's that. I'm giving myself another 10 years to fix the rest of it :-)

Indigo Kelleigh’s 8-bit Tarot Cards

2009-06-03 17:58:59+00:00

I stumbled upon Indigo Kelleigh's fantastic Tarot cards some time ago. Based on the popular Rider-Waite deck that's in widespread use, Kelleigh's deck is faithfully illustrated using an 8-bit retro computer graphic style. If you grew up with computer games in the 80s and 90s, you know what I'm talking about. Before we had millions of colors and photographic imagery on the desktop, computer artists basically had to work with what amounted to a digital Lite-Brite, hand-picking each pixel and color to create cartoony imagery. It is not unlike creating a mosaic out of tiles, with a very limited color set. People of my generation, however, remember this era of computer gaming fondly because quality games had to rely on good game play and story--or so we game snobs like to believe.

Anyway, Kelleigh's 8-bit Tarot covers all 78 cards in the Rider-Waite, using the same 256 colors that used to be the standard system palette on the Macintosh. That may sound like a lot of colors, but when you consider that realistic shading can take dozens of colors for each hue, you quickly exhaust your color budget. Experienced computer graphic artists dither colors to create the illusion of intermediate shades of colors; this works well if the resolution of the screen is high enough with photographic imagery. The technique creates a stippled effect that makes connoisseurs of aged computer graphics nod with heartfelt appreciation.

But I've prattled on enough...just take my word that these are really cool. The complete set became available recently for sale, and I jumped to snag a couple for my collection of esoterica. Have a look!

They're not very large cards, slightly smaller than a standard playing card. However, the printing is quite good and is on a nice coated cardstock. The cards also come in a very cool brown box decorated with blocky 8-bit illustrations done in a Victorian (?) style. The mixing of retro 8-bit graphics with retro package design is very cool.

I suspect they will also work just fine as any Rider-Waite deck for Tarot purposes, as Kelleigh's digital creations are based on the thematic elements that are in Pamela Colman Smith's original illustrations. You can see the entire card set at Kelleigh's site. If you've got US$30 burning a hole in your pocket, head on over to the lunarbistro store and send the artist some bucks.

Day Grid Balancer: Assessment 1

2009-06-01 13:36:33+00:00

It's been a week since I first started trying the new day grid balancer form, and in practice I found that it didn't quite mesh well with my expectations. Partly this may be due to the long weekend and the surprise visit of one of my best friends, which meant that I didn't adhere to the daily schedule I'm striving to put into place. Even when factoring that in, I think I can still say with confidence that there are several aspects I didn't like about the form:

Filling out the little day balance grid was confusing because my categories didn't quite fit what I was really doing. They are not named quite right, even for me.
I wasn't quite clear on what kind of things I should list. In hindsight I see I was mixing up several categories of task: things I want to "make time" to do, scheduled meetings, and ongoing projects. The sheet is also a little cramped for writing any more than a few words per item, though perhaps this is a good thing.
I had a tendency to just want to use the day balance grid to just check things off to try to complete the figure, instead of noting time.

In short, I wasn't very clear myself on how I wanted to use the form, and this might also be due to imprecise expectations. On the other hand, I also knew that the first week run was unlikely to be quite right, which is why I'm doing this review. There were some useful insights:

There's something kind of fun about the day balance grid that I like. People have commented it reminds them of Tetris® in its shapes, and perhaps that gives rise to the expectation of fun.
Merely checking off a box does make me aware of the other areas I could be balancing, which I think is a good thing. The current design of the sheet, however, doesn't leverage this very powerfully. Perhaps a single larger diagram is the way to go.
Having notes on what I did every day to achieve balance is very helpful in remembering what I did.
My mindset was that of achieving balance through completion, not through doing. This may be because I feel I am bootstrapping a lot of projects to get new work lined up, and I perceive a long sequence of intermediate steps that will take time to complete. In other words, I'm "finish fixated".

That last point regarding completing versus doing is somewhat subtle; I'm thinking that some actions are inherently good because it is about the time spent in the process itself, and other actions are good because they "finish" something that needed finishing. For example, I'm told that fishing is quite relaxing, and that it is not about actually catching a fish and (as I used to presume) getting to eat it. If one is results-focused, then spending lots of time fishing and not catching any fish would be a big waste of time. However, for someone who enjoys the experience of fishing itself, the entire point is to be immersed in the pleasure of the activity itself.

So there are at least two elements of balance that I should be considering:

Maintaining a healthy variety of achievements, which lead to balance of multiple prerequisites for security and happiness. This the working assumption behind the design of the current form.
Remembering to engage in both immersive and results-oriented experiences. This is a distinction that is probably important to note.

So what should this form even do?

And even more important is to decide exactly what this form delivers. I'm not really sure yet. If I look inward to see what it is that's really on my mind, it's that I transform myself into a higher-performing version of myself so I can get my languishing projects done. Just about all these projects are related to either creating new business machinery or creating new ways of interacting with people en masse, which is also beneficial to me. The net result I expect from completion of these projects is more opportunity, both financially and socially.

So why even worry about balance when there's so much to do? The assumption I am testing is whether balance leads to consistent productivity. My gut says that this is part of it, and I keep coming across mentions on other blogs and books that seem to confirm this. Consistent productivity in my case is a matter of maintaining consistent momentum and motivation. I know certain activities inspire and energize me, and I know others drain me. When I am not getting things done AND not constantly exposed people energy pre-mixed with optimism, my motivation wanes.

If I leave this balance issue up to chance, then it's pretty likely that I'll have inconsistent days of productivity. This may actually be an acceptable choice, but I am also feeling that time is short and I need to get my ass in gear. Hence, the creation of a new form to help me track what I'm doing and improve my mindfulness. Improving mindfulness is, perhaps, the main point behind this form.

I'll probably take a second pass at this in the coming week. I'm also very curious about other people's experiences using the form. Feel free to leave a comment, and I'll try to address the feedback as much as possible in the second draft.