The Happy Studio- Invest in Good Tools.

Computers – The Way You Earn Your Money.
In the manufacturing world, investing in equipment is a major part of the annual budget. We are so lucky in the studio world. A serious machine costs only a few thousand dollars. It’s amazing that a machine you can do 100% of your work on, and that can earn you many tens of thousands of dollars costs so little. At most studio rates, you can earn enough to pay for a new machine plus software in a couple of days. Why then, do so many studios run on out of date, slow machines, or deficient software?

The Happy Studio- Make Your Studio Like a Home.

As creative people, we often find that our creativity translates into lots of aspects of our life beside design. While Gestalt, “variety within unity” and color theory apply to all the great design arts, it doesn’t necessarily mean you’re good at everything design related just because you know the basics. It’s true that you could probably have a great conversation with a fashion designer or an architect about how similar graphic design is to their professions- but it doesn’t mean you can sit down and design an award winning skirt, or esplanade.

Still, we for one, would like to believe we at least have the skills to make our space comfortable with a little thinking, and study.

Our studio
A creative space is what you make of it. Some people are inspired by the blankness of white space, others are claustrophobic about it. Some people love loud busy areas with lots of activity, some are irritated and/or terrified by it.

Our studio is wide open. Bigger than we need. If one person is on the phone, everyone hears it.

The Happy Studio- Email.

Why on earth would a whole post in this series be devoted to email? Because quite honestly, it’s an enormous part of what we do these days. It has affected our workflow, our technology budget, our client list, and even our hiring practices.

Email survival
If you are responsible for a significant portion of your company’s communication (i.e. are an owner, a sales person, or account executive) you know that the effectiveness of your correspondence is tantamount to virtually all other attributes of your skill-set on a daily basis. If you’re like us, you started out being a good designer or programmer, or copywriter, and have (abruptly) evolved into a digital communicator.

The Happy Studio – A Five-Minute-A-Week Portfolio.

It’s not that hard really. Think of all the things you do once a week, and how they add up after a while. A weeks worth of trash? A weeks worth of laundry? A year’s worth? Your portfolio is just the same. Small work adds up to big changes. Five minutes a week adds up […]

The Happy Studio – Conflict. When it happens- and it will.

It’s unavoidable. We work in a field where you have to fight for what you believe in. Conflict is part of the job. Finding careful, and complimentary ways of saying “no” feels like a recurring calendar event. This is more than a service industry, it’s a creative service industry, which makes it more perilous. It can get you down if you let it. We’ve evolved some ways of coping with conflict. Some of them through good advice, some through trial and error- most of them out of pure necessity.