Mark Poppen

Yes, I’m redesigning this blog. It’s like I’ve had a jolt of inspiration over the weekend, and the past few days I’ve done nothing but designing stuff. I love it!

What does that have to do with Dribbble? Well, not that much, but let me explain how I felt and now feel about Dribbble.
At first, I was skeptical. To me, Dribbble was just another website where you can dump your stuff, and you’ll move on in a few months, like every other website. The invite only system didn’t help me like it either. If I can’t get in, I’ll use something else.
Let me say, since @meredithmarsh hooked me up with an invite and started exploring the site, it all made sense to me.
Because you’re only allowed 24 “shots” per month, you’ll have to be selective with what you post, so you’ll make sure you post only your best shots. Because it’s invite only, there are no spammers. Only “worthy” designers get in, although, I think “worthy” is a big word, and I don’t think I can compare my work with someone like Jason Santamaria or Veerle Pieters, but I did manage to get in.

Keep track of the redesign on Dribbble here: http://dribbble.com/shots/84615-The-redesign-of-my-personal-blog

To clarify, DFF stands for “Design for fun”. That said, I also have to confess I cheated a little on this. I designed this card before my post about designing for fun, but whatever. I liked doing it, and it wasn’t a business thing.

My cousin Kim and her hubby Gerr had a design for a card in mind, and found a very small image of a card that they liked online. They asked me if I could make something like it and make it so that the printer could print a good quality card out of it. I based this design on the image they sent me, and sent them the .PSD, to forward to the printer, so they could edit the final text on the card (like name, weight, length and of course, date).

They were kind enough to send the finished card over the big pond to announce the birth of their second girl: Isis. Congratulations!

Here’s the result of my design.

So, the past few months I have been busy with mostly client work and stuff I don’t really like doing (finance, administration etc.) for my little company. Today, I finally realized why my inspiration has reached a new low.

Although I love working for my clients, and they’re all awesome to work with, I’m not designing “for fun” anymore. You know, having a baby project, or a poster for an event that will never happen, or even designing a button-set nobody is going to ever use. Silly? Perhaps, but I’d like to get back to that. So, from now on, I’ll try to dedicate more time to “design for fun”. Hopefully it wil trigger my creative juices into a new stage of awesomeness.

This probably sounds easier than it is, but I’ll prioritize, and hopefully, I’ll be posting at least 1 new item per week. This means, I have 1 week to complete a design, that I’m designing just for “shits and giggles”. I would really appreciate your support and feedback on the items I’ll be designing.

Subscribe to the RSS feed, or follow me on Twitter, and I’ll keep you updated on my situation.

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Lately I’ve been re-evaluating why I’m designing. Is it just to make money, is it to impress someone, like a client or fellow designer, or is it for myself?

To make money?

If I did that, I’d create illusions for myself. Only the really great designers make good money off designing (I’m not talking blogging, just designing). Sure, I think I’m creating nice designs, but I’m not fooling myself by saying I’m great.

My boss?

Good thing I don’t have one. The reason why, is because I don’t want to be a pixel pusher, working for someone who tells me what to do, even though I know it’s wrong. I rather sell electronics during the day, and design websites for MY clients in my spare time (I used to do this).

Impressing someone?

Sure, I love hearing clients go: “Oh, that’s perfect”, but I know they don’t have a clue how much effort I put into that tiny little detail on the left they never noticed. Creating a web site for a client is filling their need for a good looking website, but even if you skip insane details only other designers would recognize, you’ll still impress them.
Speaking of other designers; I’m not convinced that I’m the designer other people look up to, and sure, I probably created something other designers can pull inspiration from, but impressing them? Nah, there are tonnes of designers out there that are truly inspiring to others. I’m just another web designer looking forward to create another new design, which brings me to my final statement.

For myself?

Yes, I’m designing for me and only myself. This might sound egocentric, but it’s true. I got into this business well over 10 years ago because I was intrigued by designing stuff on my computer. I started off designing ASCii-art. The stuff you see on Twitter now is not even getting close to the awesomeness we created at the end of the 90′s. We formed groups that would “release” ASCii-packs to show to the world through BBS.
Then came the internet available at my parent’s place. A whole new world opened up and I started fiddling around with web design. You know, with tables in Frontpage. I got degrees, recognitions and pads on the shoulder for finding something I really liked doing, and I kept pushing forward into making my career out of it.
Now, about 10 years later, I’m still planning big things for my company, but I will always be designing. Either for web or for the next generation of the web (whatever that may be). I just enjoy doing what I do.

What about you? Who are you designing for?

I’ve done a screencast on the introduction of Typekit for The Web Squeeze about 2 weeks ago. For those of you who haven’t seen it yet, here it is:

Introduction to Typekit from TheWebSqueeze on Vimeo.

You might not have heard of Anouk, but she’s The Netherland’s rock-chick. She’s an amazing singer. As a music loving designer, my eye caught Anouk’s new album cover. Apparently the gory-ness is not photoshopped, but the “Anouk logo” is, and it’s an upside-down one, and I think it’s awesome.

Happy Camper

Recently I had a conversation with a young designer who told me something like “When my client approves my design, I’m happy, even when I know it can be better”. This inspired me to write this post, because I think he’s wrong. (more…)

I don’t know how it came to me, but I woke up with the question: What would big sites look like in Comic Sans? So, when I got to my computer, I opened up a bunch of major web sites and converted them into Comic Sans. I was surprised that not all sites looked ugly instantly..

While doing this, I noticed there are a few sites that have a horrible css.

What does your website look like in Comic Sans? Leave a comment with the link to your website in Comic Sans (make a screenshot).

A while ago I entered a “Comment to win” on Andy Sowards’ blog. The assignment was: post the best comment on “Why you should win the Canvas or Business cards”. UPrinting supported the contest by giving away 1000 business cards or a 24″ x 18″ printed canvas.

I posted this comment:

I already have a stack of business cards, so I’d got for the canvas.
I think it will look pretty professional if I have a canvas on the wall of my office with my company logo on it. I’ll add a little tag with the text “brought to you by @andysowards”, like they have in art galleries.. but without a price

Andy thought that was worth the canvas, so a few weeks later I got in this gorgeous print, provided by the awesome UPrinting

Image 1 to 3: how the canvas was wrapped (good job guys!)
4th image: The canvas!
The 5th image is to illustrate how big it is. The dot in the middle is a Canadian 2 dollar coin.
The last image is to show that I kept my promise.

When I’m online (that’s about 50% of a whole day), I scour a lot of blogs, and some of them amaze me how the authors come up with the topics they write about. I recently read iBouaghtamac.com, which is a great resource for Mac related tips. I noticed Brent had one of those little tabs on the side of his website with the title “Suggestions?”. When I clicked it, it opened a nice overlay, powered by Skribit, where I could dump my suggestions for the site. Not layout or design-wise, but “what should Brent write about”.

I thought that was a great idea, and I started investigating if I could get Skribit on my site. Turns out the service is free! (well, unless you want pro-features like modify your own theme and moderation).

So, please, if you like reading my blog, and have suggestions for me, for let’s say a tutorial, review or any other kind of article, let me know through that little tab on the right side of the site. Thanks.