Over the past few months I've been pursuing a little self set idea called Illustration Sundays. No strict rules, deadlines or timeframes just an excuse to sit down and illustrate to my heart's content. With it being the festive season and thoughts of a white Christmas I attacked my Moleskine with fine-liners and my personal card project commenced...

Those of you who have been following my Twitter would have seen recent updates of my progress over the past few weeks. The result being a limited run of 100 sets of three hand drawn illustrated Christmas cards. Each set contains three different designs of A6 cards printed on 350gsm 100% recycled stock with coloured envelopes. 

Sets are available to buy at £6 and there's a few ways you can get hold of them by either popping by Substrakt towers, following this link to my site or via Paypal with this button.

Merry Christmas! x

Last friday we launched a new site for the good people at Beadesaurus.co.uk. They have a couple shops in Birmingham and Marple, Stockport, as well as an online store, to sell a wide range of clothing, jewelry, accessories and loads more.

The brief was to overhaul the design of the site and rebuild it around the Satchmo Ecommerce framework. The site design has a weathered and ‘grungey’ appearance to appeal to the target demographic, but still remains clean, clear and a good usable browsing/shopping experience.

We used a range of CSS3 techniques in the site, such as a multiple background images in places and @fontface to use custom fonts throughout the site. It’s also great to see the people at Beadesaurus already making the site their own by adding some new slides to the ‘featured slider’ on the home page, which will keep the site looking fresh in the future.

Check out the site at www.beadesaurus.co.uk
(and maybe buy a little something for christmas!)

Substrakt have recently released a fair few new websites which boast active blogs. For example the Brightspace run blogs Project Platform and Creative Careers, which has just launched, which will have plenty of regular posts. While it is great that sites are getting some love from regular updates, over time the quality of the blog might slip as more and more things are added to it. 

Embedding stuff ¶

Most sites now allow you to embed some sort of media or another, but unfortunately most of this embedded content is not so elegantly styled. For example if you embed a YouTube video onto your blog by default it will be sized at 480 pixels wide. This is fine but it looks pretty ugly to have a box of this size embedded on your site if the rest of your blog content is a different width. Joined with Flickr galleries which default at 500 pixels wide and 600 pixels high. This is pretty big and if your blog layout isn't that wide then its going to break something. 

Freshen Up ¶

So how do we make sure our blogs stay beautiful and look fresh as time goes by? Don't let your standards slip. When you get a brand new website you want to fill it with awesome content and make sure it looks as slick as possible. Just because your site matures a bit and has a lot more content than when it was launched, doesn't mean you need to let it get into a state of disrepair. Get into the habit of resizing your images to fit. Obviously sometimes some media just wont be the same width as your blog and theres nothing you can do about it, but more often than not you can customise embedded content to fit.

If you are embedding content from YouTube, Vimeo or Flickr, look out for something like this: 

<object width="480" height="385">

It is usually in the first line of the embed code. WordPress 3 now has an auto embed function, for security reasons, and to make things easier for the end user. When you paste a YouTube link into your post content, it is automatically converted into a video player on the site. If you look in the media settings tab you can change the size of any media which is auto generated. 

Details are important ¶

Paying attention to these small details makes a huge amount of difference, and can be the difference between a tight professional looking website and casual blog, so give your blog some love and don't neglect it after a couple months. 

We've recently re branded and developed a new website for Creative Alliance.

Creative Alliance is a group of experienced creative professionals working collaboratively to develop, support and train creative talent

It's been a great pleasure working with Creative Alliance, who are doing some really valuable work for the creative industries, notably their involvement with the creative apprenticeships programme.

Substrakt have also been working alongside Creative Alliance and Meshed Media on the all new Jobplot which went live earlier this week. More on this in a separate blog post soon.

Visit the new Creative Alliance website.

We've been working with a partner agency this month, producing a microsite for a household name fashion brand clients. Much as I don't like talking about things in vague terms, we have to, because it's a white label project. However, the really cool thing about it isn't the brand or the microsite itself, it's where it's getting its content from - Facebook. 

Substrakt worked with Facebook's Graph API (that's Application Programming Interface for us clueless creatives) to find a way of taking the content from the brand's Facebook fan page and adding it into the relevant pages of its microsite. Wall posts turned into latest news, photos to latest styles, discussions page to Q&A section, and so on. The tone of the microsite reflects the Facebook fan page spirit, mixing branded content with user contributions. It flows easily, the content updates when it needs to and caches itself in case Facebook posts don't come through for some reason, so there's never any blank spots. I'm convinced, having seen this in action, that this kind of collaboration between social and corporate media is going to be the way forward. 

Even the most traditional of brands is beginning to use their websites to demonstrate that they are a fan of two way conversations and aren't going to stick to the one-dimensional tradition of standing in cyberspace screaming your own name until you get attention. We've put a latest Tweets feature, for example, on all our new-build client sites in the last 12 months. But using Facebook content to augment your brand is genius. Pulling it in from Facebook itself and nestling it amongst your brand's existing website and other media completes the social circle. everyone's talking about the same thing, and now the conversations can meet in the same place. 

If it's managed properly and the Facebook page is maintained as well as any other route to market would be, then the conversations generated on the branded Fan page add authenticity to your online image and people can be inspired, not bored, by what they read. The other, cost-effective argument for making more use of branded Facebook fan page content is that it sidesteps the issue of copy-production for brands online. Re-using this existing company material is cheaper than trying to re-create the same vibe all over again. Using it as part of a wider strategy to engage people online is also going to become popular, as after all, there are some people who don't use Facebook. And why should they miss out on all the fun that's being had? 

We really loved building the technology to make this work - the sort of challenge that gets us going!

Arlene Adams is an illustrator based in Moseley, Birmingham, originally from Scotland. She recently had a break from her work to raise her new child, but when she was ready to kick start everything again, she came to Substrakt. The brief was simple. Replace her dated existing website and make her work and thoughts more accessible.

This project was interesting to work on, as it presented new challenges and involved trailing a few unique ideas. It ultimately ended up with us stripping back the design and build to the bare bones to keep it as simple and easy to use as possible. The original design, and much of what it looks like now was designed by Arlene herself, but aspects and extra elements had to be adapted to make it work for the web.

Check her work out at www.arleneadams.com

My favourite way of keeping things challenging is by making everything into a game and competing with myself. As I get better at what I am doing, I have to make these challenges more difficult, which only makes succeeding all the more satisfying. In short I sometimes set myself seemingly impossible goals. Then I split these down into smaller tasks to make them more manageable, but try not to loose sight of the big picture. I set a bunch of tasks in the awesome iPhone app Epic Win and set about ticking them off. 

Read more books ¶

On the 1st January this year I decided I wanted to read more. I guess this is a resolution plenty of people make. I want to read more, I want to go to the gym more, I want to eat healthier. These are perfectly acceptable goals, but they are too broad. Its hard to challenge yourself and motivate yourself to do complete a vague goal. What is "more"? If you never go to the gym at all, more could only be once a week. This is fine, but its hardly pushing yourself to achieve something impressive. So I took my vague, wishy-washy resolution and refined it, deciding that I would read 52 books this year. To refine that some more thats one book a week. 

This was a far cry from the 6 or 7 books I read last year, and it seemed pretty daunting, but as soon as I got into a routine of reading every day I found that I was easily reading a book a week. I have now read 41 books this year, so I am close to finishing this challenge. I have trained myself to never miss a deadline and I never do.

Efficient markup ¶

This has also crossed into my work life. I am constantly trying to build sites faster and better than I did previously. Each site I build I try to employ some new techniques that I haven't used before and finish the work quicker than before without losing any of the quality of the work. The feeling of achievement I get every time I complete one of my goals is awesome and it really keeps my moral up. 

Quick wins ¶

My point is, set yourself big scary unlikely goals. Its a big cliche to say so, but aim high. Punch above your weight. Set a challenge then break it down into smaller ones. The 'quick wins' of completing these smaller tasks will keep you motivated and without even noticing it you might have achieved something epic!

We've just received the latest copy of Panlibus, a publication we recently wrote an article for. Here it is...

Libraries as gateways to the urban experience
Andy Hartwell, Managing Director, Substrakt

Libraries are already regarded as social institutions. However, their status as visitor attractions is expected to return in the 21st Century. Libraries are primed to become the gateways into a city’s identity. They will enjoy a transformation from inward facing keepers of ‘quiet’ information to vibrant, community-driven hubs. Technology will link libraries with their environment and integrate their resources with the cultural and social assets around them. The concept of linked data has arrived.

Linking data will take libraries a step beyond the drive to digitise the material that each collection possesses. This isn’t a question of turning dusty volumes into scanned, clear images that can be displayed on a screen. It’s also not about encouraging people to go online rather than visit a library, or indeed go online when they visit a library. It’s about providing each visitor with a personalised perspective of the library, transforming their short trip to source a book or see an item of interest into a rich experience that starts with their original purpose for coming and takes them on a journey through spaces and places which has been imagined specifically for them. Like changing the filter on a camera lens to give you a better picture, structured data is set to give a new outlook to users of 21st Century city libraries.

These changes are being brought about because libraries are responding to the needs of their visitors and potential visitors. People’s expectations of public information services are higher than ever before. Currently, what could be a colourful experience can easily become a wasted journey, with the visitor left wondering why something couldn’t have been done to prevent the inconvenience. The perception that smarter technology could combine with better information and make the visitor journey more palatable and personal is growing in the public mindset.

Substrakt’s recent research has highlighted what visitors expect from libraries and how they regard them in terms of their place in the fabric of their surrounding towns and cities.

•  47% of people intend to visit a library in the next 12 months – more than intend to visit an amusement park
•  Two-thirds of people look at maps or site plans before visiting places such as the library
•  Over half of visitors to a library would download information to their mobile phone before visiting
•  60% of visitors to places like the library read user reviews before going
•  Only one in five people want to be directed straight to the thing they came to visit on arrival
•  40% of visitors are frustrated by lack of staff and information when experiencing new places
•  86% of potential visitors to a library would like to use interactive information kiosks
•  Four in ten visitors to the library think their visit would be made more special by meeting people there with similar interests

This research supports the conclusion that libraries have the potential to integrate themselves further with their communities by being more than just a place to use the Internet. They can empower their own data via Internet applications and link it with that of others, to formulate better visitor experiences. By creating relationships between their Library Management Systems and other local information sources, adding partnerships with leisure and tourism facilities and creating accessible and social ways of sharing data, a library becomes a knowledge hub for the spaces and places that surround it.

Technologically, empowering the libraries to become civic gateways will mesh public and private hardware and software. Visitors’ mobiles and laptops will be able to work in conjunction with the data stored in the library and around the city in a more accessible and productive way. Interactive kiosks and on-site terminals will use information from public and private databases and booking systems to link together personalised recommendations and experiences. Applications, Augmented Reality and graphical representation addresses like QR codes and bar codes can be utilised to produce digital mapping, way-finding and 3D modelling solutions. Social media applications can be linked to create user-generated tours and suggestions for routes around a library and beyond into its town or city. An Urban Lens can be created, with a focus on the library.

A catalogue of possibilities

From stage to shelf
Imagine that a town’s theatre is showing Arthur Miller's 'View from the Bridge' starring Helen Mirren. To promote the play and encourage people to get under the skin of Miller's work, a library’s Urban Lens could feature the 'Five recommendations' from the actress of further reading by or about the playwright, his work, or 1950s America that can be found in the library. People could also be prompted to buy show tickets or purchase a copy of the play from Amazon.com

A walk through the City's history
Many cities have several historical walking tours. Imagine if the library could promote the tours whilst drawing visitors to the Library into exploring further with books and archive material? The way-showing solution could produce a visual map, dotted with literary sources to seek out, old photographs to study, and even user generated content which tells the story of times gone by in the city. Tickets to tours could be purchased, as could concessionary refreshments by clicking on locally advertised restaurants and bars.

Centre to the community
Many cities have many successful community events that don't at first glance concern a library. But what if they could get involved by simply showing people another side to a story? For example, imagine if during a Christmas Market, The library way-finding solution had an interactive map of the market's layout, with user reviews and links to recipe book trails or cultural backgrounds on the cuisine available?

Finding more than just books
Many people will be using the library on a regular basis and will develop their favourite parts of the new building. Where's the quietest corner? What if you need bright lighting or like to be near the coffee shop? What if the way-finding solution could make each visit more personal to visitors by showing them, for example which parts of the Library are busiest today, or how many desks are free in the archive section?

Key to the success of linked data projects such as Urban Lens will be ensuring that all electronic roads in and out of the library lead to the unique catalogues, bibliographies and archives that they contain. Each digital solution must be developed for each library and its corresponding location with the original purpose of the journey to the building in mind – to find a resource contained within. The added unique element for the visitor is two-fold. Firstly, a personalised route to that resource which helps them bypass all the negative aspects of a trip they dislike. Secondly libraries can add an element of unexpected value to visitor journeys – discovery of more than they came for. The benefits are not just social, but commercial too. Librarians and other staff will have increased opportunity to focus their roles. Operational processes will be automatically streamlined and economies possible. Linked data also presents several revenue generation opportunities through retail and commercial partnerships and sponsorships.

The options to connect public information via digital media are a real possibility and will not just put libraries back on the map in their location, they will become the map for their location.

Download a copy of Panlibus.

Last weekend I hopped on the train and went up north to Liverpool. I'd never properly explored the city and with it being named European Capital of Culture last year and hosting Liverpool Biennial, (a contemporary visual art event) my adventure begun...

First stop was the Walker Art Gallery which was grand Victorian building promoting itself as the 'National Gallery of the North'. Its collection proudly announced artworks dating right back to the 13th century, including art heros such as Rembrandt, Turner and David Hockney. I didn't visit all the rooms but I did enjoy The John Moores Painting Prize. The competition has ran for the past 50 years and is open to everybody so attracts over 3,000 entries so there's a eclectic mix of both established artists and new talent. Some weird and wonderful things to say the least!

Next door, as it seemed we were right in the centre of the 'cultural quarter' was another neo-classical building housing Liverpool World Museum. Just so you know, I went to the aquarium and checked out some pretty amazing fish ;) 

After previously visiting 3 of the 4 Tate galleries I was looking forward to ticking off Liverpool as I strolled towards Albert Dock. There were quite a few tourists around and a massive que at The Beatles Story as it attracted fans for what would have been John Lennon's 70th birthday (This was later confirmed as we walked down Mathew Street later on!) The main Tate exhibition was 'DLA Piper Series: This is Sculpture' which asked key figures from the cultural sector to co-curate and pick works from the collection to represent their interpretations. Each room was donned with a fluorescent hue dissenting from the traditional white wall gallery space which was pretty cool. As I approached one of the rooms presented with a wall of wireless headphones, I took the opportunity and the headphones, pulled back the black curtain and entered the room curated by Hemingway & Son. With the likes of Greg Wilson and Yousef playing in my ear I stepped right into a disco environment fully equipped with mirror balls, ambient lighting and an interactive light up dancefloor! The juxtaposition of the 80s disco vibes and modern contemporary sculpture was definitely a different way to look at the 25 life size sculptures focusing on the human body. They explain a little more thoroughly of their 'nightclub in a gallery' idea here. Other curators included poet Carol Ann Duffy and artist Michael Craig-Martin, definitely worth checking out if you're tup norf' anytime soon!

Taking part in the Biennial were venues A Foundation and Contemporary Urban Centre about a ten minute walk from the centre. Named the 'Baltic Triangle' and a bit of a hidden gem the area had qualities similar to those of Digbeth with its abandoned warehouses, numerous Grade II listed buildings and affordable creative spaces. With a no larger than A2 sized board sat in the middle of a unused road we were directed to the A Foundation. What looked like an oversized garage door appeared to be 2500sqm of exhibition space with cafe and bookshop. Currently showing was Bloomberg New Contemporaries which shows the best of up and coming emerging talent from across the UK. I was a bit overwhelmed by the space and the quality and range of work spanning all medias. If you don't get an opportunity to check it out then it's on at the ICA in London shortly. Last but not least was headed over the road to the Contemporary Urban Centre, (NB: the entrance is a little hard to find on the massive scale Grade II listed warehouse!!) The centre was a stunning space for creatives with art galleries, a unique cinema, studio spaces, cafes and a gig venue. Unfortunately we arrived on the one day they were closing early so we didn't get to see much of the City Spaces 2010 exhibition.

So we ended our day (I won't tell you about my evening!) in the Leaf Tea Shop & Bar, set on the ground floor on the opposite side of the building to the CUC. We arrived a bit late for it's high tea menu (we're quite partial to these thanks to the folks at Fazeley...mmm) but just in time for a cheeky beer and shortcake. Looking back I wish i'd tasted one of the show-stopping amounts of loose tea on offer served in their fancy teaware, but hey it was getting dark! Alongside its imaginative interiors, the laid back art cafe vibes, tasty cakes and the slick branding no wonder its became a worthy hang out to Liverpool creatives embracing the amazingness of tea, cake, and music! I'd say it's right up there with the likes of London, Berlin and New Yorks cultural hubs.

So yeh, Liverpool was pretty inspiring :)

I've been away on two European trips in as many weeks. The first of which was to Amsterdam, and the 2nd was to the European ICT conference in Brussels. I'll come back to the Brussels trip, but for now i'll attempt a brief rundown of my jaunt to Holland.

The primary reason for this trip was my involvement with a project called Creative Metropoles, a project that presents a shared vision of 11 European cities on creative industries and creative economy. We heard from some seemingly very intelligent and afluent people running some interesting projects within the Amsterdam creative industries. One particular project that drew my attention was the Bureau Broedplaatsen, a project that subsidises and helps manage the development of creative spaces, http://bureaubroedplaatsen.amsterdam.nl/en/.

The added bonus of this trip was that I was able to attend the Amsterdam Picnic event, http://www.picnicnetwork.org/.

PICNIC is about innovative ideas for business and society. It is an annual three-day festival that blurs the lines between creativity, science, technology and business to explore new solutions in the spirit of co-creation. Curious minds eager to exchange their knowledge, ideas and skills gather at PICNIC, making it the place to create the future – together.

I attended some really engaging panels, which were extremely closely related to some of the work we've been doing here at Substrakt. In fact, one of the lab sessions took the same title as a project that we've been working on, Urban Lens (more to come on this soon). This particular session gave great input to our thinking on this project and explored how a city could be explored.

How do you experience the city surrounding you? As a series of buildings and streets, or a collection of data and connected objects? During the Urban Lenses Panel, a collection of experts will explore the city as they see it – combining services, sensors, objects and data.

The chaps from Tellart, who doing some pretty cool work, are especially worthy of note, http://www.tellart.com/

We design products, services, and environments that address human need and shape human experience. We work between worlds–analogue and digital, visual and physical, yesterday and today and tomorrow–because that is where most people live.

Urban Lenses Lab:
http://www.picnicnetwork.org/program/sessions/urban-lenses-lab.html

The Beyond Tourism session was highly relevant to some of our projects too, and explored the future direction of cultural content on mobile devices, http://www.picnicnetwork.org/program/sessions/beyond-tourism-future-directions-for-mobile-cultural-content.html

It would also be a crime not to mention the amazingly energetic and entertaining Pips Lab, presenting Diespace http://www.pipslab.nl/onlinepromo/diespace_subs.php

If you can get to this event then I would highly recommend it. I only managed to get to day 2 but the content throughout the days seemed to be of very high standard.

I certainly came away buzzing with ideas and inspiration.