Thursday, September 20, 2012

Cows don't get milked in a diary



Over the years a few people have asked us if we could make a diary. This was something I have always wanted to do, but in terms of production it was always daunting. Finally things have occurred to make this year the year we make a diary for next year. We have a new printer that makes it all a possibility, now it is just up to me and my brains and hands to get to designing it.

I made a mock up yesterday due to being a big old visual learner as I needed to have something real in front of me. There is lots of things to learn with the process which is fun, hard work, sometimes frustrating and you learn from lots of mistakes along the way (which is another way I love to learn). Once I had the mock up in my hands I felt so much better about the whole thing, suddenly it was possible. As it is just me doing all our design work I find things take a lot longer than you expect and you need to concentrate really hard to get them finished, a hard task when there are cats on the internet and cats running around outside. (There is an unspoken rule in our office, if you see a cat outside you yell out CAT CAT CAT and everyone runs out to look at it or sometimes if we are lucky, them. The cats will not let you pat them FYI).

Often when I have a job to do I imagine it finished so my brain automatically feels like it is done, but then when I have to start working on it I do all these silly jobs that make me feel like I'm accomplishing things when actually I'm not. I often feel bad about doing these things but I've come to discover they can be helpful in the whole beast that is THE CREATIVE PROCESS. Take for instance the front of the diary of the mock up in the picture above. That isn't the real front, I just spent time drawing with all my colours, having fun and avoiding the real task at hand of actually designing the real cover. Even though it isn't going to be the good copy I will use some of the ideas from that to create what will be the front. Hopefully it will be ready in time for 2013.

PS: If you want to follow us on Instagram we are ableandgame and we don't post photos of our lunch and we like every single cat photo that comes up on our feed. 

PPS: If you're after updates about the diary you might want to join up to our mailing list. The newsletter comes once a month and has new products, silly drawings, giveaways, things we like and other stuff like that. On the left of our blog there is a spot where you can join.