Imagenetix.net has been long term client of mine and I have been designing and developing their corporate site for a number of years. For a while now, they have really needed a simple way for “non-technical” staff members to updated and manage their website. WordPress to the rescue…

If you don’t know, I really like the features of WordPress as a simple Content Management Solution (CMS). WordPress is great for letting my client update press releases, content, and products all through their web browser without technical experience. The days of me updating their site manually are now gone. Yeah!

This project involved taking their existing design (which I designed a number of years ago), updating the look a little, and converting it to a WordPress theme.

If you have seen mego.com, you will see that it’s widget is ideal for an iPhone App and when it came time for them to build this App, I was in charge of developing the User Interface.

The initial concept of this application was to create the same user experience of the web widget on the iPhone. Well, this turned out to be challenging. After looking at the widget and seeing how interactive it is, you’d think it would be a simple to adapt to the iPhone. Since the iPhone does not support Flash and the typical user has come to expect a certain navigation flow in iPhone applications, I had to collaborate with their lead developer and come up with a new user experience.

The application was developed and submitted to Apple and they are waiting approval.

Also, since the mEgo widget is so perfect for the iPhone and mobile devices… this became part of their standard pitch to other businesses. Below are some concept UI’s for Ubisoft and the Avatar game.

I thought I’d make my old portfolio reel available. It has some good stuff in it plus it shows that I can do motion graphics as well. I created this using Adobe After Effects and Adobe Premiere.

Fishing Lounge from Michael Church on Vimeo.

In the sea of trade show booths, how does a company get their name noticed? One way of doing this is with free stuff and stickers are a great way of peppering a venue with your name. People may not hold on to these permanently but you will end up seeing your name stuck to all kinds of things during the show. And, they are cost effective.

mEgo asked me to come up with some designs for a trade show they where attending. They wanted something unique and colorful. This is what I came up with.

mEgo.com is a company where members can create interactive profiles and post them on a number of  social networks and websites. Originally their main home page was set up as a login/signup page and that’s as far as potential new members could go. In this project, mEgo wanted to open up their site so that non-members could poke around a little before signing up and they wanted a heavy focus on their custom avatars.

Project responsibilities:

• Design
• Art Direction
• Information Architecture
• All development was handled by mEgo developers

This is a before and after shot of their website. You’ll notice that we moved from a dark heavy theme to a bright and light theme.

As new users navigate to areas that require membership, the user is presented with a friendly login page and action to sign up.

The new signup process went from requiring the user to sign up first to letting them actually play with the product before sign up. We also integrated Facebook Connect for easy registration.

The owner of Socrata is a repeat client of mine and when it came time for his company Blist to shift it’s business model, it was time for me to create a new brand identity. This project is a very good example of my process in creating a brand identity.

Discovery

As with all creative projects there is a Discovery phase. This is where I sit down (or get on the phone) with the client and discuss goals and objectives. When I create a brand/logo, I like to know what the company does and who they do it for. I like to know key words, messages and buzz phrases. I take all this information and begin the task of creating a logo that is both representative of the company and communicates a strong brand message.

Round One

With Socrata, and all clients, I begin the process of exploring different fonts, font treatments and marks. I typically develop 3-6 logos based on the Discovery conversation. One of the key messages with Socrata was “Making Data Social”. I took that message and tried to play off the concept of data and social icons. I also played with taking a standard font and customizing it.

Round Two

After presenting the initial 6 comps, we decided that an all lower-case font would not be appropriate for their demographic. We focused this next round on a serif font and  played of the waves of a logo in the first round. We wanted to see what the logo would look like using the concept of the standard RSS icon.

Round Three

After presenting these concepts it helped Socrata circle back to the sans-serif font. We felt that it would speak to a more professional audience. We also decided that the RSS concept was the wrong path. We wanted focus more on the data aspect of the company. So, I developed some more marks that represented social media and a play off of bar and pie charts.

Final Logo

This last round resulted in Socrata zeroing in on one logo. It clicked.

Imagenetix is a a bioceutical company that develops products which have pharmacological benefits. The have a number of products that are sold through costco.com.

Project Highlights

• 3D Product Illustration
• Photo composting and manipulation

I created a number of their product images that are used as display images on costco.com’s retail pages. The challenge in designing these images was to create and environmental background that related to the benefit of the product.

The process of designing these images was quite involved. I was provided packaging artwork in a flat PDF file. I then took that file and created a 3D image of the product using various applications and Photoshop trickery. I then turned to various stock photography websites to find images that related to the product. Using Photoshop, I composited a number of photos and the 3D image to come up with the following results.

In addition to creating the main product images, I also was required to create small banner ads that would be used throughout CostCos’s website.