business
Good start to the year!
The first post of the year and January is almost over! It was a busy start to say the least. I’ve been living inside Photoshop this past month and I’ve actually had a blast. I recieved a new Wacom tablet that has made me a speed demon. I’m now using an Intuos4 medium and the difference from my old Graphire is just unbelievable. I should have invested in the new one a long time ago.
One of the major speed boosts comes from the new Radial menu. Program any button on the pen or on the tablet to show this menu and when you activate it you get a circular overlay where your pen is positioned. This menu can show any command that you need to access frequently. And it gets better. You can have a submenu of commands so the total number of items available is huge.
Wacom Radial Menu
I have arranged this menu so that I have my most used actions there. I just need to click the back button on my pen and in that instant and wherever I am on my screen I can create layers, change brushes and add masks to name a few.
I’ll add more of my Wacom tricks in the next post but since I have to run and actually work on some shots I’ll leave you with a cool link to some cool images.
Mathew Albanese has created some amazing landscape photos but the cool thing about them is not that he was at the right place at the right time to get them. He actually created the landscapes himself as miniatures. Everything is “fake” but it looks real. Great creativity to figure out how to mimic what we see in nature with things like paprika and parsley! Go check it out at the following link:
Panic Sale
No, I’m not selling my computer and camera equipment…yet. I just found out about a sale that the folks at Panic.com are having over at their site. If you do any FTP to update your website or work with clients and you use a Mac, then you should be using Transmit as your FTP client.
It is hands down the best application out there for transferring files. Beautiful interface, easy to use and it has a ton of power under the hood if you ever need to get fancy with it.
Besides Transmit there are a couple of other applications that Panic offers like Coda for website design and Unison for using Usenet groups. I’m not into that stuff but FTP is almost a daily thing for me.
And the whole point of this post is that Panic is having a 3 day sale and all their main applications are 50% off.
So for $15.00 you can purchase the top of the line FTP program for Mac and also support a great software company (check their site to see how cool these guys are). Skip a few lattes and get it. Oh and check out the TV ad that their tech support guy created, it’s awesome!
Invoicing and a discount on Lightroom
I’ve been working on my bookkeeping process trying to learn as much as possible so things go a little smoother next year when taxes are due. In that process I revisited my invoicing system and looked into a couple of options available to freelancers and small businesses. Here are 2 cool examples.
Billings 3.0
For over two years I’ve been using an application called Billings from Marketcircle based in Toronto. Version 2 of the software was a bit clunky in my opinion so I signed up for the beta of version 3 and after a couple of months they had listened to users and had made big improvements. The version you can download now is version 3 and it’s really good. It’s a time tracking application that does invoicing and creates reports. It also uses the Mac address book and overall it has a great interface and enough power to be used as my main invoicing / time tracking system. They have promised an iPhone application to go alongside with Billings which I assume will track time and will let you see the status of your projects which I think will be fantastic.
The only thing that could still be improved is the tool used to design your own invoices. If you are happy with the samples they have, you are good to go but if you want to brand and modify your own it takes some knowledge of how it works and in my experience, a lot of trial and error.
I wish Marketcircle would crate a very simple accounting application that would work with Billings. This would be the perfect solution for a freelancer or small business. Right now I still have to work with a separate accounting application (which I’ll talk about in another post). I highly recommend you check out the demo of Billings. It’s a great invoicing application that tracks time, creates reports and lets you know the status of all your projects. Right now they have a reduced price promotion so you can get it for $40 instead of $60.
The Invoice Machine
This is a web application that almost got me to switch from Billings. The Invoice Machine’s interface is beautiful and couldn’t be easier to use. It’s a free service if you are doing minimal invoicing (3 invoices a month) if you need more you can move up to a paid plan. They do time tracking and actually have a dashboard widget to track it. It works with Basecamp if you are a user of that service. You can receive payments via Paypal and send invoices as PDF just like Billings.
I really liked the service and love the simplicity of the application. The idea of being able to invoice from any computer on the internet and the ease of use are incredibly attractive but for me the issue really was the price. Since I need more than 3 invoices a month I would have to use their Medium plan which is $12 a month. After 5 months I would be paying more than the cost of purchasing Billings. It’s not a huge expense but that and the fact that I couldn’t modify the invoices to what I need were the deciding factor. Other than that I think it’s a great option.
So I’m sticking with Billings 3 for invoicing, project tracking and time tracking. I can’t wait to see what the iPhone app looks like and what I can do with it. Both of these applications have a free demo you can use so if you do let me know your thoughts. For accounting I’m testing out a web service that looks really good. I’ll be posting a review of it when I work with it some more. Now back to tweaking my invoice format and actually sending a couple out the virtual door!
** Just found out that Adobe is offering Lightroom for $25 off the regular price. The offer is valid until May 31 so if you haven’t purchased it yet you can save some money. Here’s the link to the North American store
Livebooks online seminars
Livebooks, the people who offer one of the best systems out there for creating a professional portfolio website (not inexpensive though), have a section on their site with “webinars”. I recently found out about it and checked out a couple of them and they were excellent.
The Marketing Fundamentals webinar had so much information and advice I started taking notes and doing screen captures of their slides! They have a calendar of upcoming webinars as well as an archive of older ones…all available for free.
I’m not a Livebooks client but definitely considering it. The whole system makes it so easy to update images on your porfolio and even redesign your entire site when you need to with just a few clicks. Offering content like this for free is a great example of what I believe companies should be doing these days; especially since these webinars are all about learning and getting better at what you do.
The webinars are totally worth the time. I’ve already registered for a few more.
Go check them out by clicking here
the value of getting good advice
Not a new story but I just found out about this and was shocked to see another example of people getting bad advice or just not gettin any advice. I’ve always thought that one of the things that success offers you (of course after satisfaction, happiness, etc.) is that you can afford to get experts to help you in making your decisions.
Now this doesn’t mean that the advice is always good, but you can afford to get second, third and fourth opinions right? Well, it seems that sometimes this just doesn’t happen even to famous and successful photographers like Annie Leibovitz.
From the Telegraph paper in the U.K.
Annie Leibovitz pawns copyright to life’s work to pay debts
I read the article and googled for more since that headline was a bit dramatic and found this from another site. The Business Insider:
Celebrity Photographer Annie Leibovitz $715,000 In Debt
Also while searching, a different news item popped up in Google that made me think if this was just a case of not getting good advice or if something else might be adding to her problems.
Stylist Sues Annie Leibovitz; Says She’s Owed $400K+
Although the specifics are not known and each of us have our own issues to deal with, I took this as a reminder that even though we all wish for a successful career and the things it will bring us, we should try really hard to stay grounded and have sane people around us to keep things sane. That’s my personal take on it, now off I go to work on getting that Disney ad campaign.
My new venture. Learn photography with me.
