PeterApo.com

I finished a personal website for a client of mine, Peter Apo. Peter has had a very exciting life, ranging from a recording artist, OHA trustee, State representative, poet, songwriter, etc. So he wanted to have a site to basically put that all together.

This was a fun site. The gallery section was great fun and some of his poetry is great reading as well. Check it out: http://www.peterapo.com

Photo Gallery

Made my own photo gallery.

http://www.raphaellowe.com/gallery

I got tired dealing with Yahoo Photo, Flikr, ImageStation, etc etc. So many different places to upload...it's hard enough dealing with different passwords much less all the different ways they have to handle photos.

This way all my albums will be in one place and I have full control.

I'm slowly trying to upload all my old photos. My mom always says, "You take all these photos of me I never get to see them." OK OK OK! I have some pretty funny ones of my old coworkers and friends. Nobody is safe....

No Spec

I became a proud member of a "no spec" movement the other day. I've always been a long advocate of this practice and only recently noticed this huge site about it. No-spec.com (http://www.no-spec.com/)

What it's about is a practice called "Speculative work". In layman's terms it's the practice of soliciting designs from multiple designers with no promises of compensation.

This happens more often then you think. Sometimes a company would make a design "competition", with nothing more then a promise that the chosen designer would then get awarded the contract.

From the company's standpoint, that's great right? They get to see all the available ideas that are out there, and they pick the one they like. But they don't understand that this practice harms both parties.

First, the designers who are doing the designs for "free" are spending hours and hours of their personal time with no promise of getting paid for their work. There's no protection for the artist's work either. What's to stop the company from taking one of the design ideas they like...and then taking that to another artist who's "cheaper" to finish the job?

Second, the client is unwittingly harmed by this process because you're getting free artwork from designers who most likely have not spent ANY time at all actually understanding and researching the business they are designing for. The only thing they've done is design something that they think "looks good". In other words, you're getting a whole bunch of designs that have no foundation for which they're built upon other then just subjective aesthetics.

Design is a process and a relationship between the client and the designer. As a designer, if I don't take the time to learn about you and your business, then how would I expect my designs to speak for you? As a client, I have to place value in the work that my designer has come up with, so how could I expect value from a design if I don't give my time, energy, and funding towards my designer's efforts?

This is most easlily illustrated in the whole UH logo fiasco a couple years back. The university shopped out a bid to all these designers to come up with a bid for their contract. In the end, they awarded the contract to a Mainland company...purely on the fact that this Mainland company included a couple of designs with their proposal. This company "cheated" you could say, in an effort to land the contract.

$20,000 lighter in the pocketbook, the University had to cancel the project because of public outcry. The proposed logos were oddball....viewers didn't feel they properly represented UH, in fact, they weren't even in the ballpark. A classic example of a design company that didn't understand the target audience or didn't do their research, and a client that clearly did not understand the process of how to pick the right designer.

Anyway, it's nice to have this website now so that it's easier to direct potential clients who don't understand why they they need to pay for design work.

Plus I get to have my little business name listed there as a No!Spec friend. I feel like I've joined a freakish club.

Threadless

Here's a design related post (it's about time right?)...

I friend of mine reminded me of this site that I always thought was kind of cool called Threadless (http://www.threadless.com).

The idea is that people get to submit their own designs to them online. It's like an ongoing competition each week where the viewers themselves get to vote on which ones they like best. The winner each 7 days gets their design put on tshirts to be sold right there in Threadless' online store.

It's a great idea. First it inspires graphic artists to come up with some pretty cool illustrations, and it also lets the buyer have feel like they have shirts that are a very limited edition.

I must admit that I have a fetish for cool one-off type tshirts. I like them when they're a little big different...only often these things come from Hong Kong, Japan or New York so they're very expensive.

Check it out....

Old Fartey

OK. I think I'm officially "OLD". There are certain signs that I've detected. Let me explain.

I was watching TV the other night and I saw a band on tv called "The Academy Is". The song wasn't all that particularly spectacular...in fact I thought it rather sucked. The singer was like a young anorexic version of Steven Tyler.

And that's where it happened -- I said to myself, "They suck. They're not as good as the bands I used to like" GAAASP. When did that happen? When did I cross the line where popular music of the day has past me by and I've stopped appreciating the cool music of today? I'm officially the "old guy" who doesn't know what's cool anymore.

Seriously though.... if that song is the band's best song, they suck.

Another thing that tells me I'm old. I went to a music festival yesterday. It featured Jack Johnson, Ben Harper, Willy Nelson, among others. You might say, "Oh, see? You're still going to concerts...you're young!". Well, not when the last concert you went to before this one was the exact same festival the year before. CRYYYYY!

The show turned out ok. I think we were all must excited to see a performer called Ben Harper. The funny thing about Ben Harper is that he's relatively unknown when compared to Jack Johnson. Yet, he's been around for over 15 years...in fact, he kind of gave Jack Johnson his start because Jack's first shows were on Ben Harper's tours. Ben's songs are all pretty soulful and deep. It was great watching him sing...it was even better watching him sing some duets with Jack. There was a surprise appearance of Damien Marley so we got a little bit of dancehall reggae at the show...that was pretty exciting.

OK, last sign I'm getting old -- apparently the cool thing to do at the concert was to high-five the people around around you, get drunk and disorderly even before the show starts, and to yell "I LOVE JACK JOHNSON!" every 5 seconds as if somehow everyone in the concert must know that. What's with the high-fiving!?

Where's my walking cane?

Pulling my hair out

I can't believe how some people can handle some of this stress of running a business.

I've observed two different types of business people:

a) First you got the composed and organized people. They know their shit...they stay on top of their business plans, they keep on top of their bills and cash flow. Everything is planned and worked out.

b) And then you got those business owners that just completely wing it. I get the feeling they have no business plans at all....all they are concerned with is making the sales, and then being able to cover the bills when they come. These people just go completely by gut feeling.

I'm kind of stuck more towards the first category. But I sometimes get the feeling that a lot of what is making me stressed about business from day to day, are stuff that category B people could care less about. And yet they've stayed in business and operated fine. So am I doing some of this wrong?

Should I really be balancing my accounts every week or would it be less stressful to do it once a month? Should I worry about my taxes that I'd have to pay 4 months away? Being able to pay my social security contributions this year? Covering a vendor who's doing work for me 3 months from now?

I talked to one business owner, who happens to be my hairdresser. He told me once, "Look, you can worry yourself to death over things like cash flow and your income each month, but at some point you have to trust that it will come."

So is that the secret to managing business stress? Planning your business up to a certain degree, and then just letting the rest rely on just blind faith? Perhaps it is.

Stress is a big thing. I once was so stressed at work a few years back I ended up with Shingles. For those that don't know, Shingles is basically the Chicken Pox virus part deux. Apparently once you've had Chicken Pox, the virus stays in your central nervous system for the rest of your life but lies dormant. For the rest of your life, there is a chance that virus could wake up and say hello to you if you've either let your immune system rot, or it could be triggered by things like extreme stress. So then the virus comes back to life in the form of Shingles.

I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy. Shingles felt worse then getting a full-body tattoo. It was like getting a whole side of your body punctured by a million burning needles at once...and it stays like that for days. I had a tattoo done before and I can tell you.... the tattoo needle feels like a pillow of feathers compared to Shingles.

I DEFINITELY don't want to get that again. So I better learn to follow my own advice to "play hard". I think certain things work....the gym, my girl, joining up with friends, getting a dose of CuteOverload, and certainly bitching about life in this humble little blog of mine! Seems like I have quite a few invisible therapists out there reading these things. HI!!! *wave*

I AM SOFA KING WE TODD ED

Oh my god.... check out what the average wedding cost is back in 2004 (http://www.onewed.com/articles/wedding_article_4.html)

Are you kidding me? $20k-$24k? Holy smoley smell the granoley!

Yeah, I haven't "officially" popped the question yet but Florence has already begun the process of planning. Bless her heart I'm sure this is something that's really exciting to her...and it is to ME as well. But I'd be a fool not to be shocked at how much it could be if we're not careful.

Of course their calculation includes the Honeymoon so that's a large chunk. And then I figure I'd be doing all the invitations myself....heck I'm a graphic designer for goodness sake!

But some of the charges looks insane. $2500 for the photographer? Granted some photographers can really make the difference. But we're looking at what...4 hours of work for them, and they make $2500 in that time? All they do is point camera in your general direction and push a button how hard is that? Hahah. OK, here I am posting how I suck as a photographer a couple days ago and now I'm dissing them all. I just think for $2500 I should be seeing a lot better photography then the ones I see at some weddings.

$750 for a rehearsal dinner? That better be inside Willy Wonka's giant candy lawn because I don't see how it could be that much just to have a small wedding party stand around for a couple of hours to rehearse walking down an aisle. I figure if it's inside Willy Wonka's lawn somebody would be feeding me some candy berries, scooping me a huge cup of waterfall mixed chocolate, or Oompa Loompas would run around singing me songs to keep me entertained. "OOmpa Loompa doompity doo....we're gonna charge you lucky for you!"

Maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan...... I'm in trouble. But I guess it's worth it.
Today it's our anniversary marking the VERY first time we "met" each other online. Yeah, it sounds strange even when I say it to myself too.

Who would have thought? But come on...look at that smile. I'm a sucker for a pretty smile. I think I'm automatically going to lose any future arguments with her because I could be in the middle of proving my point (because I'm likely to be the one who's right all the time), and then she'd just flash that smile at me and I'd melt away into a tiny puddle.

I am definitely sofa king we todd ed aren't I?

Freaky Deeky

Tell me I'm not the only one a little freaked out by this image? I found this while working on some product photography for my client.

Look at it. First the nurse has this look on her face like she's about to eat the poor child. Either that or she's sharing a knowing look with the kid, "Aren't you so cuuuute......I just ate your mom.... poopy shmoopy!"

Then the dang baby's head is HUUUUGE! That's a little bigger then normal isn't it? YIKES. That sucker's head is a freakin' third of his body. He reminds me of that big-headed mouse on that old cartoon Animaniacs....Pinky and the Brain.

I took some indoor shots last night at a friend's party. I'm depressed. I suck at it. A good half of them were blurry. The sad part is that I know why too....

1. I hate standing up and calling attention to myself as a photographer. I hate it when people notice I'm taking a picture, I can't explain why. Perhaps because I like candid shots and as soon as people know you're taking their photo they either ham it up, hide, or freeze. I've heard from other photographers they used to feel the same way until they just got used to the feeling and ignored it.
2. I'm having trouble with low-light indoor photography. It's a little related to my first problem because in low light conditions my DSLR camera strobes a light to attain focus. It's a bit of an irritating effect for my subjects because it's flashing epileptic inducing lights in their eyes every few seconds as it tries to focus. I think the only way around this is for me to learn how to use ISO settings and/or manual focus so I can leave the flash OFF and still get my clear shots.
   
3. I don't have enough patience yet. A good photo involves careful and patient timing. Good focus, good composition. I realize I haven't the patience yet. Sometimes I would hit the shutter and then leave, only to hear my shutter finally release 2 seconds later because of a long exposure. GOD I hate that.
   

Sigh. I gotta practice. I'll have what little shots of the party up soon.

Birthdays

OK, so it's past one of my best friend's birthdays and I haven't found anything for him yet. Isn't that so sad?

Here I am wracking my brain wondering what to get him and I have no idea. He's usually one of the easiest ones to get for too....usually a comic book or a toy or something and he'd be happy. I'm the same way.

The problem is....I've been shelled up at home for the past 8 months, I have absolutely NO idea what's the IN thing now. I'm the same way even with my brother....what do I get him these days he can't already get all around him in San Fran?

I think.. hmmm.... video game? Nothing really exciting out. I mean, I'm not rich enough to get him an Xbox 360 or anything.

Best Buy gift card? Nah.... a gift card is another way of saying "I can't think of absolutely anything at all so here's this little gift card that's looks a little better then giving you cash....OH, and you can only use it at Best Buy. Knock yourself out!" I've given and recieved my share of gift cards....I'm trying my best to boycott them now. I admit I was about one foot out the door today to go get him a gift card.

I thought I had a brilliant idea to get him a family domain name like "bigdaddy.com" or something like that for his email addresses but everything I looked up was taken. These days you're lucky to get any kind of .COM address at all.

So....what to do? Yes....I suppose if I had been a responsible friend I would have seen this coming months in advance and kept my eyes open. But here's where I pull out my trump card and say "But I'm a single guy, we're not supposed to be responsible at these things" I give myself a pat on the back just for remembering the friend's birth months, let's not even talk about the right days.

/sigh. I think I'd rather look like the loser and not get him anything just because of desperation. If I get someone something, it's gotta be something I KNOW they will love.

They should make it a new rule as you get older....you no longer have to get something silly on your friend's birthdays, but anytime you see something during the year you KNOW they'll like you can just get it for them. Hmmm? Good rule? Hahah. I say it's good because it makes me look less like the punk.

Sigh. It will be so embarrassing to see him without anything........ Big D, if you're reading this. Sorry man, you'll just have to wait with a rain check till Raph get's his head out of his ass to find you something good. I'd give you a free gift pass to unlimited porn or something but I don't think your computer can handle the stress. hahaha.

Blaaaaah

A little under the weather today.

I have this weird sensation in my left ear. You know when it feels like you got a little liquid stuck in there or something? It's not like I went swimming or anything lately...God knows I'm not jumping into any contaminated storm water anytime soon, but yet it feels plugged up somehow.

It's irritating. I hope I'm not coming down with an ear infection. So far it's just a minor nuisance so I'm not too worried yet. Besides that my head feels a tiny big congested today.... so if this post makes no sense, blame the pills.

Are things moving along? I suppose so.... work has been hectic, phones have been ringing. Does that mean I'm getting paid? Hmm.... it comes and goes. Some days I can look at the bank roll and think things are great...the next day I'm paying tons of bills and taxes and so it goes POOF really fast. I can only take things one step at a time and hope that my planning and numbers are accurate.

I gotta start saving too. All signs point to the fact I'll be getting married next year so I'll have to have all kinds of money saved up for wedding expenses and marriage life. Whodathunk? I'm excited, but at the same time that's added pressure to do good work because not only have to help my business get past its infancy years, I'd have to consider helping to pay for wedding expenses not to mention a life with someone else soon.

It's quite nerve wracking when I think about it too much. I feel just a small breeze could teeter me over the edge into being a total nervous wreck. But this is what I asked for wasn't it? That I live each year to the fullest?

Well....it's certainly full lately.

After a meeting one day I walked into this designer furniture place they have here called "Island Living" or "Island Home" down here on Ward. Just curious if they had any desks. They had one desk in there that wasn't bad.

It was somewhat what I was looking for...a flat surface, a few tidy drawers under it. It was very solid. Felt like very heavy construction I don't know what kind of wood it was. Very minimalistic design, just the kind of thing I like.

It was $999 though. OUCH! Considering all the things I have to save up for soon, that's a little beyond what I'm comfortable spending for just a desk. Besides....it's just "OK". I'd prefer a desk that's maybe a bit longer and wider so I can spread things out more.

Still. It was a cool place.

Ugly people

Right around my lunch time each day my TiVo automatically catches this Food TV show for me called "Everyday Italian". It's hosted by this italian girl named Giada De Laurentis who's very pretty. A little like Natalie Portman.

I think she's really pretty. Apparently I'm a little late to the neighborhood, because I've heard she's been super popular for quite some time now. All of a sudden I see her in all kinds of commercials and books.

It's very obvious that the Food TV Network loves her looks...every shot of her is really close, sometimes they zoom right into her face. God knows they never did that with Emeril Lagasse. "BAM!"

But I must say it isn't all looks....she can really cook. Those recipes she makes looks so great.... here I am sitting at home eating my microwave bean burrito pretending I'm eating one of her "Brucetta with Gorgonzola cheese and honey". Somehow imagination isn't quite the same...that burrito still tastes like crap.

That combination is deadly....skills + looks. Pretty people who really have brains too can accomplish so much. There's nothing in their way. Just like my honey Florence....she's got the looks AND she's so smart, so I'm reduced to a slobbering baby every time I see her. She's saving people's lives every day and here I'm just worried the printer colored my last letterhead wrong?

/sigh. Ugly people like us can only depend on hard work to get by! How's that fair?

Pork Chop?

You know how sometimes you hear a song and you have no idea what they're singing...so you make up the words in your head?

I have the latest album from Sinead O'Conner where she did a whole album of reggae covers. Yeah, HER...the bald girl that made all that fuss years ago. Anyway, I've been a fan for years....this latest album is great because her voice is a perfect compliment to the laid back reggae tunes.

There's this one song called "Curly Locks", where I suppose she's talking to a guy in the song and saying like, "Curly Locks, now that I'm a dreadlocks....Your mama say you shouldn't be playing with me"

There's one line that I've been singing all this time and I thought it said, "Curly Locks, your father is a pork chop...and he don't want you dealing with me" Pork Chop?! I knew that couldn't have been it, but I sat there listening to it very closely and couldn't make out what it was. Come to find out she's saying "...your father is a poacher"

OOOOOOH. The mystery is solved! Perhaps having a father who's a pork chop can't be all that bad can it? You'll never go hungry.

I have a history of making up my own words. Mom will tell you I had this song in Kindergarten where I sang "B.I.B.L.G. a jo jo said for me... ". It wasn't until my brother later learned the same song and sang, "B.I.B.L.E, Jesus sang for me..." that we all learned what it really was.

HEY, we all have hidden talents....singing is just not one of mine ok?

Orisinal

Great site for some fun little online games. Very cute, very original (or is it "Orisinal"?) & very free: http://www.ferryhalim.com/orisinal/

These games reminds me of the games back in the 80's when graphics were so crappy that designers had to actually THINK of fun game ideas.

I like the presentation and the design of it all too. So I can play this and say it's all for "research".

I got issues

I've been a little mopey lately. Is that a real word, "mopey"? Well...you know what I mean don't you? As my friend Mona would put it, I'm "futless" again.

Why am I futless you ask? Well...I guess this whole incident with one of my good customers is affecting me more then I wanted it. Everyone likes my work but just the one boss doesn't so now we either have to change it or they go somewhere else.

Now no matter how much I steel myself against taking these situations too personally, I think as a designer if you're not SOMEwhat personally involved with the result of your work -- then you're not putting enough into it. These projects each take a bit of me.... so someone that might come along and say "That's ugly" is akin to someone walking up to your new baby and saying "EWWW!"

You know what they say about how it takes 2 positive remarks to make up for 1 negative one? I find that's very true. I could have compliments all day but it takes just 1 negative one to ruin my day. OH well. It comes with the territory.

The thing that rubs salt in the wound is that the boss likes work from another company that has crappy work. It would be one thing to have lost a job because they were aspiring to have someone better because then I can blame myself for not having done enough. But when you lose a job to someone who sucks? BAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH. Those bitches better be good! Ahhhhh, that feels better.

Anyway, on to happier subjects. Check this out....I gots me a shop! http://www.cafepress.com/lowestudio Cool huh? Go ahead! It's not fake.... I'm probably going to order a shirt for myself. Isn't that pathetic? I created the store so I could buy stuff for myself. Florence joked that one day I'll have my office full of Lowe Studio memorabilia everywhere we look. Like that one scene in Spaceballs.... "We have Spaceballs the Musical!"

I make like $1 off each shirt only. Not too bad...perhaps I'll sell like 4 or 5 shirts and earn a plate lunch. I debated making a Lowe Studio thong but I didn't want to scare away the kids.

BNI

So I joined BNI today. (http://www.bni.com)

I had built this into my marketing plan for the year, I downgraded my telephone book advertising just a little bit so that I could invest a little into this.

The concept of BNI is that you get a bunch of normal business people in a room each week and you basically talk to each other about your business. Over time, you get to know each other and your busineses so that you naturally start building relationships through word-of-mouth for each other.

It's like if someone asks you, "I need a graphic designer do you know anyone?" You'd naturally say, "OH! As a matter of fact I know a great designer in Lowe Studio let me have him call you!"
So they have these chapters across the country that is at least 15 members to each one. The nice thing is that each chapter will only allow one member from each industry. So you're never competing with another person for the same type of work. If you're a vacuum cleaner salesperson, there can't be another vacuum salesperson in the same chapter.

So that's kind of nice. Today I already picked up maybe 4 or 5 people that I might end up working with...either they need my design work or I might need their help. I met 2 photographers today in a couple of the new chapters.

The chapter I joined is trying to make 15 people so we can split off and form our little node. There's a photographer in our group, somebody from the dietary supplement business, a mortgage specialist, a guy from Sprint, etc so far. I know there's very little graphic designers in BNI so there's a lot of potential business for me. There's a LOT of realtors, insurance agents, & brokers in BNI so they're kind of hard up to find available chapters to join.

I keep my fingers crossed this will work out for me.

Why are there no asian superheroes?

MMMMmmm hmmm. Okie dokey.

Mom sent that to me today as a joke. A little scary but I definitely got a good laugh out of it. I can't place it but I think these are cartoon characters I've seen somewhere.... maybe it's some Pokeymon thing or something.

I'll tell you something....that takes guts to wear something like that.

I've been getting some rolling blackouts for my home office today. I'm a little afraid of working on my computer because at any second it might

Drowning

Well, I don't think we need to see another add to "conserve water" anytime soon here in Hawaii. We've endured 42 straight days of rain. It started well before Florence's visit back in February.

I heard a statistic it's never rained this much here in 100 years. I thought that was bullshit. Everyone must have short-term memory I thought. Anyone who's lived in Hawaii for a few years must remember those periods where it may rain here for 2 weeks straight....remember those muddy days back in Punahou Carnival? How many rubber slippers did you lose there in the mud? How many days did you walk into a University classroom drenched head to toe?

We had a few years of drought for sure. All of a sudden it seemed like it just didn't rain here in February anymore. All of a sudden we didn't get water at restaurants unless we asked for it and commercials urged our residents to water our plants at night and avoid washing our cars.

So when I first saw this rain, I thought everything is back to "normal". But yesterday as I was driving to the gym I think I finally believed the news reporters when they said this wasn't quite what we were prepared for. Here I am dodging new potholes deep enough to drown little dogs, my windshield wipers are going full speed yet I can barely get enough water off my windows to see 10 feet in front of me, and I hear thunder loud enough to shake my car and set off all the car alarms around me. That's freaky.

I'm ready for sunlight now damnit. This ain't Seattle....

The stories of what's going on around the island are a little unbelievable. Kahala Mall got flooded with about a foot of water. I was just there 2 days ago! For once I'm thankful I'm not living in a house.

http://www.khnl.com/Global/story.asp?S=4711580
http://www.thehawaiichannel.com/news/8409825/detail.html

I went to another ring-shopping adventure with my mother. I found out I DO have a limit on my shopping patience after all. Here's my mood chart while ring shopping:

Hour 1: Happy and excited. "Hey...this will be cool! I'll find something real special!"
Hour 2: Moderate. "OK, that's kind of nice. I'm a little hungry mom."
Hour 3: Tempermental. "That looks just like the last 100 rings we looked at. Where's Starbucks?"
Hour 4: Impatient. "............... They haven't vacuumed this floor in a while. "

I think mom was just getting warmed up.

Help me.