Kyle Fiedler

Constraints Fuel Creativity

Kyle — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 14:56:47 +0000

The imposition of constraints can lead to great design decisions. Limitations often force you to view things from a perspective you are not accustomed to and, in turn, can stimulate the clarity and purpose of the design, rather than debilitate and hinder your creative process.
Joshua Brewer, Constraints Fuel Creativity

Fear means it’s worth it

Kyle — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 20:35:35 +0000

Even when you choose the thing that inspires you, the thing you believe in, work with colleagues you learn from, do good work, there’s going to be a level of fear involved. People will have opinions and negative reactions. But that fear means it’s worth it.Liz Danzico , Confidence for good

Keeping Curious

Kyle — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 17:00:02 +0000

Keeping Curious

As kids, we are inherently curious beings; we ask a lot of questions.

Almost all of them are directed at our parents, who know everything about everything and are never wrong. The questions range from being slightly impressive to being slightly annoying. Everything from what is the meaning of life to just “why.” Kids ask the same questions over again and ask questions that they already know the answers to, somehow either momentarily forgetting the answer or trying to test the vast knowledge of their parents. Kids yearn to grow and learn without a care for the shame it might bring.

Parents get bored, tired, or annoyed at the questions. They berate kids with things like “stop asking so many questions” or “curiosity killed the cat.” Parents end up killing this hunger for knowledge mostly because they don’t have the patience to deal with the barrage of questions.

Then this sad thing happens; we stop asking questions. Questions become embarrassing to ask and you feel judged to ask them. Then we become satisfied with the knowledge that we have, thinking its enough for the course we have set. After all it takes a certain amount of energy and courage to continue to ask questions. When that happens you lose the life in you; you give up.

“I am neither especially clever nor especially gifted. I am only very, very curious.” Albert Einstein

Hopefully that isn’t happening as much as I think it is. Hopefully we are still learning and maintaining a state of curiosity. Hopefully we just know where we can find the answers to the questions we are asking. Ask questions and don’t be afraid of the answers.

Keep hungry and keep curious.

Colophon: Titles set in the Gnuolane by Typodermic and implemented by Typekit. Special thanks to The Wombats for providing the sound track for design.

When things go perfectly

Kyle — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 20:56:48 +0000

When things go perfectly, sometimes it’s hard to tell if it’s because your design was perfect or because your design didn’t matter.Jason Fried, Insight: When things go perfectly…

The spelling of “ove”

Kyle — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 20:27:19 +0000

The spelling of “ove”

I am horrible with words. Horrible. I have been since I can remember.

One of my worst and most embarrassing memories comes in the form of a second grade spelling quiz. The fact that I can still remember this might make it one of the reasons that I have such a fear and distaste for writing. We’ll leave that for my therapist. (Please note: I don’t actually have a therapist, yet.)

Anyway, there I was spelling away. I was doing great until one seemingly easy word. “Of” my teacher said. I sat there mulling over the word, something I had probably skipped over the night before thinking it would be all to easy.

I sounded it out like all good second graders will do and still nothing. It looked as if my teacher was about to move on to the next word so I quickly scratched down “ove.” Yes “ove.” To this very day I’m not really sure what was going through my mind. That was the only word I got wrong on the test. The ONLY one.

Maybe this was the life scarring action that scared me away from this writing thing. Who knows? What I do know is my struggles inevitably continued. I’ve found out from my mom that I just barely passed a New York State writing exam in eighth grade. In high school I was not much better. I coasted through my English classes the best I could. By the end of high school I had decided that I was just not meant for this type of communicating. I was to rely on my art talent and somehow communicate visually. In college I did just that, avoiding my greatest weakness. (Side note: for some unknown reason I got a solid A in College Writing. I’m still not sure what happened.)

Writing more better

I’ve since realized that life is not like high school and college. I won’t be able to do the things that I want to do without knowing how to communicate in the English language.

The idea behind starting this blog in the very first place was to try to write more often and thus get better at writing. Lets face it, there might be some improvement overall but its not close to where I would like it to be. I still make embarrassing mistakes on posts and frequently have to go back and fix errors.

Not any more. No more excuses. I’m going to tackle the problem head on.

On a similar note: If you have any books, blogs, or other material that could help me in my valiant quest it would be much appreciated.

Also: I told myself that I would never ever design a post that didn’t have a web safe or otherwise easily readable font. I guess rules are meant to be broken. The x-height for FF Duper Web Pro made it OK as body text and the large size for the design helps too. Apologies to any of those that had a hard time reading or think this was a bad choice.

Colophon: Post set in the loverly FF Duper Web Pro by FontFont and implemented by Typekit. Special thanks to Tokyo Police Club for providing the sound track for design.

Fear of bad ideas

Kyle — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 15:39:25 +0000

The problem is that you can’t have good ideas unless you’re willing to generate a lot of bad ones.Seth Godin, Fear of bad ideas

Hey speedy, slow yourself down: A cautionary tale of mystery, intrigue and stupidity.

Kyle — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 18:38:44 +0000

Hey speedy,
slow yourself down:

A cautionary tale of mystery, intrigue and stupidity.

I’ve been designing in turbo mode for too long. Yes turbo mode.

You see in college they seemed to forget to tell me that in the real world you need to track your time on projects. What’s worse is they didn’t tell me that this is the basis for how I would get paid.

In a natural progression, I sped up my work flow to accommodate for low budgets and high return. I got faster and faster and faster. I got rewarded for this speed so I went even faster and it has caught up to me.

The vast past of fast excuses (say that 5 times fast)

I can sit here and say that this all stems from the client but that would be letting myself off way too easy. I have had the tendency to not say no since I started freelancing. Accepting all time lines, all budgets, and all projects. This inevitably lead to several damaging problems.

I became overwhelmed and I didn’t even know it.

I had too many projects and not enough time in the day to do them. Because of all of the projects that I had going on at once, none of them got my full attention. I was lacking focus that I needed.

The timing was all wrong.

Through out all of this, I had to learn how to time myself while designing which is not a very easy task. I was able to figure out an easy way but it wasn’t right for me. The system I had in place made me feel paranoid, rushed and a bit queasy. It only enhanced the need to rush though the design process.

Harmful effects

I foolishly dug myself a deeper and deeper hole. I was harming my designs, my growth and my frail design ego. The designs that I was producing lacked any kind of quality. The time for fine details that can take a design to the next level had vanished in favor of speed. Several silly mistakes, especially spelling errors which I am predisposed to make, kept slipping out in production.

I was doing work for people that wanted a fast and cheap solution rather than a higher quality solution. They didn’t really value the design I was doing. The projects that I was getting wasn’t anything I could put in my portfolio and they weren’t the type of projects I wanted to be doing.

Righting the ship

During this soul crushing process, I believed everything was alright. The light finally turned on and I saw what was happening and let me tell you it was not fun getting hit with a ton of bricks.

I needed to set a new pace. I need to balance the quality with the quantity. I need to say NO to projects, time lines and budgets. I need to pay attention to the details and prevent stupid mistakes.

In the last few months, I have been able to create a better balance. I have peeled back the amount of work I am doing at one time. I have, at the very least, doubled the amount of time I would give for an estimate. The projects that I have been working on are more interesting and more enjoyable. I feel like I am producing better quality work for clients that value what I do.

Of course its not all honkey-dorey. I know what I was doing wrong, I know where I would like to be and what I want to work on. I still have more head way to make but its a good start.

Colophon:

Titles set in the loverly Deva Ideal by DizajnDesign and implemented by Typekit. Special thanks to Radiohead for providing the sound track for design.

Disclaimer:

Parts of the story could be embellished for dramatic effect.

Too Late…

Kyle — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 18:51:01 +0000

The problem is no longer budget. The problem is no longer access to tools. The problem is the will to get good at it.Seth Godin, Is it too late to catch up?

Good things come to those who wait.

Kyle — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 04:38:24 +0000

Good things come to those who wait.

Waiting, it seems, is one of the hardest things for us humans to do. It probably has something to do with our natural instincts. I’ve found several accounts proving that designers and developers of web stuff tend to be even more impatient. I’m sure it stems from being in a constant flux of new information, new technology, and most important new gadgets. Our patience runs thin quite quick. Need I bring up IE? The waiting never seems as bad at the end as it did during the waiting.

Well I’m asking for a bit of patience this month from you. I didn’t plan very well and got caught up in a few other projects and neglected the blog. If you’re patient enough to wait till next month I plan on posting a few articles and I hope to balance my time a little bit better.

This apology is as much for you (any readers I might have) as it is for me. There is a reason I set monthly deadlines for the blog. So if you hold up for a few more days you will (hopefully) be rewarded.

Yes, I am that damn cheap: Why I’m not getting Typekit just yet

Kyle — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 17:43:18 +0000

Update: When I take a stand, I take a stand; I got Typekit just a few weeks later.

First let me start of with saying that I think Typekit and services are much needed in the web world. I truly appreciate what they are doing to improve the landscape of type for the web. I believe that it is because of Typekit that we are seeing a push for WOFF and .webfont formatting that will revolutionize typography on the web. I am sure that there are plenty of great uses for this service and the other services that are coming out like it.

Since I got my invite relatively early, I’ve had a fair amount of time to play around with the free account that they provide. I even used one of the fonts in one of my posts. Overall the experience was great. Typekit was easy to use and implement.

There were only a few annoyances with the process. First you need to enter your stacks into their web site to be deployed on their style sheet. Which means that there is one more step in the way of changing the design. I’m pretty sure there is a way to override this but it wasn’t very obvious. Second, the delivery relies on Javascript. Poo on you if you don’t have Javascript turned on. I wasn’t too worried about either.

I was very close from getting off my cheep ass and finally laying down the $50 for the year so that all future blog posts could be decorated with a unique font. In all my glee and anticipated typographic glory, I paused and thought about it. A couple of question piled up in my mind. When the year was up would I be forced into a monthly payment plan that they have set up? If I decided to stop the service or if the service halts what will happen to my designs? Will I need to go back to every one of my blog posts and replace the font or write a new stack? The doubt set in.

In the end I don’t think it really works well for me and this blog at this time. For now I am holding off and saving my $50 for a rainy day or maybe even a new typeface. I wish that the pricing structure was more permanent. Much like buying a typeface, you would pay one fee upfront to use that typeface on whatever your heat desires. I understand that the current pricing scheme is probably brought on by a combination of profitability and the agreement they have with the foundries. Maybe in the not so distant future I can put this cost on a client project or somehow make money on off blog to get close to the monthly bill. Until then I will gladly look on as some great designers create beautiful sites with the new library Typekit is offering them.