Activity

how many LA’s did you hire this year?

Worldwide, though primarily in the Great Lakes region.  And being a small niche firm is key.
 
Essentially all of the projects listed above came online in the last two years, ie not backlog from before 2008.

Good to know. I don’t need any more spam.   Thanks!

I signed up for elance.com and they spam me constantly now. I’ve never gotten a job through them. You have to take a little exam to ‘qualify’ yourself for work. I tried the photoshop exam and it was actually pretty tough and I’d consider myself an advanced user.

@Christina, I’ve toured green roofs. That was the first thing I thought of when I read Ryan’s post. The MNU Landscape Arboretum has recently completed a large geothermal project which involves routing the pipes through the main parking lot. http://www.arboretum.umn.edu/geothermalheatingandcooling.aspx
 
There is a lot of interest in geothermal s…[Read more]

I have done 2D and 3D design on the side for years now.  I really fell into it while helping a co-worker with some photoshop questions.  It then turned into brochure design for her friend, then some odd photography, and 3-D modeling jobs.  It is slow business, but I have never actively pursued any jobs before.  While I don’t pretend to be a gra…[Read more]

I agree entirely.
 
Contrary to popular belief, graphic design as a profession is more complicated than knowing how to open photoshop. Although, there are a lot of basic tasks that LA’s and architects may be capable of that fall under the umbrella of graphic design.

Yeah, I guess chances are I wouldn’t find anything since the market is so saturated, but it’s worth a shot…if I have enough time that is.

We’ve happy with Freshbooks for the past 2 years. http://www.freshbooks.com/ 
 

Knowing Photoshop does not a graphic designer make. I toyed with freelance GD for a while several years ago, and after spending time with real graphic designers (on forums and in person) that is the conclusion I came to. I started doing all the marketing graphics for the firm I work for, which lead me to believe that I could also offer those…[Read more]

Ah, finally!  Where have you been? haha.
 
I’ll just have to play it by ear I guess.

Excellent points Tanya, and the same holds true for DOMESTIC headhunters as well, although there isn’t much of that going on.

Here’s some advice from a fellow Canuck. Given that it is Toronto and it is a more expensive city to live in I would not hesitate to ask for the high 40’s…if not $50K. The Canadian economy has not suffered as much as the American economy and it sounds like the firm is in a healthy state. Also keep in mind, that once you make a offer with a c…[Read more]

This from my good friend who works for an international recruiting company….
1. don’t ever pay – the corporation pays the recruiting fee
2. don’t ever give anyone your personal information like drivers license, ssn – resumes only
3. recruiters normally only screen and pass on your resume to the hiring company and the company contacts you from t…[Read more]

I just finished a little contract for art for a cad software company. Igot the job through my blog which I haven’t updated in over a year.

I’d say there are definitely opportunities out there but I might go as far to say that graphic design is as or more saturated than LA. Architects are of course all over that too because as we all know they can…[Read more]

I agree.  Private forces largely drive development, and it tends to be the same old same old suburban style that gets implemented.  In my opinion, it’s only because of “new” municipal policies asking for some mixed use, or slightly smaller lot sizes to accommodate slightly more density, that even a bare minimum of choice and diversity has been i…[Read more]

Deltek Vision is no fun.

ps, my own hometown was the unincorporated city of McLean Virginia..Now there’s a good example of the stranglehold of planning concepts on development! NOT!.

Jason, Wytold is harping on his talking point, “public-private” NOT market based only. Market based only  to me would mean exclusively private, right? That is NOT what Wytolds tired ‘idea’ is all about.. He’s  been saying that for a while, public-private, public private, and to that I say, yawn, so what else is new? 
to the prefurbia concept of pr…[Read more]

I think many of you are reading too much into this. His point was that the current “trends” do not work into everyones desired lifestyles, and there should be choice.
The ‘God” he is referring to are the architects and planners who advocate one type of development….theirs. The Prefurbia model is a MARKET based ALTERNATIVE program for the design…[Read more]