I decided it might be fun to give them a little cosmetic TLC (they still sound great) and thought filming the process might be interesting. Using our adhesive vinyl product, which is stocked in 12×18″ sheets and on a 60″ roll, I set out to print custom artwork that would be adhered to the drum shells to give them an entirely different look.

As you will see in the embedded video I leveraged the tools here at Date-Line Digital Printing to complete the whole update. I drew a custom design into Illustrator, printed the design on adhesive vinyl, stripped all the hardware off the drum shells, trimmed and applied the giant stickers onto the drums, and put it all back together.

It was time consuming (every minute of video is about an hour of real time) but I love the way they turned out. They still sound great too!

Thankfully Melissa came across the documents and immediately set out to find the person who left them. The phone book (yes, those still exist) was no help so she decided to try Facebook. Armed with practically every detail about the customer she was able to sift through the multiple entries for this person’s name and find their cell number which was listed publicly.

One phone call later and the person had their incredibly important legal documents back in hand.

See, we really do solve problems!

But there’s a problem: it’s not enough.

It’s not that it isn’t enough money, it’s that there is so much more to do.

So I recently met with James Menaker, the Executive Director at Joel’s Place, to identify ways we could participate in a deeper way. In the course of our conversation I came to realize that the needs of Joel’s Place are so broad, almost anyone can contribute in some way.

Joel’s Place, for those of you who don’t know, is a mashup of an indoor skate park, concert venue, and a clubhouse. A warm and safe haven for the youth of our community, especially during those long winter months, Joel’s Place is there so kids can hang out, skate, play video games, eat, play music, create art, laugh, cry, and more. Young people need an outlet for their energy and they need people who will care about them. Joel’s place provides both.

As you’ll read below, Joel’s Place needs your money. But they also need your talents and your time. They can use your help if you are able to spend time with kids, help with homework, cook meals, teach kids about music, teach kids about art, be an adult presence at concerts, help with maintenance projects around the facility, or just simply advocate for them to your network.

So allow me to advocate for them. During the month of September Joel’s Place has a goal of raising $4,000 from at least 50 donors via a partnership with the Global Giving platform. If they are able to rally this support they will be able to continue to participate on Global Giving’s platform to pursue their ultimate goal of $30,000 to provide much needed staffing.

As of this writing they need at least 30 more donors to donate $2,880 by September 30th. You can donate as little as $10 and make a difference for the youth of our community. It’s $10 you won’t likely miss, and it can help change the life of a youth in our community for the better.

And it’s so easy to do. You can CLICK HERE to donate any amount (perhaps a recurring monthly donation) via the web, OR you can simply text GIVE 10805 to 80088 right this minute to donate $10. It’s okay, I’ll wait. 30-seconds is all it takes to make a difference.

Oh, and if you really want to help, share this post with your network. Here’s the link to cut and paste: http://datelinedigitalprinting.com/us/joelsplace/. Share it on Twitter, Facebook, Google+ (people use that, right?)… Helping to spread the word makes a difference.

Of course the folks from Joel’s Place can tell their story much better than I can, so watch this 3-minute video and consider how you can help.

While we can’t say we’ve supported the folks who organize the Equinox for 50 years, we are proud to have been working minor miracles for them for more years than I can remember.

Each year the race starts early on Saturday morning, the finish line remains open until 6:00PM, and there is an awards banquet at 7:00PM at which results books are made available.

Wait, what? The finish line closes at 6:00 and there are results books at the 7:00 banquet?

That’s where we come in. For many years we have fired up the shop during off-hours, taken race result information provided to us just after 6:00PM and produced 50-100 result books for the racers in the span of about 1 hour. It’s a courtesy we happily extend because we believe in going the extra mile for our customers. We are here to solve problems.

Travis used to come in around 5:30 to get the machines ready for action, but then he started running the race a few years ago. He’s fast, but that would be asking a lot so we make sure someone else is in the shop ready to start printing results books as fast as our machines will allow. Which is pretty fast.

It looks like our friends who organize the Equinox have had a record number of registrations this year and we hope the race is another huge success. It truly is a part of the fabric of Fairbanks and we are so fortunate to get to participate.

Good luck, marathoners!

PS: Travis is running the 2012 Equinox as the second of 3 marathons he is running in the span of 8 weeks. Next up is the Chicago Marathon in October. Foolishness…

I just realized that I haven’t left the Mandalay Bay Resort since I arrived yesterday afternoon. Somehow I haven’t been outside in almost 30 hours.

This morning, after running in the gym, I attended two back to back sessions with Joe McNally about using Speedlights (external flashes) in creative ways to light subjects. It was a tremendous pair of sessions as lighting has been my biggest stumbling block when it comes to capturing portraits of the staff for our business cards and other promotional pieces. I learned a ton and look forward to picking up a couple of simple light modifiers at Alaska Camera to put some new techniques to the test.

In the afternoon the expo floor was open and a million vendors were shilling their wares. I even stopped by the Xerox booth who had the cutest little machines on display. My favorite find was this GIANT Wacom tablet pictured to the right. It was ridiculous. Shawna wants me to bring one back. It was all pretty overwhelming so I’m sure I’ll go back tomorrow to take it all in again and check out some of the demos that are scheduled.

This evening I was able to listen to Jeremy Cowart, a photographer/artist, speak about having vision and being original. The gist of his message was that too many photographers look at what everyone else is doing and try to emulate it. Which makes them look like everyone else, which makes them boring. Photographers (and marketers, and printers…) need to set themselves apart by being their unique selves. It was a great reminder to spend less time trying to be safe and boring.

By the way, Cowart is a sort of personal hero because of his heart for people. I had a chance to speak with him for a couple of minutes after the talk and found him, even after having flown all night from Haiti to get to the conference, kind and gracious. Just as I imagined.

Tomorrow is another big day. I plan on going to more sessions, checking out the expo floor again, and maybe even going outside. Ruth’s Chris is just up the strip…

Holm Town Nursery sells bedding plants and gardening needs in the spring and summer, and houseplants, hydroponics, and gift
items year-round. Plus, they have a restaurant on site (Petunia’s Bistro) offering fresh, homemade lunches and baked goods as well as a full espresso bar.

When she came to us she knew what she wanted the piece to communicate, but needed help creating the design that would bring it all together. We took the copy she had written, and some photos she wanted incorporated, and drafted an initial proof that communicated clearly that Holm Town is open year-round. After just a few quick revisions, she had finished artwork that was ready to print.

She shared with us why she needed some help putting the piece together: “Frankly, I just don’t have the skills. I was overwhelmed by the possibilities and didn’t know where to start. It was much easier to have someone else create something and then once I saw it, I was able to make a few changes until it included everything we wanted.”

The 4×9″ two-sided artwork was arranged 4-out (with bleeds) on a 12×18″ sheet of card stock and then cut precisely to her specifications. The finished pieces were beautiful and designed to attract attention to Holm Town Nursery’s year-round services.

Shannon told us that working with us to create these cards was the “quickest and easiest” way to tap into a market they hadn’t been reaching. She was wonderful to work with and we hope the rack cards she had us create do wonders for business.

We’re not sure what’s wrong with him, but we are all very proud of him anyway.

Good job, Travis!

And when they book a band or performer to come to Fairbanks and play, they need tickets. We are honored that for years they have trusted us with producing these tickets.

CREATING THE TICKETS
With a new show on the horizon our friends at the Blue Loon create their own ticket artwork and send it to us online. We then add sequential numbers to the top and bottom of the tickets and print them multi-up on 12×18″ sheets of card stock.

After the printing is complete we run the sheets of tickets through our perforator to create a ticket “stub” on one end that they can use when taking tickets at the door.

Once each sheet has been perforated we cut them to size and shrink wrap them in sets of 100 so that they are easy to manage and account for.

MAKING THEM FAST
Blue Loon owner Adam Wool usually needs to get the tickets we make for him on sale quickly. Because of this it’s important that the tickets we make are not only beautiful, but also available in short order. Having worked closely with him for such a long period of time has enabled us to develop a process by which we can create high-quality tickets, sometimes as many as 3,000, on incredibly tight deadlines.

In fact, Adam had this to say about us: “Date-Line makes concert production so much easier by making high-quality, numbered tickets whenever I need them, which is usually the very next day. Date-Line is so great to work with and they make my job all that much easier. One less thing to worry about.”

WE CAN DO THE SAME FOR YOU
Our years of work with The Blue Loon mean that we have a rock-solid system in place for producing tickets for anyone. You get the benefit of our expertise which allows us to design and create tickets quickly, but with extraordinary quality. The Blue Loon chooses to create their own artwork, but we can easily create beautiful custom ticket artwork.

Call us today at (907) 479-3831 to find out how we can help you create tickets for your next event.

Oh, and here’s little video we made about a recent project for The Blue Loon:

For more on The Blue Loon: http://www.theblueloon.com

We’ve known Lucas since 2009 and have done a variety of projects for him through the years including limited edition prints, postcards, business cards, and other promotional pieces. When he’s famous we’ll fondly remember that we had the honor of printing his first show cards.

Lucas was preparing to attend Comic-Con in sunny San Diego and needed to take some mini portfolios with him to present to the many publishers he would intersect with at the show. We knew these pieces would be important for Lucas and we took a lot of care to ensure they represented his work well.

It sounds like they did. Lucas shared this with us when he returned: “I received so many compliments on just how well put together the portfolios were. I had people asking where they could get their own books made.”

We think the relationship between an artist and the company they trust to reproduce their artwork is pretty important. Lucas agrees. “Honestly, having a local printer has really been a big help! The fact that I can just go right down the road and drop my projects off and pick up the finished pieces within a few days is awesome. I never had to worry about where my project was in its progress because Date-Line let me know at every step.

It sounds like Lucas had some great conversations with publishers while at Comic-Con and enjoyed the experience immensely. Lucas certainly produces amazing work and we are really thrilled to get to work with him. He is a special talent and we fully expect him to have an amazing career.

You can find out more about Lucas Elliott on his web site (www.lucaselliottart.com), or by checking out the following links:

The Art of Lucas Elliott on Facebook
Lucas Elliott on Twitter
Lucas Elliott on Etsy

Recently a customer (someone who had just watched our video about making magnets) came in with a really unique project. Something we’d never done before, and couldn’t have managed before we upgraded our equipment last fall.

The customer was creating favors for a bridal shower and needed business card sized magnets, stickers that would be wrapped around chocolates, stickers to replace chap stick labels, and a return address rubber stamp. Aside from the magnets and the stamp we had never created anything quite like this project, but we love leveraging our equipment to do new and unique things.

We quickly set out to get the artwork arranged, carefully measuring each item to ensure the printed pieces wrapped perfectly, and coordinated proofs with the customer via e-mail. Once approved we began printing, cutting, and magnetizing the individual components. In all, the order was completed in less than 24-hours.

The customer was kind enough to share a finished bag of favors for us to photograph and share here.

As you can see in the pictures below the finished favors turned out beautifully and we had so much fun helping to make them possible.

A custom sticker wrapped around chocolates.

Custom save the date magnets.