Social Networking Craziness

I have spent the day here at the MasterWerks office figuring out, or at least attempting to figure out, how this whole social networking thing goes. What I've learned.....? It's complicated stuff. It all can tie together and work as this amazing machine of communication iiiiiiffff you can figure it out and do it right.

Now, as I've already mentioned in this entry, I have yet to enter the smart phone, iphone, app world. I had a choice last month when I purchased our new phones to get the data plan or not, and I chose not to. Internet at the office and at home on the laptop is enough. Needless to say, as far as social networking goes, I do facebook and thats it. This blog is merely a creative extension of that activity in that I've managed to click a share button a few times.

I say all this to say, I volunteered to be in charge of social networking with the company and a world of communication opportunities are at my fingertips now that I never put effort into exploring before now. I've managed today to make the company blog (please follow us! I'm the only follower so far, so I'm basically following my own updates, haha), set up our Twitter acct and managed to link it to the facebook page so it will update both simultaneously, AND put links on facebook and the blog to our Vimeo and You Tube channels.

SO - If you'd like to be connected with everything MasterWerks, essentially, I'll point you towards our blog because that is the hub for all communication. I'm pretty proud of myself for connecting the dots today. I did a lot of google "how do I?" searches. Ha!

Taking a break from being at the computer to . . . be at the computer.

Does anyone else's life revolve around a computer screen? If you're reading this blog, then I'm sure yours does to an extent, and just due to the world we live in, your life at least revolves around an iPhone, Android, or some other smart phone and the glorious apps that they provide. I have yet to enter in to the app world, or any other world that requires the purchase of a data plan, but when I'm at the office, I spend countless hours in front of a screen (editing pictures these days, editing film projects others, and researching everything else in between). My eyes hurt so I'll take a break, or its lunchtime so I'll take a break, and my break consists of eating while checking my email or facebook or blog or...or...or....

In a way its a break because I'm not focussing my eyes on one thing for a long amount of time, instead I'm scrolling or whatnot, and I guess that's a break? My eyes know that I'm kidding myself, but there's a difference, even if its a psychological one. Break time means mindless computer time, work time means creative computer time that's a little more intense. Either way, I'm pretty glad that I don't have internet at home, because then my eyes wouldn't get a bit of rest.

And yet, last night, I was talking with my best friend about the endless possibilities that I can enjoy when I transfer over into the data plan world. Whenever I can afford to do that, you can be sure that unless I set up strict rules for myself when I'm at home, there goes the treat that my eyes get to have at the end of the day.

With that said - I am really enjoying editing my sister's engagement photos. With two different photo/filming sessions we were able to get some great shots of her and her fiancee and interviewed them as well for the "love story" film we'll be doing for them. I'll post some later today or tomorrow once I get the okay from her.

Today's Poll:

People say you should take a 5-10 minute break from the computer every 2 hours. Do you?

Customization. . . the HTML Blues

I have spent the past three days immersing myself in HTML and websites and Photoshop and Photobucket and tons of other sites I haven't ever been to just trying to make a blog to my liking. Three days later....I'm pretty satisfied and I have eye strain, BUT I've done almost everything that I had set out to accomplish. I changed my template to something cuter, added a signature, added more gadgets, added titles for my gadgets, set a new font for the date/post titles and most importantly, designed my own header (which was the most fun I had in the whole process).

After a few days, I'm glad the customization process is over. There's creativity and then there's eye-crossing code for days and I'm not sure if I'll ever learn how to use it to my creative benefit without a step-by-step instructional - which has been my only proven method so far, and even with that I managed to screw up. I give a round of applause to those who can actually look at the rolling pages of code and make sense of it all on the spot.

My favorite part of it was designing my header. I've always loved tooling around in Photoshop and making something that truly reflects myself and my individual creativity. I barely used Photoshop at all to make the header because I happened across a website called Scrapblog that was super fun to use and create with. You are able to import your own images, and with them and the provided images, create an assortment of items: calendars, books, albums, cards, etc. that you can order. You can also create an online scrapbook that you can invite friends and family to. Another way you can use it is create one page and export it as a jpg like I did. Then you can leave it as is, or take it into Photoshop and add some more flare to it. It was a great tool, in that it gives you lots of backgrounds and TONS of stickers to use, all for free. You can pay for some really cool decorative stickers and backgrounds, but why when you can just get it for free?

With that said, my blog should be looking the same for quite some time. I don't think I'm down for anymore html craziness for a while. I set out to make something I'd enjoy looking at and I accomplished that. I hope you enjoy it too. =)

Here's a link for Scrapblog....Check it out!