Every once in a while, a company comes along that just gets it. They don't just entice you with a flashy website--they actually deliver a quality product at a competitive price, and enhance the customer experience with outstanding support. Recently, I discovered a company called Inkd, which fits that exact description. I was looking for some last-minute graphic design work for a flyer, and Inkd gave me some of the most personalized care I've ever received from an online merchant.

Inkd provides original graphic design templates for flyers, brochures, business cards, and much more. Due to a last-minute change in the scope of a project, one of my clients needed a two-sided flyer designed as soon as possible. Not to worry, Inkd had me covered. They took on the project and turned it around in no time, thanks to super-designer Chelsea and her team. A proof was ready for me in a few hours. Brilliant!

Their site is remarkably easy to use: browse the available templates, pick a great design for your flyer/business card/brochure/etc., and tweak it as necessary (if at all) to make it your own. The whole experience was easy, and whenever I had questions, Chelsea and the Inkd staff where there for me.

Inkd makes it easier for the producers and consumers of design work to connect. Even if you regularly work with a graphic designer, it's possible that they may not accept last-minute projects. Inkd took on my project at a good price and allowed me to finish other work simultaneously. Added bonus? Inkd doesn't use cheesy templates that make you think about dot matrix printers and Betamax machines--all of their designs are fresh, modern, and look 100% custom.

As a business owner, it's a relief to know there are companies like Inkd out there. Their personalized and efficient service has made me a fan!

The benefits of using Inkd:

- Stylish templates for a wide array of projects

- Designs that reflect a more modern aesthetic

- Excellent, personalized customer care

- Quick turnaround

- Fair pricing

Many of you have been asking when the song "Chain Reaction" (from the Grasshopper video I produced) will be available via multiple music sites. Well, some good news: it's finally available for purchase on iTunes (in addition to Amazon and other sites).

Carly Comando created this incredible track, and she was really a pleasure to work with--enthusiastic, poised, and responsive. She composed "Chain Reaction" based on the script I wrote and my sometimes annoyingly specific feedback about the sound I needed for the video. She ended up producing one of the most evocative tracks I've ever heard. It really completes the "Entrepreneurs Can Change the World" video.

Grab the track on iTunes today!

Good news! You can finally buy "Chain Reaction," the song Carly Comando created for the Grasshopper video. It's now available for purchase on Amazon and should be up on iTunes soon, too. Carly created the track just for the Grasshopper video using only the script I wrote for inspiration. She is an amazingly talented musician. If you watched a basketball game at all in the last year, you probably heard Carly's song "Everyday" playing in the "NBA, Where Amazing Happens" commercials.

iTunes should have "Chain Reaction" available for purchase on or before June 30th. I'll keep everyone posted on the progress but if you catch it on iTunes before I do, please just post a comment to let me know. Shout out to the wonderful site TuneCore, which made getting the song out there super easy and straight-forward! Thanks, TuneCore!

I posted this on Twitter earlier, but had to share here on my blog, too. Richard Darrell (@minervity on Twitter) has a great post on Bit Rebels with awesome videos that provide some insight into the process of designing a website from scratch. I posted one of the videos below. Thanks, Richard!

I don't normally write blog posts about work I've done for specific companies, but I've permission from the wonderful folks at Grasshopper (formerly GotVMail) to write about what they've done because I find it so inspiring.

On Monday, the company that was GotVMail launched a pretty bold campaign to re-brand themselves as Grasshopper. Change isn't always easy, but when there's a great idea behind it, it's a lot easier to galvanize support. That's the case with Grasshopper. While the company has always been a champion of entrepreneurs, the re-branding is all about inspiring entrepreneurs to change the world, and taking innovation to a whole new level. And we could all use some inspiration right now.

I was fortunate to be involved in several aspects of the re-branding but I'm really proud of one piece of work in particular: the company's inspirational video, "A Single Brilliant Idea." Producing and writing the video was amazing because I got to work with two incredibly talented individuals during production, one being Carly Comando, who created the original score. Carly is best known for writing the score for the Noah Kalina "Everyday" viral video and for music she's provided for the NBA's "Where Amazing Happens" campaign. Ben White was the motion designer on the project. I feel so grateful to have found Ben, because he understood what I was going for with the video, and he brought a lot of passion to the project. I feel fortunate to have collaborated with these two creative people.

UPDATE: Many people have been asking for the name of the track Carly created for the Grasshopper video. It's called "Chain Reaction" and it will be available for purchase on iTunes at the end of June or early July.

Without further ado, I'd like to share the video with you:

Growing up just a few minutes outside of New York City, I spent a lot of time venturing into the urban playground just across the Hudson River. Over the years, I navigated between the East and West sides, uptown and downtown, and in college, discovered which diners stayed open late enough to serve French fries at 4 AM. Whenever someone visited and went to "the city" with me, I was the unofficial tour guide of the group, trying to explain the lay of the land to wide-eyed travelers.

Over the years, I became a fan of sketching simple pocket visual aids to help inform visitors about the neighborhoods that comprised the borough of Manhattan (geek alert). They certainly weren't detailed maps--those would've been too overwhelming and were, of course, ubiquitous--but they helped visitors understand the geography of the city at a glance. They were perfect for getting "lost in the city" without really doing so. It made visiting much more manageable.

As a lover of maps, you can imagine my delight when I found Here & There: A Horizonless Projection. They're offering a limited run of gigantic (three feet by two feet), high resolution projections of Manhattan. If you're a geek who enjoys a good map, or if you just want to get a visual sense of Manhattan, this is a truly wonderful thing.

I'm guessing you've got to clear your calendar for a few days after writing all over your entire body (or maybe not, who knows?), but this is still a pretty cool video that I found through Twitter (@lisahickey and @iamkhayyam). Since it involves writing and also features one of my favorite songs by Fatboy Slim, "Right Here, Right Now," I thought I'd share.

Those of you who follow me on Twitter know that last weekend I went to check out Shepard Fairey's "Supply and Demand" exhibit at the Institute for Contemporary Art in Boston, which opened on February 6th and runs through August 16th, 2009. Fairey's show was really interesting not only because I'd seen "Andre the Giant Has a Posse" and "Obey" graphics stenciled onto lampposts around the New York City area growing up, but because his work really makes you think about what we call "art," and why. His work also raises questions about the process of making art, and how to give credit to the people/work/movements that inspire you (although in the case of Fairey, the issue might be whether or not to give credit at all).

Fairey uses everything from newspaper clippings to stylized graphics to other people's work(!) to address potentially incendiary subjects like war, violence, and consumer culture. He's been creating street art for more than twenty years, but resurfaced again in the media recently for creating the Obama Hope image seen on t-shirts, posters, and even on Spike Lee. According to Fairey, in the video below, his work is based on the concept of "cross-pollination." While Fairey describes this as "getting people to think about things from a perspective that they hadn't before," I think it would be best defined as the idea that what you produce is informed by other cultural movements--social, artistic, or otherwise--as well as other people's ideas, and perspectives.

However, sometimes the fruits of cross-pollination can get you in trouble, which is what happened to Fairey last week, when the Associated Press threatened to sue him because the Obama Hope image he created is based on a photograph taken by an AP photographer. However, just yesterday, it was announced that Fairey will actually be beating the AP to the punch, and suing them first. What's happening with Fairey and the AP gives credence to the artist's detractors. It also bolsters claims from those who say that while Fairey draws liberally from other artists, he doesn't like it when they draw on his work. Case in point? When Austin graphic designer Baxter Orr borrowed from Fairey's work, he received a strange expression of gratitude: a cease and desist letter from a Fairey representative. So much for cross-pollination!

All in all, Fairey's exhibit was really thought-provoking. It made me think about the kind of art he creates, and about his beliefs and actions as an artist. But it left me with more questions than answers. While I'm still so curious why someone who believes in cross-pollination reacts so negatively to artists pursuing that very same goal, I know the show succeeded in some way by making me question everything.