http://www.mightybytes.com/ee/index.php en tim@mightybytes.com Copyright 2008 2008-12-30T21:37:39-06:00 http://www.mightybytes.com/news/blogging_cms_class http://www.mightybytes.com/news/blogging_cms_class Tim Frick and Whit Nelson's class on blogs and content management systems (CMS) will make its inaugural run at Ascend Training on January 8-9, 2009. The two-day class will cover a variety of blog and CMS-related topics, including software options, RSS feeds, case studies, social media, custom templates, and so on. Hands-on exercises built to help you learn the ins and outs of setting up, configuring and customizing your own blog or content management system will round out the two day curriculum. Day one focuses on blogs and blog software while day two is reserved for CMS. For more information or to register for the class, check out the outline and class description on the Ascend Training site. News 2008-12-30T20:37:39-06:00 http://www.mightybytes.com/news/terrible_spaceship_on_npr http://www.mightybytes.com/news/terrible_spaceship_on_npr Terrible Spaceship's second show at Martyrs on November 14th was a full-house affair. The band shared their unique audiovisual assault of samples, beats, animation, video and musicianship to an engaged audience with all the success one would expect from a lineup of seasoned performers. WBEZ, Chicago's NPR affiliate, ran a five minute segment on Terrible Spaceship the day before the show. You can listen to the five minute segment on Terrible Spaceship, here. News 2008-11-24T16:57:22-06:00 http://www.mightybytes.com/news/new_portfolio http://www.mightybytes.com/news/new_portfolio We just made a significant update to our online portfolio. The new Work Page 3.0 sports a spiffier interface, increased usability, and best of all, is search engine-friendly. We say so long to the prison cell that the Flash Player held our content captive in. And hello to the sleeker, slimmer and dare I say sexier JavaScript and jQuery-powered version. More features, such as fullscreen and tell-a-friend capabilities are just on the horizon. Also, check the Mightyblog in upcoming days for a full update from Whit Nelson on how he built the thing. News 2008-10-31T19:28:02-06:00 http://www.mightybytes.com/news/create_chaos_08 http://www.mightybytes.com/news/create_chaos_08 Create Chaos combines the best of ten individual conferences--The Creative Suite Conference, The Pixel Conference, The Vector Conference, The Web Design Conference, ASMP Fall Photo Summit, Motion Graphics Festival (MGFest), Create Chaos Job Fair, Printing, Paper and Packaging Design Conference, STASH Theatre, and the Create Awards Gallery--into one action-packed week at a single price. Whether you're into building websites, creating animated characters, designing cereal boxes, or if you just want figure out a better way to run and market your business, there is something for nearly everyone in today's creative fields here. The 2008 show was held at the world's largest Marriott and featured speakers and delegates from all over the world. Tim Frick gave presentations on content management systems and video workflows for the web as part of The Web Design Conference. You can check out PDFs of each presentation here: Download: Understanding CMS (7 MB) Download: Video Workflows for the Web (6 MB) News 2008-10-16T09:24:12-06:00 http://www.mightybytes.com/news/digital_marketing_panel http://www.mightybytes.com/news/digital_marketing_panel Tim Frick moderated the digital marketing panel at The Association of Educational Publishers' Midwest seminar on Wednesday, October 22, 2008. The seminar was held at the Pearson Scott Foresman offices in Glenview, Illinois. The panel, titled 30 Tips in 60 Minutes, focused on best practice strategies for enhancing your online business presence. Tim discussed blogging, social media and other techniques Mightybytes has employed to increase site traffic, search engine results and business revenue. The panel featured Patrick Riley, Director of Education for Rand McNally, Beau Clark, VP of Product Management for Follett Digital Resources, and Gladys Rosa-Mendoza, Information Architect at Rosa & Wesley, Inc. Full details on the entire seminar can be found on the AEP site. News 2008-09-23T18:06:42-06:00 http://www.mightybytes.com/news/agda_08 http://www.mightybytes.com/news/agda_08 Thirteen is apparently a lucky number after all. That's how many awards Mightybytes has won for our work over the past year, including two recent 2008 American Graphic Design Awards from Graphic Design USA magazine. The recognition came for our work on fine art photographer Barbara Kipper's site and the site we created for the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs (DCA) Theater. For the fourth year in a row, awards were chosen from a pool of over 10,000 entries, so we consider ourselves very fortunate. The American Graphic Design Awards have recognized outstanding work across all media: print and collateral, advertising and sales promotion, corporate identity and logos, internet and interactive design, packaging and p-o-p, broadcast and motion graphics for over four decades. News 2008-09-10T22:40:17-06:00 http://www.mightybytes.com/news/terrible_tunes http://www.mightybytes.com/news/terrible_tunes Travis Chandler's band Terrible Spaceship recently brought their self-described synthetic ambient horror pop to Martyrs' Restaurant and Pub with great success. Mightybytes project manager James Johnston is also in the band, along with Bumpus members Zack Marks, Andy Rosenstein and Brent Puls. Tim Frick provided live-triggered retro sci-fi visuals and Whit Nelson ran camera. Stay tuned for videos from the show posted to our site and on YouTube soon. News 2008-09-04T11:28:12-06:00 http://www.mightybytes.com/news/back_to_school_season1 http://www.mightybytes.com/news/back_to_school_season1 Autumn is just around the corner and for some that means back-to-school season. So in the spirit of education, we have several classes and conference presentations lined up for this Fall to share some of the things we learn from project to project at Mightybytes. Tim Frick and Whit Nelson's two-day Blogging and CMS Made Easy class will run at Ascend Training on October 2nd and 3rd. Based on recent seminars given at Ascend and the Chicago Area Adobe User Group, this two-day class will cover the basics of blogs and content management systems, how they work, why you should use them, what your options are, and the basics of how to set up and configure them. The class will consist of a blend of lecture and hands-on 'how to' lessons on installing, configuring and working with blogs and content management systems. Registration details and a complete course outline are available on the Ascend site. Tim will present at two sessions during Mogo Media's upcoming Web Design and Development Conference in October at The Orlando World Resort. The first session, Understanding the Power of Content Management Systems, will cover the workflow process of using and configuring a content management system (CMS) for your site as well as outline various CMS solutions available. The second, Tips for Getting Your Videos on the Web, will focus on video workflows from acquisition to distribution and cover simple and cost-effective tips for creating online video content that stands out. Session details are as follows: Session #1: Tips for Getting Your Videos on the Web Wednesday, October 15, 2008; 10:30 a.m. The explosion of online video has taken the Web by storm, but the simplicity of posting a file to YouTube has made professional, high-quality online video the exception rather than the rule. In this age of sophisticated users who can sniff out bad design and usability from miles away, you need video that enhances rather than detracts from the online experiences you create. This session will focus on video workflows from acquisition to distribution with a concentration on simple and cost-effective tips you can employ to make your video stand out. Included topics will range from demystifying the alphabet soup of video formats to production, editing and compression techniques that will keep your video on par with the professionals. Distribution tools like TubeMogul, which can help you distribute and track video clips across multiple social networks, will also be discussed. Session #2: Understanding the power of Content Management Systems Thursday, October 16, 2008; 9:00 a.m. If you're not using some sort of content management system (CMS) on your website you are missing out on a very powerful tool that can not only simplify the process of site updates but give you control over extended functions such as forms, e-commerce, forums, blogs, and so on. Learn the ins and outs of working with various CMS options available, compare blogging systems vs. CMS, and demystify the workflow process of configuring a CMS for your own site. This session will help you decide which CMS option may be right for you and get you started on the path of managing your own online content. Mogo Media's Web Design and Developer Conference brings the entire workflow together -- from design and prototyping through development and testing. Whether you're targeting the desktop, web browsers, or mobile devices, you need to deliver your solutions quickly and efficiently. With sessions covering applications like Flash, Dreamweaver, Fireworks and Photoshop, and strategies on the use of CSS, AJAX, XML, and AIR, the WDDC brings the world of design and development together. For more information or to register for the conference, check out the registration page on Mogo Media's site. News 2008-08-05T11:55:00-06:00 http://www.mightybytes.com/news/modular_expansion http://www.mightybytes.com/news/modular_expansion There's been a whole lot of remodeling going on at Mightybytes' humble home in cyberspace as of late. In May we converted the site's content management system to Expression Engine and every month since then we have been cleaning up code, optimizing graphics, enhancing the design, and adding more functionality. We added a new animation demo reel and even converted the e-newsletter signup form to work with our Emma account. The first Mbulletin e-newsletter will be sent out in August '08, so if you haven't signed up yet, please consider doing so. It will be chock full of helpful tips and tricks for increasing traffic to your site, video workflows, industry news, design resources, and so on. In addition to all the maintenance enhancements, we have added a number of recent projects to the portfolio and threw a company blog into the mix as well. Yeah, we know the blog is a little, well, sparse in places, but give us time. We hope it will be a great space to share ideas and tips/tricks we pick up on the job. The portfolio additions include a variety of projects completed for Rand McNally, Medela, The Chicago Cultural Center and Kindermusik International, as well as several others. A whole new portfolio layout is just around the corner. News 2008-07-31T18:52:00-06:00 http://www.mightybytes.com/news/creative_shake_awards http://www.mightybytes.com/news/creative_shake_awards Rack 'em up! Just on the heels of our recent Communicator Awards and McDougal Littell's Codie Award for a long-term interactive animation project we worked on, Mightybytes also recently won three PCom Creative Awards from the fifth annual awards show of the same name. According to the congratulatory email we received, "The PCom Creative Awards Show is an international awards competition that recognizes outstanding work in the communications field. Entries are judged by industry professionals who look for companies and individuals whose talent exceeds a high standard of excellence and whose work serves as a benchmark for the industry." All three of the awards were in the Web Design category. We received a bronze award for the The Neo-Futurists theater company site at neofuturists.org, which is the third award we have won for this site. We also picked up Merit awards for Barbara Kipper's site at blkipper.com and our own company site. Looks like we're going to need a bigger mantle. News 2008-06-17T23:00:01-06:00