Ok, so here’s the deal. I’ve decided to start getting back into my design work, including but not limited to web design, logo design etc. I’ve got a plan worked out, but the problem I’m having is… coming up with a name for, i guess you could say, the ‘business’. I’ve had a couple of ideas, but it’s hard to come up with something that is unique, interesting, available in domain registration and available for business name registration. It seems that everything I’ve come up with so far is taken in some aspect and sends me back to the drawing board. This is where you come into it…

I’m giving one lucky person the great opportunity to name my new business identity and if chosen, be the winner of a green iPod shuffle! Even if I don’t choose your idea directly, I may choose to follow the direction of your idea in which case you will still be awarded the prize! Here’s the scope: I want to be able to provide design products and services to everyone and anyone that needs it at reasonable prices, and I want to provide these products with the client’s products hopefully being carbon neutral. Hence the green.

Yes, computers, websites and the internet do use energy, directly and indirectly. Carbon offsetting these products means offsetting the the computers used to create the products as well as the servers that hold their websites to reduce their carbon footprint. Think about facebook, which is just such a huge website… Well somewhere in the world, there are servers (like big computers) that are turned on 24/7 to make sure people can access it. That is a lot of computers that never get turned off and use up a large amount of energy, not to mention the millions of people that access it everyday using their own computer.

UPDATE: In summary: All I’m looking for at the moment is a name. Something relevant to the scope of my brand, which is carbon offsets and reasonable prices. Hopefully this clarifies things a little further.

So that’s basically it. That’s my idea. But yep, can’t think of a name. That’s the only thing holding me back so far. So… do you think you’ve got what it takes? Think you can come up with a unique, interesting business name for me? If so, you can email me: rjcoutts (at) gmail (dot) com (replace the at and the dot of course) or you can leave your idea in the comments…

Thanks for reading! Hope you can come up with something new and fantastic!

Cheers.

An idea or concept may or may not be chosen, therefore a prize may or may not be awarded. Only a chosen idea or concept will be the recipient of said prize. Submitting ideas and or concepts transfers the rights of said idea or concept to the author of this post therefore ownership is obtained by the Author. Cheers.

As you can see from the picture and the witty title, I am getting back into the swing of things. This means I’ll be posting a lot more often with interesting (mostly) bits of information for you all. The first bit of information I’m going to release to you guys is basically the whole reason how I made it to this point. You see, for the past year, I’ve been avoiding this website like the plague, because I was afraid. Yep, scared of a website. Why? Because it was in such a mess and I didn’t know how I was going to fix it up. I made a couple of attempts in the past few months, but today, having nothing to do, decided to sit down and have a real go at it, and I did. I’m about to go into some Internet techno-babble here so be warned… For those of you that know Wordpress at all, you might know that it’s up to version 2.9.1 right about now… well, I was still on version 2.0.2 with only a manual upgrade possible. So yeah, I tried numerous times to export and import my database in Wordpress to a new one, but was constantly greeted by errors and confusion. So, I did probably what I should have done some time ago and searched the Wordpress forums! And Alas I found my solution!

Basically I wanted to export from an older Wordpress database to an upgraded fresh install Wordpress database. Sounds simple, and I didn’t think it was, but it turns out that it is. So what did I do? After my searching I was lead to the Wordpress-to-Wordpress Import Plugin from the guys over at Technosailor.com. At first I thought it too good to be true, but from seeing the comments of 3,000+ I decided to give it a crack. Lo and behold I was finally & safely able to export my precious precious posts, pages and comments. The next part I also wasn’t too sure about, but Wordpress has advanced so much that I was simply able to import everything with one click! So here I am, writing in a brand new user interface, installing themes and plug-ins like nobodies business and using little funky things like widgets!

WIDGETS ARE AWESOME!

Anyway, from here on out you can expect to find me posting more often, hopefully with some points that you might find interesting. I tried to use my previous custom theme but as it was built for the previous version is didn’t seem to want to work. So the theme you’re seeing at the moment is just a theme I picked from the ‘featured’ in the theme section of Wordpress. It’s the ‘Piano Black Theme’ created by mono-lab. It’s a pretty sexy theme and is compatible with widgets. I hope to be recreating my own theme in the near future and hope it to look as good if not better than this one!

A few other things on the horizon, I plan to re-start my freelance design work, including web design and such. If you’re looking for someone to build and/or maintain a website for you or your company, feel free to give me a shout and I’ll be happy to help you out. Not just websites too, logos, business cards, invitations, the works! Also keep an eye out for a couple of brand new web sites I’ll be starting that some people may find interesting.

Well, that’s about it for now I think. I will definitely be posting more and more so bookmark me and follow my RSS feed!

Thanks for reading!

Cheers.

I don’t know if you all experience it like I do, but when you stop declaring ‘fan mail’ as ‘fan mail’ and start declaring it as ’spam’ – that’s when you realise you’ve lost the passion. It’s no longer about the people but more so about the money and the fame, and it’s not what I wanted to become. So I’ve decided to make a comeback. I’ve stopped living the life of a star and have come back to my roots… And this is where it starts, my first blog in a year and a bit.

Now, after all this time of neglect and abandonment, are you, my people, the fans, even still out there? If I can just reach one of you perhaps that will be just enough for that one person to spread the word that I’m back. A wise-man once said “Post, and they will come.” – I don’t remember who it was but I’m sure he was old and wise. I imagine him in a robe of sorts, holding a staff, and he says it to me with a hand on my shoulder. He also has a long white beard, which I’m tempted to pull to see if it’s real… oh crap… it is…

So… people of the interwebs… I am back! Go, spread the word. May you enlighten people of possibly one of the best comebacks of all time. Me! And don’t worry, I am dedicated to bringing you more of what I used to bring you. Whatever that was. News? I dunno, whatever…

UPDATE: This post is no longer relevant. Don’t bother clickin on the links below! Cheers.

So at Tafe I am currently working on my Final Project, which is a Management Project where we can do pretty much anything we want (God I hate open briefs!). For my project I have chosen to create a “Choose your own adventure website” with a twist. With 2 twists actually…

The first twist is who writes the story… You! That’s right, you can write your own part in the story… This is where I need your help! Please go to the submissions page and submit your own part of the story! Feel free to submit as many stories as you wish, and just maybe your story will be chosen!

The second twist is… For each part or page that is chosen, I will create a piece of art that will represent the part or page of that story… If that makes sense… Well, that’s the plan anyway…

So please, go to the submissions page and help a fella out!
It would be greatly appreciated!

Cheers!

I’ve also been working on my main project for Tafe this semester… In which is such a broad option of a project it’s the hardest one so far. As in, I can do absolutely anything I want… this makes it quite difficult. I would much rather a theme to work upon or some guidelines to work off, that would be much easier. All I’ve come up with so far is an idea to work around the choose your own adventure books, but to make a website and/or DVD. For example, the website would have a written story, with media of different stories that depict the story, like on one page, a photo, on the next, a video. I would then also put the same story onto DVD but instead of a written story it would be a narrated story with sound effects and music as well.

So that’s my idea for how, but I have no idea on what sort of story I could make up. It’s kinda limited because I’d like to do a fantasy type story, but wanting to put video in it kind of makes it hard because I don’t have the resources that say, Peter Jackson had on Lord of the Rings. Anyways, if you happen to have any ideas I’m very willing to accept any sort of suggestions! I might even go as far to say I’m desperate! Seriously!

Anyways, for those who haven’t seen any work I’ve created to far, I’ve uploaded a couple of assignments onto youtube, here they are…

This one was a project where I had to include a number of elements which could include video, 3D, photography, text or vector graphics. So in this one i chose Video with some 3D space using after effects for the title, and yes, we had to use a voice over so that is my voice. So here it is…

This is another one I did earlier in the semester where again we had to include 3D and video. For this I created the scene in 3D using Cinema 4D and embedded my friend into the 3D space using rotoscoping. If I had more time this would be alot better, but it’s not bad for 3 weeks production work.

Well, I think that’s enough for today. Hopefully this post will tide you over for some time. I will post again soon I promise.

Cheers.

So now I’m happy to say that I’ve found a couple of decent songs I’m really getting into. After I had ‘obtained’ these songs I decided I’ve been missing out, so I’ve been going crazy getting lots of funky tunes thanks to Egor and projectw. If you don’t know what projectw is google it. I can’t be held liable to send you there! Don’t worry, it is safe for work.

So here are a couple of tunes that I’m really into at the moment. Not sure why, they’re just really funky and easy to groove along too. Managed to find the video clips so you can listen to the song and watch the clip too! Here you go…

Wait a Minute Feat Timbaland – Pussycat Dolls

Glamorous – Fergie

Hope you like them.

Some Albums that you should look into if you get the chance…

Ministry of Sound…
Euphoric Dance Breakdown
The Mash Up Mix 2007
Trance Nation 2005
Chillout Classics
Maximum Bass

So yeah, look into those too. As for what I’m up to these days, I’m just studying like crazy and working on my assignments. Once they’re finished I’ll upload them so you can take a look. I should have one ready for you all by Thursday, coz that’s when it’s due
Arghh! So busy!

Ah well, off to bed… see yaz!

So here I am safe and sound, after quite an adventerous weekend. Very adventerous! Actually, my Saturday was a pretty quiet Saturday, which was lucky because I don’t think I would have been able to handle two big days like Sunday! Let me explain why…

For my birthday my beloved Emma bought me a few hot laps around Calder Raceway in a V8 Supercar. We headed off at about 12pm to arrive there just before 1:30pm. Had a sausage and watched the cars go round the track for a bit. After a bite, I suited up and headed to the briefing room. The professionals introduced themselves and gave us instructions and what to expect on the track. We then headed over.

It was fantastic just to stand so close to these vicous machines, with the rumble of a mean V8 engine and the smell of burning rubber… it doesn’t get much better than that. Until of course, you’re allowed to drive one! This was crazy. It did take me a few laps to really get comfortable and put the foot down, but the whole drive was fantastic! Going hard around corners and 160-180km/h down the straight!

This is me…

The next bit was the hot laps with the professional driving and OH MY GOODNESS… After i had checked my pants for soilment, I had the ride of my life. So cliche but there’s no other way to put it! These guys truly are nuts, taking every corner as fast as physically possible and somehow pulling out still on the road. Going down straights at 180km/h plus, only to slam on the brakes with only 25-40 meters before the corner. Ridiculous! And the cars handle it so well, like, unbelievably well and it’s still a smooth ride all the way. It was just so much fun and I am forever grateful to my beloved for it. So Thank You Emma, and next time you will be the one driving!

As for after the race track, was a whole new adventure! Imagine driving down a major highway in a little daewoo lanos, being in the middle lane travelling approx. 100km/h, in gale force winds, when your bonnet (hood) un-hooks and flies up into your windscreen! This was probably the point where my heart was pumping the fastest for the whole day! I was very lucky to be able to pull over into the emergency lane without too much trouble, but the windscreen cracked and there was glass everywhere. We had to pull the bonnet back down and bend it into shape. We were then very lucky to find a rope on the side of the road to tie down the bonnet so we could travel very slowly back to my house. And we made it! But shit did that scare us!

All in all it was a very eventful weekend and I just had to share it with you all. I’ve put some photos up in the gallery for you to view so check them out. I will upload a photo of Emma’s car to show you the damage! It’s pretty crazy.

Well, that’s all I’ve got to say at the moment. But I would love to hear your comments on the photos and our wonderful experience!
Thanks for reading…

Yes that’s right, the wonderful Sara and Jelena have completed the WordPress plugin Ask Me. It has been long awaited by many, especially myself (sorry for bugging you heaps Sara ). But the wait is finally over and now we get to enjoy it to our hearts content!

So what is Ask Me? I hear you ask. Well Ask Me is a small little WordPress plugin that allows visitors of my site to ask me those questions they have just been busting to ask me. The questions that only I could know, whether I tell you the answer or not is a completely different story! If and when I do answer your question both question and answer will be posted on my Ask Me Page.

So now is your chance, head over to my very own Ask Me Page and ask me anything you’d like. Your question will be delivered to my inbox and answered as soon as possible! Only appropriate questions will be answered (sorry Doc), but if you’re desperate I’ll just email you the answer.

Hope to hear some interesting question from you soon!