From Print to Web, Web to Video: A
SPEAKER: STANLEY COLOMA
Creative Journey
Digital Artists in this time and age has evolved into a
better equipped creative ninja, arming himself with multi-
disciplinary skills and knowledge in the creative arena to
become more versatile in a more challenging environment
in todays more competitive standards.
Knowing how to acquire these much coveted skills and
learning how to control and use it is part of the journey to
become a master of the creative universe.
This seminar will help to guide you in the right direction in
your journey to become a better creative professional by
providing insights and inspirations on the different types of
creative challenges.
WHO SHOULD ATTEND
This seminar is aimed at fledgelings on graphic design
and digital arts and those who want to seek inspiration
in their creative journey.
WHAT YOU SHOULD LEARN
• Nurturing your seed of creativity
• Finding your creative inspiration
• Discovering the tools that will help you jumpstart your
career as a digital artist
• Learn how to challenge your creativity
• Learn how to deal with the different types of projects
• Learn the best approach in cultivating and enhancing
your skills to become a master of the creative battle-
field.
This handout has been developed as a simple
guide/outline to help you understand the scope
of the seminar. Details has not been provided to
encourage everyone to listen better.
Feel free to ask the instructor for matters that you
don’t understand or needs more clarification. You
will be allowed to ask questions necessary to ex-
pand your skills on the subject. A space for notes
will be provided for each page of the handout for
you to record important details for the course.
TOOLS OF THE TRADE
Perseverance, professionalism, determination,
inspiration and a seed of creativity.
ABOUT THE INSTRUCTOR
Stanley Coloma is a multidisciplinary digital artist
and a technology evangelist who advocates the
use of new media and emerging technologies
to create engaging and dynamically driven user
experiences accross different digital mediums.
Stanley has gained more than 12 years of ex-
perience in digital arts and handled multifaceted
projects in print, interactive, broadcast and post
production. He is a health and technology advo-
cate. Stanley continues to pursue his quest for
learning and explores interactive possibilities on
the web and various media.
Stanley’s works can be seen on his interac-
tive playground www.subliminalinflux.com and
updates his activities on his personal blog www.
nasansistan.com
A Creative Journey by: Stanley Coloma 1
 INTRODUCTION
From Print to Web, Web to Video: A The workshop will cover a total of 3 hours and will
Creative Journey include the following lessons:

Seminar Outline

9:30-10:00am I. The journey begins

• Digital arts, the big picture
• The influence of technology on Digital Art.
• Facing the challenges ahead

10:00-am-10:30am II. Preparing for the

digital battlefield
• Finding your creative inspiration
• Choosing the right tools
• Exploring your opportunities
• Understanding your strengths and weaknesses

10:30am - 11:00am III. Dealing with

creative challenges
Notes
• Closing the deal
• Becoming a risktaker
• Pushing your creative limits
• Finding your creative stimulus
• Understanding your client and the project
• Educating your client

11:30am - 12:30nn IV. Enhancing and

mastering your skills
• Best practices for graphics / print
• Best practices for web / interactive media
• Best practices for video and motion graphics
• Becoming a versatile digital artist and how to re-
main competitive
• Important points to remember

A Creative Journey by: Stanley Coloma 2

From Print to Web, Web to Video: A I The Journey Begins
Creative Journey

• Digital Arts, the big picture:

Digital arts nowadays has greatly evolved from

a sigle media focus into a multidisciplinary mix
technlogy from print, video, web, and mobile.

Gone are the days of specialization on a single

discipline, now, in order to stay competitive you
have to equip yourself with a working knowledge
technologies for cross media.

(you can’t just be a video guy or a web guy, you

have to be a multimedia guy)

• The influence of technology in Digital Art

Technology advances at a phase that was never

imagined before. The death of PDA, Beepers,
VHS, has ushered a new era of convergent de-
vices which changed the way we think and the way
we live our lives.

Digital Art has to catch up with technology with the

introduction of new and more powerful applications
(e.g. Adobe CS 5.5) Computers has become more
powerful and affordable. Cameras has become
smaller yet more capable. We are living in an age
where all of us must be connected. Change is
inevitable

• Facing the challenges ahead

As a budding digital artists, most of the time, we

lose direction, we don’t know how or where to start.
The right tools to use, what technology to use and
practically finding our own identity. In order to keep
up with the rest of the world, we have to learn fast
and keep ourselves abreast of what’s happening
around us. We need to face new challenges and
conquer our fears.

How do i close a project? how do i charge my

projects? How do i manage the client? What is the
process? How do i benchmark myself? What type
of projects should i consider? How do i build my
portfolio? Where do i start? These are some of the
most important questions one must answer.

(e.g. applying for the right job, startup as a graphic

designer and move up)
A Creative Journey by: Stanley Coloma 3
 From Print to Web, Web to Video: A II Preparing for the digital battle-
Creative Journey field

• Finding your creative inspiration

Most well-known digital artists of our times come

from a different discipline. But they always have a
seed of creativity in them all along. Tap that inner
spark and begin to nurture it. Follow your passion
and look for a work that you love doing. Do not be
discouraged by problems but instead take them as
challenges which you need to overcome.

(I am a marketing graduate, but eventually became a

graphic artist - multimedia artist)

• Choosing the right tools

The best way to protect yourself from difficult chal-

lenges as a digital artist is to equip yourself with the
right tools. If you’re going to start as a graphic de-
signer, learn the basics of colors, layout, typography
and learn the applications that are being used by the
industry (e.g. Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator etc.)

• Exploring your opportunities

As a digital artist, a myriad of opportunities awaits

you. As long as you have the determination, the cre-
ativity, the skills and the proper attitude. Every aspect
of creative opportunity will be at your grasp.

You will be able to work in any creative disciplines

such as Logo and Branding Development, Print and
Publishing, Web Design and development, Interac-
tive media (CD’s and DVDs), Video editing and post
production, animation and motion graphics etc.

• Understanding your strength and weaknesses

To help you start at your best, you have to under-

stand and find your strengths and weaknesses. Are
you good in layout? Do you have an eye for color and
details? Are you good in illustration? Do you have
your signature style in your design?

Look at other artist’s work and see how you differ

from them. Find your style and nurture it. Be inspired
but do not copy. Learn from your mistakes and
respect others. Learn the art of humility. Sometimes
what we want is not what we always get. Be patient.
•

A Creative Journey by: Stanley Coloma 4

From Print to Web, Web to Video: A III Dealing with creative
Creative Journey challenges

• Closing the deal

The most critical part before you start a project is

how to close the deal with the client and when you
see the green light. Questions such as How do i set
the meeting? What should i ask first? How do i talk to
the client? How do i quote the project? are the usual
predicament of a budding artist.

These questions are critical on the very first phase of

your potential project.

• Becoming a risk taker

Most of the time, the only way for you to improve and
widen your horizon is to always take the risk. If you
are constantly thinking of your inability to handle the
project or fears of not being able to deliver, then you
are doomed.

Being a successful multimedia artist, involves some

risk to take up the challenge and explore other oppor-
tunies beyond your comfort zone.

(*ICTSI project)

• Pushing your creative limits

Taking the risk also means pushing your creative

boundaries. To shake your seat and get out of your
comfort zone. If you are a print artist, it’s about time
to learn more about web design, if you are a web-
designer, it’s about time to learn more about video
editing and motion graphics, If you are a video mo-
tion graphics artist, its about time to learn interactiv
media.

Being knowledgeable in multiple disciplines is your

best weapon to survive in an ever saturating creative
world. When you already know a bit of everything,
then comes your attittude and professionalism.
Sometimes, its better to be a mediocre artists that
delivers what he promises than an excellent artists
that can’t deliver on time or has an ego bigger than
his head. (* interactive CD projects)

• Finding your creative stimulus

Sometimes, during the course of your journey, you

lose interest, you become frustrated or depressed,

A Creative Journey by: Stanley Coloma 5

From Print to Web, Web to Video: A III Dealing with creative
Creative Journey challenges

you lose your drive to create and imagine. Design-

er’s block happens more than you can imagine.
Many designers suffer from this dillemma.

So how do you find your creative stimulus? Go out,

take sometime for yourself, play a game, watch a
movie, take a work in the park, browse the web,
learn a new hobby. Whatever floats your boat. Get
inspired again. Each creative stimulus will be dif-
ferent from individual to individual.

(* I dream about my designs, e.g. hyperionblu)

• Understanding and educating your client

Most of the time, the failure of one project lies on

miscommunication. Because we tend to misin-
terpret what the client wants, and how the client
visualizes the output. Most clients aren’t web/tech
savvy so you need to educate them as well. What
is a domain name? web host? FTP? why are there
limitation on the web? why CMYK? Why 72 dpi?

(*Fitness TV)

Sometimes when a client says “i want it to be

trendy yet sophisticated” these words are vague.
You need to know what these words mean to them.

(*The C2 life.com)

What is true to you may not be true to her. Listen

more and get to know them better. Talk more to the
client, visit his/her office, know her interest, look
at her desk, the colors that she likes, what items
do you see?, the clothes that she wears, her style.
From here you can get clues which you can echo
in your project.

(*La maison de toska web)

A Creative Journey by: Stanley Coloma 6

From Print to Web, Web to Video: A IV Enhancing and Mastering
Creative Journey your skills

• Best practices for web/print

Learn the basics and work your way up. For print
learn more how to layout properly, how to use proper
typography, how to use the correct colors and how
to place page elements. Knowing the standards like
CMYK, 300 dpi, Pantones, Color Separation etc. is
also very crucial.

Standard applications for print such as Adobe In-

Design, Photoshop, Illustrator, Quark Express are
important as well.

• Best practices for web/interactive media

In this discipline, you need to learn standards such as

RGB color space, 72 dpi, resolution and web dimen-
sions, Domain name, web hosts, FTP, standard file
types and technologies used.

Standard applications include Adobe Flash, Dream-

weaver, Flex Builder, Fireworks, Indesign, Photoshop
and Illustrator

• Best practices for video/motion graphics

Standards such NTSC/PAL, Video dimensions and

resolutions, Video formats, Video cameras, editing
techniques etc. should be learned first in this disci-
pline.

Standard applications include Adobe Premiere, Final

Cut Pro, Adobe After Effects, Adobe Encore, Adobe
Soundbooth, Motion, Shake etc.

• To become a well-rounded digital aritst you need to:

Equip yourself with the right skills

Nurture your creativity
Face your challenges and take the risk
Expand your horizons for learning
Keep yourself updated
Find your creative stimulus
Learn the art of humility
Learn the art of professionalism
Get out of your comfort zone/Push your creative
boundaries

• Your imagination is the only limit

A Creative Journey by: Stanley Coloma 7