Blog Action Day: The Environment

johnny — Mon, 15 Oct 2007 16:13:17 +0000

Since writing about Blog Action Day last month, I’ve tried hard to think about something useful and meaningful to write about The Environment. The issue is so big, so important, and so far-reaching, that I found myself stalling on the enormity of attempting to address it in a mere blog entry. Eventually, I came around to the simple fact that I can’t address it all, but that we can all contribute in a small way to thinking and acting in a more sustainable, low-impact way. The beauty of Blog Action Day is the recognition of this fact – that our greatest asset is our ability to communicate and collaborate in order to promote a better environmental ethic (at time of writing, 15,861 blogs participating!).

So, rather than a rant about the issue, I’ve decided to restrict myself to a list of the things I feel I’m doing right for the environment in my everyday business, and those that I need to improve upon. The latter are combined with a commitment on my part to actively pursue those improvements. Since this blog is dedicated primarily to my business, I will focus on those activities to do with Creative Creature.

The things I’m doing right

I work from home, eliminating the need to commute.
I turn off my monitors and speakers when I’m going to be away from my desk for more than a couple of minutes, helping to conserve energy. I also unplug my computer overnight (though I do leave it sleeping).
I bike to all meetings, reducing the noise and pollution caused by car traffic. Thanks to the climate in Hamilton, I can do this throughout the year (though it gets chilly sometimes!).
I use recycled paper for all printing, and use both sides of the page most of the time. I also recycle all fine paper waste that my activities generate.
I donate 1% of my sales to environmental organizations through 1% For The Planet.

The things I can improve on

I leave my routers, hubs, and telephones plugged in and running when I leave the house for days at a time, consuming unnecessary energy.
I have not converted to CFL bulbs in my home. I have doubts about the Mercury in the bulbs, but this is debatable based on the method used for generating electricity in your area (ie. the method of energy production (coal plants) may produce more Mercury to power an incandescent bulb than a CFL would use in production and use combined). The energy mixture in Hamilton is primarily hydroelectric (Niagara Falls) and nuclear, so I’m still not sure about this.
I use a wide variety of electronics loaded with plastics and heavy metals, every one of them manufactured under loose environmental guidelines in Asia and shipped overseas. The seemingly low environmental impact of the web industry (“It’s all digital! It’s all so perfect and clean!”) hides a lot of toxic waste. Not sure what my options are for this right now.
I’m sure there are many more. Any suggestions?

Save Our Forests!

Finally, as a little goody for those interested in making the small changes, I’ve put together a little “No Junk Mail” 2.5″ x 3.5″ badge that you can download, print out, and put on your mailbox. I printed mine on sticker paper, but regular (recycled!) paper and some tape would work as well. If you’d like, you can download the artwork in Illustrator format and rework to your needs (maybe a skinny mailbox door?). Enjoy! I’d love to hear if you use it.

Download Formats

This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Public Domain License.

Baseball Card Templates

johnny — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 14:54:33 +0000

After a recent Saturday afternoon baseball game with friends, I took a bit of time to create baseball cards for everyone using an Illustrator template I built and some photos from the game. They turned out really well and people got a kick out of them, so I thought I would share the templates here for anyone to use.

Steps

Download the template you would like in your preferred format:
Adobe Illustrator CS (baseball_card_template.ai) [494kb]
Adobe Photoshop CS (baseball_card_template.psd) [454kb]
Select a photo you would like to turn into a baseball card using your favourite photo management software.
Crop that image to a 2.5:3.5 aspect ratio and save it. This fits the 2.5″ x 3.5″ format of the baseball card.
If using Illustrator, Place the photo in the template by selecting File > Place… and selecting the photo.
If using Photoshop, select the Paste Photo Here layer and paste your photo.
Resize your photo as necessary, making sure to maintain the aspect ratio.
Clean up extraneous elements in your file (extra starbursts and text, credits, etc.).
If using Illustrator, Export your card by selecting File > Export…. Select your desired file format (.jpg, .png) and file location and press Export.
If using Photoshop, save your card by selecting File > Save As…. Select your desired file format (.jpg, .png) and file location and press Save.
Email your cards around to your friends/teammates, or take them to the print shop!

If you end up using the template, let me know! I’d love to see what people do with it. You can see lots of examples of the template in action at my Baseball Flickr Set.