Blog - Creative Virtual Office

Here’s a great list of FREE Photo and Clipart resources

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No need to keep searching for free clipart or free photos!

Here’s a nifty list with many various resources and websites that provide free clipart and photos for your blog posts.

Note that I mentioned “for your blog posts”. Not all clipart or photos are free for anything you want. After all, the artists and photographers deserve to make a living too, especially if you’ll be making money off of their work!

When visiting these sites, you’ll see, in addition to advertisements, other images offered in response to your search inquiry. Usually, the images that have a watermark on them, are images that you’ll need to pay a license fee for. The images that are free of watermarks can be used for blog posts.

Be sure to read the requirements on each of these sites because some allow you to use their images carte blanche while others may request that you sign up for their newsletter, or pay a fee for any image that you’ll be using for print or marketing purposes, or other endeavors outside of blog posts.

What you need to know is that when you pay a fee to use images – whether artwork or photographs, you aren’t actually buying the image outright. You are licensing the image for a particular use.

Or this informative article regarding copyrights on clipart, written by Bobbie Peachey, Clip Art Expert on About.com.

Can't find the clipart you need? If you can’t find what you are looking for, then you can always contact me personally and for a small fee for clipart, or a licensing fee for custom illustrations, I’ll create just what you need!

Cartoons, clipart, and illustrations are used for not just blog posts, but marketing material, presentations, branding, book pages, book covers, websites, products, trade show booths – you name it, an illustration, cartoon or clipart may be just what you need.

Contracting for Customized Artwork

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Often a customer has a specific need or character in mind. Choosing existing clipart or cartoons sometimes doesn’t work for a new project, and so they call me to consult with them regarding creating a new piece of artwork or cartoon.

As a Professional Creative Life Coach, I’m use to working with entrepreneurs and other creative individuals who have a vision or an idea in mind, but are overwhelmed with how to get from A to B. They may have one idea, but instinctively know that there’s more to their idea than what they can see. When they hire me as a coach, not only do they get a discount for their custom artwork, they access ideas, strategies and resources that make their project all that more possible.

Not only do I provide creative services, I also network with a wide range of other service providers and artists who are excellent and are great team members. Not every artistic style meets every need. My joy is in helping you move forward with your project and dream, as an artist, a coach, or both.

If you don’t mind the image being resold, then you save money. If you want artwork that will be original to your product and own all rights, then your investment will be higher. Copyright and licensing is negotiable when you have a win/win outcome in mind.

Contact me now!

More Than Meets the Eye …

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A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words ...

Not every illustration and cartoon has to be funny. Sometimes the message is so difficult that just a touch of humor (or sugar) makes the medicine go down easier.

Perhaps your message is complicated and you’ve noticed your audience stumbling over a particular point or subject matter. Perhaps an illustration is needed to help those attendees visualize the concept more clearly.

If your message is important enough for you to devote your time and energy to delivering it, then you will want to pay attention to the high number of individuals who are visual learners.

Visual learners comprehend and remember information that they see – not necessarily hear. While they are listening, they are searching for visual clues to comprehend and understand what they are learning. Body gestures, facial expressions, physical examples and demonstrations of what you are communicating will help aid your visual learning audience. Utilizing charts, illustrations, flowcharts, cartoons and illustrations enhance and make clear your message and information.

What Exactly Does Work for Hire Mean?

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The conversation that revolves around work for hire is one that I repeatedly have with my clients. I do not do work for hire work at my normal prices. Why? There is no need to, since I give generous licensing rights to my clients to reproduce the work I create for them, for the purposes that they set up with me from the beginning. However, if you are serious about wanting work for hire, please read the articles contained in the links below, and be prepared to pay a much higher price.

Many people think that work for hire simply means what it appears to say on the surface, which is, “I hired you to do my work, therefore, I own it.”

In a nutshell, the legal definition does NOT mean that – fully. It means that the client is considered the author and creator of the work and can do whatever they want to do – stripping me, the artist of all rights.

In order to keep my prices reasonable and to stay in business, I keep all copyrights of the work I create. Various resources that address this issue are as follows:

DEFINITION

US Copyright Office
Wikipedia
Works Made for Hire under the 1976 Copyright Act

TO THE DESIGNER

Stop Work For Hire
Graphic Artists Guild
Jim Keefe

If you’d like to know more about legal terms surrounding artwork and graphic work, here’s a direct link to the Graphic Artist’s Guild for their CONTRACT GLOSSARY.

Celebrating Creativity, Ideas, Inspiration and Momentum!

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July 4th is the perfect weekend to start celebrating creativity by connecting with other creative people. What defines a creative person? A creative person is not just a visual artist, a musician, or a writer or actor. Creativity resides in every industry and in every nook and cranny you can think of.

Did you know that one of the worse things you can say to a creative person is, “Just stick to one thing”?

Nothing shuts down the creative flow faster than being limited as to what can flow creatively – and when.

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If you have a challenge in business, or in life that needs a creative solution – join us to brainstorm the answers!

Start off your holiday weekend with a bang! Light the fuse on your creativity …

How To Create Your Product Empire on a Shoe String Budget

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Take your message, your quotes, or the characters in your book and put them in a product that your visitors will love to buy!

Multiply your intellectual property into a line of products that reinforce your brand.

3 Ideas for creating products:

Online Retailers:

Zazzle is an online service that provides a plethora of products and opportunities for you to implement into your own business online and offline.

The service is free. The biggest condition that you must have is the legal permission or copyright to reproduce the artwork onto their products. You simply go to their site, create an account and upload your artwork to create products. They make the product and ship to the customer when it is purchased (whether it is for you to resell or use for advertising or someone who wants to buy for themselves.) The money earned is split between you and them.

Here’s what it might look like for you. You’ve written a book and are writing blog posts that support your book. The topic is fascinating and a following is created. In your writing you bring out interesting concepts or facts. These concepts, facts, characters, etc. become the image that you put on merchandise. With a service like this, you can do that, without worrying about the manufacturing or distribution of the merchandise. It can be sold directly from your website. Besides selling products, you are building your brand by word of mouth.

Digital Products:

Amazon has a service called CreateSpace that allows you to upload your manuscript for sale as a Kindle product or for print-on-demand. However, understand that your manuscript should be written, edited and ready for publishing before you upload it!

Anything that can be printed in a document can become a digital product as a PDF or as an ebook. Your manuscript, which we’ve mentioned above, could be sold by you from your website. Know that if you sell as a PDF, then it can easily be passed along – but don’t despair! If passed along, your product becomes a viral marketing tool. Make sure that the footer of each page contains your name, your website URL or a URL that goes directly back to your products. You want an identifier on each page with an action step.

Coloring pages, and workbooks, are a couple of other ideas that you can print as PDFs in order to make a digital product.

Collaborations:

Do you write? Do you know someone else who writes or has a story? How about someone who illustrates? Perhaps you are an expert and don’t write, but have information that you know would be something that people would pay to know? Consider a joint venture with a complimentary talent to create a product that could be sold on both of your sites and through both social media influences and split the profits 50/50.

What ideas do you have? What are some quick and easy product or merchandise ideas or sites that you’d like to share? Please share as a comment below.

7 Ways to Capture Ideas On-The-Go

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Do You Have an “Idea Dump-Zone”? If Not, Here’s Why You Need One!

Here’s 7 practical ways to capture those slippery ideas before they get away from you, on-the-go!

An idea dump zone is essential for all entrepreneurs or busy people who have ideas popping up all the time. Ever had a winning idea in a shower or driving the car and swore that you’d remember it, only to completely forget it by the time you sat down to a paper and pen?

What about when you and another entrepreneur get into a fascinating conversation and the ideas start flowing so fast that it’s like drinking water from a fire hose? Ever been-there-done-that? Getting into the habit of valuing those ideas is like making daily deposits in the bank.

With ‘idea dump zones’ you have all of those ideas to dig through to inspire you, give you your next product, next book, or next service. Maintaining momentum in business is essential to growth and staying relevant. When you’re under pressure and struggling to force an idea – it won’t be there, unless you’ve created your own dump zones for this purpose.

Here’s some reasons why this is an important habit to get into. Note the word “habit” too. It takes time to get into the habit of noticing and capturing ideas. That’s why thinking about your dump zones ahead of time will help you to prepare for those exciting times of clarity, inspiration and vision.

Personally acknowledge and notice the idea. Not only does this build confidence, after time, you’ll begin to see patterns and themes that will help you to position yourself better as an expert in your field.

Having a dump zone allows time for sorting of priority and profitability or effectiveness. Jot the idea down, or record it in an electronic device and keep it in a specialized folder where you can easily get back to. This saves you from taking time consuming rabbit trails and will be there when you can make the time to give those ideas the attention they deserve.

“What exactly is a dump zone and how does that work?” one might ask. Here’s some ideas

Types (think of this as your gold coins)
- 3×5 cards
- Word Document
- Voice recorder
- Blog posts – set as drafts
- Post it notes – poster sized and desktop variety
- White erase boards – large and small
- Blank white paper – draw and doodle zone
Containers (think of these as your treasure chests)
- Blog drafts
- Audio files
- Hanging files
- “Treasure” box
- Folder on your hard drive or in a cloud file storage system

Talk Fusion Launches CONNECT

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More powerful and dynamic than ever before – Talk Fusion does it again …

Creative Consultation – Creative Solutions Virtual Office

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Consultation with graphic recording to visually illustrate what matters most to you in your business. Creative solutions and resources provided for you.

“I’m going in too many directions!” the woman sat across from me with her hand pressed against her forehead. “I have a love/hate relationship with just about everything I’m doing, and I just can’t keep spreading myself so thin. What do I do?”

I began asking her questions and listening very carefully to what I was hearing – not only in her words, but in between the lines. Pulling up my flip chart we began writing things down and drawing pictures that would have meaning to her. (Schedule yours now)

When we finished, she squealed and clapped her hands. “I can’t believe it! You are amazing! How did you KNOW?” I love it when people leave my office, or hang up the phone shouting with joy and renewed enthusiasm!

Where it all began, I can’t tell you, but what I can tell you is that not only has God given me a wonderful gift of encouragement and an artistic talent, He has opened my ears and my eyes to see potential in people. Utilizing the skills, talents, and insights that He has given me, I blend them all together and literally Illustrate Your Potential!

This part of what I do personally is probably the most fulfilling and fun part of my own destiny and purpose. To bring hope, clarification and meaning to people who thought they had blown it, or had no talent is more exciting than anything else I can think of.

A Purpose Discovery session usually lasts anywhere from one to three hours. I am available to do them by phone, or in person. By doing it in person you have the added benefit of visualization as we plot out your thoughts and impressions on the flipchart in front of you.

If you are interested in finding focus, meaning and passion to what you plan to do for the rest of your life, CLICK HERE to contact me further about scheduling your own Purpose Discovery session!

“During my first visit with Shannon, I was able to see who I am, rather than what others think I am or shouldbe. This was very helpful because I was a bit lost in my direction, but now have a focus toward my passion. Matter-of-fact, after meeting with Shannon, I was scheduled to speak with a school principal and staff about the importance of passion.” — JM

Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki

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An outstanding introductory video that will help you renew your mind when it comes to understanding your money, investments, savings, assets and liabilities.