Some time ago I held a talk at my company regarding print Ads. Because of the world-wide recession Ad budgets dropped. I wanted to know: Is anyone still buying print-ads? If so, who? Why do they choose to advertise in newspapers? This information might help the new business team. Anyway, hope you enjoy the SlideShare presentation. Read more

Oh yeah. I just finished my very own Flavors.me and it only took me about 30 minutes from start to finish. The Flavors service is very good. It basically allows anyone to create their own online profile that will show all of their online interests. If you want to add, include or modify anything (like say the layout, fonts, colors) it can all be done using just your browser. Very nice and totally free. (The 20 bucks full-service allows for much more customization and extra’s like custom url, favicon, inserting movie-clips and more). Check it out. The photo I used was made by Photographer Henri Vos.

Hoi Marco,
Een tijdje terug heb jij getwitterd,
en niet eens heel erg verbitterd,
dat men doodleuk had besloten
jou VosLibert uit te stoten.

Dat verbaast mij uiteraard,
want jij was elke euro waard.
Maar ik ga, tot mijn grote spijt,
niet over VL’s personeelsbeleid.

Je vindt ongetwijfeld heel snel weer
een baan als ‘digital engineer’.
Jouw gedicht was toen een mooie geste,
mede daarom wens ik je het beste!

(Jouw gedicht heb ik helaas niet meer.
Die heb je toen intern verstuurd en daar
kan ik al heel lang niet meer in.)

Wim Platje, NetCopy, de online tekstwinkel.

(Mijn hart-onder-de-riem gedicht aan Wim indertijd is helaas verloren gegaan).

Wow. I received an official letter today. After more than six years at VosLibert, as of today I am officially fired. The paperwork will take some time (so I’ll probably be around until September or October) but VosLibert needs to cut costs. As I am a Senior Desk Top Publisher / Graphic Designer I am somewhat more expensive than the average Desk Top Publisher because my work is more diverse. Some very good friends have also been fired. They’ve basically gone and fired people at every department: Art Direction, Project Managers, Traffic Manager, Desk Top Publishing, Receptionist, Technical Support… It’s been a bit quiet lately buy I didn’t see this coming. Heck, just two weeks ago I had an official talk with Management and my position was not an issue. All was well. Anyway, as of today I am available for other jobs.

So if any of you guys (or girls) hear of a job for an all-round and good graphic designer / desktop publisher / project manager with a high degree of technical and workflow knowledge please let me know. I’m also looking for new Linkedin connections and I’d like to add the readers of this site to increase my network and the likelyhood of me hearing about a job.

One of the nice things of getting fired is all the postive feedback I’ve received. This one is from the VosLibert owner, Sander on my Linkedin: “Marco is een gedreven vakman, met grote technische know how en enthousiasme voor zijn vak. Gaat graag op zoek nieuwe mogelijkheden en toepassingen op zijn vakgebied. Deelt dat online ook met vakgenoten over de hele wereld en is daardoor goed op de hoogte van de laatste stand van zaken om zijn werk sneller en beter te kunnen uitvoeren.”


Anyway, I’m still around until September but after that I just know I’m really gonna miss those guys. I’ve had the honor of working with a great team of dedicated professionals. How professional? Well just look at all the party’s and company-trips (even to Tunis, Africa!) we’ve had all those years and how we chose to communicate about them. What a team! (More examples after the break).
Read more

I just returned from a very nice trip to Brussels in Belgium. What a great city! I want to share 4 remarkable photo’s with you.



The Atomium, based up on or a molecule of iron about 200 meters tall.



Great ads all over the town.



When in Brussels, drink beer. This is the pub that is home to the famous brand ‘Mort Subite’ or ‘Sudden Death’.



I visited the famous Art Noveau House, Horta. Look what I bumped in to (besides a lot of Art Noveau). I never knew that was where the old English saying came from. (Hint: This logo was stamped in the toilet).

Here at VosLibert we’re looking for a good graphic designer to help us get all of the jobs done at the end of the day. If you feel you’re the one, let us know. We’ve got a great portfolio of clients like Grolsch, Nestlé, FricoCampina, Gardena, StorkAir, Pepsi, C1000, Celavita, and many, many more. Check out the website and send your application to the Studio Manager. We are looking for someone with at least 3 years of experience. (And you must be able to speak and read Dutch).

The company I work for, VosLibert Communicatie, is looking for a good Project Manager to handle jobs for one of their clients. The job consists of communicating between several graphic designers and the client in order to streamline their packaging-design jobs. You need to be able to communicate in Dutch and English if you feel like applying. We’re also looking for two young ‘KickStarters‘. Two guys (or girls) that want to start their career at VosLibert. They get to concentrate on ‘new media’ and we want them to join our creative team and suprise us with their idea’s and concepts. You get to work for big clients like Nestle, Grolsch, TVM, Canei, Univé, sc Heerenveen and many more. No experience required, but a Design or ‘Communication’ education is required. Check the Dutch website for more info. English? Send me an email.

This Tuesday I’ll be visiting Esko Artwork in Gent for a presentation called ‘From Design to Print: Mastering the entire production chain using ISO 12647 out-of-the-box’. Apart from discussing the importance of standardization & ISO compliancy, we’ll be shown workflows revolving around ISO 12647. Yes, only real ‘print-geeks’ will be allowed entrance. And if that wasn’t enough the very next day I’ll travel to Brussels for a two day event regarding the latest & greatest from Axaio, Callas, Enfocus, ProofMaster and DMP. Should you happen to also attend either one of these events, you could always let me know. I always enjoy talking to other Digital Engineers. (I really do hope the farmers are done with all their protesting!)

Last week one of the Dutch websites I frequently visit to check the Mac and Print news (Mac-Zone.nl) decided to quit and that was too bad. They had lots of visitors but the original crew couldn’t find the time to keep pushing out short stories and news each and every day. I enjoyed reading their articles. But having run a Dutch website focussed on Print and Graphic Design Techniques myself for over six years now, I totally understand how difficult it can be. Writing, interviewing and doing the research for an article takes up huge amounts of my time. If it’s so hard and it takes up so much of my time then why would I even bother? Why don’t I just spend my spare time flippin’ burgers? At least then I’d get paid right? Read more

My colleagues and I always use large black foam-boards to present our designs and idea’s. Most of the time we end up with several of them. But how do you transport a bunch of those things? For years we’ve used standard king-size art-folders, but everybody’s got those… They don’t let us stand out of the crowd and they’re too expensive to just hand over to a client every time we present new designs. It feels rather cheap to return home with an empty art-folder after a presentation and leave the client with a pile of foam-boards on his desk… Apart from that we were also looking for a way to let our company and designs stand out at the very beginning. So we decided to create our own foam-board carrying cases. They were designed to carry foam-boards, impress the client from the get-go and they were to be made out of cardboard so we could hand them over along with the designs. We decided to look at the Old Dutch Masters for inspiration. Read more

Well this is really cool. I was visiting my friend Rinus some time ago and were talking about setting up the new Digital Engineer website. Now he’s no graphic designer but he is a creative guy and knows people all over the world. I admired a portrait on his wall. ‘Too bad Sipke, the photographer, lives and works in London’, Rinus said… A shame because I really wanted a good portrait for my new website. But who was I kidding? I had already spend all the money I made selling ad-space for my Dutch website, MacMojo… What to do? It’s not like you can find good photographers on every street corner… Read more

I’m a graphic designer, not an English teacher so you’ll probably find some ‘Denglish’ or Dutch-English popping up in my articles, but I hope they won’t keep you from reading and commenting. If it gets really bad, just send me an email and I’ll update the English. Please don’t act like a ‘dictionary dictator’ and use the comments to tell me I wrote something wrong. Please use the comments to comment on the subject, not the language and keep in mind I’m Dutch and English is my third language.