Custom iPhone Wallpaper and Backgrounds.

If my wife isn’t buying clothes online, then she’s buying them at Daisy Clover Boutique in Webster Groves. I just so happen to do all the print and design work for them : ) For fun, I made them this iPhone 4 wallpaper to celebrate the beginning of Spring.

If you have a business, and need anything like custom desktop backgrounds, iPhone backgrounds/wallpapers, custom icons… let me know. I can do all that kind of stuff.

Want this on your iPhone? Click HERE for the high-res file.

Are You in a Band?.

I am. It’s a cover band called The Dude Abides. We rock. Anyway, I’ve been doing the music thing for a long time. Some bands fail. Some bands succeed. Do you want to succeed? Do this:

Set aside money from gigs to invest into printing to help promote future gigs. We can help you with your printing.

Here is what you should be printing (we do all these things):

- Cheap black and white 4.25  x 5.5 handbills, preferably on cheap colored paper. – - These are good for blanketing an area with… you get the point across with your crappy black and white design without breaking the bank.

- Super high quality glossy 4 x 6 postcards, preferably double-sided. – - These are what you use if you have some type of huge event that you really care about. These are going to impress the crap out of people. People will probably keep these after you hand them to them, instead of throwing them on the ground immediately after you’re out of sight. If you’re lucky, they’ll take them to their car and leave them for their friends to see every time they ride in it.

- Super big black and white posters. – - We’re talking like… 3 foot x 3 foot posters. Put them on a wall. Everyone will see. Limited to black print on regular white paper, these huge posters are nice because they don’t cost a lot. If you can think of a place to put them, they can be very beneficial to getting your name out, or the word out for your upcoming gig.

- 12 x 18 color posters. – - We do a ton of these for different promoters around the Saint Louis area. These are the standard. If you have a show coming up, and you don’t print out a handful of these to put up at your school, around your neighborhood, by the club, in the loop, or wherever, then you’re not doing a good job promoting your show. Give up now.

Another thing we do here is pimp out bass drum heads. Tell your drummer. It’s always cool to have your logo or name written on your bass drum. We can assist you with that.

Photo Manipulation.

Ever had a photograph that you absolutely loved, except there was always something in the picture that bugged the heck out of you that you wish you could take out??! Well… bring it here to The Done Dept.  I can take it out for you. My grandmother doesn’t call me the Photo Manipulation Master for nothing. (She doesn’t really call me that.) (She does constantly remind me that she thinks I’m super talented though. Which is hard to take for serious, because sometimes it’s after I’ve showed her some crazy video that I made, and sometimes it’s after I’ve replaced the batteries in her kitchen clock.)

Below is a before and after of a picture that I fixed for a customer. They loved the picture, but it bothered them that the vinyl curtain in the background was slightly open and therefore, unsightly.

And then they wanted me to make some color edits for their framing purposes, so I did that too.

What in the World is Going On?.

Well… to start, Art in the Park was fantastic!  It wasn’t until the event was almost over that I was able to get a photo of our tent without at least 5 people standing in front of it! That’s my cutie wife helping out! Thanks, hunny!

And I couldn’t believe how many people played our ball toss game. People got so excited over it! What a great time! I can’t even imagine how boring the day would’ve been without it. It was so successful, I’m trying to figure out what we can do next  year to top it. : /

And what the heck! The Cards are kicking butt in the playoffs! I designed this fall Cardinals logo to put on shirts for my close friends and family. GO CARDS GO!!!

TheDoneDept. @ Art in the Park.

September has officially been dubbed, “Art in the Park Month” at TheDoneDept.  For the first time, TheDoneDept. is going to have it’s own booth at Art in the Park! Represent! So now, besides having to print all of the materials for Art in the Park (TheDoneDept. is the official printer for Art in the Park), now we have to get our ish together for our own booth! Exciting! See you there?

All Kinds of Scans – Canvas and Frames.

Something that we do a LOT of, is scan large images. We’re talking like… posters, maps, large family photos, photo collages. Sometimes people bring in painted canvases, and they’re like, “Um… can you do this?” And I’m like, “Yeah. I can.” and then they’re all like, “Dang. Nobody else can do this.” And I’m like, “Well.. I’m sure some people can, but yeah.. most people can’t. What’s your number and I’ll call you when it’s done.” Then we high-five, and that usually ends the conversation. We even have pretty good luck scanning images from behind glass (while they are still in the frame). If you REALLY want a copy of something, but you are super afraid to take it out of the frame, bring it on in, and I’ll try to reproduce it for you… for free. It’s worth a try, right?

The image below is called ’1950 Plymouth’ and is an acrylic on canvas, by Meghan Jesberg. I was amazed at how photo-like it looked when she brought it in. Check out her website (meghanjesberg.com). Her work is amazing!

Cheap Signage??!! Where??.

Economic signage. You want it? We got it.

SOHA – Studio and Gallery.

I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it again – - my in-laws are rad. My wife’s aunt, Julie Malone, just opened her own studio and art gallery in South City. It’s called SOHA Studio and Gallery, and they have all kinds of hip stuff going on over there… even yoga sessions! Check out their Facebook page to stay in the know with everything they have going on there!

Wedding Season.

TheDoneDept. makes darn-good looking wedding materials. Do you want people to call you and tell you how cute your wedding invitations look when they get them in the mail? Why the heck wouldn’t you? Is your name Debby Downer? Oh.. ok. That explains it.

The End of an Era.

Our parent company, Rotolite of St. Louis (a.k.a. ‘The Mothership’), has been the leading reseller of Xerox Wide-Format in St. Louis for more than 3 decades. That all came to a end this month when Xerox announced they were discontinuing their Wide-Format division. -insert fog-horn sound here- Luckily, for more than a decade,  Rotolite has been building it’s list of vendors, to include all of the wide-format industries heavy-weights, HP, Cannon, Ricoh, Oce, and the latest and greatest, Seiko.

If you’re an architect, engineer, contractor, or if you’re just super rich and are thinking about purchasing your own machine to run large prints, give Rotolite a call. We have the best service team in town.

Send Your Friends Off in Style.

We made this for someone who had a friend who was moving to Colorado. Apparently they hung it up at the bar, and everyone wrote little messages on it. Fun!

Business Card Design and Print.

Sometimes it seems like all I do is make (kick-a$$) business cards.

Photo Restoration.

Probably twice a year, someone comes in with a REALLY old photo. It’s so old, that time has just taken a beating to it. These people are desperate for a restoration. We do a heck of a good job at it.

This isn’t the best example of how deteriorated they can be, but it will give you an idea of what I’m talking about. The original had little stains all over it, which were very distracting. I took the distracting stuff out, and what they were left with, was a truly vintage photograph.

(Click to see this image larger)

YOU… for President. Let’s make it happen..

This political season, we got to do all the campaign materials for Ken Burns, who was running for a spot on the City Council of Webster Groves. Ken won. Coincidence? I think not.

Do you want to be a winner? Call me. 314.832.DONE.

2720 Cherokee.

My in-laws are rad. My wife’s cousin, Josh Grigaitis, opened this amazing new space called 2720. It is located on 2720 Cherokee. They host all kinds of amazing events, like Live Art Galleries, Burlesque shows, and Dueling DJ’s (everyone wears wireless headphones, and you can pick which DJ you want to listen to at any time). Sounds crazy? Yeah, it is. Crazy awesome! He’s even already voted “  ” by the Riverfront Times. You should really go check it out sometime. They have shows almost every night. Check out their website for more information.

St. Glee…er.. I mean… Gabes.

I made this for St. Gabe’s. It was fun. : )

Walk-In Copy Center.

YES. You can just walk in and have something copied, or scanned, or faxed. You don’t have to have an appointment, or a big wallet. Heck, you can even email me something, and I can print it and have it ready for you when you walk in. Email me. greg@thedonedept.com

Custom Posters.

A woman walked in to The Done Dept. the other day with a big picture book full of photos from Africa. She sat it down on one of our tables, opened it up to a large four page spread and asked, “Can you make this into a poster?” I said, “Sure, hunny.” Then I created her poster.

If you have a good idea for a poster, whether it be for framing and hanging up in your own house, or for a friend’s birthday gift… hit us up.

St. Louis Hills Member Card Redesign.

The St. Louis Hills neighborhood has got to be one of the most beautiful neighborhoods in all of St. Louis City and County. I do not live in St. Louis Hills, but man would I be proud if I did. So when the SLHNA came to me to print their annual membership card, I took the opportunity to capture the beauty of their neighborhood, and fit it all onto the front of a 4.25 x 5.5 card. : )

I was able to get most of the photos off of the very cool www.stlhills.com, and the photos that I wanted but couldn’t find, I just took myself.

Make Your Passwords Un-Hackable.

I was listening to the radio today, and I heard a fact that I found very interesting, and I find it to be something that everyone should know. Cigarettes are bad for you. Just joking. Well, yeah, they really are, but what I really heard, is that when it comes to passwords (like the ones you use to protect your email, or Facebook account) the amount of characters (letters or numbers) in them can make all the difference between it being hacked by mega-computer nerds or not. Basically, the fact is, a 4 character password can be decrypted by a hacker using special decryption software in under 2 minutes! Crazy! But a 6 character password takes 2 CENTURIES to decrypt! Which is even crazier!

So if your password is only 4 characters long, for any email client or social application that you use, CHANGE IT. Usually most social apps (like Facebook, Myspace) or email clients (like Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail) won’t even let you create a password that is less than 6 characters long.

I also feel like this is a good time to talk about clicking on stuff that you shouldn’t. The most recent thing that I’ve seen, is getting a message in your inbox that says something like, “Hey, here is that picture that you wanted to see (followed by a link).” You DO NOT want to click on that link. I even almost fell for this the first time I saw it. It’s pretty clever.

I don’t mean to scare you about any of this stuff. I just think that it’s good to be aware.

If you have any questions about any of this stuff, feel free to email me.