Business Communication = a creatively charged work life

Today when the globe has become so much networked and tiny, there is a greater need to reach out to people/associates who are from different walks of life in a way that is understood by their respective cultural languages.

Copyright © 2011 rembrandz.com

At least 10 years before I stepped into business school I was intrigued by business communication and getting into it was like a given when I was an executive at our family business. Hence my first classes in the same was given by one of my mentors who is a business communication, marketing and entrepreneurial advocate and a professor at a university who also happens to be my brother. It is with gratitude to him that I look back and see that my creative writing may have stemmed from the grounding since those early days.

So, years later when I sat for my formal graduate studies, I had enough time to make my communication as creative as possible, by adding-on illustrations, personalized cards/e-cards or even an animation if it meant keeping a lasting impression with my associates.

This has simply been the reason why I work till date, with some of my oldest colleagues, clients and employers.

Following are a few tools I can suggest to help maintain a business relationship.
1. Maintaining 'Press Releases' to keep your audience up-to-date with your activities and top achievements.
2. Corporate E-cards or Greeting Cards: A need to seize an opportunity of an occasion to pass on a good wish (not too annoyingly frequent). Just enough to remind them that you are available and open for business.
3. If not for a fancy flier/card just drop in a corporate howdy and pass on your current portfolio to show of your updated services.

Copyright © 2011 Remy Francis

4. Choose perhaps the occasion of a New Year? to send your associates some merchandize of your services and products, something they could use all-year round to remember you, also to indicate to them of your renewed interest.
5. Finally, perhaps send them a special invite to an event which has your presence.

The above mentioned are not only effective tools, but also a reflections of a goodwill you radiate to show that you are always client-oriented, on call and ready to serve.

That's all for now! Wish you Happy communicating!

Business Studies + an Art Passion = a Corporate Creative

Copyright © 2011 Remy Francis

Being an artist at heart and having a traditional academic background gave me a good balance between my left and right brain passions and helped me much in my wild adventurous career ride.

Thanks to my university curriculum and extra-curricular activities, with my extensive research work over the years, today I work with flexibility. Being able to work in different departments at once providing my core competencies.

With this said, it is my pleasure to invite you to see projects I enjoyed doing because it is a profession from my extended hobby and way-of-life.

1. Web Back in 2006, I had a golden opportunity to work with an all IT group in keybank USA as a UI and front-end programmer, designing the web by hard-coding using HTML, CSS, Javascript and being able to create an intranet flash-based site for our 10-person group from different nationalities which I was not new to with my years of UAE experience. It was the most fulfilling job I did during my tenure in USA. Hence more of my friendship between my left and right brain came into play there. Being the only UI design and front-end programmer in the group was also quite an enriching experience.

Below I display some of my web screen shots, of course starting with my own HTML5 based website:

Copyright © 2011 Remy Francis

2. Illustrative articles/writing Having got my first article published back in 1999 in a Canadian magazine, I have been writing on and off enjoying it as a passion and using it in every job I have been in. I am currently pleased to get back into regular writing since April 2010.
My main feature in writing is complimenting it with my sketches to put across my messages.


Copyright © 2011 Remy Francis

2. Illustrations/Newsletter/Book Design This passions stems from the early 90s when I got my illustrations published on a newsletter where my sketches were to pass on some corporate messages.

Copyright © 2010 Remy Francis

3. Branding & Identity

Brochures and Print collateral:

Internal Branding:

4. Concept for Ads/storyboard
Copyright © 2011 Remy Francis

5. Museum installations/illustration/Posters
Copyright © 2011 Remy Francis

6. ISO 9000 training (management cartoons) I have iPhoned below a couple of the sketches I created long time ago during my ISO 9000 thesis, done for an ISO expert to aid his corporate training slides (those days it was the OHPs).
Copyright © 2000 Remy Francis

Copyright © 2000 Remy Francis

7. Audiovisuals

8. Broadcast Design Animator was the first job after my business studies and I was freshly able to put 2 and 2 together and form a lasting grounding.
Copyright © 2010 Remy Francis


9. Events - Creative /Exhibition Stands

10.Political Cartoons Business school introduced me to Political Economy and that helped me grow my interests in global current affairs and my thoughts are let out mostly through such cartoons

Copyright © 2010 Remy Francis

Copyright © 2009 Remy Francis

What is Map Design or Cartography

car·tog·ra·phy/kärˈtägrəfē/ is the science or practice of drawing maps.
Just as the craft of Graphic Designing, this is something which needs in-depth study in order to master it.

This art and science of map-making are traditionally practiced by cartographers. Drawing of maps came to be as part of an effort to understand our environment. Explorers have traveled far and wide in quest of an accurate map since the 1700s.

Modern day cartographers still hold regular jobs in their specialization, thanks to political and geological changes.

Cartography is made up of two Greek words, Cartis meaninng "map" and Graphos meaning "to draw or write".

Modern practitioners of Cartography are much better off than their ancient counterparts because today they have the advantage of computers and other equipment to make their maps more precise.

Even we design professionals can get off doing a few cartography projects with our design gears.


But of course we too have to do a sound amount of learning into the GIS (Geographical Information Systems) and technicalities to be able to do justice to the field of Cartography.

My Map Designs / Cartography

To be politically correct I cannot call myself a cartographer because cartography was only one part of my Graphic Design education.

However in today's life-styles of open-source and transparency a cartographer or a 3D modeler or a qualified writer cannot push out the talents who pursue all this without any specialist education. However they have had access to all the technology along with an enthusiasm to learn about it informally. The less fortunate who would never have had the luxury if not for this internet revolution like the poor part of the developing world are the gainers here.

I started as a 3D Modeler, an animator, an artist much before the Photoshop, 3D revolution and even the internet. We have had to slog and spend many hours on end to get to our goals those days. I remember I got my research material for my animation summer project during my masters by getting the material downloaded onto several floppy disks, from a library owner who had a server (which was a mammoth machine). This was during the age when the monitor screens were blue.

My work life would have been a disaster if I considered technology as my competitor which gave short-cut methods to people who did not have to go through years in the mill learning and getting experience in the same in a much much shorter span. Technology helped keep the quality. With this being said, I must say if not for technology and new gadgets springing up each day and social-networking, many may not have been able to progress very fast up the ladder. So today people who take mediocre seats in the hall of fame are those who have held hard to their traditional ways alone. The best thing perhaps would be to use these traditional groundings to see how technology can help better them as well as things required in today's world.

However, may I remind that lucky are those who have learned about art, animation, writing the traditional way for I can't deny that it is much sought after even till today. Talking about this phenomenon, I must mention that I will talk to you about this very important topic very soon on another occasion.

Now let me explain what is cartography :o)

The good thing about being a Generalist Creative Director (Events Creatives)

The good thing about being a Generalist Design Person is that I am able to fit into any creative job to deliver what my client wishes. This makes me a busy person 24/7 leave alone this whole business of creatives getting more and more exciting every day. With an opportunity to display a diverse portfolio.

I am quite pleased that I am getting an opportunity to explain the versatility of my creative jobs here through my blog...also to complement them with a learning platform with my own findings in my experience in this field.

Here are some of my creatives I have done for large scale expositions/exhibitions and events.

My predictions about Animation in India back in '99

It was a great day today! I believe it must have been a good one for you too.
I just made out an from my animation archives, while waiting for an errand to get done. And while I press the publish, I felt it a great opportunity to invite you to have a read.



It is my pleasure to share it with you because it is with a realization that how a decade-long animation industry in my home country has turned out in a way I had envisioned it would be.

Read on! Hopefully I'll be able to upload some pix I had from that era very soon.

1994 : My beginnings as motion graphics animator

A clear sunny day in the UAE, the first day of the working week was busy busy as usual. I had quite a few jobs on my agenda today which went off pretty well, but couldn't help thinking about my first days as a Motion Graphics Animator back in the early 1990s at the Crest Animation Studios (http://www.crestindia.com), Bombay. I recently got connected to one of my colleagues who was one of my first mentors at Crest, when I did my first real-time 2D and 3D broadcast graphics. He was a pro on the Quantel, today running his own studios in the likes of Crest in Bombay. Can't believe it's been over 16 years?! Glad I was able to keep my sanity and devotion towards the field I still adore with much excitement as when i started back in the days.

My Corporate Design Stints Part 1

The day I entered the Corporate World in the field of designing was in the early 1980s or late 1979, when along with my family I had an opportunity to design a logo for my father's additional business of a cold storage plant. I remember the logo vividly. It was hand-drawn and printed with the use of conventional off-set printing methods. I remember we as a family took part in all of the promotional and marketing efforts. Even as a school kid I was exposed to this wonderful industry planning out seasonal fliers, inserts in newspapers etc. In following posts I shall continue discussing with you of my journey as a Corporate Designer. That's crazy! I just realized this was my first logo design gig with the best team one could ever wish for...my siblings and parents.

While I speak to you about my growth as a Designer through small snippets here, let me introduce you to some of my designs for the Corporate World.

Hello there folks

I am so pleased to start off my first post on my very own blog today.

Today was spent pretty laid back with the weekend in our part of the world which ends today. Tomorrow is the first working day of the week. "Sunday" is the Monday in the rest of the world. I however spent the day a bit anticipatory. But am really excited I doodled a cartoon but sad I did not think it was appropriate to release yet. As I always quote "Modern-day artists survive their natural instincts by having 2 exhibit spaces, one open to the public & the other locked-up in their closet."

Instead here is a doodle of an innocent girl I made for a dear Emirati friend: She is as sweet as this kid too!