tothepoint's 2013 calendar – how it all unfolded

our 2013 calendar

Each year, we produce a desktop calendar that goes out to our clients and friends in late December. With digital calendars becoming increasingly prominent, and traditional print calendars being shunned by many, we are surprised (and flattered) that ours has remained so popular. We enjoy great feedback from clients on its usability and many look forward to receiving theirs each year.

Being a superstitious lot, this year we thought we'd turn a negative into a positive and pepper our 2013 calendar with lucky charms. Once we nailed our concept (Make your own luck) we thought it would be a doddle for a creative bunch such as ourselves to fold up 12 origami animals. Oh, how wrong we were! Even with instructions all over the internet, the most nimble fingered of us struggled to turn simple origami instructions into anything resembling an animal! To add to this, we also discovered that like most creative industry outputs, intellectual copyright also covers many origami designs.

We quickly realised that we needed to link up with an origami artist of the highest order, who also owned their own copyright. Who better then than the acclaimed Chairman of The British Origami Society, Mark Bolitho? We were delighted when Mark agreed to join our venture and after only one brainstorming session (and a quick trip to Paperchase), we were overwhelmed when he brought the 12 completed 'lucky' animals over to the office!

Mark Bolitho with his mini-menagerie

Now we just needed a professional photographer to capture these fantastic pieces in their best light. In stepped Noel Murphy. We've worked with Noel for a few years for clients including EDF and The Technology Partnership, so we knew he’d do a great job. With Noel on board, we assembled our pop-up photographic studio at tothepoint towers and set to work.

Noel keeps quiet while shooting elephants

Once we were happy with the photography and artwork, it was over to one of our favourite printers, Scanplus, who help us with the calendar every year. This time, Linda and new recruit Katie watched the guys in action, experiencing the quality and attention to detail they deliver on every job. Of course, this year’s calendar was no exception…

the calendar rolls off the press

We’re extremely happy with the results of this year’s collaboration of experts. Forging close working relationships with other specialists is both inspirational and effective in achieving great results, whatever the project.

We hope that our calendar brings you a little extra luck and wish you a happy and successful 2013.

For further origami inspired stuff, including wallpaper downloads, a free screensaver and our 'Flight of a Thousand Cranes' game – head on over to our origami page!

P.S. if you haven't received a copy of our calendar already please let us know and we’ll send one over (if we have any left).

Energising EDF's Upstream brand

EDF Energy, one of the largest UK home and business energy suppliers, asked us to give its business division Upstream an impactful presence at its internal leadership conference through highly visual banner stands and digital presentation. These were then used as part of Upstream’s internal leadership strategy roadshow across all of the division’s sites.

The deadline was pretty tight, with just two weeks from brief to the first conference. So, we got to work creating a series of colourful banners, with images relating to each area of the business, and accompanying bold text, to bring the brand to life. A core part of the brief was to ensure the banners were highly visible at the conferences, whilst portable enough for one person to set up, manoeuvre and break down easily.

We then carried these concepts through to an animated slideshow to be played at each conference and brochure design to ensure a consistent brand identity.

EDF was delighted with the banners and video, which were really well received at the leadership conference. Theresa Stinson, Communications Consultant at Upstream, EDF Energy, said: “TTP found the ideal solution and also turned the project around to very tight deadlines.”

So, a nice way to end 2012!

Helping Centrica Energy stay safe

Tight deadlines are always interesting, they keep us on our toes. And so the design, build and testing of a bespoke questionnaire-based microsite in around a week did just that!

As part of its safety at work campaign, Generation Safe, Centrica is running a series of interactive workshops at its Grimsby renewables base, designed to find out how employees would react when placed right at the heart of a variety of safety situations.

To measure and monitor the effectiveness of these workshops, internal communications specialist Mat Rumbelow asked us to create a custom built microsite to capture delegate and session data from each workshop. This needed to launch before the first workshop on 4th December, as employees are asked to log in and complete a short 'pre-work' questionnaire, which is used in the training session. The site also asks participants to add their personal information and gives them contact information and a route to the training location.

During the training sessions, participants are given an iPad and asked to log back into the site, review their previously submitted answers and complete each session's questions as the events of the day unfold.

We built a content-managed site that offers a simple 'back-end', which means any registered administrator can log in, edit users' information and access all submitted questionnaire answers – as well as exporting the data in a variety of formats.

The deadline was incredibly tight as we had less than a week to put this all together. But with the client on hand to test the system with us we managed it – even adding and tweaking the functionality so that it worked exactly as they wanted. Once launched, we made further additions to streamline the system and make it easier for admin staff to manage.

Mat Rumbelow said: "There aren't many designers who could deliver a fully-functional website in a matter of days, but as always, tothepoint rose to the challenge. It helped that the team understood exactly what I wanted from the outset, which meant there was virtually no to-ing and fro-ing over design and content. Even with a myriad of last-minute changes and tweaks, everything went smoothly."

The training sessions will continue into the new year, however, once complete, the plan is to add new content and features to the site, extending this into a safety-focused 'hub' for Centrica Energy's power business.

The End is Nigh – Part 2: Back it up

In our last blog we left you with a shopping list of items to help you survive the aftermath of an apocalypse. This month it’s time to look at what you’ll need to save your digital self (because your back catalogue of Backstreet Boys albums will be essential for rebuilding civilization…).

To refresh your memory, the world is going to end on 21st December 2012! (Note. if you're reading this on or after December 22nd this could be embarrassing). This is because this day marks the end of the 13th bak’tun in the Maya calendar. Whilst the Maya believe that this date will mark a full cycle of creation, and in turn an exciting new chapter in Earth’s life, apocalypse observers would have you believe it symbolises the actual end of the world. Now, whilst science has sided with life after the 21st, Hollywood prefers the morbid glamour of an apocalypse.

I’m sure by now you’ve clocked a good number of doom and gloom related propaganda, from one man and his Ark to the comedic stylings of Mae Martin and cute indie films staring Keira Knightley, even this gem from Old Spice! And although these are all great responses to the threat of Earth’s destruction, we’re going to talk about something a little more practical than spending your life savings on an Ark (as fun as that may be). So, we’re going to talk about data back up…

Now, I’m sure that if you fear impending doom, then backing up your data is going to be the last thing on your mind (unless you strongly feel the pictures of that night need to survive…). There are also those who would question how useful this data would be after an apocalypse, however, these people always have a criticism and are known as pedantic party poopers…

We reckon that whether you’ve sided with science or Hollywood, it’s still important to know how to back up. After all, losing your data could spell the end of your world regardless…

Your Digital Self

With all of this hullabaloo going on, not to mention the million different buzzwords flying around, it’s easy to feel a little lost when it comes to the mystical world of data back up.

For the tech savvy it’s easy, but for those more inclined to pen and paper, it’s a bit like surviving the end of the world. So, hopefully the next few paragraphs will make it all a little more digestible…

External Hard Drive

The humble hard drive might be a common little thing, but it’s also a good option for backing up your data. There are, however, as many of them out there as there are ex-Sugarbabes, so it can be a little daunting to find the best one.

So we recommend a quick search online, as this will give you a plethora of reviews from industry experts such as Wired, Techradar and PC Mag. These are normally pretty handy, and they don’t tend to be full of the techie jargon that can make choosing a hard drive a total headache!

There are a few out there that could have apocalyptic suitability and are more rugged than the average hard drive, one being the LaCie Rugged Thunderbolt, which not only features fast upload and download speeds but also a pretty hefty case that promises protection for even the clumsiest user. LaCie’s USB keys are also pretty rugged, promising water, scratch and drop resistance. Handy if you only need to grab a few bits and pieces before you flee for the escape pod….

However, the LaCie hard drives pale in comparison to this next product, the Holy Grail of indestructible hard drives. This video sees the SP A80 set on fire, kicked over a football field and put through a car wash, each time it comes back stronger… seriously impressive!

Cloud Storage

We’ve all heard this word batting around the atmosphere and it’s largely thanks to Apple’s iCloud. But what does it mean?

Sadly, it’s not as romantic as it sounds. Simply put, it’s a service provided by a third party that allows people to access online storage. That means you could have access to your files from anywhere without needing to carry an external hard drive.

They do often whet your appetite with a little bit of free storage to start with, but for something more substantial you’re likely to have to pay a monthly subscription. Of course, this will vary depending on the amount of space you go for, however, ultimately the space available could stretch on… and on… and on…

There are things to keep in mind when selecting a cloud storage service to ensure that your data is safe. Things like encryption, back up copies of your data and high tech robots guarding the server rooms….

However, that said, there are no guarantees that the servers where your information is kept will be equipped to survive an apocalypse. Although, one Singapore-based company is clearly taking the threat of apocalypse seriously having recently released Lockcube, a cloud service that is reported to have been built on a military-grade data security infrastructure.

If you're decked out with all of the latest shiny Apple products, then iCloud could be the cloud service for you. However, for those of us not on that bandwagon then it's good to know that industry experts suggest there are three main cross platform competitors that really stand out in terms of cross platform cloud storage: Google Drive, Microsoft’s Skydrive and Dropbox. All offer very nifty apps that allow you to sync your information across all your devices and in turn, get your mitts on your data from any device that you’ve synced to the cloud.

Automatic/Timed Data Syncing

Do you have a mind like a sieve or are just too preoccupied with Earth’s impending doom to remember to back up your life? If so, this ones for you. There are two main programmes that essentially take a “snapshot” of all of the data on your computer at a certain time; this snapshot can be set to save to an external device such as an external hard drive.

These “snapshots” allow you to essentially travel back in time and view the contents of your computer at a certain date. It’s not quite Marty McFly, but it does mean you can retrieve previously saved and possibly lost files.

Apple's Time Machine, which essentially does what it says on the tin, is for Macs, and for PC there is Genie 9.

Hopefully all the doomsayers are wrong and we’ll be back with another round of news in 2013 (lucky for some we hope!). In the meantime enjoy playing our Crane Game and we wish you a very merry Christmas and a happy new year.