BAM
I am currently employed at By All Means Graphics (BAM). I started in January of 2020. I have enhanced my knowledge in the Adobe Creative Suite and Google Online Office Programs. As a Graphic Designer, I designed many different materials for customers. This also may involve printing and cutting their orders too.
Here is just a short list of what I’ve designed. Below the list are some examples of what I have created. Under the wedding tab, some designs were done while working here.
- Posters, Banners, & Signs
- Fliers & Brochures
- Print & Digital Ads
- Forms
- Invitations for Any Event
- Anything Wedding
- Business Cards
- Books; Cover & Layout
- Postcards & Rack Cards
- Letterheads
- Envelopes
- Magazines & Booklets
- Labels, Stickers, & Magnets
The largest project my company has is the Entertainment Guide which is published monthly. It is a magazine that lists the happenings in and near Northfield. It is supported by advertisers. Starting in February of 2021, I have started taking over the majority of the layout workload. I also create many of the ads. In January 2022, I was able to write a feature on my Polaroid artwork (see lower right corner). In September 2022, we refreshed the look. My photo was featured on the November 2022 cover!
My absolute favorite thing to design is anything to do with weddings. BAM used to publish a wedding guide every year, but sadly they couldn’t get enough ads to support it right now. I designed everything in the most recent guide (even all the wedding printing samples!) I also wrote an article on why you should hire a Graphic Designer for your wedding materials. While other companies are less expensive, it seems like we always need to adjust files from third parties for printing. Also, brides receive a custom design that only they have. We can also design anything they can think of and it will all match perfectly, than trying to find something similar to their pre-purchased design.
We design the magazine for Inspire Bride located in St. Petersburg and New Ulm. I took up most of the project for the second issue.
A popular project is business cards. Sometimes the customer has a specific look in mind and some are open to our design expertise. Either way, they are fun to create.
Other popular projects are fliers, posters, and brochures. Usually, we get more freedom to design what we think would look best.
Here are some examples of banners and posters I have created. Some of the products are as small as 4×6 (a handbill menu) to a 24×36 menu sign.
Another favorite project of mine is creating forms for businesses. This involves a lot more layout than design.
Many businesses like to have letterheads and they are fairly simple to create. We also can design matching return address envelopes to go with the letterheads.
It is always exciting to create cards and programs for people. This is another project where we tend to have the freedom to design what we think would look nice.
Below is an assortment of projects I have created for customers. From banners & fake plane tickets to a CD case, notepads, labels, and a coupon booklet. Recently, I have been designing raffle tickets and gift certificates.
Below are some exciting book projects I have done. Some are small saddle-stitched books and some are actual perfect-bound books. The St. Olaf Theater Book was the largest & longest project I have ever done. It took about 2 years, but I only worked on it for about 1.5 years. The two books by Gail S. Jones were the most enjoyable to create. They are children’s books for her granddaughter and couldn’t be more precious. Gail Jones also wrote another book that I had the pleasure to design/layout.
There are also some yearly projects we design for our customers. For the Cannon Falls Chamber, we create a Discover Guide for the year. This guide shows the community and tourists what is happening in Cannon Falls that year. We also sell and create ads to help support the design and printing of the guide.
We create a yearly coupon booklet for the Cannon Falls Chamber of Commerce. The Chamber sells the spots and we design & print the coupons.
The Northfield Chamber of Commerce has us sell ads and design a city map of Northfield and Dundas. The ads help support the map and they get their location marked on the map too. We also create a Senior Housing Guide for the Senior Housing Guide company in St. Paul. They have their own salesperson, but we do all the design and layout (minus the grids) for them.
The bi-annual Horse Catalog Book is a new project our company has been hired to create. I design the entire project, using their template, and making it a little more modern. They did select a different cover than what is shown in the samples, but I liked this one better. While working on this project, I learned a lot about horses.
One skill I have started to develop is Photoshop. Here are some before and after photos. The bottom wedding picture was a personally commissioned project, I did not edit it through By All Means Graphics.
