Artscape is coming up this week. In case you don’t know what Artscape is, get out from under your rock and go to their site at www.artscape.org to find out more! It’s billed as the largest free public arts festival in America, and it’s always a great time. Stop on by to check out some of the bands, some of the artist booths, and to get some great food and drink.

Our friends from the Maryland Film Festival are going to be attending Artscape this year, and will have their own booth set up to tell everyone there all about the great things they’re doing throughout the year. They came to Orange Element recently and wanted our help promoting their Friends of the Festival (FoF) program. This is a program that keeps those interested in film involved year-round through screenings, events and giveaways (not to mention great early insight on the upcoming Festivals).

This year, given the size and quantity of people in attendance at Artscape, we decided to do a movie-ticket themed handout that would encourage all the folks in attendance to visit the Maryland Film Festival’s free outdoor screening. Since free screenings are one of the great benefits of being a FoF, we wanted to get as many people out there as possible. Then, when we have a captive audience, the MFF folks will say a few words about the program and encourage everyone to sign up!

The film that’s going to be screened on July 19th is Automorphosis. Check out the cool ticket we created below (click for full size):

Front:

Back:

Hope to see you there!  For more information about Friends of the Festival, go HERE.

Garret Ohm
http://www.orange-element.com

Hi all -

As part of my role as a member of the Board of Directors for the Advertising Association of Baltimore, I am chairing our annual golf tournament. This year, we mixed it up a bit. Instead of holding a golf tournament at a local country club, we decided to host a mini-golf tournament. I think it’s going to be a ton o’ fun, and since the cost of the tournament will be a whole bunch less, the cost for entry is also way lower. We hope to get a ton of people out - it’s open to everyone, so by all means, sign up HERE (or sponsor).

Here’s the promotional poster for the event, which was done right here at Orange Element by Sarah Rosenthal. Great work, Sarah!

Garret Ohm
http://www.orange-element.com/

Hi all,

As many of you know, last night was Orange Element’s 5th Anniversary party at Kiss Cafe in Baltimore.  It was a celebration of all of the great people that have played a part of our success over the years.  The turnout was great and it appeared that everyone had a REALLY great time. The pictures are starting to roll in, so here are a few:

Setup

Orange table settings

Front door signage

Yes, that is orange cheesecake

Lots of people!

Must have been something over there…

Emmy wearing the Purple Tooth shirt!

Caroline and EJ

The silly string incident

Entrance area

Dave Stock and Andy, eating…

Bird’s-eye

I’m so embarrassed…gang signs?

EJ, Andy Bonner and I

Rache from Tilt and Jess

Orange flowers, and me sniffing them

Jess, Rachael, Garret

Myself and EJ

I promise I didn’t drink that much…I was just really happy

Ande and Dan

Garret Ohm
http://www.orange-element.com/

Aaron and I were invited by our good friends at The Brick Companies to attend the sponsor’s dinner for the Akridge Save The Bay Classic to benefit the Chesapeake Bay Foundation. It was an absolutely amazing event, held at the Phillip Merrill Environmental Center, which is the headquarters location for the Chesapeake Bay Foundation. It’s just an amazing building that has set the standard for sustainable workplaces with features like geothermal walls, natural ventilation, solar panels, insulated panels, rooftop barrels, composting toilets, a bioretention system, and even more. I’ve never seen anything quite like it.

This is the inaugural Save The Bay Classic, but by the looks of the event last night you would never know. The presentation was amazing, and I really learned some great things about the efforts many organizations are making to do sustainable business. Among the speakers was Will Baker, the executive director of the CBF, Ed Allenby, the director of development of the CBF, an executive from Akridge, Ron Dodson, the founder of Audobon International and Lex Birney, the CEO of The Brick Companies.

Each of these folks had a lot of great things to say, both about the role the Chesapeake Bay Foundation is playing in saving the national treasure that is the Bay, as well as how important this golf tournament is in that effort–both in raising money, but as Will Baker said it also helps to spread the word of their cause out into the public. And it’s amazingly fitting that they chose Queenstown Harbor as a location for the tournament. That is, after all one of the most sustainable golf courses in this region. It has also recently been certified by Audobon International as a cooperative sanctuary.

Unfortunately Aaron and I couldn’t be there for the tournament today due to other commitments, but we’re definitely going to play next year. Actually, if all goes well, we could even be helping CBF with their tournament marketing materials and more next year! After all, they ARE one of our dream clients!

Garret Ohm
www.orange-element.com

*Photo courtesy of the CBF Web site.

Yesterday was a really exciting day for our crew at Orange Element. It was the inaugural monthly Font Hour. Font Hour was an idea of Aaron’s in which we each vote on a Font that we’d like to see added to our collection.

Each team member was asked to bring an idea for a font they’d like, including information on the typeface designer, origin, context, display set, pairings, cost, etc. At the end, a vote was held and the winning typeface was chosen: Freight Micro by Joshua Darden. You can read all about Freight Micro HERE. It’s going to make a great addition to our collection and should really enhance some of the designs we are able to produce here in our design studio.

As is the case with many inaugural events, we did have one new rule added to the mix mid-event. We decided that typefaces that we all love of that are under $25 are eligible for purchase in addition to the winning typeface. Such was the case for 58 Rodeo from Baseline Fonts. You can read about it HERE.

The highlights of the other contenders for this month’s Font Hour included:

Herald Gothic
FF Meta Serif
P22 Underground

Here’s what the scene looked like yesterday:

Stay tuned for next month’s font hour recap.

Garret Ohm
www.orange-element.com

I have recently signed up for Bloggers Unite, which is an effort by all bloggers to draw attention to human rights issues at the same time. Here’s a description from their Web site:

While the words might change from country to country and are sometimes taken for granted, human rights represent one of the universally agreed upon ideas - that all people are born with basic rights and freedoms that include life, liberty, and justice. This year marks the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by the United Nations.

Bloggers Unite For Human Rights challenges bloggers everywhere to help elevate human rights by drawing attention to the challenges and successes of human rights issues on May 15. What those topics may include - the wrongful imprisonment of journalists covering assemblies, governments that ignore the plight of citizens, and censorship of the Internet. What is important is that on one day, thousands of bloggers unite and share their unified support of human rights everywhere.

Please visit the site and sign up to join me.

Garret Ohm
www.orange-element.com