I knew pretty early in life that I would pursue a career in something related to visual art. Whether it was drawing banners or building crafts as a kid, I was always pretty artsy-fartsy. I identified and thrived in this area because I was exposed to it and given the opportunity in school and at home to be as artistic as I could. I was lucky. Not every kid has those opportunities.
Research shows the arts offer benefits far beyond creativity — they increase productivity and focus, they boost confidence, teach problem-solving and so much more. Regardless of their benefits, budgets and curriculums in our public schools make it difficult for our children to be exposed to visual and performing art.
So when our team started thinking about what local organizations we wanted to support this holiday season it was only natural that I thought of something that has had an impact on me personally. I’ve had the pleasure of working hand in hand with Arts in Education NEPA, a partnership organization of The Pennsylvania Council on the Arts and NEIU 19. Their mission is to advocates for arts education in schools and communities. They administer quality learning experiences in the performing and visual arts.
The most widely known AIE NEPA program, Arts Alive, is celebrating their 26th year this summer. Arts Alive pairs professional working artists and students in grades K-12 for four intensive weeks each summer. And the outcome is nothing short of remarkable. They create a safe space where no one feels like an outsider and anything is possible. Students self-esteem skyrockets and the boost in confidence trickles through all of their studies improving their grades and attitudes with lifelong lessons they will take with them throughout the year.
What’s even more remarkable is the effect these programs have on children with more serious needs. I’ve personally met autistic children who entered the program as a nonverbal student and have found their voice through Arts Alive… literally and figuratively.
Support of AIE NEPA provides scholarships and transportation to students that otherwise wouldn’t have access to quality educational art programs.
Show your support for the arts and build a virtual gingerbread house for AIE NEPA!
Join the Posture House Party now through December 31st and share your house on social media with #PostureHouseParty to vote for AIE NEPA as the winner of our grand prize — a cash donation plus design and digital support totaling $5,000!
Our Pocono Waters is dedicated to protecting the exceptional value streams of the Pocono area. What’s an exceptional value stream? I’m glad you asked. An exceptional value stream is a classification given to streams that have the cleanest and highest quality of water. In the Pocono’s region, we have over 80% of the state’s exceptional value streams, and a lot of the streams are threatened by bad environmental practices. Our Pocono Waters wants to help protect these streams.
Our Pocono Waters is also important to me personally too. I grew up out in the woods messing around, falling in streams, building forts. Now, I spend a lot of my free time outside fishing or hiking around these same beautiful streams and outdoor spaces.
They’re a source of endless inspiration and relief when nothing else suffices. You really can’t beat standing in the middle of a stream with a fly rod in your hand. It’s a magical feeling hearing and feeling the stream flow around you. When you’re out there like that, you start to get a sense of how important a small stream can be to the local environment and the people around it. Pristine beauty like the streams of the Poconos need to be protected for generations ahead of us to experience. I’d hate to think of a future where kids couldn’t spend their time alongside a babbling brook. If you want to learn more about their organization visit ourpoconowaters.org
Support the protection of a local resource by
building a house for Our Pocono Waters
Join the Posture House Party now through December 31st and share your house on social media
using #posturehouseparty to vote for Our Pocono Waters
as the winner of our grand prize — a cash donation plus design and digital support totaling $5,000!
The Posture elves have been busy working on something really fun for this holiday season — we’re having a house party, and you’re invited! No need for a covered dish or party clothes, you can join in the fun right from your couch if you like.
The Posture House Party is an interactive gingerbread house building extravaganza!
We’re asking our friends, families, clients and the community to build their own digital gingerbread house and share their holiday creation on social media. But what’s even better is each house built will be a vote for one of our favorite non-profits. The organization with the most houses shared in their honor will be awarded a cash prize and a boatload of our time for their design, web, and digital content needs — all totaling $5,000!
As a chill comes blowing in the door, and our Posture orange begins to look a little more decorative, we’re getting pumped for the Halloween season with some inspiration from far away places. Give a little look-see, maybe something will catch your eye.
Photo courtesy of A-Way-To-Go
Posture’s Favorite Trippy Virtual Reality Experience: A Way to Go
A Way to Go is a walk in the woods. It is an astonishing interactive experience, a restless panorama, a mixture of hand-made animation, 360˚ video capture, music and dreaming and code; but mostly it is a walk in the woods, c’mon. Created by Vincent Morisset, Philippe Lambert, Édouard Lanctôt-Benoit & Caroline Robert (AATOAA). Produced by the NFB & France TV.
Doug’s Album: Alkaline Trio’s “Is This Thing Cursed?”
The new alkaline trio album may be one of their strongest releases in about 10 years, I’m loving it so much. They have spooky lyrics so that counts right?
A fantastical retelling of P.T. Barnum’s story from rags to riches. The musical adaptation creates a wonderful world of carnival inspired songs with a heartfelt message.
This week I’m inspired by “The Shape of Water” I just saw that movie this weekend and there are just so many things that are hauntingly beautiful about it. The grimy scenes set in 1950’s Baltimore along with the vintage music compliment each other perfectly. Parts of it are actually very reminiscent of the Bioshock games. Also, it IS described as part love story, part monster movie so……kinda on Halloween theme there?
Castle Rock is an odd TV Show on Hulu about a small town that is supposedly haunted. The series is actually based on several of Stephen King’s novels like ‘Kujo,” and ‘The Body,’ more aptly know by its film adaptation: ‘Stand By Me.’ The town’s inhabitants struggle with their history and a boy who appears out of the jail’s basement. Through a series of mind-boggling time jumps and odd bits of storytelling, you’re left with a mystery to solve.
Want to learn more about Posture Team? Check out our About Us page.
In the Google-plex universe of the internet terms like SEO, API, and algorithm are thrown around, but what does it all mean and why is that important to you as a customer?
Internet jargon is all the rage nowadays, but it’s shrouded in mysterious overtones. In the Google-plex universe of the internet terms like SEO, API, and algorithm are thrown around, but what does it all mean and why is that important to you as a customer? First, it should be noted what SEO stands for: Search Engine Optimization.Put simply: SEO is the underlying system that helps search engines create relevant results on websites likeGoogle.com. Even that sounds vague and very intangible, though. It becomes a lot easier to understand when you think about it in terms of physical objects.
So let’s imagine the whole internet is in a library, and all the books within the library are the websites that inhabit them. These books have images, text, and tons of info within them that are managed by the Dewey Decimal System. When you look for a book at a library, the librarian can look up the book on their computer or uses the Dewey Decimal System, which is a system created to organize books by their subject. When it comes to the internet, you have Search Engines like Google or Bing instead of a librarian. Rather than using numbers to find your website, like the Dewey Decimal System, these search engines use metadata. Metadata is the information that defines what kind of topics are within websites. Meta is a Greek derived term meaning “beside” or “alongside.” So its all the data that naturally appears alongside a website as its developed that gives it content
All of this content has to be logged and indexed in search engines like a book would if it were to show up in the dewey decimal system.
…its all the data that naturally appears alongside a website as its developed that gives it content
Best practices these days consist of someone combing through and editing the metadata to correctly inform the Search Engines what all the content is, or the search engine will define it however it sees fit (or sometimes not a all). So it’s important to have someone go through and make sure the content throughout the website is correctly formatted to communicate with the Search Engine effectively to show relevant results for the customer.
You might be thinking: why do I need someone else to do that for me? First, you might need to edit direct HTML in the websites code. It’s not impossible, but can sometimes be risky, frustrating, and time consuming. Someone who is intimately involved with websites can do this more quickly and efficiently. Secondly, there are ethical guidelines for the internet’s metadata. Back when Google started out, you could simply trick the search engine into bringing your results up first by jamming a bunch of keywords into your metadata (known now as black hat SEO and VERY much frowned upon). This meant your end user might get unrelated results because someone packed their website with poor quality metadata.
Google is a little bit more complicated now, and uses an algorithm that actually tries to get around these SEO tricks that manipulate the search engines. Google actually encourages people to report improper use of SEO, so its important to keep your metadata ethical and full of truthful and quality information.
Have any questions or need help with your SEO, drop us a line: Contact Posture
Throughout the week things get hectic. There are plenty of deadlines to meet and new projects to start. Keeping ourselves creatively fueled is one of the hardest, and most important aspects of any job in the creative industry. Work pulls from your creative inkwell, and you have to make sure to keep it filled. Let’s take a look at what Posture’s team has been using to keep themselves inspired and creatively active.
Pixar’s recent movie is about a boy whose family forbids music in their household. The story follows him and his dog as they trek through otherworldly dimensions to get permission from deceased family so that he can play music again. Pixar weaves a carefully constructed story with beautifully rendered characters, worlds, and creatures to give the viewer an immersive glimpse into other cultures and the age-old themes of family and tradition. All of that is great and all, but we really loved it cause it gave us a good cry, and who doesn’t need one of those once in awhile?
Doug’s Book: Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan
A San Fran ex-techy can’t find a job and ends up taking a night shift as a bookclerk. There seem to be some secrets to his mysterious boss and his strange bookstore.
I’m really getting into the second season of Netflix’s series “Glow” this week. The bright colors on both the clothing and in neon combined with the larger-than-life hairstyles and classic 80’s tunes definitely engulfs you in nostalgia. But I’m also pulling a lot of inspiration from the nostalgia, playing with some brighter color palettes and enjoying some great throwback jams while at work. I may have been born at the tail-end of the 80’s, but I still friggin’ love them. <3
I love creepy movies and books, and this one sets a high bar that a ton of other series take from. It’s your classic end-of-the-world situation: the government accidentally releases a “superflu” that quickly devastates a majority of the world. As the book progresses, groups form and need to compete for survival. The twist is Stephen King’s unique character creation and development. You find yourself sympathizing with them when you least expect it.
Want to learn more about Posture Team? Check out our About Us page.
Posture is happy to have so many wonderful interns come through our doors. We also are really glad when they return to intern with us several times so we can help them grow and watch them progress through their school careers. We’d like to introduce you to our intern and graphic design student at Kutztown University, Emily Rudolph.
Where are you from?
Born and Raised in Scranton, PA.
What inspired you to study Graphic Design?
I wanted to go into art with some kind of structure that has a goal in mind, and less of a vague idea.
What’s the best thing so far about going to school in Kutztown
I like that their design program covers tons of subjects like Interactive, Branding, and Illustration. There are some old professors and some young ones, the mix is helpful and you have more choices when it comes to classes to take.
What is the most interesting project/client you’ve worked on at Posture Interactive?
Working with the Everhart Musuem brand. It was the first thing that felt serious, because it was entirely in my hands. It wasn’t just a project anymore. Also, I got to work with all parts of it the mailers, the logo, EVERYTHING. Now I get to see it launch too. It’s nice seeing the museum, I saw as a little girl, getting an upgrade.
What is the biggest piece of advice or working skill you’ll take with you from your intern experience here?
Multitasking for sure. Prioritizing and setting important time aside for specific tasks and being able to juggle tasks. In school things are so much more open ended for your timeframe, but here you have to get things in on time and budget the time right so you can keep on schedule.
What would you tell fellow students who haven’t had an internship yet?
Do it. Go get yourself an internship, you need all the experience you get and while your in school its all low stakes on your part. You get to take a lot away from it and you don’t have to be afraid of messing up. Messing up is part of the process. The businesses usually understand you’re a student.
What is your ideal design project (logo, package design, print, web design…)?
We did a magazine in school, start to finish, and I loved the editorial parts and formatting everything. That would probably be it.
Illustrator, InDesign, or Photoshop?
Illustrator, that’s what we learn the most.
Cats or dogs?
Dogs, I would be reincarnated as a lab.
Is Manning’s Ice Cream the best ice cream around or what?
I don’t get ice cream, if I do: Chocolate fudge brownie is good, but only on occasion.
True of false: Mat lives in the back closet and sleeps under his desk.
Not these days much. If someone told me that was true, I wouldn’t be surprised.
As we celebrate our independence, we couldn’t help but think a bit on this summer’s changes in rules regarding a “free” internet. On June 11, when net neutrality officially expired, and we were trying to find the latest updates , Google suggested: “How does that affect you?” Well, Google, net neutrality affects everyone. it’s just that the internet is so populated with news sources reporting different aspects, that the “how” gets drowned out. It seems no one knows what to make of it.
Here at Posture, we are most interested in what it means for us as a team and the clients we serve. Will it slow traffic to the web applications we create? How will we know? Will it limit people’s access? How will clients need to evolve in order to stay current with any trends or consequences that result from the Net Neutrality expiration? For the most part we don’t have definitive answers. We do however, have a hell of a lot of ideas.
The internet was created as a government program during the Cold War to bypass wired communication, in the event of an attack. Essentially, the government set up what we would call servers in order to send and receive very limited amounts of information. These bits of information would later be used to transmit scientific data, and later the servers would expand and grow to become the “World Wide Web.”
Essentially, the government set up what we would call servers in order to send and receive very limited amounts of information.
At the time of its creation, the World Wide Web was the epitome of human communication, and obviously in many ways it still is. The expiration of net neutrality marks an end of the World Wide Era in the context of information freely flowing without limit.
Now,companies and profits can be prioritized for certain levels or access to services instead of the users being free to experience any service they wish. Many companies made statements assuring customers of their loyalty to customers. It’s a hard place to be, the crux of two impasses: customer loyalty and making money.
At Posture, we want our clients to be happy, which means we provide the best possible products and services in order to fulfill their goals. We expect no less of our internet providers. We’ll keep our information on this topic free flowing as we learn more.
At Posture, we want our clients to be happy, which means we provide the best possible products and services in order to fulfill their goals.
The Fourth of July, contrary to conventional belief, is not only about burgers
It is, of course, the American holiday celebrating our break from England in 1776. At Posture, we’re celebrating by “breaking off” to enjoy the heat, family, and friends. This week has mostly been about finishing up the last minute “Fourth of July” signs, finishing touches on larger projects, and meeting up with clients to set goals. The best part about a holiday, though, is the time to regroup your thoughts and recenter your attention. Reflection and recentering is human nature on holidays, and it’s also something we strongly believe in doing inside of our office everyday.
Tuesday meetings are the most notable weekly centering and help us measure our week-to-week progression. We share our most recent ups and our notable downs. It’s important for us to keep both a hopeful eye to the future and pay careful attention to our missteps and lessons learned. These meetings help us with that. Next to those group meetings we also have individual milestone discussions with clients. Finally, there are the sporadic meet ups with each other, and if we need it, ourselves. These meetings are a lot like barbecues: they come with a casual atmosphere, and a common goal of communal communication. Although, we usually aren’t chowing down on a cheeseburger and sipping a beer; instead, we’re chowing down on thoughts and sipping creative juices (if you liked this one, get ready for even MORE burger puns to follow!)
Sometimes, there is no clear direction in these casual meetings, and that takes a bit to get used to, but it’s also the most important aspect. If you try too hard to look for creativity, good ideas have a way of avoiding you. So we talk about the project direction and brainstorm by drawing and bouncing ideas off each other freely. It’s kinda like stoking the fire of a charcoal grill, and slowly we start getting hot enough to really get cooking. Suddenly, there’s a little electricity in the air, and you can almost smell the good ideas getting all juicy and crispy. Finally, it happens, the time’s up and a creative solution reveals itself; the burger is done. Of course, we check to make sure the burger is completely “well-done,” because what’s a chef without consistency. Only after all that process do we enjoy the taste of our cooking. The creative process is a lot like a Fourth of July Barbecue: it calls for distraction, play, and most importantly communication between yourself and others.
So from all of us here at Posture Interactive: Happy Fourth of July. Get out and grill some burgers (or veggie patties, as Doug might be having) and have a beer on us.
TL;DR : Posture won some awards at the Addys, enlightenment ensues.
This past weekend our agency had a stunning experience at this year’s American Advertising Awards, the annual ceremony where creativity’s effectiveness, judged by folks we respect & recognize, is acknowledged and ultimately rewarded for excellence at the Addys 2018.
(L to R) Mat Giordano, Robert Jones, Kathryn Bondi, Tony Bartocci, Jean Carlos Cedré, Joey Zarcone, Charles Ferran. Not pictured: Kevin O’Boyle, Doug Griffiths
Now that it’s been a few days, I’ve had a bit of time to try and understand what that night signifies for our team, processing how we got here, and looking forward to where we’re headed. I apologize in advance for the windy road below and appreciate the time your eyeballs are on loan to these words….
This year’s Addy awards yielded us the type of acknowledgement that gravity sort of pushes down onto you like humid air…a blissful, nervous, overwhelming, ultimately self-conscious state of being where you aren’t sure what to do or say, how to feel or what to make of it.
We ultimately won eight awards (listed below in order of category – client – award):
Packaging Campaign – Electric City Roasting Co. Cold Label Packaging – Gold Addy Award
Branded Content Entertainment Campaign – Breaking Benjamin Social Teaser Video Campaign – Gold Addy Award
Digital Self Promotion – Posture Interactive Company Website – Gold Addy Award
Judge’s Choice – Electric City Roasting Co. Cold Label Packaging
People’s Choice – Electric City Roasting Co. Cold Label Packaging
Best in Show – Breaking Benjamin Social Teaser Video Campaign
Addys 2018 Takeaway #1 – Validation is Nice.
To a certain extent, falling into the category of recognition for anything that we put out the door makes me do a double take. Years and years ago when we formed this little strange-brew human triad of a designer, a programmer + and a business director, we had no idea how we were going to *do* anything.
We didn’t have much, but we had what we needed.
We had a strong, rapidly evolving knowledge base of core design and development beliefs and best “practices” with the chops to back it up. We had a deep, neural understanding of the need to execute the client’s vision in their best interest no matter what, and ultimately how to build the foundation of long-term, healthy business relationships.
Posture was built culture-first. I don’t care how freakishly talented some rock star developer is. If they are an asshole, I don’t want to be around them a bazillion hours a day (and I certainly don’t want to make cool shit with them). If we can we have a conversation that produces something meaningful, and the skillset is chasing close behind, we’ll gladly cultivate that mindset and grow *with* you. The rest is cake: Just don’t be a dick.
This many years later, I never dreamed I would be so fortunate to have had the opportunity to hire and surround myself with such talented people that are just…*better* than me in every sense of the word: I’m made aware & encouraged every day to be a better artist & builder & thinker, to develop more tasteful business acumen, and to strive to actually become the person I’m prone to convince myself I think I am.
I get to work and grow with these incredibly talented people every day to produce some of the most creative, challenging, and engaging solutions our clients have come to know and depend on us for.
It was only after I ran this dialogue back in my head (quite a few times) that I was able to get a grip on why people put so much weight on being validated and why it matters.
When I wrap a project, if I’m cool with it and it has met or exceeded the client’s business objectives, that’s as far as I can let myself define a “success” for our team. Taking some time the past few days to dig into how I reflect on work we complete, more often than not at some uncomfortably blistering pace, makes me think I need to be open to understanding and accepting validation more in general.
We work in an incredibly competitive, feverishly paced industry. These awards represent projects that span the breadth of our core competencies and were in some way or another touched by every single team member doing the best that they possibly could to help make our clients successful.
I realize now that these awards signify that *in addition* to meeting our client’s goals and helping write their success story, our work is being appreciated by other creative talent in our industry as well…peers that understand the hustle and what good hard work is when you see it.
If this is what feeling validated is like, sign me up all day.
Recognition is Humbling.
This speaks for itself, but we are truly humbled to have been recognized to this degree by the American Advertising Federation. A jury of fellow creatives singling out our work out of the battering ram of submissions is incredibly rewarding and we couldn’t be more grateful.
None of it really comes easy for any of us, and I’ll spare you the cliché agency nonsense masquerading as team-building or business growth …such gems as “Excellence is a habit”, or “you can’t choose which projects you go all in on or which you push through the pipe – go all in every time and be inspired!”……it’s all bullshit.
We’re a team and a family. We fight, bicker, bitch and moan. We burn ourselves out on the grandest of scales. We’re all incredibly guilty of not seeing beyond the closest Deadline o’Clock coming full throttle, but also staring it right down to not only our own mental nerve-endings but of those around us as well. It’s intense, it’s challenging, it’s relentless, and I wonder on occasion how we didn’t implode or collapse on ourselves completely by now…
Why is calling ourselves out like this so important? Humility. It’s all rooted in Posture’s commitment to getting the absolute best solution for the visions and goals that we are fortunate enough to be trusted with by our clients.
My mind loses sight of that, and we just need to remind ourselves every now and again that we are never pushing for the *wrong* solution, or the *easy* way out when it gets tough. We are pushing for the new, the best, the most abstract, the brightest…we’re pushing further.
We were recognized and rewarded for our take on the creative spirit of excellence in the art of advertising.
I can’t tell you how proud that makes me to say, and with just a smidge less self-consciousness this time around the bend.
Let’s Push Further.
We look forward to what this year may bring, having the opportunity to be pushing new boundaries, exploring new tech, creating new types of content and solutions for our clients…virtual reality, 360° video, Blockchain development…the sky is the limit, and I’m looking for 2018 to be a pretty rad year.
About the American Advertising Awards/ADDYs
Conducted annually by the American Advertising Federation (AAF), the local chapter is the first of a three-tier, national competition. Concurrently, all across the country, local entrants vie to win ADDY Awards – recognition as the very best in their markets.
All local Golds get automatically forwarded to the second tier where they compete against winners from other local clubs in one of 15 district competitions. District ADDY winners are then forwarded to the third tier, the national stage of the American Advertising Awards.
The ADDYs 2018 is the advertising industry’s largest and most representative competition, annually attracting more than 40,000 entries.
The most widely known AIE NEPA program, Arts Alive, is celebrating their 26th year this summer. Arts Alive pairs professional working artists and students in grades K-12 for four intensive weeks each summer. And the outcome is nothing short of remarkable. They create a safe space where no one feels like an outsider and anything is possible. Students self-esteem skyrockets and the boost in confidence trickles through all of their studies improving their grades and attitudes with lifelong lessons they will take with them throughout the year.
Show your support for the arts and build a virtual gingerbread house for AIE NEPA!
We’re asking our friends, families, clients and the community to build their own digital gingerbread house and share their holiday creation on social media. But what’s even better is each house built will be a vote for one of our favorite non-profits. The organization with the most houses shared in their honor will be awarded a cash prize and a boatload of our time for their design, web, and digital content needs — all totaling $5,000!
