Big Business Design for the Small Business Client

 
Fantastic Realities Studio is a small, boutique, graphics and web design studio specializing in providing world-class Art, Graphic and Web Design services to the small business community.

KURT E. GRIFFITH - Creative Director

Owner and Creative Director Kurt Griffith is a veteran Art Director, Graphic & Web Designer, Illustrator, and Design Consultant. A Skilled, experienced and versatile graphics professional with over 40 years (holy cats!) of experience in print and web design, illustration, publishing, marketing, promotions, branding, business identity, photography, audio, video, and print production. He has produced projects ranging from brochures, logos, magazine designs, book illustrations, to media kits and web sites. This broad range of design and technical skills and flexible stylistic approach enables him to execute client’s projects from concept to finished production art ready for print or deployment online.

Over the years, as the design world grows ever more technological, he has embraced consulting and educating our clients about design processes and graphics technology as a vital part of our provided services. We Translate! We speak English to you, and the appropriate dialect of geek or tech to vendors and technicians as needed to get your project done.

We take great pride in working closely with our clients to execute their projects with craftsmanship, professionalism, and personal attention.

 

In 2014, we moved from Rockland County New York, into new quarters in Berkeley Springs, West Virgina in the Eastern Panhandle, also serving Matrinsburg, Hagerstown, Frederick, Winchester, South Central PA, the Baltimore/DC area. We continue to serve our clients in the New York City, Rockland County and the New York, New Jersey, Connecticut Tri-state region. Find out about what brought us here.

And for that matter, anywhere with an Internet connection. One of the joys of the digital age. So long as I have a roof, electricity and and broadband Internet connection – we can serve you wherever you are. One of the effects of the COVID-19 Emergency is that businesses aroind the world heve been exporting the possibilitiues of working remotely in expanded and innovative ways.

COVID-19 STATUS -

March 2023 – Fantastic Realities Studio managed to remain in operation throughout the emergency. As a home-based business, so long as we have a roof, power, and remain connected to the ‘Net, we can work and continue to serve your graphics and design needs. We also have the capability to conduct virtual meetings online via Zoom, Facetime, or Google Hangouts. Just contact us if you‘d like us to help you set something up. For in-person meetings, our household has been vaccinated and Boosted so I can go out and interact with people.

While the Pandemic Emergency might be over according to politicians, the virus itself certainly seems to have other ideas - stubbornly lingering and continuing to... um, plague us. None the less, we now seem to be able to cope better and somehow live with this thing. Seems to have settled to a Public Health “pay attention” item, but no longer a crisis level thing. Continue to stay safe out there, care for each other, stay healthy, and please be careful where appropriate.

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We’re Trying a Thing

Web Page Accdessibility for disabled persons your Web Site might not be on your radar as a potential exposure to liability. But ADA Compliance is a thing, and companies have been served with substantial lawsuits over Web Site Accessibility. Until very recently, the cost of recoding a web site into compliance was prohibitively costly except for the lagest companies, with deep pockets for specialist website developers.

FRS has partnered with a AccessiBe, a technology company specializeing in Accessiblity and Compliance, and their AI-assisted technology can be added to an exitsing site with a few lines of code at a much more affordabe subscription cost. You may note the small blue access button in the bottm left of the page - try it out! It's really quite remarkable. I was able to install the code in less than half an hour on the site and blog. 

Please Contact Us if this is of interest to your company and online presence.

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And Another Thing...

I’ve gotten the Online Store up and running on the Studio Blog. I’ve been working on getting A is for Art: the Digital Restoration into print on Lulu for on and off two years, and finally have a finished version completed and now available for sale. We did have to tidy up some technical difficulties connecting to the Lulu Direct service and some print issues. You can read about that saga in this Blog Post and this one. To be sure, it doesn come with the territory. But we did get it all sorted.

We now have the book up for sale, and it’s pretty nice. The Online Store is up and running, everything’s working, and you can get the book here as a print-on-demand title from the good folks at Lulu.

A is for Art: The Digital Restoration , Print edition
36 Pages, Hardbound. $19.95 from FRS

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(Not So) Sekrit N1nj4 Project

Having been at this for over 35 40 years as a professional creative, I've been putting together a (not so) sekrit project that takes a look back at a long career as a Creative professional. A first incarnation manifested in 2017, and I re-released a 2nd edition this year. But I’m still working on a version I’m happier with. Of course this is a “free time” (what’s that?) project. Still have to keep the lights on and buy groceries – Kurt.

How the first phases of the project took shape – read an update here.
There’s a follow-up update here – 9 July 2022.

A more affordable softcover version of the 2017 Design Retrospective is now available as a Print-on-Demand title from Lulu.

Fantastic Realities: A Life In Art & Design, 2nd edition
50 Pages, Trade Paperback. $19.95 from FRS

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Site Updates

Welcome to our ever evolving (bet you’ve heard that before) Home Page – well considering the past couple of years, make that inconsistiently revised. This latest face-lift, like the previous, was long overdue. While we’ve been steadily improving both our design and technical skills with our client's projects, with the moving target that is web design – we haven’t taken the time with our own. Check out the old site, or previous versions of some of our old home pages, or even this one, they were all so very 2000’s-era. Seriously – 640 pixels wide for 13" monitors, complete with font tags and table based layouts. Still, was pretty kickin’ for the 2000’s.

But definitely time to bring some proper HTML3 HTML5/CSS stylin’. In his huge free time We have updated most of the interior pages and retiring a lot of the old looks. We are also updating the gallery with entirely new tech and more recent projects.

Obviously, a work in progress. But thank the gods, finally in progress.

Of COURSE we needed to make the site RESPONSIVE, too. Imagine that.... Absolutely under way. You may note that this page doesn’t look all that different. it doesn’t, but it’s now coded in the Bootstrap 4 Framework and is now responsive and mobile friendly, along with other subtle updates, including a logo re-design, also in progress. Yes, just to make it all the more fun, in the middle of all this, Kurt got a crazed notion to re-design the studio logo. Madman! Right... Designer. Never mind.

Before anyone gets queasy about that, I’ve been making client sites mobile responsive for the past few years, but yes, certainly needed to do it here. We’re now up to HTML5/CSS3/JQuery tech... web tech is certainly a moving target in this day and age, and for the foressable future.

Now then, about that %$#@&$%@ Adobe Creative Suite Creative Cloud (!$) upgrade...

 

We will ART THE HELL OUT SOME STUFF for you!

Interesting Stuff

Please Read our Studio Blog - Graphics, Design, Tech, Musings and Rants. Updated Randomly.

Available from FRS:
FANTSASTIC REALITIES - A Life In Art & Design A softbound edition of my 2017 Design Retrospective

Available from FRS:
A Rockland Fall, A chronicle of Digital Photography.

For the artsy ’toon fans – 
A is for ART, an Artist's Primer - a Digital Restoration
Hardcover Print Edition Now Available from FRS - A blast from the past brought back to life.

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We do have a FRS Facebook Page with the oceassional clever post. But we’re NOT using FB’s bandwidth-eating, data-sucking Page Plugin. Nor do we mine your personal data with FB ads. Eat my shorts, you criminals.

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NETWORK NEUTRALITY

If you would like to learn more about 'Net Neutrality, CLICK HERE. You can also visit: www.itsournet.org