Amusing stories & views by us
To blog, or not to blog, that is the question. Through these musings, we hope to give you a better sense of who we are, what we believe in, and share our (design) perspective. Below, explore our creative opinion pieces and discover design tips and tricks to use in your daily life.
2024-04-22 Design thinking
Why a beginner’s mindset is key in design
Back to beginner Over the past few years, the team at Initiate has actively embraced and encouraged what is commonly known as the beginner’s mindset. We’ve come to recognize the value of promoting open-ended learning, and have integrated it into our approach to our own operations and developing client work. This mindset is not only […]
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2024-04-16 Culture Industry insights
From student to mentor: the other side of the fence
As a 2021 graduate of this program, I have only been in the industry full-time for about 2.5 years. The imposter syndrome came in hot — thoughts like “I don’t have enough experience,” “I’m not going to give good advice,” and “I don’t know what I’m going to say” raced through my mind. Not to […]
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2024-04-09 Leadership
Mi diseño es su diseño
Picture this, Ottawa, 2008… Rewinding to 2008, I departed from a comfortable position at a small agency with a vision: to create a career, and potentially an agency, that mirrored my design aesthetic and cultural values while enriching my life experiences. With this ambition, I embarked on my journey. The inception of Initiate was relatively […]
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2024-04-02 Leadership
Birds do it; bees do it, and even creatives can do it
In November, I attended DesignThinkers 2023, a design conference put on by the Association of Registered Graphic Designers (RGD) in Toronto. I was thrilled to discover that Chris Do, an Emmy award-winning designer from the US, was the Keynote Speaker and would talk about selling. I had stumbled upon Chris’s work a year earlier, particularly […]
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2024-03-29 Design thinking
Designer spotlight: Morgan’s creative process
Can you share a pivotal moment or experience in your life that ignited your passion for design? How has that influenced your creative journey since then? It’s hard to pinpoint exactly what may have flipped the switch towards design in my life. I was the kid using MS Paint or KidPix to create tickets, invitations, […]
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2024-03-26 Design thinking
What I’ve learned in my first 6 months working at Initiate Marketing
1. “Export for Screens” in Illustrator allows for faster logo packaging When creating a logo pack for a client, you can save time by exporting multiple versions of the file at once. Choose File>Export>Export for Screens… Once there, click “Add Scale” to select the format and scale of the export. This allows you to export […]
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2024-03-19
Propel video series
Tourism and hospitality had been decimated by the pandemic, and Tourism HR Canada’s Propel Student Work Placement Program was poised to help the industry start down the road toward recovery. They came to us in late 2021 to create some videos to promote the program. There was one part of the project that presented us […]
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2024-03-12 B2B high tech Culture
My move into trade show design
Before Initiate, I had very little real-life experience designing for print from scratch. At a previous print production job, I was using templated sizes for documents, and nothing was larger than 12×18 inches. The company itself was the client since we were designing our own products, and I was sending my files to the senior […]
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2024-03-05 Culture Design thinking
HOW did I end up here? Or, my first-ever industry conference
Diving straight into the deep end After a trip into Academia to study film in university followed by 15 years in the hospitality industry, it was time for a change. I completed my Advanced Diploma in Graphic Design at Algonquin College this past year. I did my final semester’s work placement with Initiate and was […]
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2024-02-19 Leadership
Before quiet quitting, there was just… quitting
In June 2020, I quit my job and left an industry I had known for over twenty years. The idea had been percolating for months, but I took the world coming to a stop as a sign from the universe that some changes needed to happen. So quit I did. With quiet quitting getting so […]
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