Designing something always makes me happy, especially when beginning to learn the usage of graphic editors such as Corel Draw. Since 1992 I regularly fall over little tasks such as creating birthday cards, invitations, poster, logos, banners, etc. Over the years I have worked with several different programs besides Corel Draw, such as Jasc Paint Shop Pro, Adobe Photo Shop, Adobe Light Room, Power Point, Infranview, and other small freeware. Whatever program is available in the moment of need, I learn to use it somewhat.
Making business cards I especially enjoy. The first one I created as a member of the European Student Association AEGEE. As far as I remember I even created them for other members of my working group. Before heading on to my African journey, I designed business or rather visiting cards each for myself and Augustas. This way it always felt easy to part from friends and other wonderful people I met.
During my recent journey through the world I decided to create a logo because I wished to have something that symbolizes this spectacular experience in my life in one image. I began scribbling in my notebook, coming up with following sketch after many trials. With the help of Jasc Paint Shop Pro I managed to put it in digital form, ready to be printed on any material.
I had several versions of it, depending on the purpose (books, t-shirts, website, business cards) – and the background required (black, white). For the making of our visiting card I included the name of our website, and after lots of fiddling I came up with this design for our “business card”.
For the first 1,5 years of our journey we were dealing with my self-printed postcard in the attempt to say thank you to our drivers. When we got out of the car we would quickly get the postcard out of our backpack, and add a personal Thank You! message and our contact details before handing it over. During hitch-hiking, especially when leaving the car, time is sparse. We usually need to be quick to avoid traffic jams or other uncomfortable situations for our drivers. That’s why we later came up with the idea for our own “business card”. It was a good move for it cheers up our drivers, inspires them to follow their dreams, and makes them remember us with a smile. And some drivers might even have great fun with the fact that also hitch-hikers have business, well, visiting cards.