The Jabloo Birthday Party Pack on Zazzle

The Jabloo Crew are now part of a complete birthday party pack on Zazzle. The collection of products includes individual birthday cards from each character, a group birthday card, as well as invitations, gift tags, customizable guest cards, large signs, thank you cards and more.

Check out the Jabloo Birthday Party Pack on Zazzle!

Jabloo on MySpace

I've set up Jabloo on MySpace - myspace.com/jabloo was taken, so I went with "/jablooproductions" - hey, it works. Even weird words get snatched up pretty quickly, I suppose - and that's why I wanted to set something up now, before the full Jabloo site launches. Like the Cafe Press store (and this blog itself), it won't get much activity at this point, but it'll be up and ready to go when Jabloo is fully operational.

And hey - it's neat to see how many different artists there are on MySpace doing music for kids. That's sure to come in handy down the road.

*edit: I've actually set up a second profile, just for Jabloo's music - just so I could add the theme song to the main Jabloo MySpace. So now, two MySpace Jabloo's... for you.

Inspiration Source: Free Prize Inside

I admit that I have serious doubts when I hear people attribute the significant achievements in their lives to one single element - a moment, a comment, a work of art - but I suppose I have to give in to the fact that direct inspirations like that do happen from time to time.

Free Prize Inside by Seth Godin was that kind of direct inspiration for me - not merely inspirational in conceptualizing Jabloo, but in executing it. I read the book over the course of a few days (it's pretty short), and as I was taking in Seth's ideas, I felt my own big idea brewing. At the same time, the topics he covers - creativity, innovation, being brave and bold, planning and execution - were helping me to fortify myself and my idea for the time when I'd let it out into the world.

The morsels that Seth dishes out in the book are still rolling around in my head more than a year later, and have helped me keep my project on course when the path has become shaky. Seth is known as a marketer, an author, a blogger, a consultant and an entrepreneur - but to me, his most valuable role is that of a protector of creativity and innovation. Since reading Free Prize Inside, I've purchased copies for several people. I have no doubt that five or ten years from now, a bunch of Seth-inspired projects will be out there, making the world a better and more interesting place. Here's one of my favorite quotes from the man himself:

"99% of the time, in my experience, the hard part about creativity isn't coming up with something no one has ever thought of before. The hard part is actually executing the thing you've thought of. The devil doesn't need an advocate. The brave need supporters, not critics."

- Seth Godin

Getting the Gear

I'm in the midst of technical development for Jabloo at this point, and I realize that I may be practicing purchase avoidance. This week I've acquired:

• The GarageBand Orchestral Jam Pack, because I feel a lot of the music for Jabloo will be lush and classical, and so I wanted to expand the capabilities of GarageBand to accommodate those sounds

• iLife '08 - solely to update GarageBand (I'm especially liking the multi-take feature)

• an M-Audio Key Rig 25 - tiny MIDI keyboard controller, but just the size I need for my office - I have two other M-Audio MIDI keyboard controllers, but they're set up in my audio recording studio downstairs - I needed something extremely compact for my office, for quick song-sketching, and this product is perfect

• a small keyboard stool, which I'm actually using to hold the Key Rig

My conclusion from all of this: the music for Jabloo is very important to me - which is no surprise. But a bigger part of the music purchases surely comes from the fact that developing the music is a very fast, satisfying way to make progress on the project, and it not only boosts my confidence in completing all the little pieces of the project, but it always helps refine my thoughts about the characters and the overall moods I'm trying to create for Jabloo.

Plus, of course - it's always fun to get new toys.

Online Store - Open For Business

In the spirit of putting the cart before the horse, I've set up The Jabloo Online Store on CafePress. It's nice to see the collected items – especially the individual characters' products. I bought a couple items myself, which felt kind of weird, admittedly. It was very easy to set up the shop, and even easier to add - and keep adding - products.

I set up a Flash header with the animated character heads - users can click each character to see their individual merchandise, and the Jabloo logo goes to the general merchandise featuring all five characters. Fun.

Alpha Site - Up and Running

After more than a year of development, I've finally placed a very simple Alpha version of Jabloo online. It's just the basics - a character overview - but it is phase one. Next will come a functional Beta version of the site, revealing the full concept. Soon... soon.

So, if anyone is reading this blog at this very early stage, check out Jabloo - Phase 1.

"The Camp Out" Closing Music

When I began writing the first Jabloo cartoon, "The Camp Out", I knew I wanted the incidental music at the end of the episode to be slow and soothing – typical kids' sleepytime music. The piece needed to be more serious than the lively theme song. So, this weekend I opened GarageBand and just started plunking down notes. Within about an hour, I had the song down, and after a couple more hours' tweaking I'm really happy with the end result. It's got the warm, cozy, childlike feeling I wanted.

Here it is - it's nice when something comes out effortlessly and exceeds your hopes. I wish that happened more often, but hey – I'm grateful that it happens at all.