Friday, June 28, 2019

Create your own logo using Designevo!



I was recently contacted by DesignEvo to try out their online application using a premium account.  DesignoEvo is a free online logo maker that will allow you to create customized logos for your brand or company.  It offers a large variety of templates with many different styles to choose from.  

First, you will need to create your free account and once this is completed, you can create your logo.  You can create a template by selecting from a category and then selecting a style you want.  If you are looking for a specific item, you can search the library using the search bar at the top.  This will narrow down your templates.



After you select your template, you will be prompted to enter your slogan name.  This information is optional, but I highly recommend you enter text in it.  This will help you visualize what your logo will look like. 



You will arrive at the canvas of your template.  At this screen you can add text and customize the font style, add shapes such as a badge, outline shapes, and much more, and include a transparent background or a color background.  

At the bottom of the screen is a toolbar that will allow you to change the size of the canvas, zoom in or out, include a grid to help you design your logo and alignment options.  

A feature that I liked a lot was having the ability to customize the text.  I was able to choose a color using a hex number, add special effects, such as an outline, and apply options such as opacity, thickness, color, and shadowing. Also, I had the option to format the text alignment, and apply spacing, line height, and curve of the text.  After I customized my text object, I was able to save time by copying it and using that format options for an additional object in that project.  It was super easy!  Here are a few examples that I created for The Suite Talk. 

  

I finally decided on this logo for The Suite Talk.  


Once I completed my design, I was able to save it and download it to my device.  The free account, allows you to download your logo, but it will be in low resolution.  The plus account, allows you to download your logo in high resolution and provide you with different file types.  Visit www.designevo.com/pricing.html to read more about the account types, options, and pricing.   

In conclusion, I would recommend Designevo to anyone who would like to design and customize their own brand and logo.  I didn't have any experience with this application, until I tried it out.  It was very easy to navigate and had many options and features to choose from.  I was able to create a logo, a website header banner, and a Facebook header banner in a matter of a few days.  All I did was create a new project,  change the size of the canvas, and added my information to the canvas.  However, I did find that I was not able to copy text objects from one project to another.  This would have been a helpful part of functionality to the application.   I did leave the team feedback on having the ability to do this in the future. 

If anyone uses Designevo to create a logo, please share it!  I would love to see what you created.  Have fun and enjoy!  


















Tuesday, June 18, 2019

What's the buzz about Google Science Journal?


Lately, I have been hearing a lot about Google Science Journal, so I decided to experiment with it.  There are three things you need to know about it. 




1.  It is a FREE app that can be downloaded to any mobile device or tablet.  Visit the Google Play store or the Apple store to download it.  

To use it in education, the app must be downloaded through the Google admin console and pushed out to Android enabled devices.  This can be done through the device management, Chrome, and app management settings.  When you click the + sign to add approved apps to your domain, the Google Play store will open up.  At this time, you can search for the Google Science Journal app and install it to your domain.  Once  this is completed, you will have to configure the app.  I recommend you contact your Google administrator to perform this task.






2.  The Google Science Journal app creates a folder in Google Drive called 'Science Journal'.  This is where all of the journals will be saved.  Note, you cannot open any of the journals from Drive because they are not compatible with any Drive file type.  They must be opened with the app.  


3.  Journals can document notes, measure sensors, depending upon the device, record measurements, take snapshots, and upload images to your journal.  The journal is an ongoing notepad that keeps track of your experiment freely throughout the classroom, school, or other environment.  





I recently completed an episode about this on The Suite Talk.  Here is the link to the episode for more information. The video is about 22 minutes, and I go over the interface, and talk about the features and the purpose, especially for math and science classes.






You can listen to it on your favorite podcast too.   

The Wakelet Collection of resources from my show, The Suite Talk episode 79, is embedded.  In the collection, you can find the recorded episode, show notes, and links that were referenced during the show.




I hope you find the information helpful!  If you find this information helpful, please subscribe to The Suite Talk YouTube channel.


Listen and subscribe to it on your favorite podcast too.