TODO Magazine Issue 3

THE THIRD ISSUE The magazine for creative freelancers and small businesses in Brighton & Hove

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Brighton Fuse:

WHAT IS A DIVIDEND?

Creative Business

magazine THE THIRD ISSUE The magazine for creative freelancers and small businesses in Brighton & Hove

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DSLR FILMMAKING

Tally & Hoe:

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BRIGHTON’S BEST HANG OUTS

MUSIC: EARTH

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Freelance Jewellery Maker

Brought to you by NLD Accountancy

Welcome

You are working for yourself and you are always on the go. You get up every morning, ready to get to work and make things happen, and make sure your business keeps running. You are in charge of your work and you love it. As we always reassure ourselves, running a business is challenging but it’s possible. It demands certain mental and physical disciplines which can be cultivated and deployed easily enough by some, not so readily by others.

We hope you appreciate the contributions to this issue as much as we do. Special thanks to The Werks and Wired Sussex for supporting our magazine in many ways. Wired Sussex events are highly recommended for anyone wishing to share with and learn from others how to stay successful as a freelancer.

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Interview:

FUTURLAB:

Successful Freelance

Local Games Company

Managing Director/Editor Nilden Ozkan todo@nldaccountancy.com

ART DIRECTION, ILLUSTRATION AND DESIGN Phil Wellington info@ilovenewwork.co.uk

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CONTRIBUTING WRITERS

BRIGHTON FARM:

THE RECENTLY AVAILABLE:

PUBLISHER

Introducing

New office spaces

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Rob Beattie, Dan Childs, FreeAgent, Andy Friend, Helen Keevy, Leif Kendal, Anna Kolasinska, James Marsden, John Shann, George Voss, Simon Wilkinson.

NLD Accountancy Limited www.nldaccountancy.com

SPONSORED BY

SPECIAL THANKS TO

A HEALTHY INVESTMENT P24-25 WIRED SUSSEX P27

ABOUT NLD ACCOUNTANCY Free Accountancy and Tax clinic

TO ADVERTISE, OR SUBMIT AN ARTICLE

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TO ENQUIRE ABOUT ACCOUNTANCY SERVICES

todo@nldaccountancy.com info@nldaccountancy.com Š 2012 TODO Magazine / NLD Accountancy Limited All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in whole or part without permission from the publisher. The views expressed in TODO Magazine are those of the individual contributors and are not necessarily shared

by TODO Magazine / xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx NLD Accountancy Limited.

CONTACT

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IMAGE: flickr.com/photos/matski_98/

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BRIGHTONFuse Brighton Fuse is a research project aiming to get to grips with what the creative and digital cluster of companies looks like in Brighton and Hove, and how the fusion of arts and technology happens in the city.

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t’s a two-year project which runs until April 2013, carried out by Brighton University, Sussex University, the Council for Industry and Higher Education, and Wired Sussex, and funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council. It’s very exciting, and pretty full-on. I’m one of the researchers on the project, based at the Faculty of Arts at Grand Parade, and have been conducting interviews with a number of people in the city about what they think is going on. One of those interviews was with Nilden Ozkan of NLD Accountancy who kindly gave up an hour of her time on a gloriously sunny day at the end of March to talk to me about her work.

background in Brighton, how and why she set up NLD Accountancy, and where she’s planning to take the business next.

I was interested in speaking to Nilden for a number of reasons. Firstly, as the founder of an accountancy firm that works predominantly with freelancers and small businesses in Brighton and Hove, she had an interesting perspective on the ways that those businesses work in the city. As well as being an accountant Nilden is also an artist who has exhibited her work at Café Délice, so I was also interested in hearing about how she balanced those parts of her life and whether her art has influenced her accountancy and vice versa. We had a really useful conversation that covered a huge amount of things including Nilden’s

We really want Brighton Fuse to create valuable research that is relevant to people in and around the city, not just gathering dust in academic journals. If you’re interested in knowing more about the project or would like to share your perspective on the Brighton and Hove digital cluster, please do get in touch, we’d love to hear from you.

We’ve got a lot going on in the next couple of months. In late spring, we’ll be distributing a survey to the Wired Sussex members to find out more about them and asking questions about the ways that they work, the types of innovations they produce, and what challenges there are to growth. We’ll also be looking at how and where the different festivals in the city – Brighton Festival, Brighton Fringe, Open Houses, and the Brighton Digital Festival – bring together technology and the arts.

CONTACT George Voss g.s.voss@brighton.ac.uk www.brightonfuse.com

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What is a

dividend?

Dividends are sums of money that limited companies pay out to people who own shares in the company. These people are called shareholders.

If your business is a sole trader or partnership, it can’t pay dividends.

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t’s important to remember that if you, as boss, are an employee of your company, the money the company earns doesn’t all belong to you personally. That applies even if you’re the only director and only shareholder in the company. The money the company receives in sales revenue belongs to the company, and there are only three ways you can take money out of the company.

One is for it to pay you a salary for the work you do as an employee or director. The second is for it to pay you a dividend on the shares that you own in the company. And the third way is for it to pay you back money that it owes you.

That’s it. There are no other legitimate ways for the company to pay you money.

What if the company pays me too much?

If you take out more than you’re owed, there may be extra tax to pay. It’s illegal for your company to pay out more in dividends than it has available as profit,

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either from this year or held over from a previous year.

As dividends count as part of your income for personal tax purposes, if you pay yourself so much in dividends that your year’s income goes over the level of the higher rate tax band, you’ll personally have more tax to pay.

But the company’s got cash in the bank, surely it’s OK for it to pay a dividend?

Remember that cash in the bank is not the same as profit. There are non-cash items which may affect your company’s profit, e.g. depreciation of capital assets; so before you pay a dividend, make sure that you check the profit and loss account to see that there is enough profit available after tax. In FreeAgent this will be the ‘Carried Forward/ Distributable’ figure. You can also find this in the mini profit and loss account on the Overview screen.

In the picture, you can see this company has paid illegal dividends, because the dividends are higher than the operating profit figure.

IMAGE: flickr.com/photos/59937401@N07/

Why are dividends important?

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Remember that dividends come after corporation tax on the profit and loss account, so when you pay dividends, you have to allow for corporation tax to come first!

If you have an accountant, talk to him or her about how much the company can pay out as a dividend.

What must I do when I want the company to pay me a dividend?

Whenever a company plans to pay a dividend, it must check its profits to make sure it has

enough to cover the dividend, then have a meeting of the directors and produce board minutes and dividend vouchers. The minutes must be produced even if the company has only one director, but don’t worry about them if you’re using FreeAgent: every time you record a dividend, it will generate the minutes and vouchers for you.

CONTACT Freeagent info@freeagent.com www.freeagent.com

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INTERVIEW Aegir Hallmundur 8

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Aegir Hallmundur, Brighton-based designer, typographer, illustrator and front-end web developer, interviewed by Leif Kendall.

H

e runs Ministry of Type, the popular blog for all things typographical. You can see his phenomenal design work at aegir.me.

I interviewed Aegir to learn how he has carved out a successful freelance career.

What follows are his words, followed by my interpretation.

“I went freelance because I was offered a temporary work opportunity that was too good to refuse.”

Sometimes, the comfort and convenience of full-time employment get in the way of progress. By being freelance we are free to grab life’s opportunities and follow enticing paths.

every interaction with a form in triplicate.

Knowing that he doesn’t work well with such administrative detritus, he leaves it well alone.

So don’t feel obliged to follow the systems used by your former employers.

“Charge high and never under-value your skills and experience. Start with rates that are relatively high, because if you start low you’ll find it impossible to raise them.”

New freelancers are often modest. You feel insecure about your skills or your ability to deliver a project, so you charge less than everyone else. It’s a common scenario, but one that leads to problems.

There’s a clue in the name, but full-time employment doesn’t leave us much time to pursue other things – and for most people full-time work precludes pet projects, learning opportunities or shortterm work offers.

Because poor rates attract poor clients, the unwitting discount freelancer may be left with a portfolio of poverty-stricken clients – clients who don’t have the budget or the brains to value their service.

A reputation as a cheapo freelancer can be tricky to shift.

Indeed, by simply being freelance, by creating that little breathing space around our lives, we invite offers, opportunities and happy chances.

It’s much easier to start with high rates and occasionally, if the mood or the work takes your fancy, you can dip your rates to get the gig.

“Being freelance means I don’t need to clutter my working life with forms, procedures or bureaucracy.”

Aegir doesn’t adhere to a strict client engagement process, or document

CONTACT Leif Kendall leif@kendallcopywriting.co.uk www.kendallcopywriting.co.uk

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futur

lab

James Marsden says you can, you really can, succeed, and here’s how.

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few things happened recently to prompt this article. I went along to the Brighton MolyJam icebreaker at the Lord Nelson pub on Friday 30th March – mainly to catch up with friends and do some auto-pimping for our new game.

There were no games being designed at the icebreaker, it was just a meet and greet – a chance to buddy-up and create a team for the following 48-hour game jam. There was a lot of youthful enthusiasm. In fact it was mostly youthful enthusiasm, which is refreshing for a games industry event, as they are often marred by jaded cynicism.

So there was I, shamelessly whipping out my Vita at a moment’s notice for anyone unfortunate enough to ask me what I did for a living. With a small crowd of people watching someone play, one chap commented “Oh you’re the cool kid at school aren’t you?” I don’t know if he was referring to the shiny new Vita, which is still new enough to cause some “ooohs”, or the fact the game I’d designed was running on it.

Regardless, his comment froze time for me, and I started thinking about the journey I’d been on to reach that moment.

Suddenly I was on the other side of the divide that plagues all creative people – accomplishment – where, for anyone that doesn’t know me or my history, I’m seen as the enviable git who has pulled off the ultimate goal: a creative work of integrity, quality and passion; one that looks pretty good actually and “Damn! Why can’t I do that!?!” Iestyn Lloyd crystallised this thought with his Tweet moments later: “Playing @FuturLab’s Velocity. Ahghhhhh it’s SO good. I hate them. Massively compulsive hateful awesome bastard game.”

so where is all this going?

Well for nearly eight years now I’ve been on the other side of that accomplishment divide, desperately doing everything in

my power to reach some kind of creative satisfaction; and I can honestly say that Velocity is the first thing I’ve done in my career that I’m proud of. I’ve come close to being proud of projects in the past, but they’ve fallen short; either cancelled by a publisher: two of those; or an investor has changed his mind at the last minute: one of those; or I’ve been severely limited by budget: one of those. I’ve been going quietly crazy with frustration (and crustacean).

So this article is for all the fresh-faced young ‘uns who should be reading this great new magazine; the people who are falling over themselves with ambition and enthusiasm, and just need to be pointed in the right direction and told they can do it. This is an article that you need to stick on your wall because it is proof that persistence is all it takes.

Persistence and the tenacity to get back up after a failure and try again, because eventually you will reach a goal you are satisfied with and you’ll be on the other side of that divide. And I can tell you from experience, it feels amaze.

So chuck your self-doubt aside, sharply ignore everyone that says you can’t do it, and start working hard. Act as if your life depends on it, and don’t stop until you’ve found a way to succeed. Come and tell me when you’ve done it, and we’ll have a drink to celebrate. : ) FuturLab’s Velocity is on PlayStation Store for PS Vita, PS3 and PSP.

CONTACT James Marsden www.velocitygame.co.uk www.futurlab.co.uk

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DSLR FILmmaking on a budget

Filmmaker Dan Childs takes you through the kind of equipment required to shoot high quality film, and gives a few pointers as to how and when use them.

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ike many others, I made the move from still photography to film when the first video-enabled DSLRs came onto the market a few years ago. Suddenly being able to capture full HD footage using a large sensor and a near-limitless variety of high quality interchangeable lenses felt almost too good to be true.

The creative possibilities were huge.

Many businesses are now realising that creative online video is a fantastic way to engage potential customers and increase click-through rates.

Video-enabled DSLRs have meant that cinematic production values have become possible on small budgets, and that puts high quality content within the reach of the marketing departments of even small businesses.

One of the great things about DSLR filmmaking is that it is a modular system; you can upgrade various parts of your kit as and when you have the money. Here I’m going to talk about my recommendations for a kit not too dissimilar from what I used when I started out. This isn’t necessarily the cheapest gear you can buy but, in my experience, it represents the best way of getting good results on a limited budget.

Canon 600D Canon really became the market leaders in video-enable DSLRs with great cameras like the 5D Mark II, which has been used to shoot everything from big budget movies to high quality TV dramas like ‘House’ and ‘Sherlock’. For this reason it is easier to find accessories that are made for Canon cameras than for any other brand. At around £600, the Canon 600D is an absolute bargain. Buy a couple of extra batteries too.

Tamron 17-50mm f2.8 lens Do not buy the 600D with the kit lens, it is an uninspiring lump of plastic and glass.

If you only have the money to buy one lens then I would have to recommend the excellent Tamron 17–50mm. Its range of focal length makes it the perfect workhorse for use on cropsensor cameras like the 600D. The fast f2.8 maximum aperture and sharp optics all packed into a fairly compact housing make it a really versatile lens. I would recommend paying the extra to get the image-stabilisation version.

Velbon Geo E630 tripod legs You will not regret getting a good set of sticks, and if you are like me and you travel to a lot of shoots by public transport you are going to want to keep the weight right down. The Velbon Geo E630 legs are carbon fibre and are really tough and light.

I used these for three months on a shoot in the Amazon rainforest and beat the hell out of them, and they still work as good as new. I reckon they could last a lifetime. £200 well spent.

Manfrotto 701 HDV fluid head To instantly get more professional results you should buy a fluid head. Panning and tilting with a normal head is a frustrating experience that will see you shooting multiple takes before getting anything vaguely

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IMAGE: flickr.com/photos/martinwcox/

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useable. Because DSLRs are small and light you don’t need to buy a big expensive fluid head. The Manfrotto 701 HDV is a bargain.

Polaroid ND Fader You will need a neutral-density fader if you are going to shoot in the day otherwise you will not be able to open up your aperture to get a nice shallow depth of field, which, let’s face it, is why we invested in a DSLR in the first place. The prices and quality of these vary widely. I have found that the Polaroid ones work fine and are only about £30 on Amazon.

Zoom H4n audio recorder On-camera audio is terrible. Don’t use it. For the most versatility on a budget the Zoom H4n audio recorder is hard to beat. It has 2 balanced XLR inputs and built-in high quality stereo condenser microphones.

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Mini tripod To enable you to position your H4n near to and pointing at your audio source you will need some kind of support. I have found one of the cheap little tripods very useful especially for interviews.

This equipment will set you back about £1500, and will give you the tools necessary to make high quality HD content. Obviously if you are going to edit that content yourself you will need editing software and a computer that is powerful enough to handle HD video. The most important thing is to get out there and get creative. One of the great things about digital recording is that it allows you to experiment and take risks. It is a very exciting time to be a filmmaker.

For a list of the equipment that I currently use see my site below.

CONTACT Dan Childs www.danchilds.net

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&

tally hoe

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ally & Hoe is a new range of affordable jewellery and other accessories created by graphic designer Anna Kolasinska.

The distinctive, handmade pieces for both sexes, have a British vintage/antique look and an eclectic range of inspirations old and new. See and buy at Social, West Hampstead, London; the Makers Boutique markets at the Unitarian Church, New Rd, Brighton; at Kemptown Carnival 2012; and online at www.tallyandhoe.bigcartel.com; and in the States from Petaluma Supply Co.

CONTACT Anna Kolasinska www.tallyandhoe.bigcartel.com

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Brighton farm

introducing...

Brighton Farm is organised by Paul Silver.

CONTACT Paul Silver paul@paulsilver.co.uk www.brightonfarm.com

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Sky Apperley skills

XHTML, CSS, JavaScript, jQuery, HTML5, JSON, iOS, certified Titanium (Appcelerator), PhoneGap, BlackBerry Webworks, Troubleshooting.

I’m am a freelance front end developer based in Brighton. My main skills are HTML, CSS, JavaScript, jQuery and mobile development. I am also happy to troubleshoot code and CSS to solve problems in other developers’ projects.

It is more for casual viewing of CSS and HTML on iPhone and iPod touch.

I can help with custom jQuery code, custom JavaScript code, Ajax, form validation and troubleshooting CSS, Javascript and jQuery.

I can modify jQuery plug-ins, write custom animations and web application logic with jQuery and JavaScript.

I also use my JavaScript and front end skills for developing in iOS and Android using Titanium (Appcelerator) and PhoneGap.

I am presently doing a lot of mobile development. My first iPhone app, currently available on the App store, is called dbug. It allows you to view CSS and HTML on nearly any website on the iPhone. People tell me that they understand what it does better when I say it is a bit like ‘firebug for iPhone’.

Ellen Cubbin skills

PHP, MySQL, CodeIgniter, HTML, CSS, jQuery, JavaScript, WordPress, ASP, SQL Server I have been a professional web developer since 2000 and have worked on websites in a range of business fields including recruitment, travel, higher education, event management, and the construction industry. I have created websites for individuals, community groups and small companies, as well as programming for larger corporate sites.

CONTACT Sky Apperley sky@skyapperley.co.uk www.skyapperley.co.uk www.skyapp.co.uk/dbug/

How I work My guiding principle when designing a system is that it should be as intuitive and as pleasing to use as possible. To do this I seek to understand what my clients want from their site, who the intended audience are and their expectations.

CONTACT Ellen Cubbin 07413 750071 ellen@beebell.co.uk www.beebell.co.uk

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The recently available The Lab for the Recently Possible has opened at The Dock, Brighton & Hove’s newest digital hub at Wilbury Villas. Dozens of people have already investigated new tools for social interaction there and collaborated on new apps.

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t is led by Prem Rose and it’s an opportunity to learn, experiment, work together and incubate projects at the edges of technology, social movements, art and culture.

This month Prem was interviewed for TODO:

Q: Where were you before The Dock?

A: For three and a half years I was at its sister space, The Werks, also non-profit, starting as a co-werker, then taking a full werks desk. It was near home, a great place to work and a revelation to work with other people doing other things. It ‘broadened my mind’ and led to new connections and new work which allowed Dharmafly to expand and develop.Dharmafly specialises in creating web applications that benefit people and their communities: www.dharmafly.com.

Q: Did you employ more people to grow?

A: No. The Dharmafly business model is against employment but strong on networks and growth. This means that everyone can make their own decisions and control their own destinies: and it works! The Werks and The Dock have allied models so they provided the perfect environment to find the best people and stretch the space when needed.

Q: And did this happen in a vacuum?

A: Absolutely not. We developed against a background of participation in events like Bar Camp Brighton, Hack Days in London, Show and Tell and Async at The Skiff. So it was this kind of noise which made it all come together.

Q: What kind of projects?

What kind of people?

A: There was a great mapping app with Jim Callender; a social network for East Hampshire Council; an interactive app to measure social impact with Southwark Council and Matt Weston; other projects

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with Oliver Bettany and Graham Sutherland.

This way is the best way to find the best people and remove the office politics which go with structured employment. And now we are working with a new set of skilled people.

Q: So what about the new Lab? A: There has been a lot of team building, and building on the base created through the events and networks. I see the Lab as a deepening of that effort and a starting point for tech communities concerned with social interaction and social impact. This reaches out into ancient knowledge and introspection via tech, so at the Lab it is a safe space to try things out.

Q: And how is The Dock relevant?

A: It’s easy to get to and there’s the space here to develop the Lab without interruption: some Lab Days have attracted over forty great people. For us it’s a fully finished space which is like a blank canvas, almost a ‘retreat’ space. It really has become possible to build collaboration in things which are bigger than the participants. It is the openness of The Dock environment to innovation which has made the Lab possible.

The Dock and The Werks are creative communities run by Werkshop CIC, a non-profit organisation.

Email info@werkshop.org.uk or call 01273 900909.

CONTACT The Lab for the Recently Possible 07941 192398 hello@l4rp.com www.l4rp.com @L4RP (hashtag #L4RP) https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/l4rp L4RP, Dharmafly, The Dock, 103 Lorna Road, Hove BN3 3EL, UK Opening hours: Spontaneous or by appointment.

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BRIGHTON’S BEST

hang outs Camping’s comeback is pretty much complete.

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n the last few years it’s turned a style corner, transforming itself from something naff that Uncle Ted and Auntie Doff did (Ted in sandals and socks, Doff in slacks and sensible sun hat), into something that’s capable of registering a respectable score on the old cool-o-meter.

Festivals have played a part, so has the recession – but so too has the growing sense that many of us spend far too much time looking at the world through the screen of a computer.

your doorstep – head out of town for a few miles and you’ll find plenty of places to hang out.

I use a three person tent for festivals (always buy a tent with a greater capacity than you need) with a blow-up double mattress, duvet, two pillows, optics... all the comforts of home. But if I’m on my own, on the bike, then I prefer to hang out – literally – between two trees in a hammock tent. It’s hard to imagine anything more convenient or more comfortable. A hammock tent packs down to nothing, you can kit it out with a mosquito net in summer and an underquilt in winter (your arse will thank you for it) and it hangs in minutes, courtesy of tree huggers – thick webbing straps that don’t harm the bark of the supporting trees. For busy Brighton new media-types, all this is on

I’ve got a Hennessy hammock, but just Google ‘hammock camping’ and you’ll find loads of alternatives. Still can’t picture it? Go to www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Hammock_camping – that’s my hammock tent next to a stream in Henfield. And no, you can’t have a go. Get your own and once you’ve hung out for a bit and felt the business benefits – sharper focus, better posture, clearer head – put it on expenses.

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It’s not just your back that’ll thank you, either. A night under the stars is good for the soul. It gves your head a bit of a sluice out, gets something other than office air in your lungs and presents you with problems that involve real things in the real world, instead of grammatical errors or bits of invalid JavaScript code.

CONTACT Rob Beattie rob.beattie@gmail.com www.robbeattie.com

IMAGE: flickr.com/photos/41894170049@N01

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Earth / Issue #3 / 2012

The Haunt – Monday 12 th March

Brain manglingly loud music helps a lot when you’re on a mission, forced to drive like a maniac through central London in order to make it down south in time for a gig by a band you know you’d be a raving imbecile to miss.

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was hurtling along the A23 whilst the support act were on, and ran into the venue halfway through Earth’s first number.

The place was jammed and the sight lines obscured by a very particular kind of audience: predominantly male, mainly over thirty and with a noticeable proliferation of facial hair. As a diminutive female my initial strategy was to give up any short term hope of clapping eyes on anything but the back of other people’s heads and, instead, to hang back, close my eyes, and take in the sounds that emanated from the front of the room.

I was surprised at how intimate the performance felt; Earth’s recorded sound is massively epic but here the scale was different, it felt like a much more subtle and beautifully crafted rendering of the material, like a gig in someone’s kitchen; looping guitar riffs and soporific cello drones rapidly smothered the hectic mind state I came in with, and I suddenly understood why the audience were so motionless in their appreciation: folded arms, firmly planted feet and gently nodding heads... Then the drums kicked in, tearing a hole the size of Jupiter

in the atmosphere of slumber that had descended on the room. The insanely heavy bass drum whacked me in the stomach and the snare smashed me with a vicious right hook that shook the room and reminded me why I was there. This is why we go to hear bands live. I forced my way through the crowd to the front of the room where the noise would be at peak force and from that point on, my ability to recall the details of the gig are a fuzzy mess. I had to smoke a cigarette when it was all over; it was that good.

Yesterday a notice demanding cash landed on my doorstep; in my rush to get to the gig I’d forgotten to cough up the congestion charge, and now Boris is on my ass for £60. I’ll pay them their stupid cash but will find a way to get my money’s worth via some random act of mindless vandalism: a smashed phone box window or a campaign of bus stop graffiti should do it... Brain manglingly loud music helps a lot when you’re on a mission, and for this one the tune of choice will most certainly be ‘Omens and Portents I: The Driver’ from Earth’s incredible ‘The Bees Made Honey in the Lion’s Skull’ album.

CONTACT Simon Wilkinson circa69.co.uk@gmail.com www.circa69.co.uk

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a healthy

Copywriter and qualified sports massage therapist, Helen Keevy, argues that freelancers can do occupational health on a budget.

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s freelancers, many of us spend hours each day in front of our computers, arms bent at the elbows, shoulders rounded forward, chin thrust out. We think occupational health is something for big companies, but for us it’s even more important.

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What’s the problem?

Burning, tight shoulders, aching back, painful neck, and tension headaches: if you work on a computer, you’re probably familiar with these. Hunched shoulders cause our shoulder muscles to overwork as they spend all day trying to pull our

IMAGE: flickr.com/photos/jdhancock/

investment

Issue #3 / 2012 / shoulders back into a healthy position.

Over time the strain causes scarring in the muscles and makes recovery more and more difficult. It can also damage our spine and other joints.

Bad chairs and long periods seated, also contribute to lower back problems and shortened thigh muscles, and a pain in the ass is another common problem.

Long periods of sitting can weaken the muscles in your bottom, or cause nerves to be compressed, which causes pain and will affect your biomechanics when you run or walk. These weakened gluteal muscles are often at the root of knee or foot pain.

A smarter set-up To make yourself more comfortable, make sure that:

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our lower back is supported: a Y portable mesh lumbar support will work on any kind of chair, and weighs almost nothing.

2 Your feet are both evenly placed on the floor with your knees bent: you can invest in a foot rest, but Argos catalogues can do the trick too.

3 Your screen is at arm’s length with the

top of your screen in line with your eyes: laptop stands are getting ever smaller, but again a pile of books, your lunchbox or a phone directory can work just as well.

4 Your keyboard and mouse are close

to your body so your arms are bent at the elbows: if you work on a laptop, invest in a small portable keyboard and mouse.

You don’t need an expensive ergonomically designed office chair or a high-spec adjustable foot-rest to save your body: there are excellent and very affordable

Shoulder burn?

If a muscle is aching we often try to stretch it, however, often the pain is caused because the muscle is overworked and overstretched. (The rhomboid muscles between your shoulder blades, and the trapezius muscles in your shoulders are achy ones you might recognise, if you spend a lot of time on the computer). Instead, start by stretching out the opposing muscles: in the case of computer users, usually the pectoral muscles across your chest.

options to make the time in front of your computer – whether at home or in a temporary work space – far better for you.

Some posture maths Cost of a single physiotherapy appointment: from £45* Budget body-saving equipment for laptop users: less than £35

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Laptop stand: from £8

2 Keyboard: from £15 3 Mouse: from £7 4 Lumbar support: from £5 You can do the maths. *As a freelancer you can’t really afford the NHS waiting times, so you’ll have to go private. And you’ll usually need a couple of appointments to sort out the problem.

CONTACT Helen Keevy helen@corecopywriting.co.uk www.corecopywriting.co.uk

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About

NLD ACCOUNTANCY

NLD Accountancy provides full accountancy and taxation services for freelancers and small businesses in Brighton & Hove. Nilden Ozkan heads a team of professionals to deliver services to our clients.

B

y spending time in the business community in order to understand businesses and the business environment locally, we have developed an understanding relationship with our clients, enabling us to tailor our service to individual needs and make real money savings.

Our aim is to help your business prosper and grow by using a range of accounting techniques and procedures, cash flow being an especially important area for most businesses.

If you think we may be of help, why not call Nilden for your free one-hour consultation: 01273 252 241 or 07960 315119 – www.nldaccountancy.com.

Free Accountancy and tax clinic at NLD Accountancy 12pm, Wednesday 19th September 2012.

The Werks, 45 Church Road, Hove, BN3 2BE Thinking of making your business a limited company? Opportunity to have a 25 minute one-to-one meeting to discuss aspects such as: • • • •

When to form a limited company he benefits of trading as a limited company T What trading as a limited company involves Tax savings

Only four slots available. Please email: info@nldaccountancy.com to secure your place. Looking forward to hearing from you.

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Wired Sussex is a Brighton-based membership organisation for companies and freelancers operating in the digital media and technology sector in Sussex, UK. We work to help our members to create, innovate and grow.

projects

events

Web developer – JQUERY

Brighton Members’ Meetup

Madison Solutions – The skills are HTML/ CSS, jQuery, PHP and you must know your way around wordpress. matt@madisonsolutions.co.uk www.madisonsolutions.co.uk

Photoshop files for web

Tuesday 21st August, 5.30pm Venue: Above Audio

WorthingDigital Coworking

PWS Design – Small agency requires proficient artworker able to build layered files in Photoshop for web project. jasia@pws-design.com www.pws-design.com

Thursday 30th August, 10am

3D Animator required urgently

Brighton Mini Maker Faire

Stokenbrand – We are looking for a very quick 3D animation job to include in a movie we are making for a client. john@stokenbrand.com www.stokenbrand.com

Venue: Barneys Cafe, 46-56 Portland Rd, Worthing, BN11 1QN

Saturday 8th September, 9am Venue: Corn Exchange, Brighton Dome, Brighton

You can find out about our current projects, events and initiatives at www.wiredsussex.com

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To Do

Your personal cut-out-and-keep To Do List for the month!

Socialise: Meet up with other local freelancers for a beer.

Daily exercise: Do one of; running,cycling or 10 mins yoga.

Accounts: Get the books and records ready to send

your accountant for the financial year ended

Events:

5 April 2012.

Check out Brighton Digital Festival Website

for coming events in September

Networking:

Write:

www.2012.brightondigitalfestival.co.uk Go to Brighton Farm next Wednesday night for a bit of networking and mixing with other businesses.

S end

an article to TODO Magazine on

todo@nldaccountancy.com.