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I am glad to introduce myself, Mustafa Khargonewala alias Qamaal Mustafa Sikander, 38/m/Bombay, freelance graphic designer, visiting Dubai, UAE from time to time for interesting projects.
graphikamaal is my online avatar /
virtual identity / alter ego.
graphikamaal provides graphic design services for print media, web design, web hosting, email hosting and web templates. Besides, I am also open to joining a progressive organisation in a creative position. Click here in case you are interested in hiring an in-house graphic designer who can be an asset to your business development and marketing team.
Some brief about me, I am a dependable, result-oriented professional with a solid performance record and would be interested in meeting you to discuss the value that my strengths and experience can bring to your organisation in general and your marketing department in particular.
Why me?
Unless you did not get a chance to complete your Ph.D. in Economics, it is quite obvious that 'why me' would be always economical for your business than 'why us'. At least four to five times to be precise. Since I don't have any overheads, I can provide my service at much reasonable rates compared to companies who have to take care of a lot of non-performing staff! (Wow! I am already dreaming about a career in copywriting).
OK let's not digress, the creative solutions are always designed by graphikamaal with your business objective and target audience/viewers in mind. Having done business for a long time in Bombay and going through a roller coaster of hits and misses a lot many times, I can help your company by avoiding pitfalls while designing a creative solution. After all, my own progress is dependent on your successful annual report !
What can graphikamaal
do for you?
graphikamaal can design and create new material to boost and support your marketing and business development / promotion team with powerful tools.
Apart from print and signage design services which are my core strengths, graphikamaal now also offers web solutions for individuals as well as small and medium business enterprises. graphikamaal's web services include domain name registration, web hosting, branding, graphic design, web design, ready-made web templates, search engine optimisation, search engine submission, directory submission and related services. This will assist you in your advertising / marketing campaign / strategy and help you reach out to the world through your own website.
My Computer / Software skills
I don't know who advised me to put this and how does it make any difference to you but since I have made efforts in typing this, might as well retain it.
graphikamaal has been using the IBM computers since DOS (those) days of AT/XT, 1990 to be precise when non-graphical user interfaces and programs ruled like Wordstar, dbase, BASIC, COBOL etc., but mostly for my favourite PACMAN than anything else :))
These are some of my favourite programs / tools / software for graphic design,
web design, web updates etc.
Adobe CS3
Adobe Photoshop - PSD
Dreamweaver
Adobe Illustrator - AI
Adobe Indesign - INDD
Aldus/Adobe Pagemaker - 5, 6.5 & 7
CorelDRAW12
I am a die-hard Corel enthusiast for working with line-art, ofcourse there are some issues regarding colour but they can be solved by exporting the image in RGB and coverting it to CMYK for print in Photoshop. I have used Corel from version 3 onwards since 1993.
ACDC / IRFANVIEW
I love to use these tools for batch conversion / image resizing etc.
PICASA / WAYN / FLICKR
These have great uploading tools for batch upload of images to the respective web galleries.
AUDIO GRABBER / SOUND FORGE / CUBASE
These are my favourite audio recording and editing tools. Ofcourse Cubase is a professional programme used in recording studios but I use a few of its basic features, mainly for track-wise recording.
MYFLIX / WINDOWS MOVIE MAKER
These are my favourite video editing / movie making tools that I use to create and upload videos to Youtube. Check my Youtube account for a few video mixing I have done for my friend Javid Raza.
MICROSOFT
I am a die-hard fan of Microsoft. From MS DOS to Windows XP I have used all of the operating systems. Also I love to use MS Office for Word, Powerpoint, Outlook, Excel and Access. I really admire the company which is responsible for adding the word "PERSONAL" to "COMPUTERS", making it PC as the computer is widely known now. I design my websites for Microsoft users because over 80% of my visitors use Internet Explorer, so I try to optimise for them and apologise to users of other browsers like Mozilla Firefox, Netscape, Opera etc.
APPLE MACINTOSH - MAC
I have worked on Mac while working with :
* Loud magazine
* Brandcom
* International Watch Middle East edition
For creative work, I prefer an IBM with CorelDRAW and then import the line-art / artwork in Adobe Illustrator on MAC if need be.
More about me
The huge collection of over 5,000 templates that I store is so exciting that I hardly foresee nobody coming this far just to know more about me. Anyway, if you don't have anything better to read and can digest Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi kind of soap operas, then you can take the risk.
I have a total 19 years of experience that includes 13 years in graphic designing for print media and signage. Being an avid internet user since last 10 years, web designing, web hosting and business promotion on the internet comes naturally to me.
Flashback
Scene 1 ... Location - Khar (Bombay) ... Day
I started my career in 1989-90 with two Bollywood films viz. Numbri Aadmi starring Mithun Chakraborty & Kimi Katkar and Akayla starring Amitabh Bachchan, Jackie Shroff, Meenakshi Sheshadri and Amrita Singh. I was thrown out of both the production houses after the films flopped and the companies stopped production for the time being, which they later resumed.
...cut to...
Scene 2 ... Location - Vile Parle (Bombay) ... Day
Well my filmi career ended in the fist scene itself. After being thrown out, I was absorbed by one of the popular service bureau in Bombay where I was privileged with the introduction of Desk Top Publishing in the Andheri/Vile Parle western suburb of Bombay, along with a DTP professional, Ramesh Palan, way back in 1992/93. The service bureau went on to became famous in that area after this.
...dissolve...
After a couple of years, I was taken as a partner by the owner of the bureau to establish a similar setup at a different location. A few of my reputed clients included producer Mohan Kumar, producers Harish & Vinod Shah, director & producer Anil Sharma, actor Shabana Azmi, writer Javed Akhtar, actor Vijayendra Ghadge, compere Annu Kapoor, legendary actor Pran Sahab, writer Sachin Bhowmick, among others.
...fly to...
In search of greener pastures, I came to Abu Dhabi in 1998 and got to work with International Development Company on the prestigious Back File Conversion project of ADNOC in preparation of EDMS project. We converted around 1 million documents and 25K large format drawings to electronic format. I was also involved with creating a new corporate identity for IDC. After successful completion of the project, I joined another group company Abu Dhabi Vegetable Oil Company as Print Media Incharge where I worked mainly on the advertisements and packaging of the company like labels, tins, cartons, cans etc. besides coordinating with the suppliers. I also created a new corprorate identity for the group.
...zoom out...
In the year 2001, I returned to Bombay and started Design Spot in association with Mustufa Zee and Ali Altas, two print media professionals. The design and printing setup is now one of the most prominent one in the Andheri West area of Bombay.
...flash back ends...
I returned to Dubai in 2006 and got a wonderful opportunity to join famous music magazine Loud as Design Head and after that, had the privilege to be associated with the prestigious 2nd World CEO Forum held in Dubai and Abu Dhabi as Print Media Head. After the successful completion, I associated with a business services company and was part of a core team involved in the successful re-branding of the organisation that enabled it to reposition itself amongst the topmost companies in that field.
While working for Brandcom ME, one of the biggest agency in Dubai, I have got the opportunity to work on three of the biggest and most prestigious accounts of the agency.
My last assignment was the Grand Issue of IW - International Watch Magazine's Middle East edition. This gave me an opportunity to see the designs and layout prevalent for some of the world's biggest names in exclusive watches like Chopard, TAG Heuer, St. Gallen, Piaget, MB&F (Maximilian Büsser & Friends), Rolex, Omega and other watch makers, mainly from Switzerland.
Now I have started providing online services, besides providing creative branding services on freelance basis, mainly to advertising agencies in Dubai Media City and other Emirates and Freezones of UAE whenever I am in Dubai.
My hobbies
Why the heck in the world would anybody be interested in my hobbies? Well don't forget I am also into SEO and adsense... I make more money by using Adsense than designing. Makes Sense?
OK, my most favourite pastime is listening to comedy shows and dramas, Gujarati jokes by Vasant Paresh and I am a great fan of his favourite character called Dhiru Dharamshi. I also like to watch The Great Indian Laughter Challenge, Pakistani comedy dramas of Umar Sharif, Shakeel Siddiqui, Rauf Lala among others.
Listening and singing retro Hindi film music is another passion with me. I am the lifetime president of Besura Hi Sahi Club. I am a great fan of legendary HFM artistes like Lata Mangeshkar, Mohammed Rafi, Naushad, O.P.Nayyar, Shankar Jaikishan, Ravi, S.D.Burman, Mukesh, Kishore Kumar, R.D.Burman and others. I also had the privilege to meet a few of the legendary artistes like Naushad Sahab, Ravi Sahab, O.P.Nayyar, Pyarelalji, Anandjibhai and a few others. I am also 'badnaam'(infamous) for starting a number of groups dedicated to the music legends but then not taking care of them. I thank a few good samaritans who took over as moderators of some of them, like the late Iqbal Sahab of Naushad Ali Group, Pravin Kumar of Shankar Jaikishan group on Yahoo and Naresh Khattar of Sangeet Ke Sitarey group on Orkut.
I belong to various business and social networks on the internet and a casual search on google for "qamaal mustafa sikander" will bring links to all of them. BTW, in case you are not aware, this malaise of searching for one's own name on Google is called 'ego-surfingitis', a term coined by Feroz, one of my copywriter friend in Bombay. Jokes apart, if we share anything in common, please feel free to add me to your business or social networks. If you have managed to come this far, graphikamaal proposes your name to be nominated for the next Nobel Prize for Patience!
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