I’ve been long overdue to develop some more skills for producing online media. Sure, some of that is to be more marketable, but it’s also to make writing a bit more interesting than just churning out posts for work.

One positive takeaway from my miserable month with Heavy was being introduced to BeFunky. No, it’s not Photoshop but I think it shares many of the same elements for photo-editing. And I’ve gotten relatively adept at creating some fun images beyond game photos from USA Today that we typically use at Awful Announcing and The Comeback.

Up top is an image I created for a story on writer/director/producer Adam McKay working with Meadowlark Media, the new content venture by former ESPN president John Skipper and Dan Le Batard, who recently left ESPN himself. I didn’t just want three pictures of the guys. And there needed to be an actual Meadowlark bird in there!

Each year for the Final Four, Michael Grant compares each of the four schools participating based on “cultural superiority.” Rather than just have a picture of players from Gonzaga, Baylor, Houston, or UCLA, it seemed more fun to use famous alumni or landmarks.

Something that’s been fun to follow in the past couple of weeks for Awful Announcing is HBO’s upcoming series on the 1980s Los Angeles Lakers and their “Showtime” championship dynasty. (Produced by Adam McKay!)

The cast includes Adrien Brody as coach Pat Riley, John C. Reilly as team owner Jerry Buss, Michael Chiklis as legendary Boston Celtics president Red Auerbach, comedian Bo Burnham as Larry Bird. The idea of the article was to rank the best casting choices. But again, who should be in the photo? Why not try to cram them all in?

A goofy story from last week was former NFL player Roy Williams being mistaken for basketball coach Roy Williams, who just retired after 18 years leading the University of North Carolina men’s squad.

Sure, I could’ve just put photos of each Williams side-by-side. But I tried to have a little more fun with it.

This NCAA Tournament preview was one of my first attempts to edit multiple images together. As you can see, I was a bit shaky on trying to cut out the images I wanted, rather than BeFunky taking out the background. I think I’m better at that already. Just needed a surer, more delicate hand with that tool.

Finally, for a post on Sylvester Stallone working on a “Rocky” prequel, I wanted an image of Rocky Balboa in front of the notes that Stallone posted to Instagram. Nothing too fancy here. But again, I think it’s better than a simple image of Stallone, something from the “Rocky” films, or those notes.

Am I ready to lead a graphics department? Most certainly not.

But I think these edited images have added some value to recent articles and helped them stand out on a timeline scroll. And I’ve had a lot of fun playing with these images and bringing an idea in my mind together on the page. Maybe you’ve noticed them a little bit here at The Casselbloggy. I should probably apply them to the banner image of this site next.

Ready to utilize these skills for a different website or social media account! Give me a holler.