Typography

Typography Guide Part 2: Weight and Width

Weight and Width Understanding how type works is an essential part of design. Weight and width can both have a drastic effect on the look and feel of an overall design piece. This is true for both print design and web design. Understanding how letterforms interact...

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Tips to Make Your Designs Better

When reviewing your designs to make sure that you have created the best design and solution possible for your client, it is good to ask yourself a few questions. Does it flow well? Does your design have a good rhythm? The overall flow and movement of your design can...

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This Week’s Places to Go for Creative Inspiration

There are so many places to go to find inspiration. This week I have found some beautiful and fun illustration work, some photography and some great graphic design work that is truly inspiring. HYDRO SEVENTY FOUR CALLIGRAFFITI TEXTURE LOVERS AMI VITALE AUTOFOCUS 1000...

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Typography: Part One

There are many different ways to classify typefaces. They come in many different weights, widths, and contrasts, and have different x-heights, ascenders and descenders. They may also be set to different angles, such as an italic version, or a script typeface. This is...

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Design Laws: Part Two

Proximity- This has to do with items that are close together. You can change the meaning of a design based on what elements are placed close together. If there are multiple groups, they are divided visually depending on which elements are close to each other, and...

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Art and Design: The Same or Different?

I hear many people, including designers, that say that they love being designers, because they love being artists. Is art and design one and the same? I am not so sure. Clients often say, "You're an artist, create a web site for me." Art is more or less for people to...

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Designing for the iAd: A New Design Horizon?

Starting July 1st, the iAd venture is supposed to be launched. With this in mind, companies are jumping to advertise on this new platform. Most of us are print designers, and a lot of us are web designers, and we are used to the different formats associated with them....

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This Week’s Creative Inspiration #5

ADAM SIMPSON This site is really interesting because it has simple iconography, as well as a bunch of simple, but good illustrations as well. SFMOMA This site is really great because it shows off a huge amount of artwork, and the way that it is done is simple, but...

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Is There a Limit to How Much We Can Do?

I was having a discussion with a colleague the other day about design and all the things that we know how to do. The topic came up where he found out that i don't know ajax, which I admittedly, don't even know exactly what that does. My response to him was that I am a...

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Creative Contrast With a Background Blur

Creative Contrast With a Background Blur

This tutorial is great for adding quick and simple contrast to a photo. When using this in your design, it is a good idea to choose a subject that has to do with target market. To start, find a photograph with a main figure of subject in the middle, with a lot going...

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This Weeks set of creative inspiration

This week is filled with beautiful photography, illustration, and fantastic paintings. One of my personal favorites is the one where the alphabet is beautifully painted throughout a city. I personally love expressive and beautiful ways that people paint or illustrate...

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Places To Go For Inspiration May 16, 2010

These works are really interesting and creative. Some of them are quickies, but some of them you will want to spend some time exploring. INSPIRE ME NOW MICHAEL KENNA AIRGROOM JEAN-MARIE VIVES BRIGHTBOX CREATIONS JOSH KEYES MARK MEYER PHOTOGRAPHY RASSOULI CORO36INK...

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Methods to the Mayhem

What I have realized from being an artist for years is that we all have a different ways of doing things when it comes to creating our artwork. Some of us like to do a mainly traditional route and sketch everything out. Some people like to take a bunch of photographs...

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Places to Go for Inspiration and Self Reflection

Places to Go for Inspiration and Self Reflection

Some of these sites will inspire us as designers, artists, and photographers. Others will make us think about how we are all responsible for our actions, and how what we do can make a huge impact. WITNESS DAVID B. REEVES FERIC BENJAMIN KRAIN CHRIS BUZELLI CATH RILEY...

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12 Essential Serif Fonts for Professional Designers

This is a list of 10 quality serif fonts that you will find in most professional graphic design work. These are all found in body copy of books and magazines. They are all beautiful and elegant for their own reasons. They all come in different weights and italics,...

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11 Quality Fonts to Use in Your Professional Design Work

11 Quality Fonts to Use in Your Professional Design Work Quality fonts make your work look much better than using free novelty fonts. Granted, there are some really well-crafted fonts out there for free now. However, if you are looking for high quality fonts for your...

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Dotted Stroke in Illustrator

Dotted Stroke in Illustrator

Creating a dotted line stroke in Illustrator First, create a new document in Illustrator. I created one 1024 x 768. Then, select a typeface that you want to use and create a nice large word or couple of words. For our purposes, I am taking away the fill to see the...

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Create an Inlaid Text Effect in Photoshop.

Create an Inlaid Text Effect in Photoshop.

Create a new layer and fill it with a color. I chose a rich orange. Then, find a nice textured photo, and size it to fit your document. Desaturate that layer and set the blend mode to overlay. Then, grab your text too and choose a nice bold typeface. I chose Helvetica...

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