September 15, 2008 – 7:00 am
Learning Illustrator gradient tools is often one of the big hurdles for Photoshop gurus when they switch, and I feel their pain! Below you will find a complete guide to solving all the frustrations you will ever experience with gradients in Illustrator.
If you double click the small slider squares in the gradient bar, a “color palette” pops up and trying to use that to make your gradients will certainly raise your blood pressure! It’s completely useless to use this palette to find your colours, at least that’s my opinion. Let me show you some better ways.
September 12, 2008 – 7:00 am
So now that the press is up and working, I need some project ideas! I spent snippets of this week mulling over ideas and creating little thumbnails.
The hard part about not knowing all the supplies (fonts, ink, paper) at the shop is that I can’t plan things out too specifically. I don’t want to take this design into the digital world and get totally attached to a font or an image and then not have it when I get up there.
Come see some inspiration I found from Etsy along with my own thumbnail sketch ideas. If you have a great idea and I can use it, I’ll send you 10 free cards from that run!
September 10, 2008 – 7:00 am
I’ve written about the principle of emphasis before, in Stand Out from the Crowd, where I gave practical ways to emphasize different parts of your design. You will see that much of emphasis is achieved through strategic use of the principle of contrast.
The principle of emphasis is used to support direction. Think of emphasis as the stepping stones on the path of direction; emphasis tells the viewer what is important and where to look next.
Emphasis supports balance, too. If your focal point is smack in the center of the layout, that’s rather boring, but use the rule of thirds to place your eye-catching element and you instantly improve the layout.
What is Emphasis?
Emphasis is about hierarchy. Although many other principles contribute to hierarchy, emphasis is what they all ultimately lead to.
September 8, 2008 – 7:00 am
Many of you know that I took a letterpress course back in August and then proceeded to clean up a letterpress of my own. The Vandercook SP15 is now fully restored and I was able to print my first project on it last weekend!
Unfortunately this post doesn’t focus on it because we actually taped it and I still need to cut together a video for you, but I do share some awesome letterpress resources with you. This post contains links for letterpress websites, letterpress blogs, letterpress stories, several knowledge base sites and letterpress inspiration!
September 5, 2008 – 7:00 am
Creativity is not just about how good of a designer you are, it’s about how well you can solve problems and find connections between seemingly unrelated ideas.
In this post, I’ll go over some sites that have many exercises for you to improve your creativity, including Edward de Bono’s How to Have Creative Ideas, Von Glitschka’s squiggle line exercises, doodlage, silhouette reinvention and image streaming. You’re sure to feel creative after this post!
September 3, 2008 – 7:00 am
I don’t often use symbols in Illustrator because I don’t generally make repeating shapes. The control over an element is also very limited when you use a symbol and control is often a huge component for me, but then again if you want chaos… its off to symbols and symbol sprayer!
It is so difficult to make something random, without unconsciously making a pattern and that’s where symbols come in.
