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Christine McGavern wrote the following on The Now-defunct Grid design forum. It’s good stuff so I “borrowed it” but I give her full credit. A designer had asked for help making a t-shirt for a bike race. Here’s what Christine had to say: Will the cyclists be GIVEN the shirts to wear while they race…

No designer wants to touch the taboo topic of selling “stock art.” I have mixed feelings about “stock design”. I don’t create stuff to sell on these websites. I’m the kind of guy who might go there to get a creative idea (like from a scrap file). But I rarely buy this sort of stuff.…

Value analysis identifies and selects the best alternatives for designs, materials, processes, and systems. You repeatedly ask “can the cost of this item or step be reduced or eliminated, without diminishing the effectiveness, required quality, or customer satisfaction?” In other words, value analysis is a method of optimization. It requires creativity. It consists of 5…

This is an esoteric design adventure never told until now. I was printing a cheap but attention-getting packaging insert. One-color Pantone 485 on Wausau AstroBright Solar Yellow, 24lb wt. When I picked up the job, the red ink really popped. PMS 485 was a favorite color. I knew it well. I’d never seen it so…

Trade shows are a low priority in the marketing budget at times for some small companies. But here are some pointers to help your client get the best return on their investment: 1. Adhere to a one-benefit-per-panel rule. 2. Readability: The six-by-six rule states no more than six elements per line and no more than…

Near and dear to my heart is the topic of “web image optimization”. But the poet in me would rather call it “judicious beauty”. In web jargon, all the image files (and others CSS, HTML, etc) that go into making a web page, when their file sizes are summed together, is called the “page weight”.…

Illustrators, photographers, and web designers have an easier time working remotely (globally) via the Internet. There is resistance to long-distance with graphic design projects (print, booths, etc). There is no explanation other than for some reason clients want to sit face-to-face with a graphic designer at least once. (This can be done with Skype but…

I worked as a designer on retainer for 14 years. I got a monthly check and worked unsupervised at home – except for a once-a-week, face-to-face, hour-long meeting. Meeting the goals and deadlines was the measurement, not the number of hours worked. This probably means I worked pretty hard for them! Every year we’d plan…

I‘ve been theming for a long time (orchestrating color combinations, type selection, symbols, etc) but I learned something new about “proportioned palettes”. A new perspective on color. The author of Handout (PDF) demonstrates his method for developing a consistent and large color palette for branding. Great stuff. I can also vouch his basis of predicting…

Theming with type and color are several of the things I really enjoy about design. Here I share my method for historical and vintage projects. Logo sample from someone else – not mine. The font above is a knockoff of type foundry P22Eaglefeather – available in several weights and a dingbat font. It is based…