a mediabistro site

I was hired about three months ago to design a logo and consult on the brand identity for Plancast, a local San Francisco start-up founded by Mark Hendrickson and Jay Marcyes. As you can probably guess from the name, Plancast a way to broadcast your upcoming plans to your friends; or as it’s often described, Foursquare for the future. The site is exceptionally easy and helpful, and I encourage you to check it out.

By the time I joined on Plancast was up and running, but they were without a logo or distinctive visuals. I began work in December and we agreed on the finished logo a few weeks ago. The project was easily the hardest I have ever completed — as well as the most fulfilling. I almost destroyed myself developing this logo and I am really excited to share the process with you here.

Just a short service announcement. I've installed file attachments to comments to help with critique and forum support questions feedback. Images appear inline and other files are as attachments. Hope you'll find it useful.

There is an exciting new medium about to become mainstream. It's a combination between a magazine and web design. It's rich and exciting. And it's pioneered by the the iPad. Soon, we'll be getting requests to design rich media brochures for companies that will be read on tablet devices. Get inspired and get ready for it. Watch the videos of two publications showcasing some of their designs.

Adapted from The Freelance Design Handbook (RotoVision)
By Cathy Fishel

Is it possible to become addicted to one’s work, to the point where work becomes preferable to any other activity? Sure. Anything that’s pleasurable to human beings releases endorphins in the brain, and those endorphins make you feel good. People like to feel good, so they repeat those actions over and over, until the activity that spawns those feelings becomes an irresistible habit.

Adapted from Adobe InDesign CS4 Bible (Wiley Publishing)
By Galen Gruman

A clipping path is essentially a shape that acts like a cutout mask—anything inside the shape displays and anything outside does not. It’s a very handy way of displaying just the pieces of a graphic that you want to display, such as masking out extraneous background or focusing on a specific portion of a larger image. Clipping paths are also frequently used to control text wrap around graphics.

InDesign can work with clipping paths that are already part of an imported TIFF, JPEG, Photoshop EPS or Photoshop image, or with clipping paths you create in InDesign. And no matter the source of the clipping path, InDesign lets you modify it.

Typography can be a powerful tool to convey a message. Check out hundreds of great examples from around the world below.

When tabs finally found their way into Web browsers some years ago, people immediately fell in love with them. In fact, most people wonder how someone could live without them. With Apple’s love for a minimalist interface, you have to wonder why we still don’t have them on the desktop. Whatever the reason, we’ve been left to wait for a third-party solution.

Check out Total Finder: http://totalfinder.binaryage.com/

Logorama is an Oscar winning movie about a police chasing an armed criminal in a version of Los Angeles comprised entirely of corporate logos.

You can watch the full movie here or on YouTube here (broken into 2 parts).