Vootie's blog

It's a question as old as work itself. Jessica Hische's chart should help you figure out the answer when you find yourself staring off into space the next time the temptation arises. You can even order a letterpress version to ensure that you don't fall asleep and say yes during a moment of weakness. Unless of course it's your mom on the phone.

Glossom seems to have hit on the right blend of providing inspiration and the opportunity for self-promotion. The appeal of it is the ability to create a portfolio of images or videos in such categories as Photography, Illustrations, Graphics&Design, Fashion and Arts, which is displayed in a visual wall composed of thumbnails. You can simply browse these collections of thumbnails or check out the curated selections that site staff create for the various categories, all available for viewing either on the site or via a just-launched iPhone and iPad app.

British freelance filmmaker, cinematographer and editor Danny Cooke recently created a short film about letterpress printing, shot with a digital SLR video camera. One can only hope that the dedication to craftmanship so evident in the work of the small letterpress workshop featured in the film will always be with us.

Belgian multidisciplinary visual artist Ben Heine is known for his series of visual explorations, such as "Digital Circlism" and "Flesh and Acrylic," but perhaps most for the ongoing "Pencil versus Camera" series, which mixes drawing and photography. In these the hand of the artist is always visible, with the often unexpected contents of the black-and-white drawing providing contrast with the colors of the real-worldphoto. While this series was begun in 2010, Ben continues to add new images to it, so it's worth checking out the 80 or so on his site for the latest examples.

It's quite startling to arrive on the English version of Wikipedia and find just a single ominous image urging visitors to learn more about its opposition to the Stop Online Piracy Act and Protect IP Act bills, currently active in the United States House of Representatives and the United States Senate.

You can understand Wikipedia's concern since, if passed, SOPA would require Wikipedia to monitor every site they link to, with any link to an infringing site potentially forcing them offline. It's not surprising that Google, Reddit, Craigslist, WordPress.com and many other high-profile sites are making today a day of protest about the damaging impact these bills could have on a free and open internet. Where have you spotted the protest today?

You could laugh off this satirical infomercial by California-based filmmaker Jesse Rosten more easily if the before and after examples hadn't been taken from real life. He provides some background for its creation in this interview.

Christmas Cards have pretty much vanished but New Year's resolutions seem to be going strong. .NET magazine has come up with its list of 10 that are geared to web designers but hold true for just about any design-related profession. Case in point — 3. Stop trying to save bad work. Ouch.

With the exception of its name, which apparently is a Spanish word related to the root of the word "average." Dan Sayers' choice of this for his new font makes sense, given that the font is derived, through somewhat tricky manipulations, by averaging the character outlines from all 725 fonts on his computer. You'd think the result of this would be a horrendous muddle but to most eyes Avería in fact can provide a pleasing effect (okay, the lowercase m is a bit dodgy, I'll admit).

Sayers followed up his first effort by generating Regular, Bold and Light variants with Italics, followed by a serif family and a web font, which will soon be available from the Google Web Fonts directory. Dubious? You can try it out for yourself, since Avería has been released using the SIL Open Font License.

Adapted from Good Design: Deconstructing Form and Function and What Makes Good Design Work (Rockport Publishers)

By Terry Marks

IDENTITY
HAZLITZ BESPOKE STATIONERY
BROWN DESIGN, LONDON

Hazlitz wanted to create a contemporary brand that would challenge the more established and stuffy stationers such as Smythson. To do this, the design would use traditional materials and print techniques applied to traditional elements such as business cards, letterhead, and so forth. But to stand out, it all had to be done with a twist yet still imply a level of personal, high-end service that Smythson was famous for. After all, the target audience was socially prominen, high-brow Londoners. The name Hazlitz was inspired by William Hazlitt, a prominent nineteenth-century English literary critic, grammarian, and philosopher.


The design is based on reams of paper and a complementary font. Letter-spacing, stroke density, and negative leading and tints were carefully prepared. The client liked the simple, pared back typographic approach common to premium brands. The designers established a black-and-white design and then focused on the quality of materials and print techniques such as engraving, embossing, debossing, and foiling items that their customers wouldn’t sniff at.

Read the full article on Graphics.com

Adapted from POP: How Graphic Design Shapes Popular Culture (Allworth Press)

By Steven Heller, Tom Brokaw

Since graphic design is not a licensed profession, we can call ourselves anything we want, with the exception of maybe doctor or monsignor (although Monsignor Dr. Heller has a nice ring). Likewise, anyone else can claim the graphic designer mantle (or “graphics designer,” which is the dead-give-away that you’re not a graphic designer), without an iota of schooling, simply because they made a letterhead, newsletter, or Web site on their home computer. So, if our nomenclature is this fungible then it stands to reason our bona fides are in question too, at least in the eyes of the outsider looking in and even the insider looking out. A designer by any other name may still be a designer, yet make no mistake, what we call ourselves is key to our professional health and well-being. As professionals we are hired to be clarifiers, organizers, and even namers for our clients. So, if we don’t know what to call us, who does?

Read the full article on Graphics.com