Personal Business Card
ncdesigns (191 pencils) | Fri, 2012-10-19 02:23So...I was messing around with a business card design for myself the other day, and while I was just throwing shapes and colors and text randomly onto an artboard, this is how far I got before I stopped and walked away. I'm a little embarrassed to post it here, but at the same time I probably need to hear some opinions other than my own. Does it have potential, or is it creepy? I don't know what I think of it. My husband thinks it's weird. lol
Commenting on this Image will be automatically closed on December 14, 2012.
i like the 3d bars of color but the concept is hella-cheesy.
maybe instead of the face just make it a vertical white box with the info and let the colors metaphorically represent "creative stuff"
Agree. I like the process used to create the card, but the talking head has to go. Whatever you decide on - give the text more room to breathe, it's really cramped looking right now. Nobody really does the "Email:" or "Portfolios:" thing anymore either. Just have the email addy and everyone will know what it is.
Thanks for the feedback. I changed it...
HUGE step forward in sophistication! good work.
but the white field seems so close to center that it almost looks accidentally off center. id try sliding it just a bit to the right.
at first glance i kind of like the new type. but i do agree with art and mara that its a bit crampy. id toy with enlarging the white box and or opening the kerning a bit or use a less compressed font.
here is another thought. though its the 3d color bars that caught my eye. i wonder how it would look without the shadows?
what i like about it as is is that it reminds me of paper samples. and a sample case from a printing company is like porn for designers! but i wonder if that will make joe-client assume youre just a _____________ (invitation, greeting card, textiles, etc...) sort of designer.
i dont know if this is a solution, or if its even a problem in the first place - because i like the piece. but i'd just be curious how it would look.
Better. Still get the cramped feeling though - and the condensed font only enhances that. You have plenty of room - why not use it?
Agreeing with the guys here, Miss Niki: the face doesn't work and in your revision, the text does seem cramped. I really like the colorful paper strips. Could you not make your white slice wider on the right to give your text a comfort margin? Also, I'm thinking that the italic serif typeface is at odds with the paper strips. Do you think you could spend more time with that, perhaps choosing a display face (kind of a logotype) for your name? This is on the verge of being a very cool card! Keep at it :)
Mara
I'm working on a new variation of this, but I want to ask a question about fonts. I am using a Mac, and I'm designing this in Illustrator CS4. I am also using a program called "FontPreview" to view samples of the fonts installed on my system. My problem is that the fonts listed in Font Preview in English are in Chinese symbols in the font list in Illustrator. They are in English in Photoshop, but not in Illustrator, so I can't find the font I want in the program I want to use for this project. Is there a way to fix that? It's annoying.
why not just use fontbook? or just type them out in illustrator?
1. You assume I know what Fontbook is and that I choose not to use it. :) What is Fontbook?
2. You mean typing out the names of the fonts? If so, I tried that. They're not listed in English in Illustrator, so it won't access the font if I try to type it in English.
Font Book comes with your Mac OS. Look for it in the Applications folder. It lets you see all the characters in the fonts you have loaded in your User/Library/Fonts folder.
In Illustrator, if you open the actual Character palette and scroll through your fonts from there instead of the Character pulldown menu at the top of your page, you'll see the names of your fonts shown in those fonts. Would that help?
Mara
mara. from here forward i shall call you "dragon" as you type wat i was going to say.
Ooh, Mara the Dragon Lady. I like it :)
Mara
Ooh, Mara the Dragon Lady. I like it :)
Mara
Ooh, Mara the Dragon Lady. I like it :)
Mara
Rut-row. Looks like I liked it a little too much. I'll shut up and go away now....
Mara
I think some of them are showing differently in the character palette, but for the most part they are listed in symbols...
Niki, those are System fonts. Do you have your custom font collection in the User/Library/Fonts folder? If so, you should see them listed before all the ones shown in your screen cap.
Mara
You say that like system fonts are not supposed to be usable. What's frustrating me is that they are showing up with their English titles in Font Preview and in Photoshop, making it look like they are part of my usable font list, but they are really hard to find in Illustrator. One of them, for example, shows up as "Yuppy" in Font Preview and Photoshop, but in the Illustrator font list it's just a bunch of symbols where the name should be. It's frustrating to have to just go through and click each one until I find it. I guess it shouldn't really be that big of a deal, I have just seen previews of some of them and I like them, but it's frustrating trying to find them if I want to use them.
Niki, I've been trying for DAYS to add a comment but keep getting an error message. Allow me to try again. I just wanted to mention that Yuppy is one of the Chinese fonts bundled with the Mac OS. In some applications, you'll see the English name "Yuppy" listed in pull-down menus, and you might even get some rudimentary English lettering out of it, but it isn't intended for use in English-language layouts. I'd advise you to choose another font.
Mara
Alrighty, thank you for the info. Sorry it took me so long to comment back, I've been away from the computer for awhile. I'll be posting a new version of this card soon. :)
Great! I wondered where you've been. Glad to see you back.
Mara