Do you fall into one of the categories above? Check out the full descriptions of each member and let me know what area you fall into.

• The Evangelist? Focuses on design at the highest level, developing strategies and processes that push the limits of design and business as a whole.
• The Dreamer? Cuts through it all to offer a surprisingly fresh attitude.
• The Conductor? The analytical mind that helps her to ensure that no detail goes unconsidered.
• The Surgeon? An analytical thinker who cuts up and dissects design problems to find the best solutions.
• The Jack of All Trades? He leads a range of projects, solves tricky problems, and dreams up big ideas

Michael Roller explains what makes a great design dream team and why these types click to make any studio a success.

A very well written article is now available over on the FontFeed (the blog of FontShop) about the various weights and styles that can come in any type family by Yves Peters. Styles, Weights, Widths; It’s All in The (Type) Family focuses on several things, one being the mention of difference between obliqued and italicized type:

While an oblique looks like a slanted version of the roman weight, an italic has a different design. Most notably the double-storey lowercase “a” and “g” turn into single-storey forms, although some designs preserve the double-storey “g”.

Don’t miss the handy list of typography-related abbreviations on Unzipped, something that can be useful!

I love when an article, book, blog post, podcast focuses on a designer and what they have gone through to get to where they are now. I especially like this article, Drawing Board to Desktop: A Designer’s Path on the New York Times where Michael Bierut remembers the days where his career began.

Like a chef, I brought my knives with me.

I didn’t begin my career in the way that Mr. Bierut did, but that is how my study in the field of design began. In tenth grade I opted to enroll in the Commercial Art program which was part of the Vo-Tech program in our county that allowed me to pursue a field of interest. We did paste-ups, color theory and much more. We dabbled on the computer but it wasn’t the sole tool that we relied on like today. I too, have my T-square (although it’s stored in a cabinet) and I still enjoy my sketch book to avoid a complete overload on my brain from the glow of the monitor. Great article, highly recommended reading!

Still, I wonder if we haven’t lost something in the process: the deliberation that comes with a slower pace, the attention to detail required when mistakes can’t be undone with the click of a mouse.

Studio on Fire has an interesting slideshow available on their blog, Beast Pieces showing the platemaking process in several steps. Three more days until my letterpress workshop at The ArmNYC !!!!

Vectortuts

There’s a great article over on VectorTuts on The Process of Designing a Killer Logo which breaks it down into two categories Type Treatments and Type Mixed with Image Treatments.

Where to begin? As always, start with pencil and a piece of paper. It should always start there and then you can jump on the computer and take it into the digital realm.

Recommended reading, absolutely.

Dangerous Curves

Dangerous Curves, Mastering Logotype Design by Doyald Young. A while back in an interview with Doyald Young by Debbie Millman on her show Design Matters, Doyald revealed that his new book would be released soon. I would highly suggest that you listen to that interview to get a better idea of who Doyald Young is if you don’t already know.

Dangerous Curves

He calls his latest book venture a “roadmap.” Doyald says that Dangerous Curves is a showcase of both emerging and expert designers and how they’ve turned to their own hands for inspiration in the digital age of computers. He goes on to say that “the only way to create a logotype that is truly unique is for the designer to transcend the limitations of the available fonts and typefaces on the market.”

Dangerous Curves

There was a lovely article on his work in a recent issue of STEP magazine and I was in love with the lettering and logos that he was able to craft by hand. I have always felt more comfortable doing things by hand but am always pressured to do my work on the computer, mostly from time constraints. I hope to find enough free time one day to take classes to hone my craft, but for now I’ll have to make due.

To purchase the book visit Doyald’s website.

Mail Chimp

MailChimp has updated their logo to a new three-dimensional monkey with mail bag in tow designed by the creator of the Firefox logo, Jon Hicks. Read the article about it over at Brand New, what do you think?

Mail Chimp

And while you’re at it, there’s a great write-up on the MailChimp website about the design process and decisions made about the new logo.

Mailchimp equation

Test Image

Over at one of my favorite blogs of all time, and in all honesty may have been the first design blog or any blog I ever read (It’s hard to remember at this point) is an interesting article. Dear Lulu, The New Standards is covering a student project that puts digital printing through a variety of tests that can be challenging when printing any project.

Reversed Type

“Graphic design is no longer solely about the most beautiful photograph or the most expensive paper in the most refined layout: It’s about effectively producing messages and experiences that can be easily distributed.”

It covers a variety of interesting tests with photos to accompany the experiment it’s a nice article. I still don’t think that digital printing has caught up to offset but I wish them the best of luck.

Type test

There is also a link to purchase the book of download a free PDF version.