April is just around the corner! You wouldn’t necessarily know it here in Edmonton, where icicles remain along with 4 feet of snow on the ground. Hopefully wherever you are is more spring-like! But soon we’ll be able to deck ourselves out in our fancy spring attire – might as well start with this new April 2011 Desktop Calendar Wallpaper!
Download the April 2011 Desktop Calendar wallpaper in 2560X1600, 1920X1200, 1680X1050, 1440X900 and 1280X800 pixels.
Here we are, at volume 48 of Found Friday – the best design finds of the week. Remember, if you find something that you think is worthwhile sharing, drop me a line or a tweet and let me know about it! This week we have: a great tool for creating CSS easing animations; an awesome, short video on the history of film title designs; a great article exploring Saul Bass’ logo creations and their longevity; a must-read article from Smashing Magazine regarding choosing typefaces; and a new website all about helping your expand your coding skills. Enjoy!
Use this handy tool to customize and create easing effects. It’s a simple what-you-see-is-what-you-get kinda deal, with copy & paste code generated for you. Well done & useful.
I found this over on Swiss Miss – a great little video made by Art of the Title showcasing the history of title sequence design in film. Interesting, inspiring, and quick. Click the image to watch!
Saul Bass is the Muhammed Ali of logo design. His work has been seen by millions and, according to this article, the average lifespan of a Saul Bass logo is 34 years. Wow. Also interesting to see the ‘refreshed’ versions of his work – some of which are terrible (Continental), some of which are good (Girl Guides). Check it out.
Everyone should read this. Developers who aren’t big on design; design students; secretaries at non-profits tasked with creating bake-sale posters and more. It’s a great breakdown of one of the most important elements of a design – the typeface. You will be a better designer having read it.
Learn code by writing code – that’s the principle behind code school. A beautifully designed site showcases a variety of courses you can purchase to hone your skills, or you can learn a new language from scratch! It’s just getting off the ground, so pickings are slim, but it’s worth a look if you are a developer (or wannabe developer).
See you next week!
Any person serious about their career – carpenters, graphic designers, dentists, or anyone else – is constantly trying to learn and improve at their craft. You and I are no different. If you’re reading this, chances are you’re an aspiring or perhaps established graphic designer (*design bro high-five*). Likewise, if you’re reading this, you’re interested in self-improvement. There are a myriad of ways to improve on your skills, but today I’d like to share 9 websites that have helped me improve, specifically, as a logo/visual identity designer. These sites are visited by me frequently, and if you haven’t already, you should bookmark ‘em.
UnderConsideration’s Brand New is, in my opinion, the undisputed king of logo/identity design critiques. Daily, Bryony and Armin post detailed, thoughtful looks into the latest logo designs and redesigns in all industries. They tackle big redesigns like Starbucks; they tackle smaller redesigns like the Alberta Art Gallery. The community at Brand New is solid too – just by reading this site, you can learn more about the thought processes other design firms put into their branding efforts, you can learn what other designers view as successes and failures, and you can expand your knowledge base.
LogoDesignLove is another site that provides unique and thoughtful takes on any and everything related to logo and brand design. They explore successes and failures; they post tips & tricks; they share logo design resources. On any given day, you can stop by the site and find something new, useful, or insightful – that’s why it’s in my bookmarks.
Hey all – welcome to Found Friday Vol 47, the weekly series where we round up our favorite design-related finds of the week. This week, we have the following: coding up a timeline in HTML & CSS, font-embedding icons with @font-face, some fun pixel oven mitts, an article on usability and CSS3 columns, and finally a bunch of advice from experienced people in the design community. It’s a good group this week – enjoy!
Check out this visual timeline, built with CSS & HTML. Slick looking and fairly easy to customize and implement.
This could be huge. Using embedded fonts as icons? Think of the speed, the ease of changing icons… great possibilities here.
If you’re a design nerd who cooks a lot – like me – what better kitchen tool to have than Pixel Oven Mitts? Fun & useful!
This article is a good read – it explores CSS3′s ability to display columns while talking about how & when to implement the feature.
To stay on top of the ever-changing design field, we need to constantly learn and look to our peers. This post has some great bits of advice from well-known designers – have a read!
See you next week!
Drop caps, otherwise known as initials, have long been a staple of print designers. Marking the beginning of a new section of text, drop caps are a great way to add a little bit of visual interest to whatever piece you’re typesetting. Thanks to the wonders of CSS, we can make this happen in modern browsers too (IE8+)!
If the site you’re working on is a static HTML site – meaning, no dynamic content, no CMS etc – adding a drop cap is a simple two-step process.
First, open your style.css file and add the following lines: Read the whole article >
