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- Graphic Design Blogging: Lessons LearnedOctober 5
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Over the past 9 months I have been blogging on Positive Space, and over that time I have expanded my skills as both a print designer and a web designer by amounts I never thought possible. Over this time, I have not only learned new skills, but through blogging I have also developed some insights that I thought would be worth sharing. For the readers who may be new to Positive Space, this article should hopefully give you a better understanding of who Anthony Zinni is and set the tone for my previous articles.
1. Aesthetics are important
No matter what the medium, the aesthetic properties of it do have an impact on its success. Don’t believe me, well think about brands like Apple, Dyson, or Lexus. Each of these brands use their unique aesthetic properties to help position their products and influence consumer perception. This is just as true of websites and marketing materials. Collateral that functions just as well as another option but looks better will most likely end up becoming more popular. This isn’t because we are a vain culture, it is because people appreciate beauty.
2. Standards are the Foundation
They just aren’t the end of the world. I fully believe that websites should be developed in a standards compliant manner as there are a number of benefits. However, I believe that this is more of a necessity that
- Amazing Websites Ten: September 2008October 2
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September has come and gone, which means another entry into the amazing websites series. This month was interesting, as I distinctly saw a number of micro trends emerging. Multicolor light sources, 50s/60s retro, and sketchy illustrations were extremely popular this month, with what appears to be a slight decrease in the number of grungy sites as well. Regardless of the trends, September was full of a number of amazingly creative websites that deserve to be shared.
The White Rabbit
http://www.thewhiterabbit.com.sg/
FF Meta Serif
Madame Surto
http://www.madamesurto.com.br/
illumivision
- Wired NEXTFEST at Millennium Park: First ImpressionsSeptember 30
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Well, this week has been a busy one for me filled with project proposals and new business meetings. However, I did find the time today to step across the street from our offices to visit the Wired NEXTFEST at Millennium Park that is taking place from now until October 12th. I only had a few moments to visit the event but I wanted to share an exhibit that really caught my eye today.
Xerox is a corporate sponsor for the event, and they are promoting a number of their new technologies, but it was their environmentally friendly solid inks that really won me over. I had heard about solid inks in the past, but never experienced anything like Xerox’s, and definitely not hands on.
Apparently they are able to reduce waste by 90% as compared to laser inks because the solid inks require much less packaging. In fact, the inks appear to look like a big blocky crayon and have no cartridge. Once the inks are placed into the printer they are then melted into a liquid and printed onto a drum which is then offset onto the paper. From what I saw of the print quality it appears that the new technology could easily replace the office laser printer in no time. As a designer it may not go a long way toward re
- Common Traits of Bad Web DesignSeptember 28
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Lately I have been writing a number of articles that I would consider to be more critical thinking based, so I thought that it may be interesting to do more of an opinion piece. In the past the article I wrote about bad blog design was successful, so I felt covering web design in general could be helpful as well. It is important to note that in this article I am referring to “web design” as the whole process of creating a site, not just the visual aspect.
10. Liquid Content Columns
Liquid content columns rarely work without setting minimum and maximum widths. Unfortunately it seems that most times in which a site spans to fit the available space results in extremely long lines of type and proportionally small images.
9. Re-listing Every Page in the Footer
This may be a way to help search engine crawlers find their way around your site, however there are other ways that aren’t so cluttered and ugly. A sitemap page is a great alternative that only takes one link in the footer. If you are doing this because you have a flash navigation or JavaScript based navigation then see #5.
8. Repeating Navigational Elements
No doubt you have seen this before. Instead of taking the time to do proper site planning and information architecture, the navigation is a mix of extremely long sub pages or pages found i
- Productivity Versus CreativitySeptember 24
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Freelancers and designers are obsessed with productivity, and rightly so. When your earnings are based upon time, being more productive means more profit. Anyone who runs a business wants to be profitable, but at what cost? I have realized something as of late, slowing down has its benefits. Productivity software such as Basecamp has helped me shave down some of the things like project management that I don’t really like to do, but that doesn’t mean that I should be extremely productive in everything I do. Not if productivity implies a loss in creativity that is.
Replacing productivity with effectiveness
The problem I have found with being productive is what it implies. Productivity implies that all end solutions are of equal quality. Once a task has been completed it is successful, so completing it in less time would mean being more productive. While somewhat true, I find a number of problems with judging one’s success based on productivity.
No two solutions are the same
Two designers with the exact same set of guidelines and limitations will reach completely different solutions every time. It is highly probable that one designer’s solution may be more effective at solving the problem at hand. However, this solution may also take more time to achieve, if based on productivity alone this approach would not be explor