Sunday, March 29, 2009

Fonts...fonts, and more fonts!! Which Do I Use?




When choosing a font, or typeface, careful consideration of how it's going to be used should be taken in order that your message is conveyed clearly, beautifully and effectively.
SANS-SERIF
Helvetica, Arial, Verdana, Avant Garde, are names of some of the most popular sans-serif types. Sans serifs are perhaps the MOST readable typefaces around and can be viewed easily from distances, which is the reason that their most common use is for highway and road signage.

SERIF
Goudy, Garamond, Times New Roman are some names that you may have come across when putting a word document together and are searching for a typeface that resembles one that you might find printed in a novel or a newspaper. Serif fonts are great for documents and small print. They also work great for signs and logo type.

SCRIPT
Brush Script, Mistral, Vivaldi, Edwardian are great script types. When designing, just writing an elegent e-mail message, creating a logo or a background, there is always a fun and interesting way to use a script font. It works as a contrast to, when placed alongside of a serif or sans-serif font. Scripts are definitely, for me, the coolest of fonts.
CASUAL, HAND
Dom, Marker, Comic Sans, name some of the casual and hand drawn types that are available. These are types that I believe are a good way to show personality in a printed message or e-mail message, displaying a friendly and personal style.


WHIMSICAL
Curlz and Jokerman come to mind when thinking of a font that is really kinda, out of the ordinary.  This style, although not used very often is a fun way to write out a messages out and in some cases, very appropriate.


There is such an extensive list of different styles of fonts out there, sometimes choosing the right one, especially when designing something that requires a good font, can be a real time-consuming task! It is a task that I must say I enjoy doing, and I am thankful that there are so many great unique fonts out there to choose from. It keeps my job interesting!

Saturday, March 21, 2009

Business Cards to Promote Yourself


Although it's the most basic, simplest form of advertising, Business Cards could be considered one of the most important marketing tools for any business. And with the advancement of digital printing technology today, a designer's imagination is enabled to run that much more free.

There have been a lot of beautiful and creative business cards that I've seen people get printed over the years, and the following article is proof that it keeps getting better! I can just imagine incorporating a Hawaiian esque design into some of the business card layouts shown... they would be that much more stunning!

Get some great ideas, be inspired by, and admire the cool business card designs on this site: CLICK HERE>>

Sunday, March 8, 2009

WRAPS!! Get Your Advertisements Rolling!


Digital graphics for vehicles, or vehicle "wraps" are an
ever effective means of advertising. Some vehicle ads out
there are, well, pretty out there! But just like an outrageous
TV commercial these advertisements get talked about,
they get noticed and they're highly sought after.

In the competitive world of advertising and marketing,
a bleak economy only makes competition that much more
fierce. No better time for companies to advertise with an
attractive, eye-catching and maybe even outrageous
vehicle wrap.

Here are some very creative and cleverly done 
vehicle wraps, on buses.

Wednesday, March 4, 2009

Screen Shots

I'm always fascinated with the many utilities that computers offer us at our fingertips. The one that I'm about to show you is among my favorites, mainly because it has one key feature: it's free!

This may not be news to some (or to many), but it's something that I recently learned and I find it very useful. It is your computer's BUILT IN screen shot capability. So if you're new to this, then please read on...

What's a screen shot?
Taking a "screen shot" is taking a still picture of whatever is on your computer at any time.

When would a screen shot come in handy?
I find it useful to capture a still image of a video when it's on pause, or to capture an image of a document that you need to save but can't print. Or, when trying to put together a how-to about something on your PC, or simply want to instruct someone and need to illustrate a step by step, then you might find this handy.










How do you take a "screen shot"?
The best part about this is how easy it is.
(Sorry Mac users, these are instructions for PCs. I'm sure that Macs have this feature also, and if you know about it please e-mail me or comment to let me know)
Alt+PrntScr: There's a key toward the top right of the keyboard, it's called "PrntScr". Hold down the "Alt" key, then strike the "PrntScr" key. Okay, you've just taken a screen shot! Now, to view it.
Use MS Paint: If you're using Windows XP, go to Start/ Run/ then type in mspaint, hit "Enter." If you're using Windows Vista, go to Start and in the "Start Search" field type in "mspaint" then hit "Enter." From the Edit menu go to Paste (or Ctrl+V)
You should now be looking at your first screen shot. If you want to save it go to File/ Save As/ where you'll be able to choose where to save it, what to name it, and what type of file to save it as (most common: .jpg file extension) 

Let me know what you took your screen shot of!

Here's one that I took: