Just add this to the “J doesn’t make this crap up” file:

Illustrator 101: To Scale or Not to Scale? Strokes, That Is.

You might, someday when you have time, want to peruse the archives of this site as you’ll find all sorts of handy info in here. You could even (gasp!) add this site to your feed reader. Crazy talk, I know.

Wow, this one is awesome.

If not a real estate development, then surely theoneillbuilding.com was promoting a new documentary about sick building syndrome, perhaps narrated by Al Gore.

What’s all the sickness about? Read The One Ill Building to find out.

(via)

Step one: define our working definition for inspiration. Read Cameron’s article on the subject from earlier this year: Influence vs. Inspiration

The natural extension of that article is After the Brief: A Field Guide to Design Inspiration. This was a SXSW presentation given by Jason Santa Maria and Robert Weychert. Fortunately for us, the audio and slides (pdf) from the lecture are available for free download. Grab them both and dedicate an hour to listen and follow along. This is an enlightening discussion about how and where to find sources of inspiration for your designs (and a great look at how today’s designers do it day in and day out).

Still stuck for ideas? Suffering from creative block? What’s a (new) designer to do? Cameron puts forth one idea (which should sound kind of familiar by now) for breaking through the haze: unplugging from the grid for a while. But not to be outdone, Cameron post yet one more on the topic: Pressure = Inspiration?

So, a recap:

• Read Influence vs. Inspiration
• Download and listen to After the Brief: A Field Guide to Design Inspiration (slides)
• Read Uninspired? Unplug yourself
• Read Pressure = Inspiration?

Anything stand out to you? What new ideas will you take to your other classes moving forward? Which of these were you already doing?

Following up on our conversation on the creative process, we dig way back into the past (OK, 2003) to read what Cameron has to say on the matter of stealing. (Yes, I would have posted this even if Veerle hadn’t outed the article.)

This article wouldn’t be complete without a warning to be careful when copying well-known sources. If I were to summarize this warning in one sentence, this would be my golden verbiage: copy the inspiration, not the outcome.

Read Good Designers Copy, Great Designers Steal

Hey all,

I’ve gotten a few questions about this, so here’s the skinny on how to submit assignment 4: Simply bring the files to class. As a class, we will zip them up and submit them via the online assignment submission system (so everyone knows how to use it moving forward). Easy-peazy.

As we talked about last night, keeping an idea bank or collection is a handy means of brainstorming. For materials that are online, del.icio.us can serve this purpose. An account is free and the stuff you bookmark is available on any online computer that you come across. To see how I’ve (perhaps ineffectually) put it to use, see my page here:

http://del.icio.us/jmaxf

Just a suggestion; not an assignment. Oh, and I think ma.gnolia.com does the same thing. But prettier.

Ted over at NorthTemple.com again graces us with lessons learned from the Tooth Fairy. It’s his daughter’s second go around dealing with this mythical beast and things aren’t all smooth sailing in Ted-land.

She had very high hopes, given her prior experience with the magical exchange of a worthless discarded tooth for three shiny quarters. She went to bed with great anticipation, her tooth tucked into a ziplock baggie under her pillow. The next lesson: Prior experience sets expectations.

You know the drill by now - give the article a read and be ready to discuss. How do the lessons Ted presents here jive/conflict with what we’ve discussed thus far in terms of dealing with our clients?

We’ll talk more about umbrella branding later, but for now I’d like you to take a few minutes and look over the reactions for Photoshop’s new logo:

• Photoshop gets a new logo
• John Nack writes about the Photoshop logo facelift
• Photoshop 2.0: The Wrong Kind of 2.0

What are your thoughts? Does it work? Is it needed?

Check out this job posting.

You’re ahead of the game; you already knew that the logo would naturally need to be vector-based.

See? This class can be relevant (when I’m not sending marker-shrapnel flying -sorry Katie).

A Brief Message presents a great and quick read on the power of communication design. Again, the ever present question: so what?

This new site presents quick articles that are no more than 200 words. Aside from reading this specific article, I’d like you to add it to your feed reader and read the other two articles posted. Be sure to visit the site (as opposed to reading the text in your feed reader) as each piece has been art directed differently.