Speckyboy Design Magazine
JANUARY 26, 2021
It seems like every designer has a horror story or two (or seventeen) about getting ripped off by a client who refuses to pay. Once it happens, there’s not too much you can do. It sucks, but it’s the simple truth. If you didn’t get a contract or a clear payment process established in the beginning, a lot of the time you’re just going to have to eat the loss.
Spoon Graphics
JANUARY 25, 2021
Follow along with today’s Adobe Illustrator tutorial to create a colourful text effect, which comprises of a stack of text elements that transition through the colour spectrum to produce a rainbow effect. This text style has somewhat of a retro vibe, with it being the kind of effect you might see on an old VHS tape box or brand identity for a 70-80s tech or media company.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Creative Review
JANUARY 27, 2021
Walk down any city street, and it will only be a matter of minutes – maybe even seconds – before you spot a Nike Swoosh. Over the course of its near 50-year life span the logomark has become a ubiquitous addition to our visual landscape, so easily identified that for half of that time it has stood alone, without supporting typography, to represent the Nike brand.
Just Creative
JANUARY 24, 2021
This article has been contributed by Jon Torres. When most people think of the factors that make an excellent blog, great writing is the first thing that comes to mind. But whether you realize it or not, images are also a key determinant of the success of your blog. Why exactly are images so important for your blog? Simply put, strategically placed images have the ability to increase traffic, boost audience engagement and help your articles rank higher on Google.
Speaker: Amber Asay, Creative Director and Founder of award-winning design studio Nice People
Understanding what trends are happening and how they’re impacting the competitive landscape is crucial to providing top dollar design strategy to your clients. With so many trends coming and going, it can be overwhelming to determine which ones you should capitalize on and which ones might not be worth the trouble. In this exclusive webinar with Amber Asay, we’ll explore graphic design trends that need to die, trends that are starting to pick up and why, trends that have come and gone, and how t
Shillington
JANUARY 28, 2021
At the start of 2021, Shillington were approached by Print Social , an accessible, sustainable pre-sale platform based in South London, and Crisis , the UK’s national charity for homeless people, for an exciting project for our Shillumni across the world. Print Social invited Shillumni to submit designs for a t-shirt to help raise funds for the charity and support homeless people in the UK during the Coronavirus pandemic.
Spoon Graphics
JANUARY 29, 2021
A free online Adobe event kicked off earlier this week at Design Cuts featuring live sessions with top designers and discounts of up 50% off various products for Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign and more. This is your chance to own some of the best Photoshop Brushes, Templates, Graphics, Fonts, and Toolkits at a huge discount. Throughout this week there has also been several FREE Live Sessions with some of the biggest names in the design community, so you can learn new tips and techniques and us
Graphic Arts Today brings together the best content for graphic arts professionals from the widest variety of industry thought leaders.
Just Creative
JANUARY 28, 2021
Charcoal is a great medium to create life-like portraits. It equips an artist with the perfect option to highlight the effects of light and shadow with shading. Charcoal sketches also work great to distinctively elaborate the gradients on a hand-drawn surface. Apart from creating portraits, charcoal also plays a crucial role in rough sketching and under-drawing for paintings.
Azure Magazine
JANUARY 25, 2021
As Germany’s economic capital, Frankfurt has a reputation as a business town, one better known internationally for its soaring (by European standards) skyscrapers than its hospitality culture. Enter Patricia Urquiola. In the heart of the city’s financial district, the acclaimed designer has introduced a vital dose of warmth and vibrancy to the public-facing spaces at the foot of a soaring new office complex.
Spoon Graphics
JANUARY 27, 2021
If you’re a fan of the vintage style you’ll love digging through the wealth of quality design resources in this vintage themed bundle! The Designer’s Timeless Vintage Collection brings you over 20 tools that help you create retro and vintage artwork, including fonts, vintage patterns and illustrations, classic elements, and much more. It’s a true treasure trove for any vintage design lover.
Creative Review
JANUARY 27, 2021
When London was placed into tier three restrictions after the first national lockdown, photographer and Kingston University student Cassian Gray decided to shine a light on unrepresented key workers in society. “There had been an extensive amount of coverage for NHS workers … and that’s when I thought of the Royal Mail postal workers,” explains Gray. “Their iconography really struck me; their bold red uniform with the recognisable Royal Mail logo emblazoned on the c
Advertiser: Issuu
Brands must create and share impactful content to thrive, but they have less people, tighter budgets, and fewer resources to do so. Learn how to publish and market digital content with the same professionalism as organizations with million-dollar budgets.
Just Creative
JANUARY 28, 2021
This article has been contributed by Ashley Lipman. In the 1800s, playwright Henrik Ibsen coined the phrase that would evolve into the adage, “a picture is worth a thousand words”. While the way we consume imagery has evolved dramatically over the past two hundred years, that phrase still rings true — especially in social media and marketing. Strong visuals are often the driving force behind audience engagement on social media.
Speckyboy Design Magazine
JANUARY 25, 2021
Web designers are constantly bombarded with security advice. We’re informed about best practices, security holes and their requisite patches. It’s enough to make your head spin. Of course, this is all important and well-meaning. Online security is a constantly moving target, where even the biggest players are susceptible. Therefore, it’s up to us to keep up with the latest developments.
Pixlr
JANUARY 27, 2021
Food photography is an exciting field not only because you get to work with appetizing food every day but also because it demands creativity. This guide details how to build a food photography setup. In addition, you will learn some techniques to use once that setup is complete. Let there be Light It is pretty [.].
Creative Review
JANUARY 28, 2021
Organised by letterpress studio New North Press, the exhibition was originally held at the Standpoint Gallery in London, where it opened in December but then had to close due to the latest UK Covid-19 lockdown. It has since reached people online and via a catalogue of the works featured. While the events of last year make an exhibition about protest very timely, planning for it actually began in December 2019. “That’s when we chose the subject of protest,” says Richard Ardagh,
Advertisement
As the design industry evolves, teams are facing new challenges and a need to produce more outstanding creative work than ever. Leaders must learn how to adapt their processes to solve today’s—and tomorrow’s—unique design challenges. In this e-book, you’ll learn how to establish your creative workflow and leverage the power of CorelDRAW® Graphics Suite to streamline the entire design process, from start to finish.
Just Creative
JANUARY 28, 2021
This article has been contributed by Ashley Lipman. In the 1800s, playwright Henrik Ibsen coined the phrase that would evolve into the adage, “a picture is worth a thousand words”. While the way we consume imagery has evolved dramatically over the past two hundred years, that phrase still rings true — especially in social media and marketing. Strong visuals are often the driving force behind audience engagement on social media.
Colossal
JANUARY 27, 2021
“Devouring Star Jelly.” All images © Robert Steven Connett, shared with permission probes the ocean depths for. Whether rendered as a snapshot of the ocean floor or a few drops of water under a microscope, the densely inhabited paintings by Robert Steven Connett ( previously ) are brimming with vitality. The Los Angeles-based artist probes the planet’s bodies of water, unveiling a range of flora and fauna that populate the mysterious and sometimes psychedelic ecosystems with ex
Design You Trust
JANUARY 27, 2021
“Kenobi-shogun! daitan-na otokoyo!” – Grievous. Digital artist Scadarts ( previously ) uses Photoshop to put Star Wars characters into classic artworks. His latest series uses the classical Japanese style to portray Boba Fett, Ahsoka Tano, Darth Maul, and Leia Organa. Click to the right in the image above to see each work on its own. But that’s just his latest series.
Creative Review
JANUARY 27, 2021
There is a distinctly dreamlike quality that imbues Hollie Fernando’s photography. Inspired by the rich colour palettes, lighting styles and symbolic features traditionally seen in classical paintings, her images of people and places feel both delicate and powerful at the same time. The Brighton-based photographer discovered her creative streak from a young age, whether making fairy houses in her garden or cooking mud pies with her siblings, but her first introduction to photography came f
Advertisement
In today’s competitive markets, how do you make sure that your content not only stands out but performs well? How can you predict whether certain design choices will result in clicks, engagement, downloads, and other drivers of ROI? Shutterstock’s Creative Insights Report (Q3) is your window into the hottest trends that are transforming the creative world.
Just Creative
JANUARY 28, 2021
Charcoal is a great medium to create life-like portraits. It equips an artist with the perfect option to highlight the effects of light and shadow with shading. Charcoal sketches also work great to distinctively elaborate the gradients on a hand-drawn surface. Apart from creating portraits, charcoal also plays a crucial role in rough sketching and under-drawing for paintings.
Its Nice That
JANUARY 25, 2021
The films by Toad London aim to resonate with teenagers, and feature work by illustrators such as Mason London, Elena Gumeniuk and Kris Andrew Small.
Design You Trust
JANUARY 26, 2021
Dutch artist Daan Roosegaarde’s latest artwork GROW is an homage to the beauty of agriculture. In the world film premiere GROW appears as a luminous dreamscape of red and blue waves of light over an enormous field. GROW is inspired by scientific light recipes which improve plants’ growth and resilience. More: Studio Roosegaarde , Instagram , Facebook.
Creative Review
JANUARY 27, 2021
Cultivated meat might ordinarily bring to mind sterile lab environments and the idea that a scientist has been poking around with your food. However, Studio Koto’s new branding for cultivated meat brand Meatable – which uses samples from an unharmed cow or pig to produce meat – aims to show that this is simply ‘the new natural’ The visual identity puts animals and nature front and centre, from the idyllic photography right down to the natural colour palette inspired
Speaker: Sean Adams, ArtCenter College of Design
Thomas Edison once said “Vision without execution is hallucination.” This statement applies not just to invention, but to graphic design. One of the greatest strengths of graphic designers is the ability to first develop a concept and then execute it to make it real. From visualization and ideation all the way through to actuation and execution, each step of this process takes skill and expertise.
Design Week
JANUARY 26, 2021
Horizon, Guggenheim Museum and the Institute of Queer Ecology. The pandemic has felt like a reset moment for a lot of us. Horizon – or Habitat One: Regenerative Interactive Zone of Nurture – wants to take it a step further. In partnership with the Institute of Queer Ecology, the Guggenheim Museum is launching the social simulation game in February which aims to get users thinking embracing an ecologically conscious life to avoid climate catastrophe.
Speckyboy Design Magazine
JANUARY 29, 2021
Video Tutorial: How to Create a Stained Glass Window Effect – Craft a stunning effect in Adobe Illustrator with this tutorial. The State of Design in 2021 – A survey of over 1,000 designers, asking them how they work, what they value, and what kinds of challenges they’re facing. 8 Examples of Icon-Based Navigation, Enhanced with CSS and JavaScript – Some interesting examples of how icons can improve website navigation.
Azure Magazine
JANUARY 25, 2021
Over the past year, shelter-in-place orders and intermittent gym closures have prompted many fitness buffs to beef up their in-house workouts. In turn, many at-home fitness brands have hit the ground running, amping up both the technical capabilities and the design quotient of their products to distinguish them from the pack. Think super-sophisticated stationary bikes , inspiring interactive mirrors, even dumbbells made of marble.
Creative Review
JANUARY 26, 2021
The artist worked on the covers at his Leeds studio Prints of Thieves, which has made work for bands and musicians as well as designers and illustrators. Craig Oldham designed the jackets, and Davidson-Hawley blended coloured ink across sheets of paper before cutting them to size and then printing the text – meaning no two copies are the same.
Speaker: Eden Spivak, Design Expert and Editor at Wix & Nir Horesh, Accessibility Lead and Senior Product Manager at Wix
When we design products or websites for people like ourselves, there are many others who are, as a result, left out. From visually impaired users who rely on assistive technology, to people with a temporary injury such as a broken arm, tech users are forever diverse and beautifully unique. The products we design can, and should, reflect the extremely wide range of human experiences and needs.
Design Week
JANUARY 27, 2021
“Everyone found out about Vocal Type at the same time,” Tré Seals says, recalling the race protests from summer 2020. “Part of me felt like it wouldn’t be successful if it wasn’t for George Floyd.” Vocal Type is the type foundry that Seals runs from Washington, D.C., US – it’s his second venture, following Seals design studio which he closed down last year because of his typography’s sudden popularity.
Speckyboy Design Magazine
JANUARY 24, 2021
There’s an old saying that there’s “no such thing as a free lunch” – meaning that everything has a cost. Increasingly, the available free WordPress themes seem to be heading in this direction. In the early days of WordPress, themes listed in the official repository were often truly free and unencumbered by ads or watered-down features. Maybe a developer out there created something useful for a gig and wanted to share it with the community.
Its Nice That
JANUARY 27, 2021
The Berlin-based graphic designer talks us through his key inspirations which revolve around perspective, research and visibility.
Creative Review
JANUARY 29, 2021
The new video campaign aims to encourage kids to take up exercise in fun ways and is created for Generation Pep, a Swedish non-profit that focuses on promoting healthy and active lifestyles among young people. Soundtracked by French dance music act Justice, who revamped their song D.A.N.C.E for the video, the film follows nine-year-old French dancer Lilyana Ilunga as she moves her way from morning to night via public transport and a stop at school, dancing all the way.
Advertisement
Download this free eBook to learn how you can create stunning typography, using the basics, such as placing text, to advanced controls like ligatures, variable fonts, effects, tracking, range kerning, and everything in between. Learn how to: Use Character Control to add variety to your font styles. Use Paragraph Control to manage spacing, alignment, justification and more.
Expert insights. Personalized for you.
144 
Let's personalize your content