Just Creative Design

7 Female Graphic Designers That’ll Rock Your Socks Off

In this guest article Kelly Erickson* comes back for a second guest article (find her first article here) and this time Kelly showcases 7 truly unique and inspirational female graphic designers with a brief bio on each.

The field is ever-changing, yet the rock stars of graphic design are still, mainly, men. Meanwhile, the purchasing power of the globe is in the hands of individual women… It’s time to see more women like these seven, making a mark with their own Vision. Get inspired!

Marian Bantjes: Step Away From the Computer!

Based near Vancouver, British Columbia, Marian Bantjes’ extraordinary way with communication begs to be called “graphic art,” in the finest sense of the term. Fabulous hand lettering is her trademark, demonstrating the power of a fine pen in a plugged-in world. A 2006 installation created with Stefan Sagmeister shows off her hand work in an ultra-modern context. Her spam email centerfold for the Vancouver Review will make you tear your hair out with jealousy. This is one hard-working lady, even when she’s riffing on a bit of junk mail!

Kristen Nikosey: The Art and Craft of Communication

Illustrator and graphic designer Kristen Nikosey’s work evokes Impressionist painting and Arts & Crafts style, with a distinctly California vibe. Her book illustrations are rich. Her pattern designs are meticulously casual, if such a thing is possible, with deep color that jumps off the page. In her packaging and identity work she blends today’s digital design techniques with her old-world sensibilities.

Janet Allinger: With Tongue Planted Firmly in Cheek

Irreverent humour in identity design? If you’ve got Janet Allinger to inspire you, why not! If the market can take it, this designer dishes it out. While she’s been known to do more traditional design, it’s her post-feminist comic stylings that will grab and hold your attention. Fun, funky, and a little bit in-your-face—this lady’s not afraid of being known as “edgy.”

Laura Smith: Reinventing Retro

While designer Laura Smith is at work, Art Deco will always find fresh interpretations. She’s done work for heavy hitters from Time Magazine to Major League Baseball to the U.S. Postal Service, and that’s just for starters. Classic, colorful, edited to only the necessary detail, her graphic images are nostalgic but never stuffy.

Louise Fili: Elegant Romance

Louise Fili has a special way with food packaging and restaurant identity design: the old-fashioned way. Her intricate illustrations and hand-lettered type grace brands from the most familiar, like Williams-Sonoma’s, to the most exclusive. As a book jacket designer previous to opening her New York City firm, she designed over 2000 covers, and learned the intimate art of connecting with an audience visually within a very small frame. Today she is also the author of several excellent books on graphic design.

Deborah Sussman: Urban Legend

Art director and environmental graphic designer Deborah Sussman has been creating legendary work for public spaces for decades. Deborah and her firm, Sussman/Prejza, have done interior and exterior wayfinding and signage systems for Apple, Hasbro, the city of Los Angeles, and numerous others. She may be most famous for her comprehensive graphics program for the 1984 Summer Olympics. She has a keen eye for both client and community needs, creating work that is imaginative, spare, and crystal clear.

Paula Scher: The Dame of Grande Design

Bigger is definitely better. Bold words wrap you up and pull you in. You’re hooked! New York-based Paula Scher, one of only two female partners at mighty Pentagram, is a graphic design rock star of the highest order. She’s also an author, a superb lecturer, and her work is in the permanent collections of several museums. Her clean, brash, and inventive use of typography has influenced a generation of young designers.

Barriers? Sure. Glass ceiling? Maybe. These ladies have their eyes on the prize, not the ceiling. As a result, they’ve busted right through it. Rock on.

Editors note: For some further reading check out this great discussion / article… Where Are All The Female Designers? or maybe check out the controversial article where Milton Glaser states that “Women will never be design rockstars“.

*About Kelly Erickson: I walk in the shadows of all the giants and emerging leaders listed above, and of so many more women and men. Great thought and design is all around us. Future rock star business owners: as the owner of VisionPoints, The Experience Designers, I’m obsessed with your success. For more writings about Experience Design, visit the Maximum Customer Experience Blog.

6 Photoshop Tips and Tricks That You Probably Don’t Know About

Here are 6 Adobe Photoshop tips and tricks that you probably don’t know about (I bet you don’t know at least one). This post comes after hearing the reactions from some of my fellow students in class when they found out about some of the options available that they never knew about.

1. Refining a selection

After you make a selection in Photoshop you can easily edit the selection using refine edge in the top toolbar. You must try this out, it is very useful!

2. Hidden Options Behind Arrows

I am amazed by how many people do not know about these tiny little arrows that hold so many more options! These tiny arrows are pretty much on every tool bar across the whole Adobe Suite. I assure these arrows will open you up to a whole new world.

3. Blending Options

If you right click on a layer in the layers toolbar, and then click blending options this will bring you to a whole vast array of effects that will keep you busy for hours. Use these options very sparingly.

4. Resist The Urge to use the filter gallery, especially the lens flare.

Not so much of a ‘tip’ but more ‘helpful advice’… but yes you heard me, do not use the filter gallery. Design is not filter effects and it never will be. Also please resist adding lens flare to your work, as well as rainbow gradients, embossed type and drop shadow unless you know how to use it well. You may want to check out 15 Signs Your a Bad Graphic Designer. NB. Rules can be broken.

5. Layer Blending Modes

Once you master the blending modes in Photoshop you can pretty much ‘own’ photoshop. Open up the layers palette, select a layer and click the downwards arrow where it says Normal. Try experimenting with different blending modes on different layers, put layers above or below other layers, change the opacity and so fourth and you will be amazed!

6. The best tip of all…

Practice. You can do this by doing tutorials or watching videos or experimenting on your own. Practice, practice, practice!

In my own personal experience I have found that if I find a design piece or style that I really like, I search the net and magazines for tutorials on how to recreate that effect and try to adapt it to my own personal project and style… I find this a great way to learn. Also if you ever need help, check out Adobes Help function in the programs and also write questions on forums (or blogs)… people will be more than happy to help you out!

Is this article worthy of a stumble or designfloat? How many of these did you know about?

The Innovative One Page Resume & Portfolio

In this guest article Jacob Share* goes through an innovative new way to display your work and CV - all on one page.

Many companies and recruiters prefer the simplicity and speed of one page resumes. As a designer, how can you have maximum impact with only a single sheet of paper? The answer…

The one page printed résumé and portfolio.

The one page resume portfolio is a 6-panel pamphlet that shows your resume when folded and your design portfolio when unfolded. You can click on the image above to view it in full.

How does it work?

The above image is an example of the one page printed resume and portfolio from a French Graphic Designer. It shows 3 different views and below is a description. From left to right;

1. Front view of the resume portfolio, slightly open.
   You can see the designer’s logo and contact information. Notice the vertical bar on the right side of the inner panel, where the text reads “curriculum vitae” with a right arrow and “portfolio” with a left arrow pointing inside.
2. Partially-open view of the portfolio.
   If you followed the left arrow and continued unfolding, this is what you’d see before you’re done. The panel with the arrow bar folds outwards, meaning that there’s actually more room for portfolio highlights inside.
3. Resume details.
   Following the right arrow will have you flip over the pamphlet, leading to the actual resume content.

Is it right for you?

Cons

• Somewhat complicated design is time-consuming to update or customise
• Uneven folding looks sloppy if done incorrectly and ruins the impact
• Usually requires costly colour laser-printing on thick paper for full effect

Pros

• More space to communicate and brand yourself
• Very memorable, especially when done well
• Design pun: lets you describe your skills while demonstrating them

Best Practices

• Have a history of school, volunteering or work projects before you use this design. Substituting with content that isn’t yours but that you’re “capable of creating” defeats the purpose and looks amateurish.
• The one page resume portfolio works best live when people can hold it and unfold it, like in interviews or at professional gatherings.
• The front panel should contain your logo and contact information at a glance.
• The front panel should be particularly eye-catching to make people want to pick it up and open it.
• An attractive image that continues off one panel will encourage the reader to unfold until they can see the entire image. Above, the French designer used that effect to lure the reader to see both resume-related panels together.
• The 2 configurations that work best are the pictured 4:2 portfolio to resume panel ratio with arrow bar and the 3:3 “resume-outside portfolio-inside” ratio.
• Use the resume portfolio to complement your “full” design portfolio whether physical or digital. For the former, you might consider a sentence about what else not pictured is in your portfolio. For the latter, give all pertinent links.

Want more resume and portfolio tips?

• The Graphic Design Resume Guide
• How and Where To Get Paid Design Work For Students
• The One Page Graphic Design Portfolio Guide - Online
• Resume-Writing Dos and Don’ts
• The 7 Deadly Sins of Resume Design
• Design Resume Style Guide

Conclusion

Great design is the best combination of trade-offs for a certain context. If you use it wisely, the one page resume portfolio could be a valuable tool in your hunt for new design jobs. What are your thoughts?

*Jacob Share created the award-winning JobMob to rally job seekers and jobfinders in getting jobs in Israel and all over the world. The blog is filled with straight-talking real world advice, lots of humour and design inspiration such as 36 Beautiful Resume Ideas That Work. Subscribe for a week via RSS, it’s free.

DON’T MISS: The Best Design Articles from May 2008

As usual I round up the best design articles from around the web however as I leave in 4 days I am extremely busy trying to get everything sorted before my trip around Europe so instead of going through all of my feeds I have scoured the net for the best round up posts and combined them here on this page. The sources come from Vandelay Design, Noupe and Smashing Apps. This post will keep you very busy. Read more »

Blatant Design Rip Offs or Just Inspiration?

Here is another list (first post here) of possible graphic design rips off. I’ll leave it up to you to decide whether these pieces are plagiarised or just inspired. The designs that were designed first are the ones on top but who knows where their inspiration came from?

“Don’t worry about people stealing your design work. Worry about the day they stop.” - Jeff Zeldman

Some resources on how to deal with plagiarism and what to do if your design gets stolen.

• What to do if someone steals your work - By far the best resource I have found on this topic even if it is based on content theft.
• Web Design Plagiarism - Tips if someone steals your web design.
• What to do when someone steals your content - Based on blog article theft. Read more »
  
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