Timeless advice
I'm reading John Adams by David McCullough at the moment and find a great line that he sent to his son in a letter responding to the boy's attempts at pen flourishes. It seemed like such a great typographic rule of thumb as well that I decided to do something quick with it. I made two posters with the quote featured. The first is set in Caslon, a popular typeface from the period that Adams lived in with ornaments that would've been typical at the time. The second is in Helvetica (I recently rewatched the movie) with some ornamentation of the modern variety. It's always been the case with me that in order to get ideas for creative work I need to be reading or learning about a variety of subjects and little things will reveal themselves.
February 24, 2009
Chickens in Motion
My family recently pooled together to get my dad a nice DSLR for Christmas. He had mentioned to me last summer while we were on a canoe trip in the Boundary Waters how he would like to be able to take pictures of the beautiful things he saw around him. So, ever since he got the camera he's been working on figuring it out. He frequently contacts me to ask questions about how things work and it has made me recall my photography classes from over a year ago. I'm no master photographer myself but it has made me reflect on how well I retain (or don't retain) things that I've learned in my various classes. My dad has set a project for himself and it seems to be going well. He is going to photograph the alphabet. He has recently gone a shoot looking for the letter A, either literally, looking for the letterform, or shooting things that start with A. Already he has some pretty interesting shots from it. I'm very impressed about how he has set himself to learn something and hope to be able to follow his example in setting good projects for myself in the future. Look at his flickr feed to see how the project goes.
In Typography class last summer we had a project involving an imagined King County, Washington program for sustainability. The idea was to encourage locals to raise chickens to cut down on waste and imported goods. Practicality aside, it was a good project and gave me the opportunity to go to work in a way that I really enjoyed. I took photos of chickens from a Bainbridge Island family that raises chickens and buildings around the city. I was pleased with the way poster and brochure and the idea to do a motion graphics aspect to the project began to germinate. Finally this semester I had the excuse to go for it. The video was fun to make. Check it out on the last page of the Seattle City Chickens project page, here.
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February 12, 2009
Indie Publishing
Thinking With Type, one of Ellen Lupton's other books, was one of my first introductions to the world of typography. Now she's written another great introduction to the world of indie book publishing. She explains the advantages and disadvantages of different types of publishing, from major houses to the online options that now exist, such as Lulu, to self publishing. She only goes skin-deep as far as design techniques go, but it's a great starting point for beginners in book design, such as myself. One thing it has motivated me to do is create booklets for Christmas gifts this year. I recommend Indie Publishing for anyone who wants to learn the basics of book design and see examples of great examples of independent books.
December 13, 2008