Artzmania 9 available for free download
Posted by Jennifer Farley | August 28, 2008 | Leave A Comment
Artsmania 9 - “The idea issue” is available for download free from Spotbit. Covering Photoshop tutorials, design inspiration, digital art, illustration - there’s a little bit of something for everyone.
Creating speech bubbles in Photoshop using the Custom Shape Tool
Posted by Jennifer Farley | August 27, 2008 | 7 Comments
Speech bubbles are used a LOT around the web in logo designs and as icons. Photoshop comes with a set of speech bubble shapes just waiting to be used, but they are hidden away a little bit. Here’s how to create your own speech bubble graphics.
1. Select the Custom Shape Tool on the toolbar.
2. On the Options bar, choose the paths option.
3. Again on the Options bar, click on the drop down box called Shape. This opens a set of default shapes that can use for drawing vectors. Click on the triangle on the top right corner – this opens a drop down menu – and from there choose Talk Bubbles.
4. A dialog box will open asking if you want to Replace or Append the current set of Shapes. I usually choose Append, and this adds the new set of shapes to the end of the currently visible shapes.
5. Now scroll down through the shapes and you’ll see a lovely set of speech bubbles.
6. Click on the bubble you want to draw and the click and drag out the shape on the image window. Hold down Shift if you want to constrain the proportions on the bubble.
At this stage you’ve drawn out a vector path, there are no pixels at this stage. We can stroke or fill (or both) the shape at this point but first it’s important to set up the colours that we’ll use.
8. On the colour picker on the toolbar, choose your foreground. (I’m picking orange because it matches my blog!).
Click on the brush tool and in the options bar choose a size, hardness and shape of the brush that you want to use. The size of the brush dictates the width of the stroke you will apply to the path you’ve just drawn.
I chose a hard, round 15 pixel brush. This will vary for you depending on the size of the path you draw and how thick you want the stroke to be.
9. Open the paths panel. At the bottom of the panel click on the Stroke Path button.
This adds a 15 pixel stroke to the path.
The path will still be visible, so to turn it off click anywhere on the grey area under the path name (it will say Work Path unless you changed the name) on the Paths panel.
10. If you wanted to fill the bubble with colour you would do the same steps as above but click on the Fill button on the bottom of the palette. Here’s a speech bubble with a stroke and a fill and a bit of text.
11. (Optional) You can of course add all kinds of styles from the layers panel to add extra ummph to your bubbles. Here’s a few examples;
Scott Kelby’s Photowalk Dublin
Posted by Jennifer Farley | August 25, 2008 | 1 Comment
Hello to everyone I met during the Photowalk in Dublin on Saturday. Despite torrential rain (what’s new?) I had a really nice time taking pictures and chatting with other photographers. I personally found it a challenge with a grey sky, grey ground, grey buildings and grey river to get some good pics but I suppose that’s all part of the fun. Thanks also to Tony for organising the whole Dublin walk.
10 Design Related Podcasts That Are Well Worth A Listen
Posted by Jennifer Farley | August 22, 2008 | 4 Comments
I spend waaaaaaaaaay too much time in my car and I find one way to combat the feeling of wasting time is to listen to podcasts and turn my car into a little learning machine. I download lots of podcasts and listen to them as I drive - it helps me keep up to date with what’s going on in the world of design and keeps my mind off road rage. There are so many high quality podcasts available out there, it’s amazing what you can learn. So in no particular order (they’re all good!);
Web Design
Boagworld by Paul Boag is a well established podcast of particular interest to web designers and developers. Paul is also the voice of the .net magazine podcast.
Illustration
Danny Gregory is an illustrator and artist who produces a great audio podcast where he interviews other illustrators, designers and creative fold. He is the author of the soon to be released book “The Illustrated Life“.
Typography
Broadcasting from the 4th Dimension, the Typeradio podcasts feature interviews with typographers and designers. The podcasts are short and filled with good info.
All Aspects of Design
Rookie Designer is currently on a break but there are about 100 old podcasts waiting for your attention. This podcast covers everything from web design to fonts and finding a design job.
Be A Design Group is unfortunately finished its series of podcasts now but there is plenty of design audio goodness in the archives. Again this podcast covers a multitude and includes interviews with designers and creative folk.
Creative Expert features interviews with designers in many fields. Past interviews have included web experts, graphic designers and branding consultants.
Design Guy is the alter ego of Anthony Rotolo a US based designer. He discusses design principles which are applicable in many different fields. At the time of writing this post there are over 30 podcasts and you’ll find transcripts of the podcasts on Anthony’s blog.
Photography
The Week in Photography podcast covers all things photographic - from camera straps to f-stops. They also have a blog with tons more information.
The Business of Design
Freelance Switch is the must-see/must-listen to website and podcast for anyone freelancing or considering freelance. It has a great panel, who discuss many of the problems creative people face when doing business.
For Graphic Designers Only is a podcast for graphic designers in business. This is not about techniques of design principles, it is good solid advice for creatives who find the money end of the business a bit daunting.
Video
Ok, so that’s the audio. There are also lots of great video podcasts (not really suitable for killing time while driving) and I plan to write a post on those soon. Please let me know which audio podcasts you guys find useful.
A List Apart Survey
Posted by Jennifer Farley | August 14, 2008 | Leave A Comment
If you work in this crazy business called Web, you might be interested in taking part in the “A List Apart” Survey 2008. They are compiling information from designers, developers, information architects and pretty much anyone who has an involvement in web work.
Designing Minds : Julia Hoffman
Posted by Jennifer Farley | August 12, 2008 | Leave A Comment
Below you’ll find the first of a three-part video about the graphic designer Julia Hoffman. Julia Hoffman is a German born designer based in New York. In the videos she talks about how she got started and the route she took to become a successful graphic designer. I found her interpretation of word documents and subsequent creation of charts to be really interesting. This is helpful viewing for anyone interested in graphic design.
The second and third parts of the video can be found here;
http://www.zoom-in.com/spotlights/designing_minds_julia_hoffmann_part_2_of_3
http://www.zoom-in.com/spotlights/designing_minds_julia_hoffmann_part_3_of_3
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About
Hi, my name is Jennifer Farley and I am a designer and design instructor based in Ireland. Read more about Laughing Lion Design .
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