J'adore Photoshop

What you've heard is true. I do love Photoshop. It was a whirlwind romance after a difficult courtship. I thought we really existed in opposition. The tools were confusing. The commands were illogical. But our mutual friend, InDesign, really paved the way to our romance.

So there are some awesome things I've learned so far with Photoshop. I love that I'll finally be able to take off 10 (or 20) pounds from my wedding pictures. I love that I can tame stray hairs from my recent vacation pictures. I love that I can adjust the colors and lighting in fireworks pictures to make them stand out the way they looked in person- or even better. But something I love most of all is the quick selection tool. I love being able to cut an aspect out of one picture, and plop them down into another place so easily! Check it out-

Look at me- in St. Thomas-

Look at me- nowhere. I got some seriously crazy hair going on.

Here I am that time I went to the enchanted castle. You know the one, right? Okay, yes. I did get rid of my crazy hair and I slimmed down my arms a bit. But hey, while I'm working on it, I might as well, right?

In conclusion, I love this tool, because now I too can get in on internet memes like "Cigar Guy," ya know?

Pretty Packages

So as soon as I read the topic for the blog this week, I knew exactly what I wanted to bring up. My favorite packing in the entire world is the original iPod packaging. I remember when I got one in 2004, I was more in awe of the packaging than the product itself. I loved the way it folded into itself- it reminded me of a toy you'd buy at a museum when you were a kid. I loved that it was so clean and simple. The feel of the paper was different than anything else. I hadn't seen any packaging like that before, and it blew my mind that simple packaging could have that effect on me.

Now I'll be honest, I kept the packaging. It's somewhere in my parents basement in Queens, NY, which doesn't help me much now. I did find some pictures of similar packing though. The pictures I found are of the first few generations, all using the cube packaging. The images on the sides are different for the different versions, but you get my point.

I love them so much. 

Grid

One of my favorite blogs (as far as layout goes) is Subtraction.com. I started reading it because a friend sent it to me as an example of a design she liked. Subtraction's design is all about simplicity. There's a clean grid that's obvious to see. I love that the lines of the grid are the white space. There's no actual line, but just breaks in the top row and then the columns below follow the breaks.

It's so easy to read because of that. Even if you don't like the content, you can't not like the layout.

Check it out at subtraction.com.

Love this layout

This is going up at 11:45 tonight since I've been watching the Chilean miner rescue all night- anyone else watch it? It's intense!

A layout that I came across that I really liked was from the September issue of Fitness magazine. I generally really like their layouts- they tend to be light and easily readable with a few columns and tons of subheads and pulled out quotes. This one is really true to that and I wanted to share it since it was something I enjoy as both a reader and designer.

Sorry about the terrible scanning job.

These face eachother

I like the photos and subheads breaking this up. Additionally, each paragraph has a mini title bolded at the beginning. I think it makes it readable and interesting at the same time.

Thank you, InDesign!

I used to look at people who were fluent in Creative Suite like they were superheroes. Clearly they were blessed with some supernatural skill set not given to mere mortals. When I submitted copy at work to the designers, it was like the work went through some magical machine that made it snazzy and readable. Now I realize I'm already capable of doing most everything that they do. I mean, not the photoshop stuff, but general layout and basic design.

I'm trying to walk the line between asking for CS5 on my computer at work to help out with simple design stuff when our 3 designers get swamped, but not wanting to make them feel like after a few weeks of class, I think I have the same skill set as them. It is a small company and pretty flexible, so I'll feel it out.

ANYYYway- I have a more confidence in speaking with the designers and explaining what I'm thinking and talking through a design with them. Stuff gets finished in less drafts because I'm not leading them astray from what I need with made-up mumbo jumbo talk. Being able to speak with them on a technical level helps me feel more confident.

Use your words

The first thing I thought of when thinking about text only ads was the movie poster for Helvetica. Being that the typeface itself is the subject of the movie, it's not surprising that it's the only thing present on the movie poster. 

You can see that they used just about every character to show the "stars" which I think is fun and attention getting. That's important for a movie poster, as they're usually tacked en masse onto construction site awnings and rented out wall space.

Another piece I started thinking about was The Beatles White Album cover. Talk about using text only- and minimally. It's hard to tell if the text or the surrounding white space is the true star- both are important for the message. Even if you didn't know the name of the album, you would know what to call it. Pretty genius.

How odd. I see a theme in what catches my eye here.