May 2010

The year is 1987, and the giant-haired version of myself is a sophomore at the University of Texas at Austin. Disillusioned and uninspired as only a 20 year old can be, I find myself hiking across campus to that bastion of black jeans and unfiltered cigarettes, The Art Department. I have found my people. More importantly, I have found my new major.

And so begins my life as a graphic designer. My parents/financiers have no idea what that means, and I fear my funding may soon be in jeopardy. My classrooms contain drafting tables and easels. The supply list includes paintbrushes and razor blades. Am I taking a class or remodeling a house? A laptop is where you put your napkin, a mouse is a small rodent, and Adobe Acrobat is a gymnast from New Mexico… The year is 1987.

In case you are wondering how to identify the illusive “Outstandingly Long-lived Designer” (O.L.D.), here are a few clues:

1. Missing tips of two or more fingers
2. Has worked with cameras larger than most one bedroom apartments
3. Understands that zips and floppies aren’t the latest drug fad
4. First computer was a MacPlus or SE
5. Knows the difference between tracking and kerning and actually cares
6. Remembers when clipping paths were made with scissors
7. Permanent lung damage from inhaling too much spray mount (and from smoking in class)
8. Has needed at least one unintended haircut due to a rubber cement incident
9. Has actually heard of rubber cement and understands it’s not a form of birth control
10. Can identify and work a proportion wheel
11. Doesn’t think of bikini lines when the term waxing comes up in conversation
12. Remembers when a spray booth wasn’t a place to get a tan
13. Knows that Letrapress is not a dryer setting
14. Can identify and use a French curve
15. Understands that Swiss style is not a sexual position
16. Would be okay if there were only seven typefaces in the entire universe
17. Occasionally dedicates songs to Univers
18. Loves the smell of Bestine in the morning
19. Has uttered these words: “I won’t be a starving artist, Mom, I’ll be designing record album covers!”
20. Knows what a record album is

So, what am I missing? Calling all designers who remember when MTV played those things called music videos… What say you?

{ 0 comments }

Welcome to this week’s edition of WTF Wednesday. Today’s first submission comes from everybody’s current or soon-to-be favorite fitness trainer, Christine Tusa, with Tusa Fitness. Welcome to the classy side of the river:

Breakfast of champions

Here we have a few signs that are welcome, if entirely unexpected:

The older I get, the more I appreciate a patient toilet.

I wonder what kind of toilet the strong get?

Because you never know when your shabby hooker might need a new look.

{ 0 comments }

This week’s WTF Wednesday submission comes from photographer David Ingram, who took this lovely photo of me in front of Mr. Weenie’s artwork a few weeks ago. He also took the first two photos you see below. Here we have signage that’s goal isn’t to be beautiful, but rather to inform. It is exactly halfway successful.

Yes, I'd like to buy a vowel. No, not that one... Apparently this adult bookstore is looking out for our military's best interest.

Yes, I'm bilingual. I can read forwards AND backwards. I'm so good, I don't even need all the letters to be present.

The photo below is by an unknown photographer, but apparently he has the same passion for graphic design that I do.

I imagine this is the most popular dry cleaner in town. Maybe in the entire universe.

So that’s all for this edition of WTF Wednesday. Feel free to send me your photos for future posts. Now, go out there and make things pretty!

{ 0 comments }

Hello, and welcome to this week’s edition of Tuesday’s Type Tip. Today we delve into the seedy side of typography with the letter “X.” The “x-height” of a typeface is the distance from baseline to meanline. The meanline runs across the tops of the main bodies of lowercase letters, excluding ascenders & descenders. This critical distance helps determine a typeface’s identity and influences its legibility.

The letter “X” is used for this measurement because it has a flat base and top. (Unlike those degenerate curved letters that screw everything up.) *See last week’s post for more on the beautiful but challenging letter “O.”

Although the letters below are set in different typefaces, they’re all the same point size! It boggles the mind.

Note that letters with serifs (above left) tend to have smaller x-heights when compared to their sans serif cousins. (More on the fascinating nature of serifs in a future post.)

Now check this out:

See how the type in the upper two paragraphs appears less dense than in the bottom two? That’s because type with a small x-height has longer ascenders and descenders (protruding/danglin’ parts of lowercase letters such as d, y, h and g). This factor creates more white space between lines of type.

Are you impressed? Well, you should be.

So that’s it for this edition of Tuesday’s Type Tip. Stay tuned for tomorrow’s feature, WTF Wednesday, where we’ll explore the darker side of graphic design.

VOTE on the next edition of “Tuesday’s Type Tip!”
Would you rather hear about the Sexy Serif, Lascivious Leading, or do you prefer a complete Anatomy (of typography) Lesson? I’m on a roll with the X-rated nature of type. Vote in the comments section or send me a tweet. Remember, your vote counts! (especially if it’s the only one)

*Coming soon… WeenieUniversity
ProfessorWeenie’s Graphic Design Lessons for Beginners will teach basic design principles to small business owners, PR/marketing professionals and astronauts. We want YOU at Weenie U!

{ 8 comments }

WTF, Live Oak Market?? Do you WANT me to stab myself in the eyes?

I’m not going to waste a keystroke on discussing how f*cked up this sign is. Instead, I will show you 3 signs that are better than this one.

~

What a deal! A hand-drawn sign gets your message across while providing a little flair of personality. An added bonus is that your customers will generally be forgiving of occasional inaccuracies.

Sometimes a good sign doesn't need words at all. A clear set of graphics indicates just as much as words can. I am very clear on what I should do here: Ram into the signs or turn around and go home.

A combination of words and graphics can really get your message across. In this case, that message is "Look! My jazz hands are covered in olive oil! Hooray!"

Now, go grab a camera and send me your favorite WTF examples. They might be featured in an upcoming edition of WTF Wednesday!

{ 0 comments }

I have a confession to make: I’m in love with letters. Not in the cool, romantic way literature buffs and poets love letters; but in the dorky, glasses sliding down the nose, masking tape stuck to chin, graphic designer’s way. And I’m on a mission to share that love with you.

Initially I had grand plans to do this in a somewhat organized way, but that’s no fun, so I’m starting with one of my faves: The One, the Only, the circle of life herself…

O.
(No, not Oprah.)

Did you know some capital letters are taller than others? (Shocking, but true.) Rounded capital letters, such as O and C, may extend just above the cap height (illustrated below as the line across the top of the letter “H”) and just below the baseline. If they didn’t do that, it would cause an optical illusion where the O would appear to be smaller than the other letters, and that would just look funny.

Pretty cool, huh? Now you have something interesting/relatively useless to tell your friends. Think of how much fun you’ll be at parties!

Next week on “Tuesday’s Type Tip” we’ll be discussing the finer points of everybody’s favorite letter: X. (May not be suitable for audiences under the age of 18—or those of us who still act like we are.)

*Coming soon… ProfessorWeenie’s Graphic Design Lessons for Beginners. This series of pdfs will teach the basic principles of graphic design and is meant for folks with little to no design background. That might include small business owners, PR/marketing firms or astronauts.

{ 0 comments }

Once upon a time, I was scared to get on Twitter. I didn’t really understand the concept and thought it was kind of silly. I’d been on Facebook for a while and understood its value as a way to relive the humiliation of high school all over again, but Twitter seemed pointless.

When I finally bit the bullet, I started out as your garden variety Twitter-lurker and had some fun while trying to market my name. (In hindsight, I probably should have considered the ramifications of naming myself after lunch meat, but that’s neither here nor there.)

I was recently mentioned by a productivity coach as one of his favorite people to follow in his list of 7 Twitter tips. I noticed that his list wasn’t a round number, which compelled me to even it out with 3 of my own Twitter tips:

1. Pepper in a few profanities throughout your tweets. It will give you credibility with the degenerate crowd that hangs out on Twitter after midnight. (You know who you are.)
2. Direct message people at 3am in hopes that they have all DMs set to go to their phones. People love that.
3. Be sure to tweet while drunk. It’s a great way to show off the real you, with the added benefit of culling your following down to manageable numbers.

So, what are YOUR favorite Twitter tips? (facetious or otherwise)

{ 0 comments }