Category Archives: GraphicDesign

What desktop publishing did to graphic designers, self-publishing is doing to authors

Skilled Workman Posted on by

OK! I’m a little punch-drunk I’ve been through this before. In fact, I’ve been through it five times now. it’s been pretty much non-stop since 1991. My life and career [yours too, probably unless you’re a kid born after 1980—especially after 1990] has been radically transformed on a continual basis since 1990 with five major paradigm shifts. Hand-drawn art and metal type to photo-production [Offset Lithography]—the 1960s & seventies:  I started in the midst of this change. My … Continue reading →

It’s very good seed! A graphic & font family package

Skilled Workman Posted on by

This is another package I’ve put up on Creative Market. An excellent image of good seed sprouting in good soil… A four-font serif family named Artimas. A good start to a card design This stuff is just useful and at a very good price. The retail cost is well over $100. This package is: Only $29

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ePUB production just took a major leap upward with InDesign CC9.2

Skilled Workman Posted on by

The new InDesign CC9.2, released this week, gives us much to be happy about as book publishers Most of the changes affect book production. The long-promised TypeKit integration is now available with over 700 Adobe TypeKit fonts freely usable and licensed for print, Web, and ebook as part of Creative Cloud. It runs much faster. There has been a major reworking of the hyperlinks panel to simplify its use. There’s a full featured QR code generator. There is … Continue reading →

Book Production Charges are often ridiculous!

Skilled Workman Posted on by

I received this post today from GoodReads purporting to give reasonable figures for editing and page layout for books. The table is from the original blog posting. While these may be common charges for freelancers living in large cities, they only serve to show how far out of touch the bi-coastal publishing industry has gotten. Let me give you some idea of what we are talking about here. I just finished a non-fiction book today with 124,000 … Continue reading →

The new flat UIs or the Emperor has new clothes

Skilled Workman Posted on by

We all remember the story. A king is scammed by cunning tailors to walk around naked. The new iOS7 and Mavericks [OSX.9] are clear examples of this type of thinking. The lemming designers, like the Weather Channel, are beginning to run around proclaiming the wonders of the new kingly style. As you can see below, shutterstock claims the lemmings are going wild for the new style. Hey! The emperor is naked!!! Fashion which forgets about the reader … Continue reading →