DTG News and Else
DT&G:   Vol. 19, Number 4,   April, 2009   ~   The eZine for Design, Typography, & Graphics   (since 1988)  

DT&G Newsletter for April, 2009

April brings some new features and beginnings for graphic designers... and we also wrap up Women's History month ! But for now, until the email newsletter comes out, here are the top stories from DTG News &Else ...

April GREEN Design

This month we investigate the growing "Green Design" movement with an article by Brian Dougherty, and a field trip to the sites of those who are making Green Design happen. We also wrap up our Women's History celebration with three more visits to some great design works by women in the visual arts world! Follow along...

Green Design: what it means to graphic designers

It's a new buzz phrase, and it is going to affect all graphic designers, publicist, marketers, package designers, and publishers. This two-page field trip takes a look at the most important, and most urgent links and references that bring home the message: Green Graphic Design is Good Graphic Design

Designing Folds to Tell the Story

Graphic designers meet challenges in print publication design when the budget is tight but the story is compelling These days, fund raising is tough enough -- but in this 2-page case study, Fred presents the challenges and solutions for a nonprofit campaign with a compelling story, a rigid deadline, and a very tight budget!
      As I've said many, many times in my design workshops: "one thing you get for free is the opportunity to design the fold into the story." The perfect solutions turned out to be single sheets of paper folded into creative folds that tell the story effectively

Find the right photo in the stock photo jungle

Finding the right photo Speaking of challenges inherent in publication design -- when you need a specific photo for a specific project -- what do you do? A good photo is worth its weight in gold, but should you have to put up with the misery in the stock photography jungle out there? We had too many happy faces for a project and needed some sad ones -- so we discovered the Bright Qube

Web Design Virtuosity: cre8d design

cre8d design When a designer hires a designer you may think that spells problems. Not in this case. After actually using the design services of Rachel Cunliffe and the cre8d design team on two successful sites, we're ready to bring them on for the 'big' job. What better endorsement can you get? Come meet the cre8d design team

Wetherbee: design with a conscience

Wetherbee Creative & Web From a family full of creative thinkers to a self-employed creative and partner in her own design firm, Wendy Wetherbee has it all. Wetherbee Creative & Web is an independent design and marketing studio based in New Hampshire, serving clients nationwide... meet Wendy Wetherbee

All about design: Amanda Keating

Amanda Keating For Amanda Keating, owner and artistic genius behind Ferris Wheel Creative, design is far more than a trendy-looking ad or billboard. Amanda's work is fresh, but takes a strict business approach for the best client results... visit Ferris Wheel Creative

Nuts & Bolts: Sheila Quinn Wilson

Sheila Quinn Wilson In a world of hyperbole, the results are what count -- how to get results? Customer care and a hard line to the nuts-and-bolts of the message. Sheila Quinn Wilson takes this philosophy seriously and gets results for her clients. DTG Designing Women feature visits the studios of Sheila Quinn Wilson

Green Graphic Design

Green Graphic Design In today's world, the phrase "going green" has its own meaning to graphic designers, publicist, marketers, package designers, and publishers. Here is the most up-to-date training manual for every graphic designer who wants to be true to the client, the environment, and above all, themselves! Brian Dougherty presents Green Graphic Design

Designing Women 2009

[2009 Designing Women] Each year we discover some pretty special ladies, and this year we introduce you to some rather special designers ... Designing Women 2009

Site of the Month: NIDO

NIDO has been designing logos and illustrating for over eleven years. This tip came in so we decided to take a look. Visiting his "illustrations" portfolio, showed us basically a anime style throughout. But when we looked at the LOGO works -- wow, we were inpressed! Nido comments "he is regarded as the best logo designer in the world... by his mum." That's a sense of humor! (Thank you again, Trish, for sending this one in!) I think you'll like the Logo works of Nido

Logo Rip-offs revisited

Murray Swift wrote in to comment on our recent article on logo rip-offs. He reminds us that the "Storm" logo you featured was ripped off from the logo of the Melbourne Storm, a major team in the Australian Football League http://www.melbournestorm.com.au/ We visited Murray's site and found some stunning photography and photo-manipulation work. You're going to like this for sure:

Photoshop: Deke McClelland Is Singing in the Droplets

Deke McClelland Is Singing in the Droplets Deke McClelland Is Singing in the Droplets -- The Droplet Song--The Next Hilarious Music Video is now on dekePod - Deke is the author of over 80 books and a popular lecturer on Adobe Photoshop and the larger realm of computer graphics and design ... The Droplet Song

Business: Your Book as Your Business Card

Book as Your Business Card What is 6" by 9," usually weighs roughly one pound, and is giving an increasing number of business leaders an advantage over the competition? A book. 'The book as a business card' has added a new and powerful tool for marketing Your Book as Your Business Card

&ELSE... freebies and cool stuff

NEWS This month's &Else includes: Voices That Matter: Web Design Conference * Online image editors * PhotoFreebies plug-ins for Photoshop * Search Engine Optimization for Flash * The Nikon D90 Companion * Power Printing with iPrint * Graphic Inspector finds graphic problems * Freeware TeXShop * iPhoto Buddy, Burn data, Barbie Adventures * Easy timers and counters * InPreflight for Adobe InDesign * ResizeMe again * Funtastic Photos * Screen Graphics Editing Tools for Designers * Color Efex Pro for Lightroom... and a dozen others! News, Reviews &Else!

New Brochure Design Layouts and Templates

These days, survival and success depend on getting your client's jobs through to finished printing with as little time as possible. We have updated our selection of Brochures, Tri Fold Brochures, Newsletters, Business Cards, and all kinds of professionally designed layouts
Graphic Design templates READY TO GO, complete with professional photography, integrated graphics and style sheets for Quark XPress, Adobe InDesign or Apple's new iWork / Pages!

Graphic Design templates New titles include :
      Post Card Campaigns; marketing for Lawn Care, Massage Therapy, Health Insurance & Financial Services; all new collection of Tri Fold brochures; Women's Health Care Marketing; Brochures for Youth Group Outreach, summer camp, field trips; campaigns for Hair Stylists, hair salon, make over, tanning; templates for education in the arts, Arts Councils or Arts Institutes; Staffing Agencies or human resources campaigns; templates for construction, building and contractors: construction industry, roofing contractors ... and a lot More!

April showers bring May flowers

Did anyone else notice how fast March went by? It's like it was there, and all of a sudden it was gone.

We should all be very relieved that the Conficker Worm didn't do much harm on April 1st. Of course, those guys are probably enjoying all the press so much they probably put off making it do its evil. And, the evil could still be coming yet -- so keep up your guard.

Web Critique: DTG -- needless to say, I was sadly disappointed and happily glad at the same time that no one offered complaints or critique for the Design Center. You may remember last month I invited everyone to go to the Design Cafe and use the Web Review section to poke holes in the site. No one did. Not a single post. In private email, I got a couple dozen posts saying they love the site like it is. So, I guess that's a good indication. Don't worry, we're not changing it too much -- only making it easier to use.
* Web Critique: The topic is still open

Next month is spring, and once again we're opening the ranks of the design center gallery and the Photo-Folio site to welcome your photos -- particularly if they are very colorful, or if they are of flowers. We'll want to have lots of flowers to display for Mother's day, right? So send in your photos, and show your good stuff to the DTG Readership! So you can sign up and send content and/photos : by clicking here.

Have a really great April and spring!

thanks for reading...

Fred Showker
Fred Showker

Fred Showker, Editor / Publisher, DT&G Magazine

Thoughts for April and Women's History Month...

      "For one word a man is often deemed to be wise,
        and for one word he is often deemed to be foolish.
        We should be careful indeed what we say."
            -- Confucius

      "In politics, if you want anything said, ask a man;
          if you want anything done, ask a woman."
            Margaret Thatcher

PS: if you've made it this far, excellent! The Publishers Warehouse have not been very successful switching all the hundreds of new clip art images to new directory structure. During the month of March they cataloged and re-linked 3,400 files! We'll be lucky if they get this project done by Christmas -- but April is the "green" month, right? ?

You can contribute and get your voice heard: When you make your contribution to the Design Center, you not only help us continue the mission... and you get lots and lots of traffic and visitors to your web site! Google metrics evidence 611,387 pairs of eyes saw our Partner's buttons last month. Need we say more? Take a look for yourself

Participate in your Design Center

Lots of fun and information for all... don't forget, any community is only as good as the participation of its members. We invite your tips, tricks, comments, suggestions and camaraderie.