Now I am not going to quote SPECfp or SPECint benchmark testing that indicates that the Mac Pro should handle complex tasks better – because it probably can – nor even refer to a recent MacWorld article that showed a significant bias toward the iMac but on simple single-threaded tasks.

Nope, I wanted a real world graphics test and so was privileged enough to get access to both an iMac and Mac Pro tower with CS4 for testing. I am posting these results specifically for the Graphic Artists out there who need to know how these computers will handle that really big PSD file they are working on.

We used a completely unscientific stopwatch (provided by my iPhone) and a couple of actual production files that have given us trouble due to their size and complexity. We ensured all other applications were closed and had both computers in the same room in the same networks.

Here are the results

iMac vs Mac Pro real world produciton environment tests. We loaded up these 2 computers with identical software and opened the same files hand-picked from our archives as being pain in the butt large files. Despite expert predictions of a sweep by the Mac Pro the GOLD MEDAL winner is the iMac.

Question: Why is the RAM config different?

We were advised that by installing 12 GB RAM in the tower in a specific configuration per core that it would perform better than if we installed 16 GB RAM. Again, this is not a technical article so I am not going to get into more detail. Suffice it to say the experts told us it would be no contest. They were wrong as far as CS4 was concerned.

Cost is another factor

Apple has out done themselves. The iMac while not significantly better in dealing with the Photoshop file, more than held its own with the Vector file. For me, dollar for dollar, the iMac i7 is my mid-level production machine of choice. If you have the budget and need super power you could spend more than double the cost of the iMac for the Tower alone (without monitor) before you see better results. The new towers purported to be coming out soon may change all this but for now we have what we have.

iMac Cost – Canadian Dollars $3,859

Mac Pro Tower Cost (as configured above in the chart) $4,180

Add a 24″ monitor to that = $5,179

That’s an extra $1,320 CAD for a comparable (and yes, more expandable) machine and a slightly smaller monitor. Not a huge difference but consider this: If you have 10 artists that’s $13,320 in savings and the iMacs would make useful admin machines when their production life is over – again, without having to shell out for more monitors for your admin staff if you decided to do the same with your towers.

The Mac Olympics are over and iMac wins hands down!

David

There are a few situations that can be difficult to deal with and must be handled carefully:

1) Demands for a quote with no parametres. Not able or willing to discuss their project or vision in order for you to hone in on a budget or cost. The simple but telling “How much for a website?” is as vague as “how much for a piece of string?” Both questions need some specific criteria to answer.

Instead of arguing or getting frustrated with this approach, educate your clients on what is involved in their project and have a series of questions ready to go over with them – pull the details you need out of that conversation. Often a client is not actually being difficult – they just need help organising their ideas, needs, wants and budgets.

2) “I need you to produce 3 designs, then I’ll decide if I will hire you.” Professionally I never work for spec (eg. for free in return for the promise of future work). Your time has value – if a client is not sure of your qualifications have a professional portfolio presentation ready for them or create a business pitch, discuss your challenges and solutions fostering more confidence in your abilities.

Stick to this rule, never undervalue your work, even at the creative stages. Set an opt-out clause and minimum charge for your consulting time. Stand behind your experience and don’t back down. Newer artists are often pressured to work for free but once you undervalue yourself the client will never pay full value or respect your work.

Protect Your Creative
I’ve actually had designs handed over by a client for me to produce with the originating artist’s slug still on it. I called the designer to discuss their vision and they accused me of stealing their art. That was a situation I did not want to get into the middle of and so declined the project. The lesson here is that besides valuing your time, value your creative remembering that no matter how many ideas you may present, the client “buys” only one of them – the other presented and rejected ideas should remain your property. See my tutorial on Protecting Your Creative for some helpful tips.

3) Refusal to sign anything. We’d all like to trust people and 99% of the time that trust if rewarded. But it is better to be consistent and ask all your clients to at least sign a letter of understanding. Clearly describe what you are doing, when the client expects it to be done, ownership and usage limitations, and how much you’ve agreed on for payment. If the project is larger, create a payment schedule. You can also offer the client an “out”.

But if the client refuses to sign even a basic letter (not full of legal jargon) by saying “I never sign anything”, that’s a red flag. Trust me.

4) A promise of future work. This is a big one. The carrot dangled in front of the supplier’s face in return for freebies, discounts or adhering to difficult deadlines. In my experience, underpaid work now stays underpaid later. In general, I say don’t go there. Obvious exceptions may be a charitable job for an established and respected client but that’s up to you.

5) Overwhelming your time to the exclusion of all other clients. I have seen this a lot, when a client demands ALL your time to the point where you have no time for other clients – and you let them do that to you – then you have already lost. It is not necessarily a step towards success. You cannot survive with one client, and often they will start demanding you lower your prices because they give you so much work, eroding your income. The other danger is that alienating your other clients as this happens kills your referral network.

Finally, when the work from your demanding client dries up – and it will – you will have nothing to fall back on. The solution is to treat this demanding situation professionally and become this client’s premiere supplier with your service and professionalism but staff up in order to handle the increased work flow to keep your pre-existing client base happy.

My advice in developing a good client base:

• Educate your clients to give you the information you need to help them manage their budgets and expectations.
• Be consistent with your paperwork and commit all understandings with your client to writing.
• Value your work and your time. Be professional and stay more organised than your client – making you invaluable to them.
• Maintain a diverse client base and multiple streams of income.
• Be a good client to your suppliers and treat them as partners in your mutual success.

Every difficult situation has an out – even if that out is to simply walk away. But if you can diffuse the situation and impress the client you have a greater chance of long term success. Good luck.

David

Transparent PNGs appear with Blue Boxes where the transparency should be in Windows IE 6 and earlier. WHY? Simply put, the support for transparent PNG images was not implemented in Windows IE until version 7.

The transparent areas of a 24-bit transparent PNG are converted to BLUE in MS Explorer 6.

The Solution

I found many scripts online dealing with the issue on an image by image basis. Basically, you would have to include the script(s) with every image uploaded. Hardly Practical.

Then Youngpup cam up with a solution that placed the fix in the head of your document so that universally all your PNG tranparencies would be supported throughout your document with no extra code to implement. It worked perfectly (see image below).

After inserting the sleight.js fix from Youngpup Explorer 6 was able to properly display the transparent images.

How to use

Put the following code in the head portion of your page between <head> and </head>

<script language="javascript" src="sleight.js"></script>

You may wish to modify the path to sleight.js. For example, if you put it in a scripts folder the path would be src="scripts/sleight.js".

Then Download sleight.js and place in the desired location on your site. Please do not remove Aaron Boodman’s copyright info at the beginning of the script. It’s important to respect the authors. That’s it!

Note:

Drew McLellan in his ALL IN THE <HEAD> Blog has published an update of the script which deals with situations where you have image swapping. I haven’t tested it out yet but it may be worth a look.

thanks

David

http://www.characterdesigns.com

Why? well according to their website

About CharacterDesigns.com

The goal for his website is to provide high quality free images to artists so that they might grow in their endeavor to pursue traditional and digital Figurative Art. With a growing collection of thousands of images, Hong provides artists with a useful resource for artists of all stripes that was previously difficult to find on the web. He hopes that his site will encourage artists to grow, connect, and learn from one another in a new way.

wow

david

As a follow up to my article on Communication Design, which related to my discovery of the term, I Googled it to see what its current status was in the industry and who was using it.

The top result is a definition:
From: Wikipedia

Communication design is a mixed discipline between design and information-development which is concerned with how media intermission such as printed, crafted, electronic media or presentations communicate with people. A Communication Design approach is not only concerned with developing the message aside from the aesthetics in media, but also with creating new media channels to ensure the message reaches the target audience… Its process involves strategic business thinking, utilizing market research, creativity, and problem-solving.

New York’s Heller Communication Design, Richmond VA’s Communication Design Inc., and Vancouver BC’s Metaform Communication Design have integrated this term into their names but their websites offer little in specifically defining the term for their clients – outside of the services they offer. Perhaps it is not even necessary.

But who, as individuals, are calling themselves Communication Designers, besides myself?

The Society of Graphic Designers in British Columbia asked that very question. Responses were mixed with some commenters suggesting that using the term Communication Designer is more confusing that the more universally understood terms “Graphic” or “Visual”.

One respondant, “Cat”, says:

Google ‘Communication Design’ or ‘Visual Communication Design’ and you’ll find that schools already have degreed programs in place, and have had for years.

Meaning our industry is filling up with students who will not be familiar with being called ‘graphic designers’, but are sporting ‘Communication Design’ degrees.

There’s more, and the comments are definitely worth a read, but I wonder due to the broad definition of the term, if using the term Communication Design will take hold faster as a corporate term, a service offered, rather than as a description of what an individual does for a living.

Many artists: ‘graphic’, ‘web’, and ‘production’ have worked in single mediums for years, or have not had a broad range of experience but nevertheless remain competent and even expert in their niches. So the broad ranged term Communication Design might not apply to them as much as it may apply to the total range of services their firms will offer their clients.

If an artist can look upon their career, experience, industry knowledge and abilities and see a broad range of experiences, projects and challenges spanning many media and mediums then perhaps they can be comfortable calling themselves a Communication Designer, but they should also be prepared for and comfortable with explaining the term and what it means to the clients who may wish to hire them.

The explanation may boil down to saying: “I am a Graphic Artist who offers Communication Design services.”

They key, for me, seems to be “Cat’s” response on the SGD site. It lies in the schools. The next generation of artists will have to be savvy with more ways to communicate, market and sell than were dreamed of when I was at school. As the people at WhyHire.me suggest, a integrated approach to personal marketing for new graduates will involve the marriage of social networking, personal branding and personal experience. This could also apply to corporate marketing. This integrated multi platform approach to branding seems to fit in well with Wikipedia’s opening statement on Communication Design:

Communication design is a mixed discipline between design and information-development which is concerned with how media intermission such as printed, crafted, electronic media or presentations communicate with people.

Terms come and go but we must shift with the times, and not get left behind. My closing advice: Keep on top of it and ensure that your own personal marketing as a “Whatever” Artist remains clear, up to date and relevant.

david

The cause of most of these problems is poor communication. Throughout your project’s life it has been scrutinised, redesigned, re-written, edited, typeset, illustrated and more. But when a project is passed into new hands it is often done so with little regard to the fact that the recipient will be seeing this job for the first time and will most certainly not know all the facts, parametres, specs and requirements the project has unless you take the time to spell it out.

To avoid incurring extra costs or engaging in rounds of “he said she said” when mistakes are made, try this checklist and the tips that follow when passing on your job to outside hands:

JOB SHIPPING CHECKLIST

• Check your work: Run a spell check, ensure your images are CMYK and of sufficient resolution, convert Pantones to Process if necessary. Taking a moment to ensure everything is fine will save your butt at some point.
• Put everything on disk: Collect your layouts, fonts, proof PDFs, images and art. Include PSD files and a READ ME with notes if your film house needs to do any work.
• Include Printouts: Make sure you have laser prints from every layout on the disk and an approved colour match proof, with Pantone® chips if necessary.
• Include Mockups: Mock up any job that is more than a simple one-sided 8.5 x 11 job. This clarifies what cuts and folds go where and also serves as a final check for you before it ships. Make an extra mockup for you to keep at the same time.
• Write your instructions: Have you re-summarised the job for your supplier? Have you added notes on the lasers of things that are important to you and the job? Are you clear when you need it to be finished? Write it down, and keep copies for yourself.
• Keep copies: Make a copy of what you send to your supplier. Include all notes, mockups and printouts as well as a copy of what was ON the disk (ie copy the disk, keep a separate folder on your hard drive for “shipped” material or burn 2 copies of the disk). That way if there are any questions or if anything is missing you and your supplier can reference EXACTLY the same things and solve problems quickly and efficiently.
• If you FTP: Ship printouts and colour proofs out as soon as you can. If you can’t, then AT THE VERY LEAST have a proof PDF generated and ensure it goes with the FTP’d files as a reference point for your supplier.

NOTES AND DETAILS
1) Include printouts and colour proofs with every job:
Even if you are FTP-ing the files you MUST make printouts of all the files you are sending as a reference point to the recipient (In the case of FTP’d files, ship them by courier immediately as a follow up).

And MOST IMPORTANTLY: make printouts from the disk you are shipping to ensure 2 things…
a) That everything on the disk has a printout and
b) That everything on the disk looks as you intend it to look.

2) Include Mockups:
Does your job fold? Does it have 2 sides? It is multiple pages? Are there dielines? If you answered YES to any of the above then your job envelope needs to include an accurate mockup of the final piece. Print it out on your laser printer, at a smaller size if necessary, and cut, trim and glue it to match the job as closely as possible. Even something as simple as a single fold or 2-sided print needs a mockup… If you do this you have expressed your intention clearly and that is the path to avoiding costly mistakes.

3) Spec your colours with samples:
If your job must match a corporate pantone colour, whether the job is Pantone or CMYK, you must attach the pantone chips to the printouts with instructions to “Match PMS Number___”. Remember though that not all PMS colours can be reproduced in CMYK but adding instructions like these can flag the printer to your intent and he will provide guidance from that point. Please send appropriate Pantone chips as well, send coated chips for reproduction on coated stock. DO NOT send printed samples on different media for your printer to match. For example: sending a PMS colour printed on matte stock with a job being printed in CMYK on coated stock and telling them to “match this colour exactly” will not yield you the results you are looking for from any printer.

4) Write everything down:

• Client: Do not discuss anything with your supplier verbally and then expect it to be remembered weeks later when the job arrives. Provide detailed follow up instructions in writing with the job when you send it.
• Suppliers: Take notes in meetings and if you notice job specs have changed from discussion to realisation, flag it to your client, especially if the changes have affected your quote.

5) Assume the recipient is an idiot:
Now this may seem insulting to some, but when packaging your job and adding notes to the package and instructions, write them in such a way that no one could possibly misunderstand. You may have full confidence in your contact at the print shop but who knows who will be first to open the envelope? Some shops run multiple shifts. Your supplier is NOT an idiot but leave no details to memory or chance, start from scratch and include notes on EVERYTHING… write all over your laser prints if you have to. Provide DETAILED instructions and your part of the job is done.

6) Answer Questions:
Even after all of this your supplier may still have questions. Having worked on both sides of this equation I can say with bafflement that not all agencies like to answer questions from their suppliers. Sometimes it means they have to go back to their clients and perhaps there is an unwillingness to do so. I won’t speculate further here but I will say that how we handle mistakes, problems and crises during a job is as important as sending those invoices at the end of the day.

A FINAL THOUGHT
The best business partners I have had have been my suppliers. I need them, they need me. I berate them on their mistakes and admit my own, I push them only when i need to and they trust me on that. Together we deliver for our clients… having a poor supplier is a nightmare so work with yours, communicate well and your clients need only know they can trust you and your network.

david

Think of it this way… do you want the same buttons as everyone else or do you want to create unique graphics for yourself or your clients? Whatever the answer is there is no harm in knowing how they are built using Adobe Illustrator.

Finished Image

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Step One

Pick or sketch a reference image.
I chose an old fashioned button Coke® sign, photographed outside, so I can get a sense of realistic light and shadow to reproduce.

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Step Two

Draw a circle and fill it with a Radial Gradient.
I based the colours on samples taken from the image with the Eyedropper tool.

Fill the circle with a a radial gradient. Sample the colours from the reference photo.

Colours
The Centre Red colour is: 6C 100M 95Y 0K
The Shadow colour is: 6C 100M 95Y 69K
The Highlight colour is: 6C 100M 95Y 28K

Place the colours at these positions along the slider:
Centre Red at 75%. Shadow at 95%. Highlight at 100%.
Notice the midpoint between the Centre Red and Shadow colours has been slid closer to the shadow (approx 70%)

Duplicate the layer.

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Step Three

Create a new layer by Duplicating the Gradient Circle layer.
Lock your original Gradient Circle layer to prevent accidental changes to its settings.

Call the new layer “Lighter Side” and go to your gradient fill dialog box.
Change the colours in the new circle to the following:
The New Centre Red colour is: 14C 80M 90Y 0K
The New ‘Shadow’ or Near Edge colour is: 0C 60M 60Y 0K
The New Highlight or Outer Edge colour is: 6C 100M 95Y 0K

Again: I sampled some colours from the image and experimented in order to come up with these colours.

Step Four: Create a new layer and a new gradient.

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Step Four

Create an Opacity Mask.
Duplicate your latest circle by copying and pasting in front (Command-C then Command-F)

Offset the circle up and to the right so that the bottom edge approximates a position on the sign just outside the bottom shadow of the original art. You can always fine-tune its position later.

Fill the new circle with a Black to white linear gradient and adjust the angle to 60 degrees, the black slider to the 35% position and the white slider to the 75% position as shown in the image below.

Preparing an Opacity Mask

Make Opacity Mask

Your art should now look like this:

Opacity mask applied to vector art.

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Step Five

Create a new layer and call it “Reflections”.
Look at the original photo and you will notice the reflection of sky and buildings on the surface of the sign. Little details like this will separate your art from the standard clip art glass buttons.

Draw an outline of the buildings paying attention to the fact that the edges of your sign curve away from you. Don’t worry about the edges of the circle, we will mask that out later.

Fill the buildings with 0C 100M 100Y 20K and in your Transparency Dialog box set them to Multiply with an opacity of 30%.

Creating the reflections

Next, go to the effects menu and select EFFECT / STYLIZE / OUTER GLOW. Set your Glow mode to Multiply, Your colour to 19C 100M 100Y 10K, Your opacity to 75% and Blur to .05 in. All these settings can be tweaked and adjusted for your final art, they came to me through experimentation.

Adding an Outer Glow

Now, go to any previous layer and copy the circle and paste it into this layer with Command-F (not Command-V). It should now cover your reflection drawing. Select both the new circle and your reflection drawing, ensuring the new circle is layered on top of the reflection drawing. Now create a clipping mask by hitting Command-7 (Menu: OBJECT / CLIPPING MASK / MAKE).

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Step Six

Create the sun reflection.
The highlight on the top right corner is from your light source. This highlight helps identify your button sign as being smooth and reflective. If the sign were chrome it would be a very contrasty and harsh reflection. For this weathered sign we are creating a slightly softer highlight.

Draw a small oval in the upper right corner and fill it with white. Go to the menu FILTER / DISTORT / ROUGHEN and play with the settings until you have a nice uneven edge around your oval. Experiment. See the image below for my settings.

Roughen Filter Settings

Next, go to the EFFECT / WARP / ARC dialog and play with the settings there to add a bit or an arc to it to match the roundness of the button sign. Once you are satisfied hit OK and then make this transformation permanently by going to the menu EDIT / EXPAND APPEARANCE (ensure you do not have any stroke on your oval first, only fill.)

Warp Options: Arc Settings

Rotate and distort your roughened oval into position on the edge of your button.

Next, using the EFFECT / STYLIZE menu add a Feather and Outer Glow using my settings as pictured below or your own experimental results. I then tweaked the scaling and duplicated the glowing oval, playing with various transparency settings, for my final result. Never hesitate to go back and tweak any element again until you are completely satisfied.

Feather and Outer Glow options

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Step Seven

Final weathering.
The original sign has water streaks, cracks, and other reflections which you can cherry pick from to give your sign those final weathering details. The most important part here is your drawing. It can’t look too mechanical and must follow the curves of the sign.

The cracks I’ve drawn here were treated as follows:
Stroke Colours: 0C 80M 100Y 0K (again: EXPERIMENT)
Outer glow: Multiply, 100% Opacity, Blur .05 in of the same colour.
Transparency: Soft Light at 40%

Adding ageing

I added some other weathering or reflective details, which I will leave you to experiment with, by this point you should have no trouble. The point of this exercise is to teach you to find and re-create your own design elements.

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Step Eight

The Shadow.
I created the drop shadow in 2 parts. Remember that a shadow is not a uniform tone when doing photorealistic art. It softens a bit around the edges and is darkest near the centre. The closer the object is to the cast shadow the darker the shadow is in that immediate area. When an object is far away from its cast shadow, say floating in the air, the shadow is more uniform and its edges even softer.

Create a new layer and call it shadow. Duplicate your button circle from any previous layer and past it in place with Command-F. Offset it down to the left until you are satisfied with its position.

The outer shadow can now Coke® be filled with Black, and in you Transparency Dialog set it to Multiply and 40% opacity. Now the light is rather strong here and the object is close to its cast shadow but the edges of this circle are a little too artificial so I added a slight Outer Glow to it from the EFFECT / STYLIZE menu.

Creating a Shadow

I then pasted another circle in its original position with Command-f and distorted its top right edge away from the edge of the original button sign so that when i added an Outer Glow to it, it would not show up at the top right edges of the sign.
I filled this with Black, set the Transparency to Multiply at 100% and added another slight Outer Glow (see image).

Adding a darker edge closer to the sign

I am creating the shadow on a layer on top of all the other art so I can see what I am doing. Once done I moved the shadow layer to a position behind the sign to finish it off.

Finished Shadow

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Step Nine

Lettering.
I added a Coke® Logo and the word DRINK but found them to be too crisp for my liking. I applied a little FILTER / DISTORT / ROUGHEN to it.

You can choose to add a slight roughen to any reflection or weathering detail on the sign as well. It’s up to you.

Ageing the lettering

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FINISHED

I hope you found this tutorial helpful. Please leave feedback so I can improve and expand upon these tutorials.

Finished Image

david

The South West produces some of the UK’s finest creative work (animation, web design, design, fashion, architecture….) Now you know why….nice conditions, space to breathe and opportunities with some of the best firms around.”

What’s interesting is that I have been unable to find out who produced it and the author of a deleted (poorly written) Wikipedia article shared my frustration.

“While efforts to contact this organisation have proved fruitless, they clearly have funding to produce this film and so must have some substance.”

And the Gloucestershire Media Group wrote a short article about it simply referring to the producer as “A company” and stating that the video is

“…aimed specifically at raising awareness of the excellent work that comes out of the Creative Industries in the South West”.

I am presuming this is part of a teaser campaign for someone… and judging by the 79,477 hits the video has received on You Tube, people are taking interest. It’s one of the funniest creative satires I’ve seen (without profanity).

david

Something as simple as the definition of a printing term would cause so much discussion. Once, a heated discussion was had at the office over the use of the word LIVE AREA.

Now, to clarify this is what I think it is in my own words:
Live Area: Also known as a visible or image area. The term is often used in a situation where part of your creative may be covered… ie in framed poster media the live or visible area is the part of the creative that is seen and not hidden by the frame.

Safe Area: An area within the live or visible area in which you must keep all your text or important graphics to avoid them being trimmed, cut off, or too close to the edge.

The Alternate Definition
The dissenting viewpoint insists that LIVE is the same as SAFETY.

Problem is that in checking on 2 printing term glossary sites, One agreed with me and the other with my counterpoint.

http://www.cdlinc.com/glossary.htm says:

Live area. Alternate term for Image area.

Image area. Portion of a negative or plate corresponding to inking on paper; portion of paper on which ink appears.

But http://www.printindustry.com/glossary.htm#L says:

Live Area: Area on a mechanical within which images will print. Also called safe area.

So who is right?

I would think that if I researched it enough I would find that one definition is more prevalent than the other. But not all glossaries deals with the term. On two pages of GOOGLE search results for the string “print terms glossary” I found only one other site which defined “Live area” and THAT site was a carbon copy of the printindustry.com definition so it is from the same source but not an independant voice:

http://www.morganpress.com/glossary.html#L says:

Live Area: Area on a mechanical within which images will print. Also called safe area.

So they are saying that live is defined as both the entire image area and the safe area. Now if they had said INCLUDING the safe area I would have agreed with them and even though it is 2 to 1 against my definition I still do not agree (I am stubborn and need more proof)

So what’s an artist to do until the Globe and Mail prints an exposé on the strife within our industry and sets the record straight?

I have said it before in posts on preflight and shipping files. Overstate your intentions, add notes to everything that is leaving your hands and try to be as clear as possible as to the intention of what you are trying to convey.

Ultimately you can argue the definitions of industry terminology all day or you can simply clarify what you mean by saying something like “Live / Visible Area” and “Type / Graphic Safety” and move on.

LIFE’s too short to argue about LIVE.

david

The news of this little freebie has been making the rounds so I thought I would share it here as well. Thus is the way of all things viral.

Sitepoint is offering a copy of their book “The Photoshop Anthology: 101 Web Design Tips, Tricks & Techniques” as a free download in PDF format.

According to their site:

It’s brimming with tried and tested real-world Photoshop solutions that will add impact to your next web design project. If you’ve ever been stuck for inspiration, have puzzled over just how to create a shiny aqua-style button, or wanted to create that seamlessly tiling background image you saw on a site recently, you need download this book.

The giveaway is sponsored by 99 Designs and expires in 22 days!!

Click here to go to their site.

david