REAL FUCKIN NEATO THREAD

File: Screen Shot 2017-07-12 at 01.45.09.png (511KB, 887x1120px) Image search: [Google]

511KB, 887x1120px

It's been a good day, got a few bugbear briefs out the way that were turning into painful sores. A few et-voila moments which usually don't come in twos, especially when you're tight for time.

If you work alot with raster, and want your graphics/imagery to be scaleable (which is always ideal), I've known many designers fall at the gates of the pen tool at the first or second hurdle. I don't enjoy interpreting imagery by tracing over semitransparent base layers, and the live trace function in Illustrator CC is still completely bollocks.

Stumbled across a total gemstone a few years ago, almost unheard of in my circles which i've been using daily for the past few weeks. Enter Cocoapotrace. Some weird little app I picked up from a japanese geocities site i'll try and locate for you in a moment.

Basically, drop an image in, and it spits a relatively decent .eps out on the other side. Okay, if the edges aren't perfect, clean it up in .ai, but this thing does a far better job than illustrator.

image is a screenshot of the UI

Suck it and see chaps. I've only ever tested this on Mac.

Google 'cocoapotrace', first hit. Let me know what you think.

File: Screen Shot 2017-07-12 at 02.13.10.png (125KB, 728x1002px) Image search: [Google]

125KB, 728x1002px

Alright, another one.

This one is important. When I was at uni, there was a time when I was becoming really really tired of hearing the word 'grid'. I had the audacity to think that I could compose by eye, just by smashing things onto a page I could achieve a balanced sensation, something aesthetic because I was in some way gifted with some ungodly power to make things look good just because I could.

I was wrong, and if you think the same, then you are wrong too.

If you want to be able to compose layout and image successfully, you need to underfuckingstand LEADING. You need to make decisions on your typography from the moment you know your page format. a 55x85mm business card to an A2 fold out mailer, what is the smallest type size you are going to use, will it be legible and what should the line spacing (leading) be.

As a rule, I'll work roughly to these guides:
A3 - 10pt line spacing min (9pt character height)
A4 - Same as above
A5 - 8pt line spacing (7pt character height)
A6 and > 6pt line spacing - (5pt character height)
These are guides, not rules, different faces have varying legibilities and different sizes, but you know this.

Also: If you are working with type and image together, you need to be working in Indesign. Are you illustrating? Illustrator. Are you editing imagery? Photoshop. Are you designing Layouts? INDESIGN.

So, with this in mind, you should work out what your leading is in millimetres and set your baseline grid as necessary, followed by a 12 column grid.

This tutorial sounds harder than it is, but once you get your head around it, any letter head, invoice template, cool looking 'easy breathing' layout you've stumbled across on pinterest, you will notice is following a strict grid - AND- if you have a solid sense of good typography and how to use it...It's all yours anon.

This is what separates the men from the boys.

http://www.creativebloq.com/
computer-arts/
mastering-grids-indesign-cc-71412235

File: secret.png (224KB, 320x320px) Image search: [Google]

224KB, 320x320px

Have a secret source.

You can see those ten a penny, bored out of their fucking minds carbon copy designers scattered across the landscape. These folk are usually followed by a trail of rehashed shutter stock vectors, all paid for, all done before.

Draplin talks about something he calls 'little heroes', little logotypes and markings created in times gone by and found on old gas canninsters and tool sets, all sourced from garage sales he drops in on.

I think that it's really telling that, this guy, at the top of his field is going down that po-mo route of sourcing and reviving the forgotten, creating new from the old. You should too. You should because if you can locate lost sources and cite them for inspiration / use them in your work, you will have a clear edge.

I have a guy. It took me a while to find him, but I visit most weekends and pick up a few things. He is tucked away in the corner of a local outdoor market. He has boxes upon boxes of magazines he's collected over the years.

For a nominal fee, I walk away with 20 or so items, put them all to the scanner and cut out what I like. It's helped me create custom lettering, collage, dadaist poetry, decoupage, logo form, everything.

60's porn, muscle building magazines, kung fu monthly, war comics from the mid 50's, most of this unseen since that time. Imagery that is likely forgotten now. It's all yours to do what you want with...

...and when you combine this awesome now wealth with cocopoatrace (see above)...

Find your cave of treasures...and whatever you do, keep it to yourself. In the infinite rehash, mine for the material nobody has seen for 50 years. Hack it apart, trace it, scan it, cut it up, find the elements that have been crafted, find forgotten lettering...

With tools like Fontself and a bit of talent, type design isn't just for the dedicated few anymore.

Image related: Thats my guy. And if I see you in there this Saturday its all going to get a bit Jet Li in 'The One'

File: 10482667.jpg (115KB, 1500x1500px) Image search: [Google]

115KB, 1500x1500px

I'll throw one in.

Get yourself a basic gaming mouse with a decent number of programmable buttons and set them to your most-used keyboard shortcuts (ctrl-z in my case because I'm constantly fucking up.) I've also got one set to ctrl, one to shift, and the mousewheel button to alt (move wheel normally to scroll up and down, click and hold while moving wheel to zoom, ya dig?)

>>314306
would you recommend being open about those inspirations? i can already imagine the nephew of some old artist claiming i'm stealing his grampa's work

>>314297
cocoapotrace is the macos frontend, but there are a variety of multiplat versions at http://potrace.sourceforge.net/