Category: Graphics

  • Saul Bass: Style is Substance

    15 minutes well-spent watching a couple of commentaries about the title sequences of Saul Bass. “Despite the fact that true title sequences aren’t really something that most movies carry today, the ones that do feature them are almost always in debt to Bass’ style and philosophy.” “What you’re seeing is actually a short version of…

  • Shop Art Theft

    Tuesday Bassen and other independent illustrators have found their work being copied and sold by retailer Zara.

  • For services to typography and road safety

    Graphic designer Margaret Calvert has been awarded an OBE (Officer of the Order of the British Empire).

  • What makes a good logo?

    Update: 2021 A revised version of this piece can be found here: What makes a good logo? Apologies for the lack of a redirect, and thanks for visiting! — Anyone can design a logo, but not everyone can design the right logo. A successful design may meet the goals set in your design brief, but…

  • On late client payments, sticking to the brief, and the value of design

    Answering questions from video calls with emerging graphic designers. Topics include late design client payments, preventing clients from going off-brief, and communicating the value of design. How do you handle late client payments? Thankfully, it’s rare when I’m paid late, in part because I keep the files I create (and their usage rights) until after…

  • Identityworks retirement

    Tony Spaeth’s Identityworks website was one of the first that inspired me to build my own. A fantastic resource, but now, sadly, retired.

  • Giving better design feedback

    Sarah in marketing wants to be able to log in directly on the home page, but Tim in engineering would prefer it on its own page. Can we compromise? “No. We cannot compromise. If you tell your barber that you like it short, but your significant other likes it long, you’re gonna get a mullet.”…

  • A short lesson in perspective

    The following thoughts have been republished from the personal website of Linds Redding, the former Saatchi & Saatchi and BBDO art director who died from cancer in 2012, aged 52. His words are an intriguing personal reflection on his creative career, written after realising his time was coming to an end. I hope he would…

  • Picasso and pricing your work

    Designers often ask me whether they should charge by the hour or by the project. This tale is the best answer I can find in favour of the latter. Picasso and Brigitte Bardot, Getty Images Legend has it that Pablo Picasso was sketching in the park when a bold woman approached him. “It’s you —…

  • On trading design services

    When Ivan Chermayeff and Tom Geismar started their design practice in the late 1950s, one of the first things they did whenever possible was to trade design for some minor services they needed. Ivan cites the following example. “When the time came to have an attorney to help with a simple contract agreement, we traded…