astrid wehling – designer notes from a large island

Thank you all for visiting this year.

Art and Photography

For almost 10 years I'm designing catalogues and invitations for art exhibitions, mainly ceramics. The quality of photos sent in by the artists has improved immensely over the time as most artists now use the services of professional photographers.

But for those who are still taking their own photos or who want to improve their skills: here are a few things you should know if you want your photo being published:

• Use a tripod.

• Leave enough space around the object - include more background. If the object on the photo sits too close to the edge of the photo, the image can't be used for full page images if you want to show the complete object. A full page image always requires extra space around the edges for bleed and you don't want two or three millimetres being cut off your artwork.

• Watch out for weird looking shadows, they might distract from the object and kill the whole image.

• The same goes for too many and too strong reflections. Try to avoid flash.

• Avoid busy backgrounds, even if your studio or kitchen looks interesting. But a busy background will distract from the main focus in the photo.

• Should your photo include a 'horizon' e.g. a table's edge or a floor edge, make sure it's straight.

• Centre your object unless you are using an interesting angle for artistic purposes.

• If you are using a paper background, make sure it's not dirty or ripped (photoshop can fix a lot, but that would lead to higher pre-press costs)

• If you are taking photos of your art in an exhibition, focus on your object, unless showing blurry people in the background is intentional and part of the arrangement.

• Make sure the digital file is large enough for printing. I often see images that look great on screen but turn out only as big as a stamp when printed in the correct resolution. Offset printing requires 250 ppi* or 300 ppi* photoshop files. An A5 .psd file can easily end up being 12 MB large.

• When you save your .psd file into a jpg to send it off, try to save it only once as each re-saving will compress the image more, which affects the quality.

Happy Snapping!


• ppi = pixels per inch; very often wrongly called dpi (dots per inch).

Student Advice

photo: istockphoto.com/alexemanuel

Every year I get emails from design students as part of their uni projects, asking me specific questions about my background, my career as a designer and the challenges of working in your own business.

Today I answered this years question by Andrew
"What is the most important thing a Designer has to learn?"
with just 2 lines as he asked for a short answer:

"Stay curious, be willing to learn something new every time you start a new job and never forget that the client knows more about his business than you do."

"How it works is even more important for a design than how it looks."

 

Jolly times ahead

7 weeks until Melbourne Cup Day, here in Australia the (inofficial) start into the Jolly Season. Christmas party bookings are on the agenda again for most businesses.
No, no, I will not start complaining about the fact that christmas cards have turned up in the shops by Mid-September. I am actually glad for early reminders.

Instead I thought I just show some of the invites I did in the past. Not all for Christmas though.

Company Anniversary I

 

Company Anniversary II

 

Christmas

 

Piano Concert and Swiss National Day Celebration

 

Cocktail Reception

 

What you do for a living is not be creative. Everyone is creative.*

 
 
* This post's headline is a quote by Seth Godin, successful entrepreneur and book author. When I first read it, my initial thought was: "WHAT? I'm a Graphic Designer, of course what I do is being creative."
But I realised what he meant when I read the second part of that quote: "What you do for a living is to ship."

He is right. No client wants you to come back to him with just über-creative ideas. He wants you to come back with a product, that works for him and his business in his market. And he wants you to deliver on time. Within budget. If on top the concept is unique, eyecatching and headturning, the better.

To achieve this, being on time, within budget and creative, you will need experience. Experience in what's possible and what not. What to trash and what to keep – you need to know when to stop adding elements to the design. Who to work with – think: copywriters, printers, photographers. You need to know how to speak their language.

You need discipline and you also need to ask it from others who you work with.

You are flying the plane or sailing the ship. It comes down to you when a job gets wrong (sounds scary, I know). But it gives you a satisfactory feeling when everything works out perfect.

photo: www.istockphoto.com

The Logo Stress Test

After you've designed a logo that

... represents the business or product it was designed for
... stands out from the competition
... is unique and distinctive

Does your logo still purvey the intent of the design when:

... in black & white?
... printed on an m&m?
... embossed?
... stitched on fabric?
... printed in a black and white newspaper?
... faxed? (yes, there are still companies using the fax)

10 years of designing the Journal of Australian Ceramics

Designing the Journal of Australian Ceramics (formerly known as 'Pottery in Australia') has been one of my first big jobs after arriving in Australia. Little did I know about the world of ceramics back then.

10 years, 3 offices, a magazine title and and an editor change later and I'm still loving it.
Every 3 to 4 month a big folder of photos and stories is waiting to go into the next magazine. 3 weeks of layouting and relayouting, discussing, discarding and developing new ideas end up in the big last question: "And what goes on the cover?" Sometimes you have a hero shot straightaway, sometimes it's a last minute Eureka moment.

Today we work with the best photographers, writers and proofreader from Australia to bring the most exiting and inspiring stories about ceramics to the large community of ceramicists and art lovers worldwide.

2001

2011

Oh, and did I mention the great coffee, pastries and curries that come with working with that wonderful team? Thanks for 10 amazing years!

 

 

Early Influences – Otl Aicher (1922 – 1991)

photo: Toby Barnes, Otl Aicher Pool @ flickr

Otl Aicher was one of Germany's leading designers whose work was a big influence on my education. Hi main focus was on crisp, clear visual language and legibility, stripped of all arty and unnecessary things. His believe was that a good design is a design which works in reality and which serves everyday life and human being.*

Otl Aicher was the director of the "Hochschule für Gestaltung" in Ulm, which in the beginning was leaning heavily towards the Bauhaus and, over the time, developed own design principles, now famously known as "The Ulm Model".
Together with his colleagues, Otl Aicher designed the corporate identity of Lufthansa and was involved in product design for the electrical appliance company Braun. The HfG defined what we call today "Visual Communication"

After the Ulmer Hochschule für Gestaltung had to be closed for political reasons, Otl Aicher was commissioned as the head designer for the Olympic Games 1972 in Munich. This was - in the eyes of the design community - his biggest achievement, as these were the first Olympic Games in Germany after Hitler's 1936 Games in Berlin. Aicher had to create an image that had to correct everything the image of the Berlin Games had presented to the world.
The pictograms he developed as part of the Olympic design are stillin use worldwide today.

photo: Toby Barnes, Otl Aicher Pool @ flickr
photo: alphanumeric, Otl Aicher Pool @ flickr

Later on he created Corporate Identities for institutions and banks like ZDF, Dresdner Bank, Sparkasse and Westdeutsche Landesbank, Munich Airport, Deutsche Airbus.
His font Rotis, developed in 1988, is today one of the world's best known and recognized fonts.

Just by coincidence some of my teachers at Uni and my first employer were students of Aicher and huge fans of his meticulous and exact designs.
His specific way to utilise grids and to work with white space became pretty soon second nature to us.

I remember, that in my first job after uni, when we worked on brochures for Deutsche Airbus/Aerospace, my boss flew regularly from the North of Germany to Rotis in the South to have Otl Aicher checked the artwork and to give us his OK (not always easy to get).

Deutsche Aerospace/Airbus brochure, 1990

For those early brochures we were only allowed to use the colours red and black - full colour came only later. The planes for example were drawn by hand and angles had to be on 45º.  And we could be sure that each time Aicher would find elements which were one millimeter out of line within seconds.

Deutsche Aerospace/Airbus brochures, 1990/91

I'm using more colour today and I can't always implement Aichers strict design rules, but I am still fascinated by his work and his way of thinking.

 

PS: I just got send this link which shows London's design consultancy Bibliothèque's collection of Aicher's 72 Olympics work:

http://www.bibliothequedesign.com/projects/exhibition-and-environment/72-Otl-Aicher/

* (http://www.metropolismag.com/story/20070102/the-olympic-feats-of-otl-aicher)

How seriously do you take your business?

Recently I came across an Irish website called tweak.com where customers can buy logos and brochure templates online. Quick and easy – you pick an image, insert your company name, pay and you can download your logo. Or you buy a PDF for a brochure or newsletter and just insert the text.

A lot has been written about crowdsourcing, templates and instant online logo creators. I have to admit - it looks tempting to someone who just started a business on a low budget. It might be the right thing for someone who doesn't care about longterm strategies and solid brand building. But using these services can have serious consequences.


Just a few thoughts:

How sure can you be that one of your competitors doesn't buy the same logo / brochure / newsletter?

Did you know that you can't  trademark a logo that has been created through that website?

How sure can you be that the logo ideas, which are sold on this or other crowdsourcing websites are unique enough to prevent any legal trouble later down the track?

Are your copywriting skills so good that your brochure will stand out? That it can sit next to the same brochure (with all the same colours and the same images) at a business event? Only that the other brochure is for a completely different company? Or worse – your competitor?

How good are your marketing skills that you can change a generic brochure template into a personalised and effective marketing tool?

Can you afford to spend hours online to go through all templates, download the template, insert your copy which you've written earlier, find a printer and deal with the printer?

?

Or do you prefer to work on your business and leave the rest to specialists? And use your spare time on the weekend for nicer things?

I've used the word 'customer' in the first paragraph on purpose, because customers buy off the shelf or from a catalogue.

Clients get into a meaningful working relationship with their designers and marketing professionals. That relationship is not a one way street, but a dialogue and work in progress. Professional designers know their clients' businesses and their marketing and advertising needs. They know the market and last but not least they know how professional design can help their clients to grow their business. 

It's not about costs, it's about investment.

photos: www.sxc.hu ; www.istockphoto.com

Marketing Collateral

Consistency in design is one important part of branding success – the others being authenticity, responsibility and engagement (© Nicole Armstrong, More than a logo)

Following are some samples of marketing collateral for Sydney company TouchMarketing.com.au
I already spoke about their logo earlier, highlighting the importance of vector based designs: Scaling logos with a 3D look

For the business cards we developed a fold up card with information about the business, contact details and even a small section for recipients to add notes. The finish being spot UV varnish and silver foil. This card still attracts a lot of attention.

The logo often sits on a portrait format shape with round corners, eg with Facebook or Twitter. The red swirls have now become part of the brand.

Presentation slide templates

Pull Up Banner 

Website Background