For Goodness Sake It's Free!

Graphic Design USA is a monthly news and information magazine for and about the professional design community including graphic design firms, corporate and publishing inhouse departments, advertising agencies, institutions and non-profits, and other creative businesses and organizations.

The magazine is FREE to creative professionals within the United States. This includes art, design and production titles at graphic design firms, advertising agencies, corporate and publishing inhouse design departments, and more. For those who do not qualify as working creative professionals or for international subscribers, paid subscriptions are available by clicking the paid subscription link above.

Graphic Design USA is available through subscription only and is mailed mid-month. Go online and signup for your free issue at gdusa.com

csca, creative best 2007

here she is, a hunk of wood and a chunk of paper to give us a pat on the back.

What's YOUR inspiration?

Creative minds can take a lead from just about anything. A few years back, I was watching the Oscars on TV while doing one of my design projects and was smitten by a charcoal dress with an olive green belt. That unexpected color scheme became the basis of an entire letter suite concept. Fancy!

So my question for all of you is where do you find your inspiration?

paul rand

"no matter how perfectly you can do something, it can still be improved"

a short film by imagery forces for paul rand, one of design's greatest. the film combines animation of rand's work with a videotaped interview.

ask force

you may not work in advertising, but here's your chance!

that's right. the cards have been made people! let's get the word out: babrain.com/askforce

One is the lonliest number

Like any creative discipline, designing tends to happen in a solitary fashion. Artists are trained, for the most part, to hone their crafts late at night, spitting, sweating and cursing over their projects with full coffee cups, with red bull, with silence. Sharing only happens after, after we feel ready, upon completion.

The catch, of course, is that informed discourse will make any idea stronger; as we like to say, more brains are better.

It's a hard habit to let go of; but I find myself happy to shed it. I have seen myself grow and evolve, soley based on the objective criticisms of others outside my bubble.

A lot of the time, for me, designing is a puzzle. A puzzle without reference, without instructions. I have pieces, I push them around, I try to make them fit. Often, very often, I am completely stuck. I have no idea what to do next. In Joan Didion's memoir "The Year of Magical Thinking", she uses a mantra, in regards to her writing process:

"Read, learn, work it up, go to the literature. Information is control."

I find comfort in that; the answers are out there. Grab a book, read a magazine, pull a bunch of smart people together and ask them questions.

Information is control. More brains are better.
Don't go it alone.

costume?

is it wrong that i did not have a costume for Halloween?