The internet never ceases to amaze me. When viewing the post on swissmiss yesterday with the typography flow chart, one of the comments pointed to the poster above. This is another designers response to Julian's poster. Instead of giving you a lot of choices, you are left with only one answer for everything: Helvetica.

Love the colors on this one.

I couldn't find a lot of info on Ron, but here is a link to the Picasa gallery that holds the image.

[via swissmiss comment section ]

This is a pretty awesome poster created by Julian Hansen from Denmark. If you don't know what typeface to use you can use this handy flowchart to find what you seek. Click on it to enlarge it or go to Julian's site to see the full version

[via swissmiss ]

It's the last day of Free Font Week. Hopefully I've added a couple of typefaces to your arsenal that you might have otherwise been lacking. Typefaces that might only fill a small niche, but when you need them, you have them.

Last up is Lot. Nice and chunky, the "C" looks like Pac-Man and the "Q" and "W" are big and beautiful. Have a great weekend!

Today I want to show you Learning Curve 2.0. It never hurts to have a handwriting typeface up your sleeve. I've used a couple of them in various projects, sometimes it's just what you're looking for.

Next up is Anivers. Great looking typeface, looks really versatile. Fantastic Asterisk. Regular weight is free, but you have to pay for other weights.

League Gothic is a revival of the old classic, Alternate Gothic No. 1. It's is part of the Open Source Type Movement (which sounds like a fantastic idea to me, check it out).

Ovalian is a bit different and far from what I normally use. But that is what drew me to it. Obviously, I am not going to set a book in it, but it would be a great addition to a logo or for some really large scale signage. (Free Use)

Free Font Week - Monday

I've posted a few fonts here and there that are available to you out there in the past and I thought it was about time to give you an entire week of it. There are always those projects out there that need a typeface that is slightly different, something out of the norm, but they're not always easy to find. So hopefully these might help you on your journey

P.S. As a personal note, I often feel that the "Q" and the "&" make me fall in love with a font. Doesn't hurt to have a really good looking font poster either.

Above is Quicksand, looks great, can't wait to use it. As with any free font make sure the usage license on it if you plan on using it commercially. You're safe with Quicksand, a note from Andrew "Feel free to use it commercially as it is license free. Cheers!”

I often read a great design blog called AisleOne, written by Antonio Carusone. He is a great designer, blogger, etc, and recently he also has started designing skateboards. His first one was the Hello and the new one is the 39 Longboard.

I love this board! I don't skateboard, I have trouble staying on things that aren't attached to my feet, but I love it. The shape, color, type, wheels, everything is fantastic. Looks like it would fit right in with the color scheme here too.

If you've got some free time, go check out his boards, and go check out his blog. Lots of great info and work being shown over there.

$160 + Shipping for the complete board

So, I bet you have noticed, posts have slowed down a bit. This could be partially because I have been really busy with a few things, I am somewhat lazy, and/or I haven't seen anything lately that has been calling out to me (I'm going to go with "all of the above").

When, I saw this book, from Dynamo,  it was calling my name. So beautiful, green and white, very well designed, fantastic typography, simple cover. You had me at hello.

However not everything can just be beautifully designed. Well it could, and the world would be amazing, but then I would be out of work... But back to my point, design isn't everything, you also need content. When I first read about what the subject of this book was, I thought, eh,  not my thing. I say that because the subject is about tweeting and status updates. Now if you know me personally, I do not tweet and I don't really partake in that. Maybe someday, but not for now. I also spend a minimal amount of time on facebook, I don't need people knowing what I am doing every second, if I tripped on a morning walk, or what I ate for lunch. However, the book is supposed to be about status updates that someone would want to read and that have meaning. I can't say for sure, but they do have my attention.

Last, the book takes from both sides of the Atlantic, and is published in both English and French, and from my understanding you get both for $20. Very tempted.

[via Unplggd]

Today I wanted to share an article from the New York Times  on typography for you. For those of you that are typography addicts it won't present that much new information (although a little insight on Hoefler and Frere-Jones, creators of Tungsten above) but I always love a good article on type. Especially those that are showing the world what we do, and that it takes a bit more then buying software to be a designer or typographer.

It discusses on how limited we are with digital type, what might change with it and the mainstreaming of typography with the Obama campaign etc.

As an update to the incredible Neutraface Video. You can head over to their blog Jark and Mason and download the mp3. Yes, I have downloaded it. Yes, I am listening to it right now.

These Logos by Alan Peters recently caught my eye. It could be that they are really great logos, have cool little creatures in them, or maybe it's the ham. Most likely it's all three. Go check out the rest of his portfolio. Really top notch logo and illustration work.

I got a pleasant e-mail update today in my inbox. The "Cats Let Nothing Darken Their Roar" 2010 Calendar is now available from Noa Bembibre.

I currently haver the 2009 version hanging to my right, and I am a big fan of it. Each month is features an unusual phrase with the month "hidden" in it. By hidden I mean highlighted in color, but the phrase contains it. So right now I have "I know Ovens Make Barbers" up.

The new one looks just as good, and since it is their 5th anniversary of the calendar there is a special edition size. I put a comparison shot up there, and the normal one is a good size, so the bigger one would be awesome.

Sadly, I have a real problem actually using calendars. The problem being I don't use them. I don't write things down in a planner or anything. My hand suffices for that. So a calendar for me has to be a piece of art as well. Which this one qualifies for sure. I have had the pentagram 365 calendar as well. Back to the point, I am sad I don't really use them. I barely use iCal. Although it would be really cool if you could skin it to look like this. I don't know if I can justify purchasing it again because of my usage problem. I am severly tempted to get one still though, because it is just beautiful in person.

Go get yours today. Spice up your desk/wall/office/cubicle/prison cell/car/ cardboard box. Or spice someone else's up and get it as a gift.

Today I wanted to show you the amazing typeface Archer . If it is from Hoefler and Frere Jones, and if you don't know about their typefaces you need to go check them out right now.

I have been in love with Archer since I first say it. It is a slab serif with ball terminals and it is just all together fantastic. Plus, it comes in a huge array of widths and weights (as with most/all of the H&FJ typefaces). You can use it as a headline, body copy, all over typography, pretty much anything. It takes it all with strides.

Unfortunately, it is not free like the last typeface I posted, but this one is well worth it. Go check it out and the rest of their typefaces.

Do you know your Helvetica from your Arial? David Friedman wanted to see if people do, so he made up a test. He took 20 logos normally set in Helvetica, and set them in Arial as well. Can you spot the real ones?

What's your score? I will honestly admit, I missed one. Toyota got me. Also, send this off to your non designer friends. It would be interesting to see their score just by picking what one looks better.

[via swissmiss ]

I met Katie Kirkton a little while back at an AIGA portfolio review. The piece that caught my eye was her Chihuly piece. I have seen his work in person when he visited Kalamazoo Michigan and her work really conveys the feel of it. The colors, photographs, and the structured typography all come together really nicely.

I also am a big fan of the brochure with his signature on it. It creates a fantastic texture and really conveys the kind of free forms that Chihuly creates in his work.

Thanks for keeping me updated on your work Katie!

Today I want to share the typeface Museo with you. I ran across it this week while looking for a different typeface for a new logo, and I went with it's Sans brother instead.

However, I really like this typeface. The serifs are different from everything out there, but yet it's not that "out there" that it can't be used in a wide range of applications.

Doesn't hurt that you can actually download a couple weights of both Museo and Museo Sans for free to give it a try before you dive right into the entire family.

As Promised time for a full report on the Renegade Craft Fair.

First things first, I had been looking forward to go to this for quite awhile, so I was all ready to be dazzled. However, overall I probably give it a 7 out of 10. Leaps and bounds above the standard touring art fair that seems to show up everywhere, but room for improvement.

My biggest gripe for the entire event would be parking, of the extreme lack thereof. I double and triple checked the website for information. It told me how to get there if taking the EL, if I was biking, but nothing about a car. I live 2 hours away from Chicago, biking isn't an option... Looked for other info online and in past years this was a bad area as well... great start. So after 2 traffic jams, we were in the area, and yup, no parking. The fair is basically set up in a neighborhood, so there aren't any parking garages, and about 60% (or more) of the street parking is permit only. After driving around for 20 min, and almost just giving up, I scored a spot.

Step 1: Get there - CHECK

It was much bigger then I expected, and had white tents as far as the eye could see as well as so many people near the booths you could barely move. I didn't even go in a lot of them because it was just too packed with people. Plus the people were for the lack of better words, assholes. Pushy, grabby, etc. They would push right in front of you only to stop right in the middle of the flow of "traffic." People would just stand in large groups right outside a booth and chat, when they were obviously in everyone's way. I mean come on people, look around you, have common sense.

So, after that rant, lets break it down into some lists:

Pros

• Overall Great contest for an art fair, not too many watercolors of a beach going on if you know what I mean
• Some illustrators I have seen on the web forever and got to see in person
• I met Jay Ryan
• Found art that would normally be somewhat hard to find (although most of it is actually on etsy you just need to look)
• Free
• Some good food and beer tent (although I didn't have any beer)

Cons

• No parking
• Everybody else who was there (ha... I sound like I need to live in a shack out in the woods or something)
• Booth after booth of overpriced screen printed t-shirts. $30 for a t-shirt, probably not. That's just me though.
• Lack of vendors who excepted credit card (even the food). I have taken this as a normal part of everyday life and didn't expect people to not except it (maybe some, but not THAT many). One place actually accepted checks, but not plastic. I didn't bring a ton of cash one me since I had planned on credit cards, so I was wrong.

To expand on the last con above I think etsy is the culprit behind this part though. Most of the vendors are on etsy and etsy takes care of all of the transactions for them. So if that is the only place you sell, you don't need CC services. However, then put yourself in a setting like this, and now you can only take cash, and limit your potential cash flow. It seems like there would be a way to do it with a smart phone and paypal (actually I know you can).

Ok, so back to the rating of a 7 out of 10. It was fun, I am glad I went, and will try to go up for the holiday sale. However, I think I prefer the much smaller and low key INDIEana Craft Exchange that I went to last year. But Renegade started out small too, and it's just grown to where it is now. I know the planners put a lot into it, but there are some problems that need to be fixed. Parking, and maybe some diversity of vendors, too much of the same thing.

Well Poster Week is coming to a close, and I think it went rather well. Maybe next time I won't plan a week with a lot of extra posts on a week where I am traveling, not too smart...

So I thought I would try and end the week with a little bit of a self promotional plug. This is a poster that I created last year. I went up to Chicago to learn how to screenprint (better) from Steve at the Screwnall Press, and this is the end result. I am pretty happy with the outcome. The poster is 3 inks, orange, dark grey, and metallic silver

It is available in my Etsy store and you can click the link over on the right side of the page to get there. There is a bit more of a description of the poster on the Etsy page as well as a couple more photos. The plan is to take the money I make from these posters and put it back into my art. So if I sell a few, it goes towards more supplies and therefore more art.

This is just a taste of some of my work, I am hoping to have a lot more of it up soon. I have some lithographs from school I am going to post on here and on the etsy store and I am currently working on a couple of bllock prints.

Have a great long weekend everyone!