The “I am not here to make friends” T-shirt is available in the shop now!
The “I am not here to make friends” T-shirt is available in the shop now!
Remember this? Don’t worry, I still have ten fingers, and I did not spoil everything by cutting across when nearly finished.
Cheers!
(Source: flis.nl)
I am not here to make friends. Design for a T-shirt print, available soon at http://flis.nl.
Promotional card I designed for my own company.
(Source: flis.nl)
This is the business card I designed for a client. He needed a business card that symbolically took the netherlands to China, and had something representing himself incorporated as well.
A sneak preview of part of my new textile collection “Modern Deco”, to be launched on monday.
I’d like to know what you think. Do you like it?
Above the concept illustration I made to use for an iPhone application icon.
Below the final icon the client will use. The application will launch soon.
I think it looks cosy. What do you think?
This is a preview of part of the new pattern design for the FLIS art & design textile collection, to be released in a couple of weeks.
I have not yet decided how to name the collection. The working title is “Modern Deco”, but I bet someone else could think of a better name?
When I was still in school learning about graphic design I got invited by a crowdsourcing initiative not unlike the now well known http://99designs.com. For those of you who don’t know, their homepage says: “Need something designed? Our community is 198,050 strong. Whatever you need designed, count on us to get the job done right. Over 29,000 satisfied clients!”. Apart from the fact that the first question that rises is “198,050 designers, 29,000 satisfied clients, what the h•ll is wrong?!” you could ask yourself what message you are sending out by not asking for the best designer for your business, not looking for the perfect match. After all, design is communication. So when a business decides to use a <irony> service </irony> like 99designs or many others (the one I did a couple of logo’s for before I realised I shouldn’t was called logomatch), what message is this business sending?
I personally think people and businesses that use services like this are not taking themselves or their business serious. But is that true? Maybe they just don’t know any better? Or maybe they underestimate the job designers do?
Currently I am reading a book by Chris Brogan, called “Social Media 101”. Halfway through the book (most of the content I turned out to be familiar with already, but I guess it is a good start for people who are new to social media) I decided to take a look at the authors website. A little late maybe, but hey, I bought the book, right? It’s not like I read my books behind my computer, I like to read books in order to not be behind my screen for once. So I checked his site, and the forelast post turned out to be this one: http://www.chrisbrogan.com/the-design-experiment-contest-is-over/?dsq=51365483#comment-51365483. You can look for the commend I made there too, amongst more rational things I also let him know: “I don’t think I have to explain to you why this post about your 99 Designs got my designer blood slightly cooking, you say so yourself your designer friends have explained this to you already.”
After that I cooled down and started thinking about this topic again. I came to the conclusion (for now), that we designers don’t have to fear. Not really. Since our clients are those who do want a good design, a design that communicates who they are, what business they are in, and what clients they serve. But still, it would be nice if we found a way to turn the tide, and maybe even educate potential clients. Ah well, I am a dreamer.
What do you think? Is good design history? What do you think of sites like 99designs? Would you use one? If yes, why? If no, why not? Is there anything we can do?
Red, red and… red?
Today I have uploaded the revised versions of my second batch of textile designs. They are now for sale on Spoonflower.
The color red and Spoonflower are a difficult combination, or so I was told. If you ask me, as a graphic designer, there is no problem with red and or Spoonflower.
However, there is a “problem” that is called color management. I would call it a solution though. Without going to deep into details regarding color management, I’d like to emphasize color is not an easy matter, neither is color management.
But what the f*ck happens when you take a digital picture, open it in Photoshop, save it as .jpg, upload it on a website and let it be seen by anyone using any screen? Up until the uploading part you can manage the color. After that you can only guess what happens to the result people are watching.
That is why I use tricks like in the picture below to show what color red my design is.
Above you see a large red pillow. This pillow is what I like to call “fire engine red”.
Now as this is a picture, and I don’t know what your screen is like, at least you will probably be able to see the middle pattern (Type Tile Red) is almost the same red as the pillow. It is just a little bit darker, of course depending on the fabric it is printed on and the light that it is in.
The left and right fabrics orange red I have now changed to the red I used in the “Type Tile Red”. So if you order either the “Avant Garde” fabric or the “Apples”, you now you will get a red red, and not an orange red.
Besides, if you are by any change not happy with the textile you ordered, Spoonflower will return you your money.
I am looking forward to creating some cool new designs. Any requests out there?
Did you know you can win cookies by subscribing to the FLIS art & design Newsletter?! Apart from maybe winning the cookies I will be starting other contests as well, so if you won’t win the cookies this time, maybe you will win something like a handprinted T-shirt next time!
Oh, and apart from the winning cool and/or delicious stuff thing, subscribing will keep you up to date with all the cool new art & design that FLIS art & design creates!
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As promised a couple of days ago: the typophile birds. These ones live in Chestnut Hill, Boston Massachusetts, United States. They seem to like the red letters the best, as we have noticed them in several signs with red letters. But that is probably because most signs are red.
Have you seen nests like these anywhere else?
