The best resources for Learning Typography

wow, Wow, WOW, WOW!, WOW!!!!!!!!

It has been years since I have contributed to this old school blog of mine.

So to kick things off here is an amazing learning resource that I have stumbled across, in particular the typographic section. Have a look at it and be truly impressed and then navigate to some of the other categories on offer and return over and over again to the epic typography section.

There is also a wonderful pen tool game in the Adobe Illustrator link called The Bezier Game - head on over and have some and improve your digital penmanship.

And who have not played the KERNING GAME - give it a go!

All of this courtesy of LAPA NINJA > LAPA LEARN - super thanks for this immensely useful site.

I hope to keep this blog going for the year and hope to get some responses OR has this comms just fall of the radar and I need to get with the program.

Cheers 4 now!

Design Indaba Wizard: Yoni Bloch

With the tech wizardry of Interlude, Israeli musician and co-founder Yoni Bloch has made music videos an interactive experience rather than merely a visual one.



Read further on the Design Indaba site here.

Avant Garden - Creative Carnival

The Avant Garden is a creative carnival launching Cape Town’s young, rising talent. This design expo & after-party catersto all tastes: delectable food, art, photography, an expo filled with creative crafts from furniture to fashion, live and electronic performers, a stocked bar, sponsored prizes & a live fashion showcase. 


Come open, inspired & ready to play.



Tickets available at quicket

36 FREE font resources

Where are the best places to go to download free fonts? We reveal websites where you can find quality typography that won't cost a penny.

There are plenty of places to download fonts on the web. But which of them contain the best free typefaces? There's a lot of noise and clutter on the web, and it's easy to end up falling down the rabbit hole of poorly structured sites and low quality fonts. So we've taken on ourselves to find you the gems in the rough.

Besides the obvious places to get hold of free fonts, we've also unearthed some less known sources - including personal portfolios, agency sites and type projects. So next time you want to download fonts, start discovering a world of typographical inspiration!

You will have to head here to go grab them...

South African Brewer Uses Ads to Declare an All-Out War on Hipsters

We've reached peak hipster. And we've also reached peak anti-hipster. But South Africa's Garagista Beer Co. is barging ahead anyway with a campaign that positions the brand as absolutely not the right choice for the coolest people on earth.

Watch below as a bunch of unkempt cool white people battle each other with records, typewriters and bicycles for a taste of the brewery's limited-edition batch of suds. And also check out the onslaught of anti-hipster print ads the brand has put together.

Over at the brand's Facebook page (because having an actual Web page is so January 2014), it's clear that Garagista is pretty normcore about the whole thing. "In a world where some people care more about the craft beer image than the actual beer," it says, "we care about one thing—damn good beer." 

Cool. Now, can we make all the selfies go away?

Thanks from adweek. See the TV ad while you there.

Young Creative South Africa 2014 | A Video Interview with 10 Local Creatives

OK Go - The Writing's On the Wall - Official Video

Google Ventures On 8 Shortcuts For Better, Faster Design Research

GOOGLE VENTURES'S MICHAEL MARGOLIS IS MORE PRODUCTIVE THAN EVER. HIS SECRET? SHORTCUTS.

I’ve been doing design and UX research for almost 24 years. In that time, I’ve learned a lot, and I hope I’ve gotten better at it over the years.

One thing is certain: I’m more productive now than when I first started. I’m not any smarter (just ask my co-workers). I’m not working more hours. So what’s my secret? Shortcuts. In the interest of helping you do more faster (and to compel you to share your own tricks), here are my favorite ways to cut corners, save time, and be more efficient when doing research.

1. Start at the end: What questions do you want to answer? 
Before you do any work on a research study, clarify what you want to get out of it. For example, would it be most useful to figure out:

• Can new customers understand and figure out how to use the product?
• What are customers’ existing workflow and pain points?
• What are pros/cons of competitive products?
• What are customers’ attitudes?
• How satisfied are existing customers with the product?
• How does new customers’ usage change over time?
• Which design performs better?

When you know which answers you’re after, it’s quicker to choose the most efficient way to find them--by picking an appropriate research method (survey, A/B test, literature review, usability interviews, site visits, etc.), and the right segment of customers to study.

Read further on the Fast Company website.

Why Drawing On The iPad Just Got Way Better

THANKS TO APPLE UNLOCKING THE IPAD'S POTENTIAL, FIFTYTHREE'S PENCIL WILL SOON GET EVEN BETTER.

Today, the iPad stylus takes another step away from stupid stick and closer to expressive artistic tool. FiftyThree's Pencil--a wooden stylus made for the impressive iPad sketching app Paper--will soon allow you to vary the width of your line as naturally as drawing with a real pencil or marker.

As the video shows, you simply tilt the tip of the Pencil to go from fine point to thick line while sketching on screen--just as you would with the real thing. In other words, digital drawing on the iPad can feel a step more intuitive than it has.

While the Paper app--also developed by FiftyThree--has some incredible algorithms inside that enable intuitive color mixing and for you to rest the palm of your hand on the screen as you draw, this update actually comes largely as courtesy of Apple. Amongst countless updates in iOS 8 is a powerful feature that most of us missed: The iPad’s touchscreen can now recognize objects of various size. So instead of treating a thumb or pinky as the same sized orb, it can accommodate the precision necessary for the Pencil’s tip to begin simulating the multitude of subtle thicknesses we’d find in any natural drawing tool.

If you already own a Pencil, there’s no need to buy anything new. Free software will update the feel of the hardware. Timing will coincide with the public release of iOS 8 in the Fall.

See more here.

This is What it Sounds Like When You Put Tree Rings on a Record Player

This is an excerpt from the record Years, created by Bartholomäus Traubeck, which features seven recordings from different Austrian trees including Oak, Maple, Walnut, and Beech. What you are hearing is an Ash tree’s year ring data. Every tree sounds vastly unique due to varying characteristics of the rings, such as strength, thickness and rate of growth.

Keep in mind that the tree rings are being translated into the language of music, rather than sounding musical in and of themselves. Traubeck’s one-of-a-kind record player uses a PlayStation Eye Camera and a stepper motor attached to its control arm. It relays the data to a computer with a program called Ableton Live. What you end up with is an incredible piano track, and in the case of the Ash, a very eerie one.

Hats off to Traubeck for coming up with the ingenious method to turn a simple slice of wood into a beautiful unique arraignment. It makes you wonder what types of music other parts of nature would play. (see video below)

Read more at http://www.the-open-mind.com/this-is-what-it-sounds-like-when-you-put-tree-rings-on-a-record-player/#zkhxmMqeF6xRpgRP.99

36 Countries, 600 Days, 125,946 Miles and 1 Perfect Selfie Video

If this doesn't want to make you travel and go and see the world, maybe something else will. Whatever you do just get out there.

Typography in ten minutes

This is a bold claim, but I stand be­hind it: if you learn and fol­low these five ty­pog­ra­phy rules, you will be a bet­ter ty­pog­ra­ph­er than 95% of pro­fes­sion­al writ­ers and 70% of pro­fes­sion­al de­sign­ers. (The rest of this book will raise you to the 99th per­centile in both categories.)
All it takes is ten min­utes—five min­utes to read these rules once, then five min­utes to read them again.

Ready? Go.

1. The ty­po­graph­ic qual­i­ty of your doc­u­ment is de­ter­mined large­ly by how the body text looks. Why? Be­cause there’s more body text than any­thing else. So start every project by mak­ing the body text look good, then wor­ry about the rest.
   In turn, the ap­pear­ance of the body text is de­ter­mined pri­mar­i­ly by these four ty­po­graph­ic choices:
2. point size is the size of the let­ters. In print, the most com­fort­able range for body text is 10–12 point. On the web, the range is 15–25 pix­els. Not every font ap­pears equal­ly large at a giv­en point size, so be pre­pared to ad­just as necessary.
3. line spac­ing is the ver­ti­cal dis­tance be­tween lines. It should be 120–145% of the point size. In word proces­sors, use the “Ex­act” line-spac­ing op­tion to achieve this. The de­fault sin­gle-line op­tion is too tight; the 1½-line op­tion is too loose. In CSS, use line-height.
4. line length is the hor­i­zon­tal width of the text block. Line length should be an av­er­age of 45–90 char­ac­ters per line (use your word-count func­tion) or 2–3 low­er­case al­pha­bets, like so:
   abcde­fghijklmnopqrstu­vwxyz­abcde­fghijklmnopqrstu­vwxyz­abcd
   In a print­ed doc­u­ment, this usu­al­ly means page mar­ginslarg­er than the tra­di­tion­al one inch. On a web page, it usu­al­ly means not al­low­ing the text to flow to the edges of the brows­erwindow.
5. And fi­nal­ly, font choice. The fastest, eas­i­est, and most vis­i­ble im­prove­ment you can make to your ty­pog­ra­phy is to ig­nore the fonts that came free with your com­put­er (known as sys­tem fonts) and buy a pro­fes­sion­al font (like my fonts eq­ui­tyand con­course, or oth­ers found in font rec­om­men­da­tions). A pro­fes­sion­al font gives you the ben­e­fit of a pro­fes­sion­al de­sign­er’s skills with­out hav­ing to hire one.
   If that’s im­pos­si­ble, you can still make good ty­pog­ra­phy with sys­tem fonts. But choose wise­ly. And nev­er choose times new ro­man or Ar­i­al, as those fonts are fa­vored only by the ap­a­thet­ic and slop­py. Not by ty­pog­ra­phers. Not by you.

That’s it. As you put these five rules to work, you’ll no­tice your doc­u­ments start­ing to look more like pro­fes­sion­al­ly pub­lished material.

Keep reading this useful online guide by simply clicking on these three dots...

CPUT GD Alumni Featured: Gabrielle Guy

Book design is a kind of art in and of itself, and nowhere more so than in the case of art publication design. Here, the design choices and intricacies of the printing process itself impart meaning and create another experience for the reader between the book they hold in their hands and the artworks themselves.

Cape Town based graphic designer, Gabrielle Guy, specialises in the layout and design of art books, publications and custom monographs. She has worked with many of South Africa’s most renowned artist, galleries, curators and arts editors, and has developed a reputation for her careful attention to detail and considered approach. We spoke to Gabrielle to learn a little more about  her approach to this often overlooked but crucially important area of design.

Get inspired further by clicking on these dots...

Create a Colorful Geometric Pattern in Photoshop

Patterns are a great way to add additional texture and depth to your designs. Some can appear to be fairly complex, and the thought of making one can be overwhelming. You may find, however, that many aren't as difficult to create as they look. In this tutorial, I will show you an easy way to create colorful, and complex-looking geometric patterns in Photoshop.

For Step by Step instructions go here

PAYDAY (feat. Jack Parow & The Kiffness) - Derick Watts & The Sunday Blues

Man Beats Robot at Ping-Pong, World Breathes Sigh of Relief

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A Travel Film Made from 852 Instagram Shots

Thomas Jullien takes us (almost) around the world in this sub 2-minute video stitched together from 852 Instagram shots. Stops include Paris, NYC and Sydney, among others.

It’s incredibly well done and the amount of work involved in just finding these hundreds of similar photos is mind-boggling.

Found here...

Infecting the City - Public Arts festival

Infecting The City 2014 includes 40 distinct artworks, which unfold over the Festival week across Cape Town's CBD. The Programme includes both daytime and evening performances much of which are designed as routes weaving through the City's streets.

10 - 15th March / Cape Town City Center

Animated warning on the dangers of taking selfies

Art that craves your attention

Aparna Rao: