Tag Archives: graphic design

Business Card Synergy

A professionally designed business card makes a big difference in image and reputation.

Ready to punch up your brand? Contact Siebenthaler Creative for a fresh look that stands out.

Business Cards Pack Big Punch in Small Package

“Do you have a card?” Before the internet, before desktop publishing, before offset printing, before area and zip codes, business cards helped form the cornerstone of corporate communications, serving as a convenient method of introduction and an essential part of networking.

“Thanks for stopping by. Here’s my card.” Business cards were a required component of print basics that included a letterhead and a #10 envelope. Together, they formed a three-part package used to communicate with the market by every business from General Motors down to the village office supply.

“Would you like a card.” Harking back to a time when brick and mortar addresses formed the backbone of corporate and commercial customer interaction, today’s business card 2.0, still measuring only 3.5” x 2”, survived the digital transformation and remains a mighty addition to any communications toolkit.

Freed from the limitations of crude by today’s standards basic letterpress reproduction, these mini-billboards combine multi-color art, an infinite choice of typefaces and a rainbow of inks, a mind boggling selection of paper stock — not to mention a wide variety of other mediums including wood, metal, and plastic — and imaginative finishes including engraving, embossing, and laser etching and cutting, to create miniature masterpieces that are uniquely memorable.

Saul Bass — America’s Designer

Saul Bass — Contemporary Graphic Design

In the latter half of the 20th century, nobody was busier – or better – than graphic designer Saul Bass when it came to movies, TV, print, and corporate branding.

His title design work for the movie blockbusters of the day — films like North By Northwest, Anatomy of A Murder, The Man With The Golden Arm, Vertigo, and many others — is still revered for its attention demanding content and arresting concepts.

Saul Bass was the graphic force that single-handedly changed the look and feel of American popular and corporate culture. His signature style was applied to virtually everything that had to do with print, film, or television, long before branding became a thing.

West Side Story — A Masterpiece That Stands Alone

The prologue intro and title for West Side Story is perhaps the single greatest movie title ever designed. Taken together, the two components are 10 minutes long, and set the stage for the film epic to follow.

Adding to the impressive design is the fact that at the time, there weren’t any multi-plex cinemas. When you went to the movies, you watched in an auditorium with 600 or 700 other viewers, gathered together and gazing up at a screen designed for viewing wide aspect CinemaScope or PanaVision stretching to the ceiling.

Before Apple, It Was All Done By Hand

Students today should be reminded that his complex and complicated movie title sequences were conceptualized and produced long before digital design software could even be imagined, let alone implemented. Then, accuracy was measured with a wooden ruler, a stopwatch, a film cutter, and some tape. A minor note, he did all this without Google and YouTube for reference.

His unique approach to title sequences was a spectacular break from the cookie-cutter template marketing methods cranked out by studios that had evolved little from the early days of film. His dramatic style used static design elements to convey mood, feeling, and focus to what had been traditional for the sake of tradition — and it worked.

Today, two-plus decades since his death, his work from a half-century ago remains vital, and is itself a continuing source of inspiration across a variety of media.

Logos to Trademarks—Masters of Their Craft

Chermayeff Geismar & Haviv Set The Bar

60 Years of Logos: Chermayeff & Geismar from Dress Code on Vimeo.

If you watch television, use the post office, have a checking account, buy gasoline, or enjoy modern art, you’ve seen their work. Driven by both research and pure instinct, the duo is responsible for a library’s worth of abstract marks and recognizable logotypes that continue to withstand the test of time.

In one short (~3′) video, design legends Ivan Chermayeff* and Tom Geismar discuss their founding, the early days, what makes a mark memorable, and how they’ve planned for their iconic firm’s future in a global environment of design on demand, ranging from crowd sourced adventure to template driven desperation to cattle call design auctions that start at the bottom and usually progress downward.

Two Legendary Designers On Memorable Careers

In this video the unassuming pair go on record about the formative years, their staying power, and what they bring to the highly competitive table of corporate communications and graphic design. Whether you’re a client or a designer, what they have to say is invaluable in charting a communications course.

Born in London in 1932, *Ivan Chermayeff died in December, 2017, at age 85.

the forgotten paper cabinet

Paper Cabinets A Relic Of Times Past

As a freelancer for most of my career and an agency and publications creative director on several occasions, having a paper cabinet wasn’t just an item of convenience. It was a necessity.

Cabinet wasn’t a euphemism either. More carpentry than not, they were close to one-offs assembled out of board stock and covered in turn with a premium stock, intended to house that company’s product line. My favorite for functional storage was from Zellerbach, then a Mead company, that served as home to a wide variety of samples from various manufacturers.

When it was time to present, the swatchbook (and a couple of alternates) was pulled from the cabinet and joined the comps at the conference table, along with PMS swatches in a separate pile. All in all a formidable display of design competence.

Paper reps called on a regular basis, loaded down with their employer’s latest sample swatchbooks that needed a home in your paper cabinet. They plied you with gorgeous printed spec, and swayed you with stacks of examples that were often graded by sheer weight and mass.

Coated, uncoated, text, cover, specialty, premium – these were just part of the extended lexicon of labels that described the various functions of unique products produced by a number of paper manufacturers both domestic and imported.

Pick Paper First, Then Design For Effect

From basic newsprint to duplex card stock, creative directors, art directors, and designers would often reach for their samples box first, then design a project to match the latest product.

Champion Colorcast and Kromekote were two such unique surfaces that in turn dictated a design that could best address the visual properties of the paper. It wasn’t quite cart before the horse, but close enough.

One metallic coated paper I wanted to use wound up being printed as a spot color using a silver metallic ink to good effect.

A side benefit of the competition between what were then independent paper manufacturers was the deluge of design aids in the form of spec books filled with examples of an endless variety of techniques to enhance the paper used for demonstration.

It’s Time To Pitch

When it was time to present, the swatchbook (and a couple of alternates) was pulled from the cabinet and joined the comps at the conference table, along with PMS swatches in a separate pile. All in all a formidable display of design competence.

And then came digital, and web ordering, and overnight shipping, and print-on-demand. Today’s paper cabinet like this version from Neenah is a nifty app – technically superior, but lacking the warmth of tactile feedback.

Ideas and progs are these days mostly presented digitally (PDFs) – faster, cleaner, and ready to finalize. Physical comps are themselves more a vestige of bygone days, having given way to the export from a close to final design document of a ready for approval two-dimensional screen display.

Most of what’s printed today – defined by ink on paper – is arrived at without the messy necessity of one-time, handmade comps created by pros.

Desktop publishing’s local democratization of the process has dumbed down the workflow to a couple of barely considered steps: crappy, template driven layouts, cheap looking overused fonts with applied effects, and a couple of paper choices. Presto! Everyone’s an expert!

Truthfully, I wouldn’t want to go back to the way things were. And truthfully, I’m glad I was around for the experience.

how logo design affects brand

Aligning Your Look With Your Mission

When it comes to promoting a business, particularly a restaurant, nothing is more critical than the brand logotype. Getting it right goes a long, long way towards making an impression on a distracted public that sees thousands of visuals on a daily basis.

To be successful, a corporate mark requires design integrity, repetition in the marketplace, and a connection to the goods or services it represents. Whether abstract or literal, the Nikes, Apples, and Coca-Colas of the business world rely on a recognizable visual that connotes quality and trust.

Emoticon, Meet Emoji

Looking at the before and after (above left) of IHOP’s haircut and a shave, it’s difficult to imagine how the approval process resulted in what struck one reviewer as a “sinister” smile beneath the word mark.

It’s arguably more legible, but only slightly, and that’s about where it starts and ends.

The IHOP acronym, in case some may have forgotten, stands for International House of Pancakes. But that’s not what I see when I try to decipher the new and improved visual. Emoticon, meet emoji.

HOW Design recently interviewed Siegel+Gale, a New York based branding agency known for their standout work, on the recent spate of chain restaurant logo overhauls. For anyone who follows corporate design, the candid remarks by the agency’s designers are for the most part an indictment of the perils of lackluster graphics.

A couple of things stand out in this collection of shareholder dependent corporate eateries. First, it’s more than okay to overhaul the corporate brand on an as needed basis. Nothing says stay away like an aged, dated, and most importantly irrelevant logotype. Second, once having decided on a freshening, make sure you’re just not slipping sideways.

Design updates should – probably – include references to historical looks that over time successfully represented a company to its public. But don’t let fear of letting go put up unnecessary barriers to a truly fresh, inspired interpretation that acknowledges the past while extending the future. Bon appétit!

need social visuals? hire a designer!

Effective Design Doesn’t Happen Without Talent

I can say with full confidence that every list ever posted promising content tips for improving your social media message, including blogs, Twitter, and Facebook, will include a requirement for “great visuals”. This post is typical, recognizing the need without acknowledging the talent required to produce art that motivates.

It’s not a heavy lift to reach that fundamental conclusion. It’s the how that usually ends up badly, as simple lip-service from the aesthetically challenged on what constitutes professional graphic design begins from a standpoint of basic ignorance of the subject.

Real guidance on achieving that lofty goal gets murky real fast. There’s very seldom a follow-up discussion on how compelling art is actually created, or how to make the subjective design judgements that are the essential DNA of an art or creative director’s job description.

One good place to start is with an appreciation for the differences between an illustrator and a designer. These are not interchangeable, even though they often overlap, and expertise in one area is no guarantee that talent carries over to the other.

It’s as if those great visuals so easily referenced as the mother’s milk of social media marketing are created with the wave of an intern’s magic kittens and string GIF wand, or by HR invoking a binding PNG spell, aided and abetted by Word’s draw extension.

The reality? Effective art isn’t an off-the-shelf commodity. It’s specialized talent that knows there’s never, ever a time to use Comic Sans if the goal is to be taken seriously. Or that Bevel and Emboss with Texture, added to a logotype of sorts sourced from an obscure MS Office font, doesn’t so much sing gloriously about brand originality as it cries out in all to painfully obvious embarrassment to everyone about the creator’s shortcomings.

Invest in Original Graphic Design for Great Results

Your friends won’t tell you, but I will: ugly doesn’t improve with time.

Within the context of social media, visuals are usually derived from photographs, illustrations, or a combination of the two. They can be used as is or modified, combined, or sampled and combined with type elements and shapes. This series of PRSA event promos I designed illustrates the point.

Colors can be shifted, shapes and objects distorted. The best visuals are unique to their specific environment, not warmed over leftovers. From social cover art and profile badges to press release supplements and web site assets, creative visual is not only desirable, but essential.

The Difference? Superior Engagement Versus Abandonment

And where are the sources for that exceptional visual content everyone is looking for? Begin with a creative director for concepts and execution. Art directors turn an idea into a finished product using various visuals, distinctive styles, and element arrangements. Pick a copywriter for a well turned phrase or snappy tagline that can catapult a campaign. Graphic designers. Illustrators. Photographers. Typographers. All play a strategic role in creating effective content of value.

So while everyone pretty much understands the role of visual content and what it brings to a message, greatness is achieved through actual talent and training, not just by proclaiming the task done and hoping for the best.

animated gifs enjoying comeback

baby cha cha and spinning globes

GIFs, or Graphic Interchange Format, was an early graphic format (dot-GIF) that demonstrated how different digital media was from print by offering flip-book like animation. One of my first attempts at the medium (READS, above) was constructed in Photoshop, while another early effort (HEADLINE!, below) was built with Fireworks.

My first recollection of the wow factor was of Baby Cha Cha, which easily holds the distinction of being the first viral internet/web sensation.

The GIF file was used extensively by the bulletin board ancestors to the web like CompuServe, which originated the format. When you see a GIF it’s most often in animated form (although there’s nothing in the file suffix to differentiate between animation and still), delivering economic motion characteristics in a sparse, somewhat choppy loop.

gifs aren’t all cats blinking or presidents winking

GIFs definitely have their place as a banner ad upgrade. Unlike Flash movies, GIFs are perfectly compatible with Apple iOS mobile devices and easily jump email barriers that often stymie attempts to pass along Javascript effects. (How can you tell whether an image is a Flash movie or an animated GIF? GIFs can be selected and saved directly from your browser.) Because of its small footprint (depends entirely on complexity – large authoring files will generate large .gif output) and quick creation, GIFs are finding renewed popularity.

Programs used to render animation include imaging applications like Photoshop (top) and Fireworks (above) at the high end, freeware by the truckload directly off the net at the other. Production is easiest with the latter, more complex – and versatile – in the former. They’re often (and perhaps unfairly) thought of as the poor cousins of Flash (SWF) movie elements.

Awarded the distinction of being the 2012 US Word of the Year by the Oxford American Dictionaries, GIFs are enjoying a resurgence as a unique art form. There’s even talk by global PR firm Burson-Marsteller of resurrecting the medium as an actual tool for business communications. As if it ever went away.

I’ve put together a vintage collection of animated GIFs over on my web site that shows how effective the medium is at maximizing a small space with a big message. No mischievous cats allowed.

Mailchimp Founder Credits Creative

to be successful don’t do what you love – love what you do

edit: Since this original post, MailChimp’s been acquired by Intuit, best known for the Quicken line of financial software.

MailChimp founder Ben Chestnut talks about his path to success as the creator of one of email marketing’s best known brands in this enjoyable, entertaining, and informative 40-minute Creative Mornings video. What works for Ben might not work for everyone, but he makes a great case for including creative as part of a business that succeeds using a non-conformist approach.

For more creative inspiration, start your daily routine with a visit to Tina Eisenberg’s swiss miss blog. It’s great with that first cup of coffee.

temp tattoos from tattly

no committment, no worries

Tattly, the latest effort from talented designer and founder of Swiss Miss graphics blog Tina Eisenberg, offers witty, low cost personal entertainment and a tempting opportunity for powersports brand and marketing managers.

The collection of expertly designed messages and icons includes “knucks,” the answered prayer for every personal injury attorney who enjoys masquerading on weekends as a Sons of Anarchy patchholder. Add fighting rings and you’re done.