So you have your graphic design blog up and running. Great template, all the right plugins, some portfolio pieces uploaded into a cool lightbox gallery. You even have some great jQuery sliders and user interface components. Wonderful! But now what? How do you market your finite graphic designer self to an essentially infinite audience on the internet? Is this a big problem?
Continue reading “Marketing your graphic design blog to a niche audience”
The smart way to run a web design business is simple: copy the plan that someone else used successfully to run a web design business and stick to it.
That is it.
Many of you know I’ve moved on from running my own web design business. I’m off in different directions including a lot of writing and programming. However, many visitors to my blog, like you, might be trying to start a web design business or are already up and running, but are short in the what-do-I-do-about-this-or-that department. So now what do you do?
Continue reading “How to run a web design business the smart way”
A small milestone for our humble little blog. I just noticed crossed a million page views a couple weeks ago. since launching at the end of 2009. Our most popular posts remain those focused on typography. The Big Book of Font Combinations and the Font Combinations app continue to grow in popularity as more people discover us.
While a million page views is nothing compared to other graphic design blogs, it’s a lot for us considering how we’ve successfully carved out such a small niche. Remember, broad numbers don’t count nearly as much as a narrow, targeted audience. Big, focused numbers in your narrow target audience mean everything! And that’s what we’ve done and will continue to do: reach graphic designers and other casual typeface enthusiasts with particular typographic needs!
What’s next? Let’s get to 2 million twice as fast 
. With some cool things coming up in 2012 we can do it! Thanks for stopping by!
Now that the year anniversary of The Big Book of Font Combinations is on us, and Font Combinations App 2.0 has been out in the iTunes App Store and updated by nearly everybody, the time is now to ask: what about the legions of free fonts that are available?
The first two products focused entirely on classic typefaces. But with the popularity of free fonts rising with each month, I now wonder about how those fonts are being used by those that download them. My question is simple: would designers find a book just like The Big Book of Font Combinations, but 100% geared towards free fonts, something useful? If you think so, drop me a line or leave a comment below.
Thanks for visiting!
I was a heavy contributor to the infamous Roger Ebert thread on why he thought video games can never be art, Video games can never be art. I concurred with Mr. Ebert, and a few of my answers where highlighted by Mr. Ebert. I duked it out with some of the best pro-games-are-art word-ninjas and logic-dodgers, and have a few trophies on my wall to prove it.
Continue reading “Why video games are still not Fine Art (yet have art in them)”
The Mac OS App Store has more and more to offer graphic designers looking for productivity software for their Mac. However, that means there is more and more to wade through to find the good stuff, just like when looking for iPhone apps. But hold on! We did the hard work and research and found a combination of the highest-rated but also most useful apps for graphic designers!
Continue reading “Top 20 Mac App Store Apps for Graphic Designers”
As I’ve said elsewhere on the blog, I believe designers should draw as often as possible. One of the best exercises, time-tested over hundreds of years of fine art tradition, is copying the Masters. But can you do this on lunch break? Sure—with a little help from a grid! Continue reading “10 Steps to Using Grids for Sketching (on Lunch Break)”
Spread the love! If you like the all-new Font Combinations 2.0 app, and we hope you do, please stop by the iTunes App Store and give it a review and some star ratings for us! We need your font-loving help!
Continue reading “Review and Rate the all-new Font Combinations App in the iTunes App Store”
What better topic for Mistral to be an appropriate font choice for, than a spoofy Italian movie about Hercules fighting against assorted masters of Karate, circa 1973? Perfect!
Some of you will love this, and some of you are going to flame me. I don’t care about the haters though. Even though a fellow TYPO3 developer friend pointed out regarding my solution, “There has to be a better way. There probably is”, I’m posting this as a help to all the Firefox users of the world who are sick to death of the phantom Firefox memory leaks.
We all know Firefox leaks memory for one reason or another. It’s been years. Plugins have come and gone and Firefox just leaks all the time. Period. What to do?
It’s time to hit Firefox with a sledgehammer. Like a boss.
Just a quick note to everyone know the all-new Font Combinations 2.0 App has been released and is available on iTunes! Please take a look at the new interface design and list of features!
If you bought version 1.0, your free update is on the way! Let us know how you like it!
And don’t forget to try out the new Twitter and Email functions while you are at it!
The Font Combinations app 2.0 is on the way for iPhone and iPod Touch with iOS 4.2 and later! It’s a complete rewrite from the ground up with a slew of new features, a whole new UI, and best of all, all-new Retina Display graphics. Continue reading “Font Combinations 2.0 Preview & Screenshots”
Here is a little foretaste of some upcoming functionality in our new Font Combinations app. Click “Randomize Me” to generate a random typeface pairing from about 50 of the top typefaces of all time. There are nearly 2000 combinations at your fingertips below.
After you’ve had some fun, please click on the link to the Big Book of Font Combinations for some full-sized, 100% vector combinations, and the Font Combinations App for some mobile typography inspiration. Enjoy!
Head over to Smashing Magazine to see my latest article, “How to Choose a Typeface“, and leave a comment or two!
You asked for it and we’re building it. Just a heads-up that all new typeface pairing apps are on the way. “Font Combinations” is coming out on iPad, iPhone 4 (Retina Display), Android, and even Mac OS!
Stay tuned this Spring 2011!
FontShop sold a typeface collection called “100 Best Fonts” for a limited time in Germany a little while back. The website for this special promotion generously listed the names of all 100 best typefaces for graphic design with background information in German. When the typeface collection was no longer available, the promotional site itself retained a life of its own, serving as a go-to reference for graphic designers looking for inspiration. The PDF on the promotional website is a beautiful piece of design work, a nice visual resource, and just plain fun to look at even if you don’t read German. (NOTE: You can click the typeface names for more info)
How could this great list be improved? I was interested into what categories and classifications these classic fonts were placed, what foundries they were from, and what interesting insights might avail themselves if I could see all the data in one place. I also wanted one place to see examples of all these great typefaces, so I put those together too.
Continue reading “The 100 Best Fonts (in a Huge Sortable Table)”
What fonts go with Gill Sans and match up nicely? The truth is that there are probably thousands of fonts that would pair with Gill Sans just fine. The trouble is finding them and making something work really well. To find something that works and still have time left for designing, you are going to have to limit your choices. But to what?
So I’m working on this big new post (check back soon) and I notice two curly quotes that for some reason struck me like they looked like that old-time barbershop down-the-middle hairstyle from the turn of the 20th century. I had typed the characters in the order they appeared on the keyboard (I had been typing just the keys with symbols) I happened to be looking at Souvenir, designed by Morris Fuller Benton in 1903. So then I thought, “What are the chances that Benton has this exact hairdo?” Pretty high it turns out. The keystrokes looked like the beginning of a typographic portrait.
Continue reading “Typographic Portrait: Morris Fuller Benton typeset in Souvenir”
Smashing Magazine’s eBook #6: Typography has just been released. I contributed an article, “Best Practices of Combining Typefaces“. Please drop by the Smashing Magazine store and pick up a copy for your iPad, iPhone, or your favorite eBook reader.
Once again, just a little horn-tooting: we crossed 200,000 visits last week. When we crossed 100,000 back in May 2010, I mentioned that I thought our tally of visitor totals felt significant for some reason. For that same unknown reason, 200,000 seems important too. Unique page views crossed 340,000. We started in September 2009, and in general get 700-1000 unique visitors a day, but have the odd day of 3000-7000 hits if we post something that gets re-tweeted like mad. That’s happened a dozen times or so.
Continue reading “Graphic design blog hits 200,000 visitors”
I had a few requests for the PSD from which all the graphics were created for the article “Best Practices of Combining Typefaces“. Here it is for anyone interested in how the graphics were made, whether you liked the psuedo-CSS3 embossing or my choice of colors or not .
Continue reading “Free PSD from Smashing Magazine article “Combining Typefaces””
Smashing Magazine just published my article “Best Practices of Combining Typefaces“. The article expands on some of the principles I’ve covered in other articles here at BonFX, but has a lot of large, original illustrations and uses some of the most popular fonts in design today. Stop by and take a look!
Continue reading “New “Font Combination” article at Smashing Magazine”
Smashing Magazine is featuring a giveaway of 2 free copies of “The Big Book of Font Combinations“. Just visit either of these pages to find out how to enter.
On another note, we just passed 100 posts at BonFX. It took 13 months from the date we started, September 2009. Onward and upward, and thanks for stopping by!
Yes, I said it. Is it possible? Yes, but in a very particular way in very particular niches.
Continue reading “An end to list posts and roundups for graphic designers”
There are a lot of great freelance graphic design resource websites out there today. From Smashing Magazine to Freelance Switch and everything in between. Enough said—these are indispensable web resources for freelancers. But is there too much information? I’d like to address the information-overload aspect of freelance graphic design resources.
Continue reading “New site dedicated to freelance graphic design: input wanted”
(UPDATE 10/12/2010: Gap has pulled their new logo and their crowdsourcing wunder-blunder attempt at damage control. Nonetheless, I hope my contribution of humorous satire for this sad episode has some residual therapeutic value for all parties involved.)
Gap selected my crowdsource entry for their logo design contest! I won a Gap shopping spree for $20 (limited to the sale rack in the back) plus I get to put the new logo in my portfolio! Here goes:
Continue reading “Gap’s new crowdsourced logo unveiled after rebranding fail”
Many of you know of what secret skill I’m referring to. I’m talking about graphic designers who write great copy, but keep their writing chops hidden in plain sight. Why do they do this?
Continue reading “The Number One Secret Skill of Graphic Designers”
Is there a consensus on whether or not graphic designers should know how to draw? Should drawing and sketching be a part of the creative design process? And is the answer relative?
Continue reading “Should graphic designers know how to draw or not?”
What is the main reason a graphic design fails miserably? It’s quite simple: you played with graphic content before you worked out your message.
Continue reading “Number one reason a graphic design fails miserably”
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What are the most popular FontShop fonts in May 2012:
"Again, congrats on a great book. It's really proven helpful. Not only has it aided my design process but I've also been able to quickly show clients some options and therewith dramatically reduce the time it takes them to make decisions."
Timothy Victor, The Typesetter
"(5.0 stars) Very cool...I love this book! I've got in on my iPad for quick access and zooming in on the detail. The resolution is awesome and it displays beautifully...."
—Belinda
"(4.5 stars) If you are interested in typography and want to get up close and personal with some classic fonts; The Big Book of Font Combinations may be just the kind of tool you need."
—Jacci Howard Bear About.com
"Douglas has pulled together...a real resource for typographers and anyone who has to work with type...a treasure trove of inspiration and a great addition to your type library."
—Joel Friedlander The Book Designer
"I...downloaded your (at first sight awesome) book. Can't wait to use it, thanks a lot!"
—Ard, Simplability
"...your book is really a great help and its worth the money! I can highly recommend it!"
— M. Jäckel
"Thanks very much for putting together the big book – I purchased it today, and it will be extremely helpful for quickly perusing new combinations (as you intended!)."
—S. Eastwood
"Thank you so much...We're amazed by how extensive it is - great job!"
—Jyoti
"I have just bought your book and started reading. Thank you for putting together such valuable information."
—Alev
"Brilliant! I have been looking everywhere for something like this!"
—Tay, ignician.net
"I'm thoroughly enjoying your book so far..."
—Jackson R., soundnewmedia.com
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