AliceN's blog

I love it!

An introspective article over at A List Apart by Luke Wroblewski delves into the reasons why...

TOP 5 CLIENT REQUESTS

1. My Unqualified Friends have different Ideas...
   - Judge the idea on its merits, reasonably explain why it may not work, due to your research, experience, etc.
2. Purple is my favorite color, Why don't we use that?
   - Backup with documentation, color board, creative specs, etc
3. We need more stuff about the FOLD!!
   - A significant amount of research is available to show that users understand they can scroll for more content
4. There's so much EMPTY SPACE, can't you fill it?
   

As a designer, I rely on my vision to impart a hierarchy of data within web pages. It takes a jarring reminder from the smart folks at the South by Southwest Interactive Festival to remind me that not everyone can see the colors I painstakingly deliberate over, the varied and specific shades that I cross-browser test for universal appeal. Even color contrast can be lost to a slight case of color-blindness.

Whenever a designer is faced with site redesign or updates to a site that has no working original document, matching graphics, colors, and most of all type can be a challenge.
Over at Fried Beef's Tech Site a number of resources are listed to aid designers in all things type related.

Over at Bitt Box.com a blog was posted today alerting designers to the growing importance to tailor web design to the increasing number of iPhone and iTouch users.

My morning tea is always piping hot due to our splendid watercooler of local fresh spring water. I know I am blessed to have such a healthy work environment that is equally environment conscious of plastic and paper consumption and recycling. The figures are staggering when you realize how costly the individual bottles of name-brand spring water.

Alright! I never had a childhood dream to become a magician, but the internet has changed many things in my life. Here is the wonderfulness that is Vector Magic. And boy, is it a doozy. Say your client send you this little, ugly, pixelated gif of their logo, and expect you to plaster it all over thier website and print collateral... in all different sizes. Now, instead of hounding them day and night until you can explain the difference between a .gif and a .eps, or any other format for that matter... you can make it yourself!

The internet has effectively eradicated designers' pretenses for secrecy of technique, and opened an unparalleled forum for sharing knowledge.

Though many hoarders still exist out there, they are missing a large opportunity for self-promotion through the web. Aspiring designers web-search design terms to self-teach themselves Illustrator, Photoshop, and so on.

With the avalanche of bloggers facilitated by ease of sites such as wordpress.com, blogspot, and many more, the key to designing outstanding blogs is in the small details. Not every blog should look like a typical weblog.

Hard evidence that blogs can make a difference.

The people over at Elizabeth Arden changed the Ad campaign to slightly less resemble the monodonation's charity branding that Chris Sloan posted about earlier this month.

While still a major rip-off, at least its nice to feel effective as bloggers!