JBlog

Fun stuff on the web

2008-02-12T16:29:00.000-08:00

So, I was searching the web to help me with some color issues. I was trying to match a pantone color with its complimentary and triad colors. Well, little to my knowledge there is a lot out there in terms of color.

Color is an amazing thing. Just wanted to share.

2008-01-28T19:33:00.000-08:00

10 Ways To Increase Pages Indexed

By Jason Lee Miller - Tue, 01/22/2008 - 12:15pm.

Or how to make Google pay more attention

For a while now webmasters have fretted over why all of the pages of their website are not indexed. As usual there doesn't seem to be any definite answer. But some things are definite, if not automatic, and some things seem like pretty darn good guesses.

So, we scoured the forums, blogs, and Google's own guidelines for increasing the number of pages Google indexes, and came up with our (and the community's) best guesses. The running consensus is that a webmaster shouldn't expect to get all of their pages crawled and indexed, but there are ways to increase the number.

PageRank

It depends a lot on PageRank. The higher your PageRank the more pages that will be indexed. PageRank isn't a blanket number for all your pages. Each page has its own PageRank. A high PageRank gives the Googlebot more of a reason to return. Matt Cutts confirms, too, that a higher PageRank means a deeper crawl.

Links

Give the Googlebot something to follow. Links (especially deep links) from a high PageRank site are golden as the trust is already established.

Internal links can help, too. Link to important pages from your homepage. On content pages link to relevant content on other pages.

Sitemap

A lot of buzz around this one. Some report that a clear, well-structured Sitemap helped get all of their pages indexed. Google's Webmaster guidelines recommends submitting a Sitemap file, too:

· Tell us all about your pages by submitting a Sitemap file; help us learn which pages are most important to you and how often those pages change.

That page has other advice for improving crawlability, like fixing violations and validating robots.txt.

Some recommend having a Sitemap for every category or section of a site.

Speed

A recent O'Reilly report indicated that page load time and the ease with which the Googlebot can crawl a page may affect how many pages are indexed. The logic is that the faster the Googlebot can crawl, the greater number of pages that can be indexed.

This could involve simplifying the structures and/or navigation of the site. The spiders have difficulty with Flash and Ajax. A text version should be added in those instances.

Google's crawl caching proxy

Matt Cutts provides diagrams of how Google's crawl caching proxy at his blog. This was part of the Big Daddy update to make the engine faster. Any one of three indexes may crawl a site and send the information to a remote server, which is accessed by the remaining indexes (like the blog index or the AdSense index) instead of the bots for those indexes physically visiting your site. They will all use the mirror instead.

Verify

Verify the site with Google using the Webmaster tools.

Content, content, content

Make sure content is original. If a verbatim copy of another page, the Googlebot may skip it. Update frequently. This will keep the content fresh. Pages with an older timestamp might be viewed as static, outdated, or already indexed.

Staggered launch

Launching a huge number of pages at once could send off spam signals. In one forum, it is suggested that a webmaster launch a maximum of 5,000 pages per week.

Size matters

If you want tens of millions of pages indexed, your site will probably have to be on an Amazon.com or Microsoft.com level.

Know how your site is found, and tell Google

Find the top queries that lead to your site and remember that anchor text helps in links. Use Google's tools to see which of your pages are indexed, and if there are violations of some kind. Specify your preferred domain so Google knows what to index

Good books . . .

2008-01-04T09:40:00.000-08:00

1. Graphic Artists Guild Handbook: Pricing & Ethical Guidelines
This is a book you should not do without. It touches on every topic you need to know about how to be successful as a graphic artist. If you want experienced and practical advice on anything from setting prices for your work on the Internet to how to best manage your client relations – this is the book for you.

2. Sagmeister: Made You Look
Daring designer, Stefan Sagmeister, chronicles almost 40 years of working in this business in this book. Sagmeister conveys his wit and humor into these pages, as he tells you his personal adventures.

3. Make It Bigger
This book caters to designers who work with businesses. Read this to be inspired and benefit from the wisdom of years of experience working in the field of graphic design.

4. About Face: Reviving The Rules Of Typography
Talking about the large topic of typography, About Face, helps you navigate through the world with ease. Many wonderful and successful examples of typography are provided in this book.

5. Typographic Design: Form and Communication
This is the fourth edition of a best-selling book. If you want just one book to help you learn about how to properly typography, it’s this one. Whether you’re interested in the history of this art, or how it can be effectively used in this modern-era, this book is chock full of valuable information for graphic designers.

6. The Elements of Typographic Style
Author, Robert Bringhurst, has written this book, which uses beautiful language to tell the story of how to apply your own artistic sensibility to typography. One treat in this book is the examples of fonts in different languages such as Russian and Greek.

7. The Elements of Graphic Design: Space, Unity, Page Architecture, and Type
This book’s author, Alexander W. White, is a strong advocate of white space – what you can also call negative space. Many designers feel the need to clutter things up, but less can be more. Learn how to master that idea with this great book.

8. Making and Breaking the Grid: A Graphic Design Layout Workshop
This book focuses on layout. With it, you can comprehensively learn the elements of layout so that you can better use them in your work.

9. Designing with Type: The Essential Guide to Typography (Designing With Type)
A book that’s been around since 1971, this is something that will introduce you to typography. It offers pointers on how to take into account such things as the feeling of a text, as well as how effectively it is conveyed in different formats.

10. Meggs’ History of Graphic Design
This offers a wonderful writing up of the history of graphic design. It may be of interest to both current graphic designers, and general artistic-minded people.

11. Graphic Design: A New History
Own this book and learn about graphic design history in a new light. The book talks in-depth of the different times of history in correlation to what graphic design’s were used.

12. Thinking with Type: A Critical Guide for Designers, Writers, Editors, & Students (Design Briefs)
Author Ellen Lupton has written this wonderful book. The book has three main sections: letter, text, and grid. Learn the history of each, how technology can help you, and then see examples in practice.

13. The Designer’s Toolkit: 500 Grids and Style Sheets: 500 Grids and Style Sheets
As you may have already guessed, this book challenges designers to re-think their idea of how to work within a grid. There are 500 grid and style sheets ready for you to produce your work on and see what you like.

14. Looking Closer 5: Critical Writings on Graphic Design
This is the fifth and final installment in a series of wonderful books. Within these pages you will find writing on controversial topics that will encourage you to think outside of the page, or the screen.

15. How to Think Like a Great Graphic Designer
Learn what you have in common with other graphic designers who have achieved success. What has helped them overcome obstacles may very well help you as well. This book is full of interviews you will find invaluable.
16. Seventy-nine Short Essays on Design
The title of the book tells you what you’re getting, right off the bat. Michael Bierut writes with whimsy and a critical eye in this book that you are sure to enjoy and be educated from.
17. How To Be a Graphic Designer Without Losing Your Soul
The work of a graphic designer is not easy, and you probably already know that. Within these160 pages you will discover writing on topics such as how to generate ideas when your mind is void of them. You don’t want to become a slave to mundane tasks and lose your spark, if you feel yourself drifting – reach for this book.

18. LogoLounge 3: 2,000 International Identities by Leading Designers (LogoLounge)
If you’re crazy for logos then this is the book for you. In this third installment, you will find a myriad of different logos – 2,000 to be exact. Get inspired with this book, and then get designing.

19. Logo Design (Midi Series)
This is a handy reference book on logo design. Students and professionals alike will enjoy this book.

20. Hand Job: A Catalog of Type
Fifty typographers are featured in this book, and what they all have in common is that they reject technology, and design their fonts by hand. While the title at first can seem shocking to anyone, it will stay shocking to a designer. When’s the last time you reached for a pen and paper for your final draft? Maybe next time you will, after reading this book.

21. Universal Principles of Design: 100 Ways to Enhance Usability, Influence Perception, Increase Appeal, Make Better Design Decisions, and Teach Through Design
Well-written, this book is what it claims to be – 100 ways to enhance, influence, increase, teach – you get the idea. It is easy to understand and follow, and gives you well-researched briefs on a variety of topics that normally you’d have to read about in several different books.

22. Adobe Photoshop CS3 Classroom in a Book
Experts that make up the Adobe Creative Team have put together this book for you to easily expand your knowledge of the Adobe Photoshop program. Learn how to do things better and faster, all from reading this book.

23. The Adobe Photoshop CS3 Book for Digital Photographers (Voices That Matter)
To have Adobe Photoshop is one thing; to be able to use it is one thing, but to be able to use it well is another. And that is especially true when it comes to digital photography. If you want the best tips and tricks, this book won’t lead you astray.

24. Adobe Illustrator CS3 Classroom in a Book
Master the programs in Adobe Illustrator by using this book as a step-by-stop guide. The Adobe Creative Team will guide you where you need to go.

25. The Adobe Illustrator CS3 Wow! Book (WOW!)
If you want to be the best with using Adobe’s Illustrator, you need this book. There are tons of lessons in this book to help you learn new tools. Ever wonder how to take a desaturated image and make it appear to be a color photo? Read and learn.

26. Adobe InDesign CS3 Classroom in a Book
This is a good book for beginners. Make sure to get the second printing, as the first as some typos!

27. HTML, XHTML, and CSS, Sixth Edition (Visual Quickstart Guide)
You should know HTML, and probably XHTML and CSS as well. So learn it here, with this wonderful book! This is not for advanced students.

28. CSS Mastery: Advanced Web Standards Solutions
Authors Andy Budd, Simon Collison, and Cameron Moll have written the ultimate guide to CSS! Learn everything you wanted to know, and more – in this book.

29. Bulletproof Web Design: Improving flexibility and protecting against worst-case scenarios with XHTML and CSS (2nd Edition)
When you build a Web site, you want it to work. This book will help you learn how to get out all of the kinks and bugs from your site so that the widest possible audience can access it without flaws.

30. SEO Book
When you have a Web site, you want traffic. You get that through search engine optimization (SEO). This is the only book you will ever need to master search engine optimization and you can download it!

I "heart" GESTALT

2007-12-27T13:26:00.000-08:00

Gestalt Principles

http://desktoppub.about.com/od/gestalt/Gestalt.htm

Gestalt is also known as the "Law of Simplicity" or the "Law of Pragnanz" (the entire figure or configuration), which states that every stimulus is perceived in its most simple form.

Gestalt theorists followed the basic principle that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. In other words, the whole (a picture, a car) carried a different and altogether greater meaning than its individual components (paint, canvas, brush; or tire, paint, metal, respectively). In viewing the "whole," a cognitive process takes place – the mind makes a leap from comprehending the parts to realizing the whole,

We visually and psychologically attempt to make order out of chaos, to create harmony or structure from seemingly disconnected bits of information.

The prominent founders of Gestalt theory are Max Wertheimer, Wolfgang Kohler, and Kurt Koffka.

1. Figure/Ground

This principle shows our perceptual tendency to separate whole figures from their backgrounds based on one or more of a number of possible variables, such as contrast, color, size, etc.

A simple composition may have only one figure. In a complex composition there will be several things to notice. As we look from one to another they each become figure in turn.

The focus at any moment is the figure.

M. C. Escher Sky and Water 1 1938

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec

Everything that is not figure is ground.

As our attention shifts, the ground also shifts so that an object can go from figure to ground and then back.
Ground is sometimes thought of as background or negative space.

Figure-ground refers to the relationship between an object and its surround. Sometimes the relationship is stable, meaning that it is easy to pick out the figure from the ground.

Henri Matisse

La Danse (I)1909 8'6 1/2" x 12'9 1/2" (259.7 x 390.1 cm),

La Musique 1910, Dance (II) 1910, 8'5 3/8" x 12'9 1/4" (260 x 389 cm)

Dance (II) 1910, 8' 5 5/8" x 12' 9 1/2" (260 x 391 cm)

Other times the relationship is unstable, meaning it is difficult to pick out the figure from the ground. Rarely, the relationship is ambiguous, meaning that the figure could be the ground or vice-versa.

Tips

Clearly differentiate between figure and ground in order to focus attention and minimize perceptual confusion.

Camouflage

Camouflage is the deliberate alteration of figure-ground so that the figure blends into the ground.

During the Gulf War, all tanks had to be repainted from a woodland camouflage pattern to a desert camouflage pattern because camouflage is terrain specific. That specificity is also evident when one goes to purchase camouflage clothing; it comes in several patterns, each best suited to particular environments or seasons.

Camouflage material may have a single color, or it may have several similarly colored patches mixed together. The reason for using this sort of pattern is that it is visually disruptive. The meandering lines of the mottled camouflage pattern help hide the contour -- the outline -- of the body. When you look at a piece of mottled camouflage in a matching environment, your brain naturally "connects" the lines of the colored blotches with the lines of the trees, ground, leaves and shadows. This affects the way you perceive and recognize the person or object wearing that camouflage.

Grant Wood helped develop the US military's camouflage during World War I.

Dali, "L'image disparait," 1938.

2. Similarity

Gestalt theory states that things which share visual characteristics such as shape, size, color, texture, or value will be seen as belonging together in the viewer’s mind.

In the graphic below, the viewer is likely to discern a shape in the middle, though each individual object is the same color.

• Repetition of forms or colors in a composition is pleasing in much the same way rhythm is pleasing in music the forms aren't necessarily identical - there may be tremendous variety within the repetition, yet the correspondence will still be discernable.

• Like static and dynamic tension a deliberate use of similarity in composition can impart meaning to the viewer that is independent of the subject matter of the image.

• Similarity or repetition in an image often has connotations of harmony and interrelatedness, or rhythm and movement.

Ilse Bing

• good composition: regardless of the subject matter, makes some use of similarity in arranging elements and space for aesthetic advantage.

Répétition d'un Ballet. 1874 Carol Golemboski

In Edgar Degas' The Millinery Shop notice the repetition of the circle motif. Circles represent objects such as hats, flowers, bows, the woman's head, bosom, and skirt, etc. The painting is a whole design of circles broken by a few verticals (the hat stand, the ribbons, the back draperies) and a triangle or two (the table, the woman's vent arm, and the front hat's ribbons).

Edgar Degas The Millinery Shop. 1879-1884

3. Proximity

The Gestalt law of proximity states that "objects or shapes that are close to one another appear to form groups". Even if the shapes, sizes, and objects are radically different, they will appear as a group if they are close together.

• refers to the way smaller elements are "massed" in a composition.

Bill Brandt

• Also called "grouping," the principle concerns the effect generated when the collective presence of the set of elements becomes more meaningful than their presence as separate elements.

Arnold Newman

• Arranging words into sentences or titles is an obvious way to group unrelated elements to enhance their meaning (it also depends on a correct order for comprehension).

• Grouping the words also changes the visual and psychological meaning of the composition in non-verbal ways unrelated to their meaning.

• Elements which are grouped together create the illusion of shapes or planes in space, even if the elements are not touching.

• Grouping of this sort can be achieved with:

Tone / value

Color

Shape

Size

Or other physical attributes

The painting by Thomas P. Anshutz of workers on their lunch break shows the idea in composition. The lighter elements of the workers' upper bodies contrast with the generally darker background. These light elements are not placed aimlessly around the composition but, by proximity, are arranged carefully to unite visually. Arms stretch and reach out to touch or overlap adjoining figures so the bodies form a large horizontal unit stretching across the painting.

Thomas P. Anshutz. The Ironworkers' Noontime

Michelangelo, Creation of Adam, c. 1510. Sistine Chapel, Rome.

Michelangelo's Creation of Adam demonstrates the expressive power of proximity.

4. Closure

The satisfaction of a pattern encoded, as it were, into the brain, thus triggering recognition of the stimulus. This can involve the brain's provision of missing details thought to be a part of a potential pattern, or, once closure is achieved, the elimination of details unnecessary to establish a pattern match.

Closure is the effect of suggesting a visual connection or continuity between sets of elements which do not actually touch each other in a composition.
The principle of closure applies when we tend to see complete figures even when part of the information is missing.
Closure occurs when elements in a composition are aligned in such a way that the viewer perceives that "the information could be connected."

Kanizsa Illusion

• Imaginary lines called vectors, or shapes called counter forms, are generated by these relationships, which the eye understands as part of the composition even though there is "nothing there.

• Vectors and counter forms exert forces and tensions that are as real in defining its underlying structure as the elements that are visible.

• Linear vectors direct the path of the eye through the composition and determine where the eye will go once it is attracted by the prominent features of the composition.

• A vector can be straight or curved, depending on the relationships that form it.

• Counter forms, (or negative spaces), determine to a great extent whether or not the composition will be perceived as a harmonious whole. Counter forms "echo" the positive visual elements with "similarity," or create powerful substructures that support and connect visible elements.

Katsushika Hokusai The Great Wave Off Kanagawa
From "Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji"; 1823-29

• Closure can be thought of as the tension or "glue" that holds a two-dimensional structure together.

5. Good Continuation (Continuity)

This Gestalt law states that learners "tend to continue shapes beyond their ending points".

The edge of one shape will continue into the space and meet up with other shapes or the edge of the picture plane.

The example below illustrates that learners are more apt to follow the direction of an established pattern rather than deviate from it.

We perceive the figure as two crossed lines instead of 4 lines meeting at the center.

Continuity in the form of a line, an edge, or a direction from one form to another creates a fluid connection among compositional parts.

In Degas' drawing the line of the round tub starts at the bather's hairline, meets her fingertips, and joins the vertical line of the shelf where the brush handle overlaps. The circular shape of the bather's hips is tangential to the same shelf edge. The objects on the shelf barely touch and carry the eye from one to another.

Edgar Degas, The Tub, 1886. Pastel

6. Symmetry or Order

Symmetry states that the viewer should not be given the impression that something is out of balance, or missing, or wrong.

If an object is asymmetrical, the viewer will waste time trying to find the problem instead of concentrating on the instruction.

• Order has connotations of stability, consistency and structure.

• An orderly arrangement of elements has connotations that will be perceived either positively or negatively by a viewer depending on the purpose of the communication and the viewer's personality.

• Utilitarian information (instructional or technical design) will be more effective if the presentation is orderly, especially if it must be comprehended quickly.

traffic signs
sets of instructions
reference books

• Texts and illustrative material may also need to be orderly; especially if the organization sponsoring the communication wishes to be perceived as orderly and well run (annual reports are typically clean, orderly documents).

• People are accustomed to receiving information in a systematic and organized manner and will be frustrated by material that requires too much work to comprehend.

• Some viewers associate order with institutional rigidity or social conservatism and will reject or be "bored" by communications that seem too highly structured.

• Developing judgment about audience preferences and tolerances with respect to order is central to the designer's task.

• The goal is to be structured and equally engaging.

Typography

2007-12-20T13:21:00.000-08:00

5 Basic Rules on Typography
Contributed by Granny's Mettle

Whenever you get projects for designing graphics for different media materials, there are certain rules you need to know before venturing to the complexities and elaborate world of graphic design.

One of the elements considered in graphic design is typography. This is how you utilize and create your text to come out with a result that complements your images and design of the whole media material, whether it's for print or web.

For typography, here are five of the basic rules to follow (or to break, whichever suits your creativity at the moment):

Rule No. 1- DO NOT use all the fonts in one document.
Every designer has his or her own collection of fonts, which he or she uses for each design project. As one designer would say: "If you're a designer, it almost goes without saying that you own fonts- Lots of fonts."

Aside from the existing fonts in the software program being used, most designers have their own lists that were added to the already existing list. And because of the availability of so many fonts, one may be tempted to use as many, if not all of the fonts that he or she owns.

Always remember that simplicity is more attractive than disarray and confusion. When you start using many fonts in one document, the message most often get lost in the jumble. In addition, too many fonts can distract the reader from the original intent of the design- to get a message across. Nevertheless, this doesn't mean that you have to be dull and boring by sticking to the conventional "two-font rule", which states that you had to have one font for headings and another for text. So where's the creativity in that? Just make sure to have a reason why you want to deviate from the rule and chose to use the fonts.

Rule No. 2- "Serif type is easier to the eyes than sans serif."
There's an old principle in the graphics world that goes "Serif type is easier to read because the serifs draws your eye from character to character." Hence, sans serif type is oftentimes used for headings and short quantities of text.

Truth to tell, all fonts can be made readable (except, well, maybe for Wingdings) with the ideal design. With sans serif, although it needs more leading than serif type, it can give your documents a very modern look, and is the popular body text in Europe.

Rule No. 3- Putting two spaces after a period is a no-no.
In the olden times, when typewriters are the thingamajigs for writers, two spaces after a period was the rule to indicate the end of a sentence.

With the onset of technology, fonts have characters of their own, with different widths, that putting two spaces after a period is no longer needed. Sometimes, this rule can create a rather annoying flaw that creates a stop rather than help you pinpoint the end of every sentence.

Rule No. 4- DO NOT use all capital letters.
One designer said that when using all capitals in the text, there are no ascenders or descenders. The two are what makes it easy to identify the shape of a word. "The shape of almost every word becomes a rectangle, and it's harder to read."

But this doesn't also mean that you cannot use capital letters. Where can you use capital letters? Short phrases or headings do look attractive in all caps. Sans serif also works better in all caps.

Rule No. 5- DO NOT center large quantities of text.
The eyes go from left to right when reading. It's the way to go. It rapidly scans one line, then goes from the right side of the page back to the left side of the page. When text is centered, it makes it harder for the eyes to be told to find where the next text begins again on the left side of the page, and makes it easy for the reader to skip down lines of text.

This time, it's not too easy to bend the rules. The best way is still to save centering to headings that don't run more than several lines deep.

About the Author:
Granny's Mettle is a 30-something, professional web content writer. She has created various web content on a diverse range of topics, which includes digital printing topics, medical news, as well as legal issues. Her articles are composed of reviews, suggestions, tips and more for the printing and designing industry.

Her thoughts on writing: "Writing gives me pleasure… pleasure and excitement that you have created something to share with others. And with the wide world of the Internet, it gives me great satisfaction that my articles reach more people in the quickest time you could imagine."

On her spare time, she loves to stay at home, reading books on just about any topic she fancies, cooking a great meal, and taking care of her husband and kids.

Welcome to JBlog!

2007-12-20T12:41:00.000-08:00

Greeting from Lawrence, KS . . .

JBerra Design is here to offer beginners and novices a like, some in site to the world of graphic and web design. We will also share upcoming projects, news and links.

We hope you enjoy our blog. Feel free to leave up notes or comments. We'd love to hear from you.