I have an inexplicable soft spot in my soul for circus peanuts; you know the orange, semi-soft, semi-hard candy that’s shaped like peanuts and tastes like a combination of red dye #5, yellow dye # 3, and sugar? Whenever I see them in stores I’m instantly drawn. But I limit myself to gorging on a 2.99 bag of Circus Peanuts just once a year. I think my love of this heinous confection is connected...

Sappi offers booklet/book samples for free to designers and students--they're samples! Highly recommended:Folding and scoring book is a huge favorite!http://sappi.litorders.com/SelectInventoryList.a...

How to design the right identity to market yourself In recent discussion with a group of students I learned that a major stumbling block in completing a portfolio is creating a personal identity package in which the finished portfolio will reside.  When in my 3rd year of undergrad, I was approached by a friend, in her final year of grad school and taking a portfolio class. One slow afternoon...

I just took part in another heated discussion with a mixed group of recent grads and mid-career graphic designers.  A young woman in the group raised the question of salary range for an entry level graphic designer with a master's degree. This question was asked the recent graduate: "What kind of pay should I be expecting for a full-time entry level graphic design position with my master's...

I just participated in a heated discussion on the dreaded final interview question. This one is asked when you're sure that you and the interviewer have beaten the molecules back and forth for the last time. The art director takes a shallow breath, exhales, and then asks, "Do you have any questions for me?" There are a few different ways you can respond to this one. My answer: I always...

I got a printed scan of our signature on my desk this morning. This sheet of paper looked terrible, but it was all I had so I needed to make it work. Here’s the quick and dirty on how to make salvage a low quality printed signature for digital use. Rescan the image and set the output to TIFF or other image file type. Be sure to select the highest resolution setting. This will yield a lot of artifacts...