+ WalkingStick Design +

The current business model for the print design industry has a problem. And I have no idea how to solve it. The print design business is based off customized, one-off pieces of work that have no use outside of it’s intended purpose of promotion the message of the client.  A designer must charge a high price for such work because that’s all the money they’re ever going to get for pouring out their knowledge and experience onto a piece of work that will go on to make money for someone else. The only hope for potential repeat business is if the client wants another highly customized piece to be designed for another purpose. So, what can be done? Let’s look a a similar industry and how they’ve overcome this same issue. The web design industry aligned itself early on with an extremely familiar method of payment. Folks like things that are familiar because they are comfortable. The method of which I speak is of course, the subscription based payment method. Subscription based payments are...

Last Christmas I designed an address stamp for my wife and put it in her stocking. I really dislike doing the same time-consuming thing over and over like writing my extremely long last name on 50 Christmas cards. So, I felt I could solve this problem for her and simplify the process. I enjoyed the stamp making process so much I made the one you see here. I read a lot of books. In doing so, I often have advice when a friends explains their troubles to me. I will usually recommend a few books to aid them in their quest but from time to time, have the book that contains the information that will help them solve their problem. So, I lend them the book. Now that I have this handy dandy little stamp I can be sure that all my books will one day return to me. When was the last time you were asked to help solve a problem for someone? How did you solve it? When was the last time you solved a problem for yourself? I’d love to hear your thoughts on this. Please post your helpful comments and le...

My good friend was getting married so me a another friend of mine decided to make them something personalized. I made the design and he sandblasted it on the tumblers. The glasses were a hit because hey, a gift like this beats a toaster or a blender any day! It seems that these odd projects are always the most fun to design. I’d love to hear your thoughts on this. Please post your helpful comments and let me know what you think. Thanks for reading, and thanks for your time :) Posted via email from Eye Say • The Web Log

I love my home state. However, I’ve never been fully satisfied with the illustration of the Osage shield in the center of my state flag. The flag is a beautiful blue field with a plate full of color barf in the center. Photographs and pen and ink illustrations have their place. My point is that most, if not all flags use bold, simplified symbol representations of things that the folks in that particular state hold up as important. That’s  one of the reasons flags aren’t giant photographs of stuff. I am in no way demeaning the art or talent of the artist who created the Osage shield illustration on my state flag. I’m stating that a simplified representation of that shield has production advantages that the current and highly detailed illustration does not have. One major advantage is the ability for the symbol to retain clarity at small sizes (or in this case, the viewers physical distance from the flag). Another advantage is the ability to be reproduced in one color. I like the ide...

Whenever we say something to somebody, what we say can be interpreted in two ways by the person we’re talking to: They can hear the words we say that make up the message and, they can hear how we say those words. The way we say something can be just as important as the words we use to say it. The words of the message we audibly project can be completely altered by what it sounds like to the receiver. The same is true of visual language. The type we use to shape the characters of the words we say has a huge effect on the visual message that’s received by the viewer. In the first example it’s confusing. The second example illustrates the voice of the type used by using familiar type to drastically alter it’s perception. Which would you take more seriously? For your message to be it’s most effective, please keep in mind the implied meaning of the type choose you use to create the messages you put out into the world.  So, why does the type we use do that? We live in a visual culture. I...