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I have to admit right up front that the title of this article is a bit of hyperbole. You might be quick to think that a t-shirt line that can be started without any money cannot possibly be a good one. It’s true that we could easily end this post in a few sentences by suggesting one of the many turnkey websites that sell one-off digital printing on every product imaginable. However, I am actually referring to starting a high quality screen printed t-shirt line without any money. Thanks to the internet…this is very possible.

Tell Your Story

One of the main ingredients in beginning a new tee line is to create a story about the brand. Something authentic and genuine, the story needs to resonate with the demographic you plan to market to. The intention here is to create a small army of followers that will help introduce the brand to the masses on the internet. This fan base is probably the most key component to creating your t shirt line without any money and will be referenced many times over in the steps below.

Telling your story is also a great way to help you figure out some very important things about your marketing strategy. Following the conversation and your brand mentions will help you identify where your followers’ online hangouts are and how they interact. This is key to knowing the “how” and “where” to most effectively get your message across to the eyeballs that need to see it.

Create Awesome Designs

Now that you’ve got your story, it’s time to turn your attention to another obvious necessity: t-shirt designs. Obviously without great t-shirt designs you’re not going to get very far. Quite often the designs themselves are what inspires the whole project. You can let your style shine and share your creations throughout each phase of the design process so your followers can watch the evolution. This is another easy marketing tactic that gives people a feeling of inclusion and it builds anticipation for the final products.

So now you have your designs and a compelling, marketable story…so what next? Now it’s time to set up an online storefront where you can sell your tees. Again this step can be completely free! Thanks to sites like Storenvy (totally free) and Big Cartel which offers a tiered membership (with the basic one being free), it’s never been easier to quickly and painlessly establish your business’ online sales presence. This can be a huge step since actually having this online store will make it feel more official, both in your eyes and in the eyes of potential customers.

The Launch Before the Launch

Speaking of potential customers, the next step is to provide them with a central hub where they can go and check for updates and information while you’re doing your behind the scenes stuff. True enough, you could just direct them right to the store page, but since that is mostly designed for the express purpose of shopping it often isn’t really the best avenue to release news about your progress. That’s why it pays off to invest a little bit of time (and don’t worry it’s only time, no money) in creating a launching page using a free site like Launchrock. You can collect email addresses with the landing page and keep everyone updated on your pending launch.

The Sales Before the Sales

Now it’s time to nail down some specifics about how many people are interested in your t-shirt line and which designs are going to be popular. You can do this by listing your designs as pre-sales on your store site. Doing pre-sales is a great way to lessen the risk involved and prevent wasted expenses. The is a great way to determine the sizes and quantities needed when it is time to print.

The Social Hustle

One more important thing to keep in mind though is promoting your business and designs. If you just set everything up and walk away from it chances are it’s going to fall flat. Instead get the word out, and then keep getting the word out. Promote your t-shirts on all your social networking sites. Release announcements about launches, and release announcements about pre-launches! Build as much buzz and momentum as possible by constantly hustling your brand on social channels such as Twitter, Facebook and Tumblr. Just don’t be afraid to ask people for links, likes, and re-tweets!

Give Your Line a Kickstart

Have you come all this way only to find that now that it’s time to pull the trigger and go into production (and thus unavoidably incur some costs) that you are lacking in some necessary funds? Don’t worry there’s a way to help ease the financial blow for this part too! Thanks to Kickstarter you can get people to donate to your goal and thus, help “kick start” the whole production. Check out successful campaigns like the one Seibei ran. It is at this phase of the process where you’ll really see things start to come together. This is where building up the small army of followers mentioned before can make all the difference in the world. This is where they will be salivating to back the project and get their return based on their pledge amount.

So there you go, now you know how to launch your own t-shirt line using little to no money while still giving your business a good chance for success! There will be work involved no doubt, and it is going to take a whole lot of effort by your and more than likely a good bit of help from friends, family, and possibly even kind strangers, but you can make it happen.

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Foreword: I first became fascinated with the ways white hat hackers took things apart to solve problems after joining an awesome local hackerspace called Collexion. I have them to thank for seeing the inspiring overlap of design and hacking (and for helping me to write this article).

The (virtuous) Hacker Ethic

What is the Hacker Ethic? In 1984, Stephen Levy wrote a book which describes six general tenets of a shared philosophy observed by (ethical) hackers. Each tenet applies in illuminating ways to the design process.

1. Hands-on imperative

When computing power was scarce (read: behind locked doors), hackers would go to any lengths (e.g. picking locks) to get hands-on time with the latest in technology. They risked everything to gain hands-on time in order to make things and experiment. How does this apply to design? Today our scarcity isn’t tools, it’s time. If paying work hinders your learning new technologies and methods, then do personal projects. Ultimately design is not a spectator sport, it’s hands-on!

2. “Information wants to be free”

Your experiences and talents are uniquely yours, but ultimately worthless without execution. Yet chasing every idea can get nothing done. Get into the habit of getting all of your ideas down. This habit both helps you to remember moments of brilliance and to generate new ideas. The best ideas will nag you (for months, even years) until you grant their freedom.

3. Mistrust authority

You should not blindly follow (nor reject) prevailing conventions, rules, or trends. Hackers value facts over fancy, and can explain their reason for solving a problem in a particular way. In design, you may have encountered the boss that wants the buttons to be red because it’s the hotness. When the authority demands more cowbell, should you yield? It is easy to say “no” on principal but why not take the hackerly approach and test the assertion. If testing is not practical, be armed with facts and information to defeat the request. Learn to mistrust authority, even your own.

4. No bogus criteria

True hackers judge one another on their hacking, not bogus criteria like degrees, race, age, sex, or position.

We all know the designer who cites a design degree, a lucrative job, or an advanced experience level as the reason they are more of an authority than you are. Often the same designers produce little and/or terrible work. But what’s important? To a hacker, not these criteria—the important thing is the work you do. All else is bogus.

5. “You can create truth and beauty on a computer”

A computer alone does not make a great designer just as a powerful calculator doesn’t make a great mathematician. Ultimately, it’s about idea and execution. But do not be numb to or biased against new technologies as they represent fresh canvases and stages for your ideas.

6. “Computers can change your life for the better”

Computers clearly have impacted the way we design with new tools and expanded marketplaces. However, a frequently underexploited channel for designers to thrive is through social media. Designer-focused social media (e.g. Dribbble, Behance, Forrst etc.) are drastically changing the business of design.

Conclusion

We have looked at some of the ways the methods and ethics of hacking can inform your design. But (in the hackerly advice of Levar Burton), “don’t take my word for it”—get hands-on by checking out your local hackerspace!

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Tons of businesses and organizations are suffering in this economy, whether it’s graphic designers being laid off or nonprofits struggling to get funding. A number of my acquaintances who found themselves with extra time on their hands have turned to volunteering – some of them walk dogs at the local animal shelter while others clean up the shoreline. But lately, I’ve also heard recommendations for unemployed people to use their skills to give back to the community, and in turn it’s an excellent opportunity to get their name out and possibly find some business for themselves. Of course, giving away for free the talent you’ve built up for years does court some controversy.

Pros

Marketing. Graphic designers often get requests from nonprofits for free or discounted services. Rather than just delete those requests, think about the new business potential: business marketing. In exchange for your work, will your company name or logo be included on a website or promotional materials? That could offer you search engine rankings as well as just put your name out there for potential new clients.

Inspiration. Sometimes you just need to break away from the day-in/day-out grind. Slaving away at a desk can induce creative block. Doing design work for an entirely different cause than what you’re used to has the potential to kick-start inspiration, whether it’s using new shapes and colors or just interacting with other folks in a different field.

Vacation. Wanna get away? Some volunteering can take you to places you’ve never been. A recent trend called “voluntourism” allows do-gooders to travel in order to help others. Sure, you’ll likely pay most of your expenses, but sometimes room and board is thrown in, and if anything, you can feel less guilty about taking a trip if it means you were volunteering.

Networking. Volunteering your time gives you the opportunity to mingle with people – people who may need a graphic designer in the future. Sure, you’re offering up free services to the nonprofit itself, but you get to network with people who know other people who might need a designer in the future. See where this is going? If you impress the client with your work, they’ll likely remember you later on.

Cons

Too much time. So what if you aren’t one of the many unemployed graphic designers out there? What if you have a lot of work and have to accept it all to pay the bills? Taking on even more jobs – especially ones that don’t pay – could diminish the quality of the projects that do earn you cash. In turn, your paying clients might seek other designers in the future if your work for them suffers.

Devalues your work. FreelanceSwitch made a post the other day about giving back to one’s community. It discussed volunteering time locally to organizations such as Habitat for Humanity and Big Brothers/Big Sisters. A commenter said that while she does volunteer, she doesn’t do so as a designer or a photographer because “I’ve learned the hard way that offering my paid-for services for free only devalues them.” Martha Retallick went on to add, “Yes, I’ve heard that pro bono work can be a good way to get referrals to paying work, but wouldn’t it be easier to just go straight to the people who can pay you in the first place?”

Burnout. Retallick makes a good point – sometimes people need a break from graphic design in order to recharge their creative batteries. Rather than volunteer design skills, why not follow FreelanceSwitch’s advice and go bang a hammer on a home with Habitat for Humanity or donate some blood? Step away from the desk and do some physical work – you can benefit society and let out aggression at the same time!

Already working for a nonprofit. When I posed the question, “Do you give away your graphic design services for free to nonprofits?” on Twitter, Traci Pitman replied, “Nope – because I’m the in-house designer for a nonprofit.” Indeed, Pitman, who works for a regional arts council in Texas, found a way to offer her skills to her community while earning a paycheck at the same time – the best of both worlds!

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Freebies and open source content are some of the best things we can run across as creatives. These help out in a pinch, sometimes are great starts to making a document or design and help save time. Some really great and inspiring things are coming from 365PSD, The League of Movable Type and Iconpaper. These three sites are tremendously different but each is unique and shares some amazing content.

365 PSD

Now, if the name alone “365 PSD” hasn’t got you excited it should… 365PSD makes as you would guess a free PSD everyday for an entire year. The quality of free layered files that are being given away is amazing. There are some pixel perfect icons, navigation buttons and full site layouts as well as full iPhone app layouts. This is a site that is fast becoming a daily stop for many creatives. Whether you use the PSD’s to learn how the pro’s make their files or you just want some extra beef to throw into that new design you should go check out 365psd.com

The League of Moveable Type

The League of Movable Type has banned together to once and for all cut through the crap and make free, good, open source fonts for all. The best part about this is that they are @font-face ready. These fonts are must downloads especially if you are trying to trim some cost of a design or just want some amazing rockin’ fonts. If you think that their awesome (which they are) you can join in the collaboration.

Iconpaper

Iconpaper brings you some amazing icons, wallpapers, dock themes, and everything in between. The guys curating iconpaper are all over the place trying to find the best content and update for you daily. They’ve had some amazing background as well as icons that have adorned my computer several times. So, whether you need some inspiration, an awesome new icon for your computer or just something to mull through, check out Iconpaper you’ll be happy you did.

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The Blank Workspace

This is possibly the hardest and most ominous part of a project. If you are not already fired up about a project or you are stuck on which route you should take, the blank workspace turns into a nerve racking place. This is true for illustrators, designers, photographers, interior designers, industrial designers or anyone in the creative realm. It has been said that sketching helps free the mind and open up concepts. Don’t think of it as “This has to be done now or I will hurt my reputation, my cash-flow & the client”. Think of it as “the beginning”. Settling down and only worrying about the task at hand helps you break into the flow and start the project like you have done so many times before.

Ideation

When done correctly this should be completely unharnessed and free-flowing. Are you thinking about cows covered in purple poka-dots that are flying with cheese pinwheels? Great. Get it out of your head and onto paper, a sketchbook or something that helps you and move on to another idea. Ideation should be sheer creativity, whether it’s silly, cheesy, creepy or just way out there. You can take all those ideas and dial them down later.

Note: Good ideas are discovered once all the stupid ones have exited your brain.

Information Gathering / Project Debrief

This is where you obtain the most complete and concise ideas about the project. It’s a good idea to have a pre-defined list of questions to ask the client/contact person so you obtain all the information that you will need later on in the project. It’s better to ask everything possible and get some extraneous information then find out later that you didn’t get enough information that you recorded inaccurately. If that’s the case, you have to go back to the client and re-ask questions that you should already have the answers to which, could start the project off in the wrong direction.

Investigation & Research

Google it, Yahoo it, Bing it, read it, search for it, tear it apart, dissect it, overall LEARN it. Do as much scraping as you can on the topic. Be it silly clip-art, logos, descriptions, definitions or other creations people have already created on the subject. Learn what’s been created then expand into your own version. You’re the vehicle for the message. Make sure you don’t muddy the waters in the process.

Note: Expanding into your own version does not mean: copy and paste, then re-create or repurpose someone else’s work.

Brainstorming / Problem Solving

You have the scope of the project all of your ideas that you jotted down or sketched out plus all of your investigative research. What happens now? You have to put it all to use. You have to tie all this into one great, creative entity so whoever consumes it understands exactly what you are talking about. This isn’t about finding new ideas, it’s about harnessing the ideas you’ve already discovered and then putting them together as something useful to solve the creative problem.

Explaining the Visual

The lost art of explaining messaging without spelling it out. If you’re working on a design does it actually do something functionally? i.e. Does it make the audience draw their own conclusion? Does the brochure help the user understand the client/topic? Does the site help someone gain information and was it easy to obtain? Does your logo solve or help identify the brand? Does your illustration support the rest of the project?

Or…
Did you just jazz something up and make it pretty because “you’re a creative” and that’s what you do? We don’t just make things pretty, we solve problems and make it easier to digest and use. If you’re making decisions based on prettification and not function, maybe the heart of your message is off. All your creative should focus on presentation & communication regardless if it’s on the web, a printed piece, photography, installations, physical objects, copyrighting, illustrations or anything of the sort.

Longevity

This is one of the hardest concepts to achieve through creativity. Timeless creative is near impossible and some tweaks will always need to be made throughout the years. If you creatively solved a problem and tried to make something that effectively communicates to your audience it should be able to grow with your client. Do they need to make some updates along the way? Sure. Who doesn’t. Do you see your endeavors lasting them for 3 years? 5 years? 10 years? I know that is hard to think of since our instant lives that are based on twitter, facebook & youtube aren’t even “that” old. Look at some big brands and how their branding hasn’t fluctuated too much over the years. Apple, Coke and Nike are just a few that have stayed true to their core branding and just made some slight modifications throughout the years. Have you effectively supplied your client with the tools to grow and expand in the future or did you hinder them in the process?

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Fast access, global demand, short deadlines and quick turnaround have made it all too easy to stray away from the basics of design. If you had a professor in college who taught you design fundamentals, the basics should be engrained in you. If you are self-taught, you may have a book on your desk that you refer to on a daily basis. For the masses, the internet is both a valuable resource, and possibly the source of a design epidemic.

People have flooded the internet looking for design content, and while you might not need to learn the basics before attempting a stellar gradient in Photoshop, there will come a point where this style is left behind and a new style reaches popularity. In history, this lesson has repeated itself with movements like ‘Bauhaus‘ and ‘Swiss Modernism‘ which will soon label our current trends as part of design history.

The fact is, the fundamentals of design will never change. They are the glue that holds the design industry together and to reach success, we need to learn these from the very beginning.

Balance

Arranging parts to achieve a state of equilibrium between forces of influences.

Examples: Symmetrical, Asymmetrical, Radial

Contrast

Interaction of contradictory elements. Expresses the duality seen in opposites.

Examples: Large & Small, rough & smooth, thick & thin, light & dark, organic & geometric

Emphasis & Subordination

Establishing centers of interest which focus the viewer’s attention. If all the elements are given relatively equal weight, there will be no emphasis.

Directional Forces

Both implied and actual, they help guide the eye and mind movement of the viewer. They can also bind the work into a single entity.

Proportion

The size relationship of parts to the entire work, and each to the other. Very often associated with figural art. (the image shows the Golden Ratio)

Scale

The real, apparent size of an object seen in relation to other objects, people, its environment, or the proportions of the picture plane.

Repetition & Rhythm

The recurrence of a design element coupled with a certain order to the repetition. Provides continuity, flow, direction forces etc.

Unity within Variety

The force operating within a work of art which can give it the appearance of oneness or resolution. The consistency of the concept.

When any variety of these principles are combined a design becomes very successful and hard to ignore. That design commands your attention, it guides your eye through and keeps you visually entertained. Combining these principles together is referred to as Gestalt – a configuration, pattern, or organized field having specific properties that cannot be derived from the summation of its component parts; a unified whole.

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We know starting a project can be a real pain no matter how easy the task may be. We’ve put together the IAB standard size ad templates for you in one little packaged up file. They come in two flavors, Photoshop and Illustrator. We’ve also put together some nice resources and other downloads below that you may find helpful in starting a project. If there is anything you’d like to see us give away in the future, let us know in the comments.

Sizes:

The Details

File Type: Psd & Ai
Number in Set: 15
License Type: Creative Commons 3.0
Author: Chad Engle

Ai – Illustrator Download

Compatible with CS1+ and comes with 15 presized Ai’s ready for you to design.

Psd – Photoshop Download

Compatible with CS1+ and comes with 15 presized Psd’s ready for you to design.

Other High Quality Freebies:

Fuel Your Creativity

• Facebook fanpage PSD
• Twitter Background PSD

teehan + lax

• iPad GUI PSD
• iPhone GUI PSD

NaldzGraphics

• Free E-Commerce Icon Sets

GO Media

• Vector Freebie: Hand Drawn Wings

WebDesignLedger

• Beautiful Patterns and Textures for Ornate Backgrounds

WeFunction

• WooFunction Free Icon Set goes Live

Tutorial9

• Mono Icons: Huge Set of Minimal Icons

Daniel Mall

• Youtube & Vimeo Photoshop Templates

Other Information

Please consult these additional creative guidelines for more information:

IAB Ad Unit Guidelines 2009 Update (PDF Download)

IAB Ad Units

IAB Digital Video Creative Guidelines

IAB Pop-Up Guidelines

IAB Rich Media Guidelines

IAB Universal Ad Package

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The advent of mobile phone internet access has signaled a change in the job description of the average web developer. Designing websites for a (relatively) simple desktop browser is now only one part of web development, and web developers must adapt to the surge in popularity of the smaller, mobile format.

So to help make sure this little transitional phase runs as smooth as possible, we’ve collated a list of top tips to ensure you’re fully prepared and equipped to take things mobile.

Image: williamhook

1. Recognize The Difference

Perhaps the most important thing to remember when designing for the mobile web is that it is a completely different format than that of the desktop browser. As a developer, it is important to get into the mindset of treating the mobile web world separately.

For example, lazy or slack coding that may go unnoticed on a large scale could be crucial when dealing with the much more concise mobile format.

2. Simplify Your Design

A key principle to bear in mind is that when it comes to the mobile web, simple is always better. Whether it be the visual design of the page, the actual coding or the content itself, trimming it down to its most simple is always most effective.

Simply taking a web page and downsizing it to fit on a mobile screen will look cluttered and unreadable. Follow the example of sites like Digg and keep your page lean and stripped to the bare bones.

3. Be Flexible

Just as the mobile format differs from the desktop, a level of flexibility is needed within the format itself. For example, when designing graphics, consider screen size, shape and resolution: designing one uniform graphic and expecting it to fit every phone type would be a grave error!

4. Test, Test, Test

With so many different formats to consider, regular and effective testing is an absolute must. It doesn’t matter how you do it, whether it be renting time, buying a range of phones to experiment with or simply asking your friends and colleagues to give up their phones for a few minutes, there is no substitute for real time testing.

5. Prioritize Your Pages

The amount of time people spend browsing on phones is minimal compared to on their home computers or laptops, so you need to make sure the page gets the most important information across first. Users often only tend to browse for minutes at a time, so if they can visit your page and get the information they need in seconds they will be sure to visit again in future.

6. Know Your Audience

If you’re going to prioritize your pages, you’ll need a good grasp of your target audience. For example, if your page is a general blog mainly used for casual browsing, you will want to keep most of the detailed information off the front page, looking more for a general overview.

It may seem overkill, but it’s these seemingly trivial issues which can a separate and average page from a very good one.

7. Keep Up To Date

Like most forms of modern technology, the mobile phone is constantly developing, and as a developer, it’s your job to keep up with the latest advancements. Take the iPhone as an example. It completely revolutionized mobile browsing, and its thousands of applications mean you can do pretty much anything from it.

The takeaway here is that as a developer, you simply can’t afford to be left behind by the fast paced progress of the mobile world.

8. Pick Your Domain

When it comes to choosing a domain name for your site, try and keep it as close to your normal domain name as possible. Perhaps the best way of doing so is to simply create a sub domain, which means the user doesn’t have to remember a second domain name and makes advertising a lot easier. Again, simplicity will see you reap the rewards in the long run.

9. Deal With Images

When designing for a desktop browser, a huge, eye-catching image is often a great solution to help improve the page’s visuals. However, images have to take a back seat to some extent when it comes to the mobile web. High resolution images, especially at the top of the page, can cause the page to take an unnecessarily long time to load, so try and keep images small. Image optimization is also a great way to make sure whatever images you use are of a high quality for the format.

10. Reduce Page Length

Many smaller devices actually restrict the amount of screen size that is available for any particular application, so often the ability the scroll both horizontally and vertically can be an issue.

There are a number of ways to get round this problem, perhaps most efficiently by presenting users with an intuitive means of internal navigation where they can quickly access other pages. This way, you can keep the amount of information on each page as minimal as possible.

11. Optimize Graphics

Graphic design for the mobile web requires some real restraint from the designer, especially one who’s used to developing large scale, intricately artistic creations. Their complex beauty often goes unnoticed on the small screen, hence designs often work best when kept particularly clear-cut. Stick to straight lines and contrasting colors to make your graphics stand out.

12. Play It Safe

As previously mentioned, lazy mark up will be much more damaging to a mobile web browser than a desktop. So when it comes to mark up, make sure all tags are supported to ensure your page comes out looking and functioning as well as possible.

For example, features such as tables and nested tables can take much longer to render on a mobile phone because they typically have much less powerful processors, and many casual browsers will just navigate away from your page instead of waiting!

13. Utilize White Space

An error that many inexperienced developers make is to think that because the format is smaller, it’s okay to cram the pages full of a content, so much so that the user can barely make sense of the screen. This is not good.

The right way to do it? Embrace white space. Yet again, the minimalist approach is key. Don’t be afraid of blank spaces: they simply keep the user’s attention focused on the content that really matters.

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 In February of last year, my company completed an extensive office addition. In an effort to show our commitment to sustainable building, the addition is LEED Certified. Without going into too much detail, green buildings are certified to different degrees (Platinum, Gold, and so forth) based on a standardized point system. One of the categories where you can garner points is through innovation and it was decided that we could create our own “education credit” by installing an internal system of signs that would make employees and visitors aware of the ways in which the building was energy efficient. As designer, it was my task to create this signage system. I thought it would be of value to share the process for putting together this system.

Step one: Game Plans and Field Trips.

Ultimately, I would be doing the whole of the design work for the signage system, but for information gathering and copy writing we assembled a team which consisted of an in-house architect who is the company LEED specialist, the marketing director, marketing assistant and myself. We had a kickoff meeting to discuss the logistics of the project, wherein the aforementioned architect explained why we were implementing the signage system as well as giving an overview of what green building techniques we had implemented.

The work flow for the project would be as follows: architect provides key green topics (i.e. “alternative transportation” or “water savings”) and explains how we garnered points in that arena, the marketing director would massage this content into more “user friendly” bullets, and I would take care of layout.

Next step: Field trip! The marketing assistant and I, armed with a camera and a thirst for sustainable building knowledge, headed out of the office for an afternoon to visit some “green sites” in the area for research. Stop one was Pittsburgh’s hub for all things sustainable, Phipps Conservancy and Botanical Gardens. Though reference signage there was limited, the trip proved an excellent opportunity to snap off a ton of photos that could later be used as green stock photography and ultimately I think the environment got us in a little bit of an eco-conscious mind set. (As a bonus, the Chiluly Glass exhibit was going on at the time).

Stop two was at Pittsburgh’s REI, where they had a signage system in place in the similar vein of what I was imagining ours would be. They also had maps at store’s entrance to help visitors locate the signs and which also elaborated on the green features of the building. Seeing the sign sizes, style and application was incredibly useful at the onset of this project.

Step Two: Options.

The key to doing creatively satisfying in-house work relies on your ability to provide multiple options for project directions and that each direction is equally appealing to you, the designer. Give your boss (read: client) two options, one you love and one you think will suffice, and he or she will always pick the latter. Give them two options you’d love to pursue and happily design-away!

That being said, I came up with two approaches for the signage system: the first was an icon driven set, where each “key green topic” would have an associated icon to represent the area where environmental savings were achieved. For example, I drew up a gas pump icon to accompany the sign that stated we had created preferred parking spots for low-emitting vehicles and carpools. This system would have ultimately been very “vector-y.”

The second concept was to utilize the aforementioned green stock photography and try to “bring some green indoors.” This photography driven approach was the one that was chosen based on a mockup of each sign style that I sent through the approval channels.

Step Three: Design, Research, and Design.

I would be designing 15 signs, 14 of which represented the key green features and one larger lobby sign to introduce visitors to the signage system. I wanted to create a flexible template so that the main building signs would clearly be a system, but they would not be identical. I decided upon the components that would be included: Title –the area in which we’d done something energy efficient (ex. “Water Savings”), Body – which would consist of one to three bullet points outlining what we specifically did in that area, Fact – which would be an energy efficiency or otherwise green fact that related to the area that the sign referenced (This was an effort to “bring the idea home” with something relatable to the amount of energy we were able to save), and lastly the company logo would be included on every sign in an effort to further brand our physical space.

I came up with three templates that involved the green stock photography and a semi-transparent green content area with the stock photo showing through fully on either the right side, left side, or bottom. The content area on each would feature the title, the body copy and the logo, with the fact being placed in a circle straddling the two areas for emphasis. These templates left a lot of room for making each sign unique, while still all operating on the same visual themes.

Each sign was laid out with a unique stock image behind it, some of which were achieved by photoshopping two or more of the stock images I’d taken together or otherwise modifying the original images. I would later combine the backgrounds from all of the key feature signs to form one cohesive background for the lobby sign, tying everything together.

As I set about designing the signs and researching the facts, I was finding it difficult to come up with relevant statistics and a lot of time was spent on researching green building practices. I generated all of the content for the fact bubbles, which, while time consuming, ultimately allowed me to choose the exact wording for each piece and thus I could most precisely layout each of those sections. I did a ton of tweaking to the kerning and line height to make the bubbles look just right.

During this time there were numerous revisions to the main body copy as we bounced it between myself, the marketing director and the architect involved. The body area especially and the signs as a whole were laid out to be flexible so the numerous changes were relatively tolerable. (I really hate doing things more than once because there are changes to copy but have found that this all too often is how it goes when working in-house.)

Step four: Application

Once all the content revisions were made and all the necessary design and copy changes implemented, the signs went through several channels of approval and were ready to be ordered. Based on our initial field trip, the dimensions were decided (for the building signs 7” w x 5” h x .25” d, and 18”w x 24” h x .5” d for the lobby sign). While the signs were being produced, the architect involved and I took mockups I had printed and walked to the building to get some ideas as far as installation. We wanted the signs to as best as possible be located in a spot that was relevant to the green issue listed. This is relatively obvious in some cases (ie “Water Savings” was to be in a hallway near the bathrooms), and in some cases not so much (where exactly do you locate the “Where the hell do we put these things?” sign that says we bought wind credits to offset energy use? Maybe near a fan?). In the end, I think the signs turned out great in design as well as in concept, copy and execution. This was a large and involved project, but it was concept driven and was undertaken by a dedicated team and the sign system represents a really unique way in which we were able to add “green value” to the physical space. The entire sign set can be viewed at www.massarocorporation.com/green-team.

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The Web Design Ledger is a publication written by web designers for web designers. The primary purpose of the site is to act as a platform for sharing web design related knowledge and resources. Topics will range from Photoshop tips to CSS techniques and everything in between.

I recently wrote a couple articles for the launch of the site. If your looking for another solid site on Web Design I suggest you head over there and subscribe to the feed. I’m very excited to be contributing to the publication. The site was done by Henry Jones of henryjones.us & Design Reviver – as always, a fabulous design!

The two articles that have been published as of this writing are:

Is Minimalistic Design More Effective?

10 Easy Steps to Become a Better Web Designer

I hope you’ll head over, give a read and comment. Enjoy!

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Since human existence, communication always is playing very important role in our life using drawings, word of mouth, eye signals etc. To make communication easier and to save information, human invented symbols to describe things they see, speak or just use. Now in our days, for example, we don’t write actual letters, we just send an email, which is really impersonal if we compare those two things.  Now people tend to use handwritten fonts, sketched graphics to give their design more personal touch, in the sake of old days. Handwritten font  can really say something special  personalizing communications with Your visitors. Actually there are a huge amount of great fonts out there, we never heard of. I wanted to dig a little deeper and so I created my own selection with some very special handwritten fonts and also great font resources, You probably never heard of!

1. Paperfont
Ok, I will start with fun font, which could be used to really spice Your web design with something eye catching, though it’s not really handwriting. But I hope You’ll forgive me this time.

PC / MAC
2. Leonardo Hand

Download Leonardo Hand font
3. Ink Burrow

Download Ink Burrow font
4. Aircut

Download Aircut font
5. Alphamac

Download Alphamack font
6. Crushed Out Girl

Download Crushed out girl font
7. Jellyka – Estrya’s Handwriting

Download Jellyka font
8. CK Becky

Download CK Becky font
9. Quilline Script Thin

Download Quilline font
10. Cursive Handwriting Tryout

Download Cursive font
11.Steve Handwriting

Download Steve font
12. Journal

Download Journal font
13. Harrison

Download Harrison font
14. Angelina

Download Angelina font
15. Simpsons
Pretty good font for titles and headings.

Download Simpsons font
5 More Free Handwritten Font Resources

2. Auto FX software
Nice collection of hand scripted fonts.

3. Desktop Publishing: About.com

4. Font Garden
Huge list of free premium handwritten fonts.

5. MyFont.de

Actually there are lot more free handwritten fonts available out there – if You are really interested, check out article 15 Excellent Free Font Resources – usually fonts are separated in categories – search for Script/Handwritten category and You will find a lot more great and free fonts!

About the author

Dainis Graveris is a 20 year old web designer and blogger. He runs his blog at 1stwebdesigner.com. It’s a design blog – topics focus on web design, graphic design, tutorials and inspirational articles.

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Take a look at these great files posted over at creative bits. Thought these may come in handy so I wanted to spread the love. I could definitely use these for some mockups! Great resource via#

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Lately I have been reading a lot about GTD Apps (Getting things done). I am always forgetting to do something or need to be reminded because my brain functions so fast it’s already onto the next thing! I read a couple great articles online that lead me to an app called Remember the Milk. Just today I read an article about a new beta app called SHIFD.

First let’s talk about Remember the Milk. The basic app is free and works really well. I can schedule tasks, reminders and I even put when my bills are due so that I am reminded on a daily basis. You can integrate it within gmail, that’s actually my favorite feature since I barely use a calendar program, it’s just easier since I am checking my email all the time. You can organize anyway your heart desires, get reminded through SMS, email and IM. I highly recommend checking out this app if your into GTD.

Next up…SHIFD. It’s currently in beta but you can sign up on their website. I’m new to this app so I will have to add more on this one later. As far as I can tell it’s a pretty simple interface, very clean looking and sorts items by Notes, Places & Links. You can also use the tag feature. This app is probably for you if you use more than one computer and a phone with web features.

If you have anything to add to this GTD list that looks promising, drop me a comment.