A design destined for print requires setting up to certain specifications to ensure that the work is printed correctly by industrial lithographic or digital print firms. This often starts with the initial document upon which the design is to be created by adding the correct bleed area and crop marks. Let’s take a look at what crops and bleed actually are, why they are required and how to set them up in your favourite Adobe package.
I guess with recent topics being based on vector illustrations and cute characters, it's about time for another Illustrator character tutorial. Previous versions saw the creation of Captain BlackSpoon and Freddy the Fish which seemed pretty popular, not to mention the quick and simple monster series. This time follow this Adobe Illustrator walkthrough on the creation of a cute little vector monster character, beginning with a quick pencil sketch on paper.
A recent post of Blog.SpoonGraphics was a roundup of vector landscapes used in web design. Follow this Adobe Illustrator tutorial through the process of creating your own simple vector scene form scratch.
A personal project I'm currently working on with a developer friend is a website called myNiteLife. As part of the overall design process one of the first jobs of the project was to develop a logo and brand for the website, follow this step by step documentation of the whole process of the logo design from conception to completion.
The Safari browser from Apple has a great little icon that works well in small formats while also displaying quite a lot of intricate details when viewed in large format. Navigate through this Adobe Illustrator tutorial to draw up your own vector Safari inspired compass in Adobe Illustrator.
I recently decided that I wanted to add a little coolness to the RSS icon on Blog.SpoonGraphics by displaying the current subscriber count. Having seen plenty of javascript tooltip examples across the web I decided this would be the best solution, displaying the relevant information when the user hovers over the icon area. Using a combination of an extremely simple jQuery script and a PHP snippet follow this walkthrough on how to show your RSS count in a cool tooltip of your own.