At Townend we’ve got an Xmas Card tailored for the graphic designers in your life. We’ve not got many so be quick!
Christmas Cards for Graphic Designers
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Category Archives: Graphic Design
Helvetidoodle on diy.com homepage
Right now B&Q the DIY giant are using Helvetidoodle as the most prominent element on their homepage. Fancy that!
Reposting font files is not OK
I have only ever uploaded Helvetidoodle on dafont.com and 1001fonts.com. Since then dozens and dozens of other font download sites have downloaded the .zip archive which contains the font and a readme file with a bio and the license terms, taken the TTF font file and posted it on their own font collection sites without my info. They do this to get advertising dollars, but it means people never know who spent hours creating the font, and it also means they never get to see my polite request for donations. The most audacious site has put a donate link right next to the download link… direct to their PayPal account!
If you really enjoy Helvetidoodle, please consider sending a PayPal donation to eddie@teamtownend.com. It helps.
Brilliant Viral Ad – The mayor gets some air!
We all love a good viral ad as much as the next guy, and when it’s Boris Johnson popping some moves – what could be better?
The Christmas Cards have arrived!
And they look awesome!
In fact, they look so awesome, we felt we had to share them with you (plus, we bought far too many.) Screen printed on ridiculously thick 400GSM silk coated artboard and supplied with cool contrasting lemon yellow envelopes, they’ll take pride of place on the mantelpiece (at least the designers’ ones!)
Don’t buy the Disengage font from Flyerfonts/Houseind…
Disengage by Flyerfonts
Helvetidoodle by Ed T... Pretty similar eh? Just saying...
…Until you’ve tried Helvetidoodle! I just discovered houseind.com sells a font called Disengage, that looks very close to my own free font, Helvetidoodle. I’m pretty sure this is a coincidence and I’d definitely not seen this font before now, but if you’re thinking of buying Disengage, you may as well try Helvetidoodle first as it’s free for personal and commercial use, and comes with a pretty wide character set.
Christmas is coming!
Having great fun designing the Townend Christmas cards – here’s a bit of a teaser:
I wish this man was my Maths teacher
Oliver Steele turns algebra into graphic representations. This is an interesting example of using graphics to communicate something that isn’t there. I wish he’d been my Maths teacher.
Sportspower Club – Custom PHP/MySQL website made to a tight deadline
I was recently commissioned to produce a site for a new betting tip service, which had to have a members area updated daily with new tips. The most important criteria to the client was speed: the website had to be up and running as soon as possible.
I chose to start from the ground up using HTML/CSS for layout and PHP/MySQL for the management components, rather than using a pre-built CMS, to get exactly and only the features the client and their clients needed.
Ed Townend Does Design! completed the project on time and to the clients delight – adding the tips each day and managing club members could not be easier! Members love the way they can filter tips for any date and the streamlined PayPal subscription system.
DIAL Barnsley – Logo Design Challenge
As a bit of a challenge to myself, I took the logo of local charity DIAL Barnsley, and decided to rebrand it. In their own words;
DIAL Barnsley is a registered charity providing free impartial advice and information to disabled people, carers and their professionals, throughout the borough of Barnsley. We strive to promote a positive image of disabled people and carers and our work is underpinned by the recognition that people are not all the same but all have a right to equality of opportunity.
Here’s the current DIAL Barnsley logo:
Not the best, eh? It’s too fussy, won’t be recogniseable rendered small such as on a business card, and above all, it’s outdated. I get what the designer was trying to do, emphasise that DIAL helps put the pieces of your care puzzle together, but really it’s a vague and bland metaphor. DIAL Barnsley needs a new logo, and I made it my mission to design one whether they wanted it or not.
So before I could start designing, I had to decide what I wanted my logo to communicate, and what better for that than a mind-map? I highlighted key words that represent DIAL’s ethos, and chose to focus on freedom, support, independance, individuality, care and progress. From there I could begin to sketch out rough concepts for the logo on paper, and before I knew it I was experimenting in Illustrator. Here are the results of the inital drafts:
Some more refining, and:
The solid black portions surrounding, but not touching, the red shape (symbolising the human form) represent the theme of support and maintenance of freedom. Additionally, the ‘head’ rising above the black areas suggests the independence and individuality of the person offered by carers. The prominance of the red over the black implies that DIAL Barnsley sees the person first, and also creates an upwards arrow conveying positive progress.
Success!
Perhaps I could help your business in this way?
If your brand identity needs refreshing, or even if you’re building a brand from scratch, don’t hesitate to contact me. My services include complete brand design, design for print, web design and development.
Together we can build a brand that truly evokes emotion, and stands head and shoulders above the competition.