I tag all my artwork posted online with a minimum of my website URL, and usually with copyright info. I wanted to set up an easy way to add this in Photoshop to each image without having to go to the Type tool, type the text, size it, etc. Here’s how I solved the issue…

Create Type Outlines

First, using the Type tool, I created my custom text on a new layer. With this type layer selected, I then went to the Layers menu and then down to the Type submenu, and chose “Convert to shape”. This is similar to the “Create outlines” command in Adobe Illustrator. It gives you a vector outline of the type characters, and this is handy so you can resize without pixellation later on.

Define a custom shape

Next, go to the Edit menu and then select “Define custom shape”. This will give you a new custom shape, available in the shapes drop-down box when you have the Shape Tool selected.

Make a Tool Preset

Next, we’re going to make a Tool Preset so we can access this shape quickly, and define color & blending attributes to it. I chose black as the color, with a blending mode of multiply and an opacity of 20%. Be sure you have your new custom shape selected, and then create a new tool preset for the Shape tool.

Now when you want to quickly add your URL to an image, just go to your Tool Presets panel and choose your preset. You then drag out on your canvas (holding the Shift key to constrain proportions) your custom “text”—technically it’s no longer text and not editable. Note that the new layer with your custom shape already has the blending mode and opacity you chose when creating the tool preset.

Obviously, the text is not editable. One could make a tool preset for the Type tool, but then you’d need to type out the text you want each time. Since I don’t need to edit the text for this usage, the Shape tool was the way to go.

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Here’s a quick tip for all you Adobe software users out there: The Adobe Exchange. What is it? The Adobe Exchange (which seems to have recently been renamed to the Adobe Marketplace & Exchange) is a community resource to share and download lots of extras for your Adobe software products: Actions, Brushes, Custom Shapes, Displacement Maps, Filters, Flash Panels, Gradients, Droplets, Patterns, Plug-ins, Scripts, Styles, Templates, Symbols, Patterns and lots more. Just about every piece of software offered by Adobe has it’s own section, and of course Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign are covered.

The downloads range from free to paid, and cover just about every aspect of the respective software. While not at this time the most extensive selection of resources for Adobe software, it’s still a great place to browse around. there are plenty of goodies for all you creatives, and lots of time-saving actions and scripts for some pretty complex effects in Illustrator and Photoshop.

You’ll need to sign up for a free account to use the Exchange, and paid items seem to be handled by going to the developer’s website as opposed to being handled within the Exchange itself.

Sound off in the comments with any exceptional finds on the Adobe Exchange.

Advertisement: Download Go Media’s T-Shirt Templates Layered PSDs of blank shirts and hoodies, for convincing mockups in minutes.

As if a gift from the gods, the new FAIL Sticker is upon us. Making such an explosive impact on the world, Michael Jackson has reportedly risen from the grave to witness such a great spectacle. Seriously, this little palm sized sticker will have you deflating bloated egos and reddening cheeks in your neighborhood.

Put down your Palm Pre (if you are able get one, and aren’t still on a waiting list!) and check out the new stickers.

The goods: http://www.failsticker.com

But all joking aside, Dave (the IT guy at Go Media) and I take this whole Fail sticker thing way too seriously. I spent way too long on the site, pushing every last pixel to perfection. It was just so much fun to work on. It’s such a simple product idea and it was hilarious (at least to us) to make it into something slightly bigger and more profound.

We actually did improve the stickers. A lot really. The new split-backing is awesome and they’re individually cut and prepackaged in a new resealable “fail wallet” (ok, it’s really just a plastic pouch, but it goes in your back pocket and pouch is such a understatment). And they’re wholesale friendly, but we ask for minimum orders of 1,000 stickers. ThinkGeek and Firebox are wholesale customers and if you would prefer to buy from them, feel free. They’re great!

Here are some more pics.

Well, there’s only one thing left to do now that your read all this, grab yourself a 5 pack, 20 pack, or 40 pack. And start FAILing things around the house for starters. Once you get good, you can take it to the streets and utilize the new speed-sticking, split-back, easy peel technique to hit moving vehicles like a FAIL ninja. Ok, I don’t really suggest you do that, you might end up with a sticker on your self while you recover in the hospital.

Have fun folks,

Jeff

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You may have created stellar photo-realistic mockups and used tons of really cool colors- but none of this means ANYTHING if your screen printer can’t clearly interpret your vision!

I find that many of my clients have had bad experiences with low-budget designers in the past who have been able to create great art, but don’t know the first thing about how to put it on apparel. This can end up costing the client a lot of time, stress, and additional set-up fees at the printer. Over the years, I’ve found that a client truly appreciates the fact that my designs come ready to hand-over to the screen printer that very same day – with no questions asked.

The best rule of thumb when preparing files? Leave nothing to chance and pretend that your screen printer is about 6 years old. (As you establish a working relationship, you may be able to edit out some of these steps once your screen printer knows your file ’style’. Remember that, like designers, every printer is different!)

This tutorial will set out to give you step-by-step instructions for ensuring that your files are properly set up and ready to go to print! (AKA: Creating a ‘Tech Pack’) Hold on, ‘cuz it’s long, but once you get it down, your clients and printers will love you!

This Tutorial will Cover:

• File Preparation for Apparel
• Creating A Full-Size Blank Shirt Template
• Setting Up Your Tech Pack Template
• Completing Technical Callouts
• Full-Size Screen Separations
• Double Checking Your Work

Equipment needed:

• Adobe Illustrator
• Pantone solid coated booklet (or use Adobe Illustrator’s included PMS swatch set and take your chances)



• Any linked files or fonts
• Any additional artwork (neck labels, custom rivet art, pattern swatches, etc)
• An actual blank apparel body that your client wants to use, or a clear photo and accurate measurements (shoulder-seam to shoulder-seam and top to bottom)
• Digital camera
• Ruler

Step one: File Preparation

For this particular tutorial, I have decided to use a t-shirt design for one of my more recent clients- the Nastia Gold line by Olympic gold-medal gymnast Nastia Liukin for Vanilla Star Jeans. Though a little girly and basic for Go Media style, it works well for the purposes of this tutorial.

We are already assuming your shirt has been broken down into halftones, bitmap files, etc and brought into Illustrator.

The first thing that I like to do is to change my document size to be about the size of a real-life t-shirt. In this case, for a standard girls’ tee, I know that I need a document approximately 24″x 30″ in order to leave plenty of room for call-outs, headers, and all the other things we will go into later.

Before diving in, I go to my ‘Links’ menu and highlight all of my links, which makes sure that no layers are locked. Click the arrow at the top right, and select ‘Embed Image’.

If I had used any special fonts (mine happen to be hand-lettered), this would also be the time to make sure that you select them, go to the ‘Type’ menu and click ‘Create Outlines’. This ensures that your printer won’t be calling you looking for attached files or fonts later.

Next, in a separate file, I like to create an accurate template of the blank t-shirt or hoodie I will be using to gauge correct size and placement. This way, I don’t have to waste time trying to print out my artwork and re-sizing it until I get it just right. Instead, I take a clear photo of the blank garment that my client wants to use, or ask them to send me one. Keep in mind that you generally want to use a middle-of-the road size shirt (Medium is good), as your art has to fit on both a size S and XL.

For this particular client, they didn’t have a blank supplier picked out yet, so I used an existing template that I had already traced from a photo. Simply drop your garment photo into Illustrator, set the image transparency to about 75%, and using your pencil tool, trace around your blank garment. (It doesn’t have to be super accurate, as different shirts will have different wrinkles and curves)

Once you have traced your shirt and created an accurate template, enlarge it to real-life size using a few key measurements. Measure the distance from the top of one shoulder seam to the other. You may also want to measure the distance from the top of the shirt (top of shoulder) to the bottom (hem). For this garment, my shoulder-to-shoulder distance is approx. 12″ as this is a juniors tee. I make sure that my “Rulers” are turned on, then size my template accordingly.

Save this file for future use as a shirt template, or click below to download the one that we have provided for you! Now you are really ready to begin!

Keep this template on it’s own layer called “Shirt” and lock it. Now in your layers palette, create another layer called “Art”. This is the layer that you will be playing in- doing all of your masking and sizing. Also create a third layer and call it “Details”- we will get into this layer last.

From here, copy and paste your original art into your “Art” layer. Begin playing with placement, seeing which parts of the design may run off the edges, how they might align to the collar or seams, etc.

Once you find a placement that you are happy with, unlock your “Shirt” layer, and using your white arrow, select only the main body area (not the lines representing seams) and copy and paste it into your “Art” layer. You can now use this as a clipping mask to make your art look like it is bleeding off of the edges. The main body area of the shirt should appear to cover the art in your “Art” layer. Under your “Layers” palette, click the little circle to the right of the layer named “Art”. This will select everything in your “Art” layer. Then simply hit COMMAND+7 or Object>Clipping Mask>Make to mask out your art.

Step two:SETTING UP YOUR TECH PACK TEMPLATE

Now that you have your art where you want it, lock both your “SHIRT” layer and “ART” layer. From here on out, we will be working only in our “DETAILS” layer until we do color separations. I like to start setting up my tech pack by copying and pasting my client’s logo into the top left corner of the document. I then align my type to the left and right underneath the logo I type in all caps:

SHIRT PRINTER
SHIRT BRAND
SHIRT COLOR
SCREENPRINT COLORS

Next, I align my type to the top right and type in all caps:
NAME
JOB #

From here, fill in any and all information that you know.
Your printer is the name of the client’s chosen screen printer (if you know it).
Your shirt brand would be, for example, American Apparel.
Color is self explanatory. Name is the name of that particular design.
Job # will most likely be given to you by your client, if they have one.

Once you get to screenprint colors, you will want to grab your trusty Pantone Solid Coated book to accurately choose your colors. In my experience, this is the book that most printers use to accurately show inks. There are also separate Pantone books just for metallics, neons, etc, but we will stick with the basic book for now.

After selecting my colors, I create little boxes with my rectangle tool to act as little swatches for each color. Next to each swatch, I list the name of the color- for example, my first color is PMS (Pantone Matching System) 7499 C (Coated).

TIP: if you use the Pantone swatches that Illustrator provides, they will look very different on the screen than in an actual Pantone book. Always go off of the book, and try to make the ones on your screen look like the book, instead of the other way around.

Also note that even though I can see that PMS 871 C is a metallic gold in my Pantone book, I made sure to note that I wanted it to be metallic foil, not just metallic ink. The more information you can provide, the better.

STEP THREE:COMPLETING TECHNICAL CALLOUTS

Now we want to really get into calling out any special art placements, special treatments, etc. I begin by calling out that it is OK for the PMS 7449 C color art to run off the sides. I show this by drawing a clean line using my line segment tool, and writing exactly that.

“PMS 7499 C ART CAN RUN OFF EDGES”

Next I want to point out that it is OK if the art runs off the collar and prints on the inside back of the t-shirt, since I know we will have a neck label sewn in over the top. So again, I call that out:

“INK RUNS OFF COLLAR. OK IF INK GETS INSIDE OF SHIRT.”

I also decide that I would like my art, for the most part, to appear centered. This is up to the eye of the printer, but lets him know that I will be looking for that. So I add that in:

“ART CENTERED”.

Hopefully, by this point you are starting to get the picture. The more info that you can provide your printer, the better. I also always like to provide at least one measured point of reference – in this case, I would like the top of the black screen (the top of the rose) to be approx. 2″ from the base of the collar. So again, I draw a line pointing to that place and write:

“BLACK SCREEN BEGINS APPROX. 2″ FROM BASE OF COLLAR”.

Finally, I know that my client has custom neck labels that they would like sewn into the neck of these t-shirts. So I copy and paste the neck label art, placing it in a red rectangular box so that there is no confusion about which label goes with which shirt. (You’d be surprised). If there is an associated ID# for that particular label, go ahead and include it. If your client wants to screen print neck labels, go ahead and include that art too, just in case. Or, at the very least, make mention of the fact that it needs to be there.

Don’t forget to include any other custom treatments such as: contrast stitching, various garment treatments and washes, rivet or rhinestone embellishments, embroidery, etc.

STEP FOUR: FULL-SIZE COLOR SEPARATIONS

Hang on guys, you are almost there! While many printers are smart and able to figure out how to ‘unmask’ your “Art” layer to make separations, many aren’t. To eliminate any confusion, I like to provide color separations at the bottom, off of the art board, but on my “Art” layer. Lock your “Details” layer, and unlock your “Art” layer. Select everything in that layer and copy it. Now paste that art directly below the art board and unmask it (ALT+COMMAND+7) Delete your mask, leaving just the art.

This next part gets a little tricky, so pay attention! Depending on how many colors your art has, this will determine the number of separations that you need to make.

My particular file has 5 colors, so I need to make separations for 5 separate screens. The way that I approach this (and others may do it differently) is to copy and paste the art that we just unmasked 4 more times in a row. I then write each Pantone color’s name above each separation, like this:

Now – PAY ATTENTION – depending on what color you are separating (my first color is 7499 C)- wherever that color is shown in the art, it needs to be made BLACK. Every other color in the art needs to be made WHITE (so that it won’t show up).

As you click on each piece of the art, turn it the appropriate color and then LOCK IT! This should leave only the areas that are 7499 C showing!

NOTE: This will mess with your brain, since you are used to thinking in terms of colors, not translating those colors into black-and-white. But I promise, it gets easier.

Proceed to do this for every color, leaving only the areas that are that specific color showing. IE: If you are on the ‘green’ screen, then all areas that are ‘green’ should be black when you are done with separating that screen. When you get through every color, you will have screen print separations!

STEP FIVE: DOUBLE CHECK YOUR WORK!

Double check everything, send a JPG to your client for final approval with all of the callouts shown (in case the client has any revisions), and off to the printer it goes! Send a copy of the final AI file to the client, and kick back until the samples roll in! Whew, you made it!

Conclusion

As a full-time art director for the new skate apparel line Self-Destruct (www.teamselfdestruct.com), as well as full-time freelance designer for my own firm (www.marenkellydesign.com) I know the ‘tech-pack’ can seem like a lot of extra work that you may not think you have time for. But once you get the process down, it really shouldn’t take you longer than 30 minutes, and it acts as a major selling point to your clients. In my experience, it even helps to justify a slightly higher, flat-rate per design, since the client knows they are getting quality, print-ready art!

Thanks to these easy-to-understand files, I have also gotten a lot of work over the years from screen printer referrals. Remember- everyone loves someone who makes their job a little easier, and it will payoff in the end!

Advertisement: Go Media’s Fonts - We create fonts too. Check em out.

Showing Prices/rates on your site:

Pros:

• Clients know the costs before they contact you, thus saving you time on writing estimates
• You’re likely to get a higher number of more targeted leads when their pricing questions are answered up front
• You can advertise you have a low price
• You can put together easy-to-swallow package deals that get you more business
• Probably more?

Cons:

• Enables your competitors to undercut you on prices
• Encourages price wars amongst design studios, thus devaluing the work.
• Fixes you to adhere to your advertised prices, and when revisions/overages do occur, they’re usually accompanied with guilt and and an angry client
• McDonalds-izes your business to more of a “store” mentality if you show “Shirt Designs – $150″ for example. Might seem tacky.
• Probably more?

Hiding prices on your site:

Pros:

• Each job is different, and requires a custom evaluation/quote.
• Makes your work feel more valuable
• Discourages price wars
• If prices are generally high, you won’t scare off those leads – allowing you follow up and hopefully start a communication between you and the client that hopefully results in a new project being started
• Allows you to quote a job for more established brands like Nike differently than a job for Bob’s Tool Shed.
• Gives you more freedom and flexibility when you’re not stuck on a price
• probably more?

Cons:

• When you finally tell them the price, it can be unexpected
• It requires more time to estimate, quote, and explain pricing over and over to each different client
• Probably more?

Go Media chooses not to advertise our rates on our site. Mostly because we don’t want to appear too “selly” on our site. Another reason, is our rates are generally higher than a lot of freelance competitors (we know we’re worth the price, but a client sometimes just goes by price alone and might talk himself out of even contacting us if he sees that Joe “Freelance” Designer has a much lower price). There are obviously pros and cons to each, so I’m opening it up to discussion. What’s your take on the pricing debate?

Tell me your thoughts in the comments!

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Time. There’s never enough of it. But what if I told you there was a way to create more time, particularly in your design life? It’s simple, actually—make your computer do the work.

Over the years, I have found a rather handy set of software utility programs for the Mac that have saved me countless hours of production time in both illustration & graphic design work, as well as in general computer usage. By letting these programs do their thing, they free you from having to do them manually.

Some are free. Some cost a few bucks (or more). All, however, I have found invaluable in my creative work. I’m a big fan of using your tools to their maximum potential. Usually if there’s some brainless, repetitive task, I have found that some software developer out there has had the same frustration and has created software to alleviate these time-wasters.

The following collection I have found to be the most useful utility software for the Mac, specifically for creatives. They range from free to seemingly pricey, but once you’ve used them you’ll find the work you’ve saved to be well-worth the price paid.

The utilities cover the gamut of creative work on the Mac—from graphic design, illustration, magazine layout output, file/folder/Finder navigation and more. I use every single one of these on a regular basis and couldn’t create a Mac without them.—or at least I wouldn’t want to!

Jumpcut (OS X) • Free!

How many times have you needed to copy & paste multiple text items from a client’s email or text document to place into a layout? Jumping back and forth between the design file and the client file can get extremely tedious. Enter Jumpcut.

Simply, Jumpcut is a clipboard history manager: it remembers as many of the previous items you have set in the preferences which have been copied to the OS X clipboard, ready for pasting.
A menubar item is offered, with a user-definable list of recent clippings, as well as a customizable keyboard shortcut to bring up a bezel similar to the OS X Sound Volume overlay. I set my keyboard shortcut to Control-Option-V to be similar to the standard Command-V shortcut for regular pasting.

If you make the bezel “sticky” so it stays on the screen, you can navigate earlier clippings with the up/down arrows, and a Return stroke pastes the text.

Zoom To Selection (Ai) • $7

Zoom To Selection is an awesome plugin for Adobe Illustrator which does one simple task: when zooming (and using the plugin’s custom keyboard shortcuts), the zooming is centered on the selected object.

If you are an InDesign user, you’ll find this very familiar as InDesign handles zooming this way at least since CS3.

The plugin adds three new commands to the view menu: Zoom To, Zoom From and Fit Selected. I think they speak for themselves. If you use Adobe Illustrator, you are going to love this plugin. Well worth the measly seven bucks.

FlickrShop (Ps) • Free (limited)/$19.95

FlickrShop is the Adobe Photoshop plug-in for uploading photos to the Flickr photo sharing website directly from Photoshop. This is a very cool plugin that keeps you within your Photoshop workflow but lets you upload in-progress sketches and design for sharing on Flickr as you work. Great for promoting your creations and giving fans an inside look at the creative process.

You can choose image format in which you want to upload your photo to Flickr: PNG or JPEG (with an option to select the image quality). All the standard Flickr info and details can be set from within the plugin: title, description and tags and add it to several sets at once or, if you need, create a new set, choose visibility: public, family, friends, additional Flickr options such as safety level and content type. You can also hide it from the public area.

The free version allows for 3 uploads per day, paying for the license allows for unlimited uploads.

Default Folder (OS X) • $39.95

Default Folder has a lot of great features, but I mainly it use for one primary purpose: to easily navigate recently-used folders when in an Open/Save dialog box.

As any graphic artist knows, it can be tedious and time-consuming to navigate through all the folders when working on design projects. Not only are you high-resolution images stored in one folder, perhaps company logos stored in another, text documents in yet another, not to speak of the in-progress PDF export folder and your final PDF folder. Now, just add one additonal document you are working on, and imagine the nightmare of navigating easily and quickly to all of these folder. That’s a lot of mouse-clicking or keyboard jockeying.

With Default Folder, you can kiss all that goodbye. With a simple keyboard shortcut (Option + Up/Down Arrows), Default Folder will easily jump to the last 10 folders you have accessed in the OS X Finder. This can be increased up to 100 in the preferences.

This feature alone is worth the price, but there are other excellent features such as Favorite folders (which you don’t need to keep in your Finder sidebar) and of course Default folders (where, on an app-by-app basis you can specify a folder to open/save to each time). Default Folder adds a stylish bezel surrounding the Open/Save windows which give you a wealth of file information, ability to tweak settings, preview images, and also off the Favorites folders, Recent folders, Default folders as well as easy access to your entire hard drive. It’s awesome to have this power at your finger tips right within the Open/Save windows.

It’s not cheap at $34.95, but I find it worth every last cent. There’s a 30-day demo so you can try it out for yourself.

Photo Booth (OS X) • Free!

Photo Booth is a free application that comes with all Macs. Typically it’s looked at as a fun toy for playing with your built-in iSight camera or USB webcam. But I have found it to be an awesome artist’s tool: a mirror with a camera.

As an illustrator, I used to have a hand-held cosmetics mirror on my work desk for using myself as a reference. Either a pose or a hand gesture, the mirror was indispensable as was my point & shoot digital camera.

Then it hit me one day: Photo Booth is basically a camera app which can take instant shots, and the “film roll” at the bottom of the Photo Booth window allows you to drag a snapshot and drag it right to the Photoshop icon for easy editing or reference. You can see in the screen shot that I use this quite a bit, especially for capturing hands—specifically hands holding objects—for reference.

Super-handy, and free.

Batch Output (InD) • $119.95

Batch Output is a niche utility, but if you are a designer with a need to export multi-page PDFs as single PDF files, this app is worth the money spent.

Simply, Batch Output allows you to export an InDesign file as any of the standard export formats, but with a very useful twist not found native within InDesign: exporting each of the pages as a single PDF file. Magazine designers will absolutely love this software. Another great feature is the ability to print and export multiple documents. No more sitting around all day waiting to print or export a bunch of files!

Batch Output uses the InDesign print and PDF presets, lets you define custom output settings in the first document, change file name in printer queue, update modified links automatically, output non-consecutive page ranges, save documents after output, use variable output file names, specify output folder or export to the same folder as InDesign document, and keep favorite output folders. Whew!

Again, this is a bit of a niche product, but for those who it is intended, it’s a life-saver. Most magazine printers require PDFs to be sent as single-page PDFs (it’s just easier in case pages need to be replaced). Exporting these manually gets old very quick. Unless you’re being paid by the hour, Batch Output is worth every dime. Rock-solid and a very responsive and helpful developer.

Sneak Peek Pro (OS X) • $19.95

OS X’s Quick Look feature in 10.5 is very cool. However as an Adobe Illustrator user, I found it very frustrating to find that I did not get actual file previews for .ai or .eps vector art files in Quick Look, nor in standard Finder column-view or open/save previews. Arrgghh!

SneakPeek Pro is a Quick Look plugin that allows you to preview Illustrator, InDesign and EPS documents in the Finder, dialog boxes and other applications. SneakPeek Pro also allows you to see fonts, images and colors used in many CS3 and CS4 documents. Awesome.

Quickly flip through your graphics files in Cover Flow, view list of fonts, images and swatches used in Quick Look (CS3 & CS4), see previews of graphics documents within any open dialog box, file previews magically appear on your Desktop and Finder windows, Illustrator files preview whether or not they’re saved with PDF compatibility, and an intelligent parser uses embedded preview for large AI or EPS documents.

* During the creation of this tutorial, I found a small bug or oversight which I have alerted the developers about: if you have color swatches in Color Group folders in your Illustrator document (at least in CS4), they will not show up in the Sneak Peek Quick Look swatch listing.

Name Mangler (OS X) • Donationware

Name Mangler is kind of a misnomer; I would call it Name Un-mangler… Name Mangler is a batch file renamer that supports all common renaming tasks: Find and Replace (including support for regular expressions if you’re geeky); Number Sequentially; Change Case; Set Extension; Add Prefix/Suffix; Remove/Insert Characters.

Name Mangler’s also offers Droplets so you can store configurations and use those repeatedly for different, alternating purposes just by dropping your files on them. Indispensable when you need it.

While “free” to use, the developer asks for donations if you find the software useful.

SelectMenu (Ai) • Free!

SelectMenu is an Adobe Illustrator plugin which adds 18 additional object types under Illustrator’s Object -> Select menu: Brush Strokes, Clipping Masks, Stray Points, Text Objects, Flash Dynamic Text and Flash Input Text, Guides, Paths, Open Paths, Closed Paths, Filled Paths, Unfilled Paths, Stroked Paths, Unstroked Paths, Dashed Paths, Undashed Paths, Compound Paths, Groups, Live Object Groups, Gradient Meshes, Envelopes, Symbols, Raster Art and Placed EPS Art.

Illustrator users reading that list are probably drooling over the possibilities. Be careful installing this plugin though: you’ll have a difficult time using Illustrator on another machine without it!

Honestly, this list is only a small sample of what you’ll find in my Applications folder on my Mac. To keep it simple, I went with the apps I use most often, and solve some of the more frustrating or time-wasting situations I run into when creating on the Mac. There are plenty more productivity utilities for general Mac usage, as well as some more obscure plugins for Adobe software which I will be covering in future blog posts.

If you have any specific requests for arcane functionality on your Mac or within Adobe apps, please let me know in the comments below and I will do my best to cover them in the upcoming posts. Also, if you have any related software suggestions or tips on the software mentioned, I would love to hear from you in the comments as well. I am always on the lookout for better, faster ways of doing things.

Or rather—better, faster ways of having my Mac do things!

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This weekend I had some fun with duct tape and some bleach making this tee shirt design. Check out these 3 easy steps. If you decide to make your own version, come back to this post and leave us a Flickr link to check out a photo of what you did!

Step 1

Use duct tape to mask off your design onto a dark colored tee. I decided to make stripes on a black tee.

Step 2

Spray your t-shirt with a bleach/water mixture. I used 70% bleach and 30% water. Let your shirt dry after you spray it to your liking.

Step 3

Wash and wear your tee. Easy as 1, 2, 3!’

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There are many potential paths you could follow in the world of “design.” Graphic Art is the term I gravitate towards the most for my own work. There’s often a fine line to distinguish the difference between graphic art and graphic design but it usually relies on less layout of typography and more visual development. A growing field for graphic artists is Motion Design (aka – motion graphics). At it’s basic level, you are simply making your graphic art move. Ultimately, it helps to know a lot about all aspects of design whether it’s web, print or motion. Eventually, you’ll find your sweet spot but you’ll need a good base in design principles first.

School is always a good option but not necessary. It’s a combination of motivation, knowledge and ability. If one is missing, the formula is incomplete. School will provide the knowledge to improve your ability. School not only allows you to learn great design principles and be critiqued by others, but you will always grow faster when you are surrounded and challenged by others who are doing the same. Additionally, the people you meet in school will go on to be in your industry and it always helps to have that connection 5-10 years down the road. School also helps you form discipline. You’ll have to be highly motivated and naturally talented to make a career out of design without an education.

Not all design students are great designers. Motivation is the key to gaining knowledge. Not school. If you have the drive to be a designer, you will find plenty of knowledge online. You can also improve your ability and be challenged by online artist communities. Not going to school is definitely possible in this industry. I have friends that own their own businesses and write code for websites from scratch without ever having gone to college. There are designers that have made great livings for themselves without an art degree. Although skipping school is probably not the norm or the suggested method, going to school does not necessarily guarantee success either. Like any major, people often graduate and do not even find a job in that field.

I went to school for Commercial Art. I learned everything from oil painting to Photoshop. My experience, however, was that I learned principles in class; but not really the software. Learning software on your own or with the aid of tutorials, etc. is a part of the design life. The classroom was more about giving me projects and critiquing them. I learned and tried web design using Flash and Dreamweaver back in the day. I quickly gave that up. I realized that I needed to be able to write code to really have a future in web. That wasn’t going to happen. I’ve learned Final Cut Pro, After Effects, Illustrator, Cinema 4d, and all sorts of software on my own since school. The software is constantly changing so even if you find your classroom setting useful for learning programs; that won’t help you 5 years after you’ve graduated school. You’ll need to learn how to keep up with software on your own. There is no rest when it comes to keeping up with technology.
Overall, I would recommend a good education. That is not available to everyone though so buying a computer and software might make more sense if you are motivated enough to learn what is needed. A strong portfolio will speak louder than a resume or degree.

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We have officially joined the PepperJam Network to help us better manage our Affiliate program. I’m sure most of you know about The Arsenal and only some of you know that you can actually be making money by promoting our products. Yeah, we never really did tell many people about our affiliate program before. That was because we didn’t really have much time to manage it. But now, things are different.

Meet Tim Seigfried, he’s Go Media’s dedicated Affiliate Manager. I’ve given him the keys to run our affiliate program and make sure you guys are put in a position to make some money. The better you do, the better we do. More on Tim in a minute.

So what is this new Affiliate Program anyway? Well, basically, you use banners and links to promote the Go Media’s Arsenal products and you get 20% for every sale you generate.

How to Sign Up

Click here to sign up for the PepperJam Network, and once you’re account is approved to the Network, log into your account and click on the “Find Partners” tab. Once you find Go Media, click on the “Join” button on the right hand side. Then Tim will review your application to join the Go Media affiliate program and let you in if you meet our criteria. Not every affiliate gets approved, but it’s not hard to get approved either. As long as you’re into design and are motivated, you’re Go Media Affiliate material.

If you have any questions, contact our manager, Tim Seigfried. His email is tseigfried@pepperjam.com and his AIM is TimPJN. One of the great things about Tim is that he’s pretty much always online and you can ask him anything about the affiliate program and he can help you right away. If he’s not online send him an email. Also, here’s a tip. To get a speedy approval process, send him a message and tell him who you are and that you want to join the Go Media affiliate program. He will get in and expedite the process for you.

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• Launched a new Go Media site at www.gomedia.us. We haven’t updated our portfolio and design services site in such a long time. It was overdue for a facelift. We are still adding projects and case studies to the portfolio, but it’s ready for you to look at.
• Launched a NEW affiliate program for the Arsenal with PepperJam network. Our affiliate manager is Tim Seigfried and his email is tseigfried@pepperjam.com and his AIM is TimPJN. We’ve also increased the commission payout to 20% of every sale you generate. We’re no longer using our self-hosted affiliate plan. Registration is now open to become an affiliate, so get on over to PJN and sign up. Once you’re approved to PepperJam Network, log into your account and click on the “Find Partners” tab. Once you find us, click on the “Join” button on the right hand side. Once you’re in the program, use the “Generate Links” tab to grab text links or banners to promote the Arsenal. You’ll find a bunch of awesome new banners and links to use. Not everyone who applies to become an affiliate is accepted. We want to make sure our affiliates are high quality and have something in common with designers.
• Worked on Arsenal 3 design with @adam_wagner and it’s coming along quite nicely. We will have some PDF wireframes for people to review shortly. We’re going to be changing the Arsenal’s infrastructure and the overall vector buying experience. We’re also revamping the concept of “My Arsenal” and we’ll switching to a “deposit funds” type system like a lot of other stock resource sites.
• Tattoo Highway, a new reality show on A&E premiered last Wednesday. Go Media did the logo, animations, and in-show graphics for it last summer. It’s great to see it finally air! Bill did the logo, I did the 3D animation, and Haley did the color, editing, effects, and map animations.
• Did a zombified Blink-182 tribute tee for Paint the Stars clothing. It came out pretty nice, pics below.
• Worked on posters for Cedar Lee Theatre for their Cult Film Series. Go Media did 3 concepts for them and they went with my colleague Chris Comella’s rad poster. The posters were meant to advertise their Cult Film series but were mainly focused on the film A.P.E. in 3D.
• Illustrated Jesus stabbing the Devil with a sword for Christian clothing brand Disciple.
• Did a quick logo/lettering job for a band called God Damned (funny, how I this job came in the same week as Jesus killing the Devil).

Tattoo Highway opener and animations

Paint the Stars Blink 182 Tribute

Disciple Clothing illustration

God Damned Logo

Cedar Lee Cult Film Series Posters

My Concept:

Oliver’s Concept:

Chris Comella’s approved final poster:

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