Being a person that gets bored with looking at the same thing for long periods of time I thought it was about time for a VelvetAnt website refresh. I’ve decided to take my online portfolio to a single page since it is just a portfolio and contact information. I also decided to add a bit more personality to my site by making the main focus of my website… my feet! Please feel free to have a look at my new design and let me know what you think!

I wish all of my subscribers and everyone else an amazing 2012!

I have recently taken up a new roll as a Digital Designer and I was sent off with this lovely cake baked and created by Julia Warnock! If you have been following the VelvetAnt blog you probably know how much I love Helvetica, so having my name baked in Helvetica is a dream come true! (Let the tattoo speak for itself!)

Just look at the craftsmanship of the a! It’s gorgeous!

As a print and web designer I use Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign on a day-to-day basis. When you are using these programs so frequently it is hard not to get agitated at some of the knit-picking tasks you find yourself spending a lot of your precious time on. I always find myself asking: Don’t you wish there was a one-click tool to do this?

Here are 5 tools that would make a designers life so much easier!

1. Hair Mask tool

Lets face it, no matter how many tutorials you read or different techniques you try; masking out hair in Photoshop is tedious and very time consuming. The Hair Mask tool would allow you to open an image in Photoshop and automatically create a mask around hair. With this tool you don’t have to worry about how complex the background of your photo is, how curly and messy the hair you are dealing with is or having a drastic contrast between the color of the hair and the background color of your image! Imagine being able to press one button to mask out hair!

2. Image Upscale tool

I couldn’t even begin to tell you how many times I have been provided with images for a project that are no where near the size or quality they need to be for both print and web. The Image Upscale tool allows you to increase the size of an image to any desired DPI without losing image quality. There are plugins and techniques to upscale images and preserve the quality of them to an extent, but any image that has been scaled up will never look as good as it does at its original DPI. With the Image Upscale tool you will be able to scale images as seamlessly as scaling vector objects!

3. Digital-to-Print tool

Have you ever created an e-booklet, digital flyer or any other type of media that was only ever intended for the web and then your client decides they want print versions of them? It can be pretty frustrating to request images in a higher DPI (chances are they don’t even exist!) and finding CMYK colors that look nearly identical to the RGB colors you were using on screen. The Digital-to-Print tool allows you to instantly convert your document from digital to print by converting all RGB colors to the closest CMYK value and taking all of your images from 72DPI to 300DPI without loosing quality. The Digital-to-Print tool will also extend your document to your default bleed specifications and move all of your text into a desired print margin. (ahhh so unrealistic, but so good!)

4. Print Preview

When I am busy working away in InDesign my hand is always resting on the “W” key. I am frequently toggling between Preview and Normal mode to view my document with and without all of my guides, rules, text frames and hidden characters. But how cool would it be to toggle between Normal and Print Preview? The Print Preview tool gives you the ability to see what your document will look like printed. Granted all printers will print documents slightly different the Print Preview tool allows you to see any blemishes that are only picked up once your document is printed. I find myself printing multiple proofs of a document before I am even ready to send it off to a printer. No more wasting paper!

5. PSM Color Slider

Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign. What do all of these programs have in common? It seems that each of these programs make you do an extra step when it comes to choosing a PMS color. Not only is it time consuming to find a good PMS color using Adobe’s color library it is also annoying that every color you want to play with has to be added to your swatch library. With the PMS slider you can easily apply different PMS colors to your document. You can also take advantage of the slider to mix colors to find your perfect PMS color. Easily sample CMYK or RGB colors from your document and convert them to PMS. (Seriously has anyone ever used the CMYK to PMS technique in Photoshop? It’s horrible!)

Even though the majority of these tools could never accurately accomplish what we are after, it is still nice to day dream about what it would be like to have such convenient and time-saving tools at our disposal! Being a skilled designer means that we should be able to effectively and efficiently accomplish all of the above tasks without having to use a one-click button, however it would be nice!

What are other tools that you wish existed and would make your workflow much faster?

The lovely folks at UPrinting are giving all VelvetAnt readers the chance to win 250 die cut business cards!

Uprinting is a leading online printer who offer high-quality print solutions at great prices and with a speedy turnaround! The next time you are looking to print business cards online head over to UPrinting!

What you can win

250 die cut business cards courtesy of UPrinting. Free shipping!

How to win

Choose any of the following methods to enter:

• Leave a comment telling us why you deserve to win 250 die cut business cards from UPrinting.
• Follow me on Twitter and tweet the following: #Win 250 die cut business cards from @UPrinting and @antonea! http://bit.ly/iV17aL (contest ends 05/13) #giveaways

Die cut card specifications

• Sizes: 1.75” x 3.5”, 2” x 3.5”, or 2” x 2”; 2.5” Diameter (Circle)
• Die Cut types: Rounded Corners, Leaf, Rounded Single-Corner, Half-Circle Side, Circle;
• Cardstock: 14pt Cardstock Gloss / Matte / High Gloss (UV), or 13pt Cardstock Uncoated
• on a 6 Business Days Turnaround;
• Front Only or Front and Back printing

Rules

You must leave a valid name and e-mail address so you can claim your prize. You must be a US resident who is over the age of 18 to enter. This contest is valid until Friday, May 13th 2011 until 11:59PM EST. (Any comments submitted after this will not be considered). There will only be one (1) winner for this contest. This giveaway is sponsored by UPrinting, no monetary compensation was given. For more information about business cards, please visit UPrinting online printing services.

Good luck!

I was feeling pretty good about transitioning my e-mail from good ol’ POP into a Google Account. One account that you can control your e-mail, FeedBurner, Google Reader, YouTube and everything else through. What more could you ask for? I was feeling so good in fact that I was ready to delete the Gmail account that I have had for years… The Gmail account that I created back when you had to be invited to use Gmail by a friend and when you signed up it would send a top secret code to your mobile… The Gmail account that housed all of my Google Apps under it. After all, I only really had a Gmail account to control all of the Google Apps. I didn’t actually use it for the mail feature.

So the deletion process began. I exported my entire Google Reader feed list and loaded it into my new Google Account. Then I logged into every service that I signed-up for using my Gmail account and updated all of my e-mail addresses to my new one. I was ready! I started the step-by-step deletion process that Google walks you through, I even paused on the bit where it let me know that all of the Google Apps that were attached to my account would be permanently deleted. I was ok with this. I was ready. I already made the decision that I would recreate my Analytics, YouTube and FeedBurner account under my new Google Account, I just had to delete them all from my old account first. So I did it. My old Gmail/Google Account was long gone, to never resurface again.

After my old account was gone I logged into my new Google Account in order to reburn my feed and I got this big fat error.

What? How? Google specifically let me know that when I deleted my old Google Account that ALL of the Apps under it would be permanently deleted. How could my old FeedBurner URL be taken? This can’t be right! I visited my FeedBurner URL and what do you know…it was still active! I thought that it would probably just take a few hours to deactivate. Then days and days started to pass and my old URL was STILL active.

I spent hours and hours on Google searching for a solution. Nothing! Before I knew it weeks started to pass and I still was unable to gain access to my old feed URL. I submitted the Google Recovery form about 7 times in hopes that I would be able to reactivate my old Google Account so I could switch my feed to my new account but every time I submitted the form I would get the very disheartening automated e-mail from Google telling me that I didn’t enter enough information to recover my account.

There was no way I was going to create a new feed URL and lose all of my trustworthy subscribers and ask them to REsubscribe to my new feed URL, so I just let it be. I kept blogging and started to think I would just have to live with never knowing the statistics of my feed for the time being. Surely an answer would surface. Surely there were others out there who have had this same exact issue.

Then a glimmer of hope surfaced! On my way to work one morning I opened the app I have on my iPhone, Ego. Ego is amazing. It is a great way to quickly check your social media stats and I linked my FeedBurner to it over a year ago. In order to use FeedBurner via Ego you have to activate API Awareness. What do you know! My FeedBurner stats loaded! After not being able to check the FeedBurner stats for weeks I was finally able to see how many subscribers I had. So, for the next 2 months I would use Ego to check my FeedBurner stats. On the 60th day of not being able to login to my old FeedBurner account I opened Ego to see how my blog was going I got an Error. The first thing I thought was Google caught on to the loophole that their API Awareness option offered and now I was really out of luck! I visited my feeds FeedBurner URL and it no longer existed so just for kicks I thought I would try to burn my old FeedBurner URL using my new Google Account and what do you know…it worked!

So, what do you do in order to regain access to your inaccessable feed?

Wait. It takes Google 60 days to fully delete any service that you have deleted. After 60 days you will be able to reburn your lost feed to your new account. In the mean time you can check your feed’s stats through apps such as Ego. Unfortunately, if you did not have API Awareness enabled before losing access to your account you are out of luck and will just have to make it through the 60 day waiting period before you will be able to view your feed’s stats.

I hope this has helped anyone who is experiencing this issue. I had to shed some light on the issue because it drove me crazy not being able to find a solution to this problem. Even though waiting 60 days to regain access to your account won’t fix your issue, it will at least give you insight into the issue and hopefully help anyone who has considered creating a new URL for their feed and losing all of their subscribers.

Simplistic. Creative. Typography. Melbourne. If you’ve ever paid a visit to Melbourne, Australia the concept of this post would make a lot more sense. The architecture of the city alone amazing and if you were to wonder off onto the many side streets in Melbourne chances are you’d end up in a funky little cafe, record/art store or a clothing boutique filled with clothes you probably won’t find anywhere else. Stereotypically, many people would describe Melbourne as an artsy fartsy city full of coffee drinkers and trend setters, but when I think of Melbourne the first thought that pops into my mind is DESIGN.

I’ve stumbled upon work featured by some of the following studios on sites such as SeptemberIndustry and AisleOne. I guess you  can say I have become a bit obsessed with some of the quality work that Melbourne has been producing. What is in the water down there? I’d like to share my 10 favorite Melbourne design studios and some of their work. Enjoy! (Some of these studios may not be exactly in Melbourne, but they are all on the state of Victoria.)

Sweet Creative

Fabio Ongarato Design

Studio Brave

Hunt Studio

Coöp

Studio Round

SouthSouthWest

Hofstede Design

Studio Verse

Swear Words

I wouldn’t consider myself a seasoned blogger by any means. I have only been “actively” blogging for about a year and some odd months. Over the past year I found myself going from 1 blog post a week down to 1 post a month. Have I run out of things to blog about? This seems impossible as I wake up to my RSS reader being populated by at least 50 different posts a day. If all of these other designers are able to find things to write about why can’t I?

It comes down to quality. This blog has seen it’s share of useless round-ups and showcases beginning with a number (15 white websites….5 things a designer…). I have come to a point within the online design community where I want to read less round-ups and showcases and more about industry knowledge. If I am craving real design knowledge  surely other designers who read blogs regularly do as well. (Right?)

I haven’t run out of things to blog about I just haven’t invested enough time into thinking up quality posts.

What do readers and subscribers REALLY want to gain from reading design blogs?

Unfortunately, there is no black and white answer to this question. To help us better understand the purpose of a design blog we have to first understand the authors. Design bloggers can be classified into four common categories:

#1 Statistical bloggers
#2 Educational bloggers
#3 Inspiration bloggers
#4 Industry bloggers

Statistical bloggers

A statistical blogger may have many goals and ideas of what they would like to accomplish from the articles they write, but one of their main goals is to increase stats. These types of design bloggers are mostly interested in seeing a huge influx in their page views, retweets, clicks per minute, pingbacks, a spike in subscribers and many other analytics that they are able to generate from a single blog post. What is wrong with generating massive leads from blog articles? Nothing. The issue arises when design bloggers sacrifice quality for metrics.

Quality can be defined as useful information that is relative to the design industry. This information should be something that a reader can benefit from and bookmark for future reference. Statistical bloggers tend to overlook quality which is a key element in writing successful articles.

Statistical bloggers are good at what they do. They are able to take information irrelevant to our industry and make people look at it. This type of blogger has the potential of become very successful, but are they successful for all the wrong reasons? I think many designers who blog have fallen victim to a statistical post here and there. (I know I have!) These types of design articles are a surefire way to guarantee traffic to a design blog.

Educational bloggers

Educational bloggers are a must in the industry. These types of bloggers really give their readers a reason to read their articles and apply the information received to our professional life. Educational bloggers generally specialize in writing tutorial-based articles and/or usability tips.

Quality of an online design tutorial can be measured by:

Content – Is the tutorial easy to follow and well-written? Does it contain step-by-step images or video to support it’s copy?

Relativity – Is the tutorial relevant? Is it a tutorial that a decent portion of the online design community will benefit from? I can confidently say that I have seen too many irrelevant design tutorials. What portion of the design community wanted to know “How to draw a cartoon dragon in Photoshop” or “How to make a vector cat with a green mohawk in Illustrator”?

Originality – Has this tutorial been done before? If so, is your approach different? Is your approach better?

Educational bloggers provide a completely different source of online information for designers. Educational blogging is a real niche and if done correctly it can truly make it’s readers become better designers.

Inspiration Bloggers

Designers who blog about inspiration get it right 70% the time and wrong 40% of the time. Inspiration on the internet can be delivered in different forms. Whether the articles about inspiration are setup as round-ups, showcases or interviews they are all intended to inspire ones creativity.

The 70%: Authors who blog about inspiration do get it right the majority of the time. This 70% success rate doesn’t necessarily apply directly to the author who found 50 links on the internet and dumped them into a post. The success is indirectly awarded to the 50 authors who took the time to create the inspiration that has been shared.

The 40%: Inspirational posts fail 40% of the time for two reasons.

They simply aren’t very inspirational. I come across “inspirational” posts weekly that aren’t inspirational at all. “20 inspirational dark websites” Are the websites actually inspirational or did the author simply visit CSSMania, search for black websites, pick the first 20 websites that popped up and slap the word “inspirational” into the title to give the post meaning?

The delivery lacks an explanation. I find myself looking through many “Friday Fixs” and “Weekly Roundups” at the end of my week and the majority of the time I am trying to really figure out why each feature in the roundup was featured. Sometimes a title and a link isn’t enough. If an author truly finds something inspirational I want to know why in hopes that it will inspire me as well.

Industry bloggers

One would think that knowledge of the design industry is something that is spread evenly throughout the previous three types of bloggers and it is! However, when I say “industry bloggers” I mean the industry stand-outs. The design bloggers whose blogs ooze with creativity and knowledge. The bloggers who are industry professionals and are humble enough to share their experience and knowledge for free via an open online forum. An author who falls under this category frequently posts articles outlining their design process on chosen projects, critiques, analyzes and shares current design trends and news and is always provoking conversation amongst their readers.

A true industry blogger really puts the quality back into online design blogs.

To the fellow design bloggers: What traits from all four of these categories do you posses?

To my readers who do not blog: wWhat makes a design blog worth subscribing to?

Dixon Bikes is an independent dutch-style bike distributer based out of Sydney, Australia. Dixon Bikes goal is to get more people riding bicycles. Their mission is to create stylish and fun bicycles available to the public at affordable prices.

We are still in bit of a beta period as the site has just launched 2 days ago and we are still doing some testing with scripts and whistles to make sure that users experience a positive visit to the Dixon Bikes website. We would love feedback from the public!

It wasn’t too long ago when I posted an update on my website’s redesign. Well, it has happened again. I am not one for redesigning a site more than once a year let alone twice within 3 months! I just didn’t feel content with the site that I had up and I wanted to pull VelvetAnt back to it’s freelance roots. The previous site was intended for just that, but I don’t think I accomplished my vision with that design. I am feeling good about the minimalistic approach of this design and I think it will stick around for awhile!

With that being said here are a few screen shots of the new site. Feel free to pop over for a live view!

I stumbled across this great website via twitter yesterday: Editions of 100. Unfortunately I can’t remember who tweeted it, but I am in love!

Editions of 100 is a collection of original limited edition works featuring art, design & photography. Each work is available in an edition of 100.

This site is an  online collection of amazing work created by fellow designers and photographers. The work is sold via editionsof100.com and is limited to only 100 editions per item.

Here are some of my favorite items from the site:

Editions of 100 tote bag

BUILD A2 poster

Forbidden Alphabet B2 poster