Your Handwriting - Font

Thanks to Laura Howard for passing this cool site on!


At fontcapture.com you can create a font from your very own handwriting. There's no software to download and install, all you need is a printer and a scanner. Simply fill in the font template, scan and upload it to our website, and download your completed font. The fonts you create using fontcapture.com can be used on both Windows and Mac computers.

Free Brushes & Patterns

Need a cool pattern or brush for a project??
Check out this cool website: www.brusheezy.com

All you have to do is download the brush/pattern set-


Open up photoshop,
if your brushes palette isn't shown go to Window > Brushes


Click on the little drop-down arrow in the upper right corner of your brush palette (under the x-out) > load brushes


Another screen will come up, find where you downloaded your new brushes (mine was on my desktop) and click Load and Wah-Lah! a bunch more brushes are added to your brush palette!

**You can also donate to the artists that submitted these brushes or submit some of your own! If you would like to create your own brush but don't know how feel free to ask!

More awesome links & free stuff under Tutorials & Stock Images/Vectors on the right side of our blog page

Useful Links

Useful Links to start you out on the right foot this semester:

FACEBOOK
Be sure to follow us on facebook and get meeting reminders, link up with other students and all that other good stuff. Search for AIGA UW-Stout Student Group and don't forget to join AIGA Minnesota Student Community to get even more event info and reminders

AIGA.UWSTOUT.COM
While Colin is working on our official website we've started with a blog (this blog!) Events, Speakers, Workshops, Resources, Student Spotlights, Artist Spotlights and other fun stuff will be posted. Make sure you subscribe either through posts/atom or by your email

AIGA MN
Look around the site - there's lots to see.

AIGA PORTFOLIOS
National members have the option to create an online portfolio through the AIGA site. This can allow potentional employers to search for you and gives you a credible online portfolio. This AIGA portfolio is a great start if you're not ready to create your own webpage.

LINKED-IN
blogged about here

GMAIL
We took a poll and by the show of hands everyone that uses gmail Loves It!
Gmail can organize your emails, blogs, documents, photos and so much more. PLUS you don't have you give up your name@my.uwstout.edu - Gmail can redirect all your other email address into your gmail account. I haven't check my stout email account in a year!  *if you are switching over to gmail and having your other email redirected test to make sure they are getting redirected*

GMAIL READER
A great feature gmail has is organizing the blogs you subscribe to. 
When you want to get updates from a blog or website find the "Subscribe" link. Choose "Add to Google" then choose either "Add to Google Homepage" or "Add to Google Reader" 
Once you've subscribed to a blog you will receive updates every time they make new post. 

COROFLOT
Just like the AIGA portfolio except anyone can sign up. Coroflot

BEHANCE
This online portfolio requires you to be invited by someone else. This is a great source for inspiration! Behance

Staci Paul has a project up:

Jesse Lindhorst has a few projects up:

TWITTER
You may think that Twitter is pointless... who wants to get updates about what people are doing all the time!? But maybe you're not following the right people. Twitter allows you to be "facebook creepy" without the whole creepy part involved... and the fact that it's not facebook.  You can choose to follow people you admire, firms you want to work for, causes you are interested in and get updates about events they are hosting, new products that are coming out and tons of inspiration.
Remember to "Brand" your twitter! Here's a great template from Smashing Magazine about Twitter Templates

Minnesota Center for Book Arts Classes

Minnesota Center for Book Arts is a great resource for information and workshopsAs the largest and most comprehensive center of its kind in the nation, Minnesota Center for Book Arts (MCBA) celebrates the book as a vibrant contemporary art form that takes many shapes. From the traditional crafts of papermaking, letterpress printing and bookbinding to experimental artmaking and self-publishing techniques, MCBA supports the limitless creative evolution of book arts.

Here are two classes that could be useful for portfolios:

Round Back Spine Binding
with Roz Stendahl
Saturday, October 10; 10am-6pm
All skill levels welcome

Learn how to sew a sturdy text block on tapes without the fuss of using a sewing frame. Work with archival artist paper to create a hardbound, cloth covered journal that will accept work in wet or dry media. Only the complexity has been scaled down in this version of the traditional round back spine structure. It proves sturdy enough for intense field work and is elegant enough to grace your coffee table. Students will have the option of creating a recessed frame on the cover to hold a label made post-class. Students will be able to make this book structure again and again at home without expensive binding equipment.


Throughout the day the instructor will provide journaling suggestions, discuss how to select paper suitable for a variety of visual journaling media, and examine ways to adapt the structure's size. She will have examples of her own journals as well as other resource books on hand. (This is a more traditional version of the structure Roz taught in "Not Your Father's Casebound Journal" which used painted boards and alternative materials.)

Read more about this workshop on Roz's blog.

$110 ($100 members) + $20 supply fee

Coptic Binding: Focus on Stitching
with Sue Bjerke
Wednesday, October 14; 6-9pm
Binding experience helpful

This session is for those who already know how to wrap covers and fold signatures.  If you've been frustrated with too little sewing time in previous workshops this approach is ideal. Start with the binding process using sets of covers and quires provided, allowing plenty of time to learn the link stitch and its options. The two-needle and four-needle binding will be executed on two books, approximately 6"x 4 1⁄2" in size.  We'll discuss how to space sewing stations, two-color sewing, options for the length of the link stitch, and various options for cover materials.

$45 ($40 members) + $25 supply fee

New Eco Font

This is a new eco font that saves 20% ink when printed. It has small holes in the letters so which allow this. For designers 'going green' this is pretty cool, and maybe something to keep in mind.

http://www.ecofont.nl/ecofont.html

Swanson Homes and Realty Seeking a Graphic Designer

Swanson Homes and Realty of Eau Claire. We would like to employ the assistance of a graphic design student that is creative and uses the most current technology available in industrial media in order to prepare a Power Point presentation built for a Real Estate franchise opportunity with Better Homes and Gardens. This is an urgent request as we need to have a presentation put together no later than Monday morning 09/28. This project should take between two and four hours and we are willing to meet the student on the Stout campus over the weekend. This would be a great way for someone to add to their portfolio and resume and gain a positive reference for the future. I have listed a few sites to get a better idea of who we are working with and some of the concepts that are relevant in the local real estate market.

http://www.listedlocal.com/

http://www.ted.com/

http://www.bhgrealestate.com/

Ted.com, when using this site run a search for Daivd Rose to see a model presentation.

Listed Local is a site we currently use to market local property and the site was designed by jetpack.com.

This is a very date sensitive project – deadline is Monday!

If you are interested, please respond ASAP to Matt Meixner at mjmeixner@yahoo.com or at 715.577.9925

UW-Stout Admissions seeking Flash Designer

Melissa Perez, a UW-Stout Admissions Counselor is seeking a student that has flash experience and willing to work on a project.

Melissa is interested in having someone create some sort of "flashy" (pun intended) email for students that are accepted to Stout and when they click on the link in an email that we send them, it'd say Congrats.

Please contact Melissa Perez if your interested or if you need further information:
Melissa Perez
UW-Stout Admissions Counselor
Wisconsin's Polytechnic University
715/232.2276
AIM: UWStoutMelissa

AIGA Event: Died Young, Stayed Pretty

Poster Designed By Tanxxx


here's an AIGA event that EVERYONE, even non-members, can attend.

Thursday, October 1, 2009 7 p.m.
Walker Art Center Cinema
1750 Hennepin Ave
Minneapolis, MN 55403

This candid documentary delves into the underground poster culture in North America.

In posters for groups such as Arcade Fire, Radiohead, and Sonic Youth, these aesthetic brawlers publicly argue the merits of octopus imagery, hairy ’70s porn stars, and the spotty underbelly of Western civilization with a visual language that’s all their own—strikingly obscene, blasphemous, and often quite beautiful—and they’re not shy about throwing it in the face of polite society.

Q&A with the director follows the screening.

diedyoungstayedpretty.com
click here to register for the event

Submit your Monster

Don't forget to submit a line vector drawing of your monster(s) to AIGA@uwstout.edu to add to our t-shirt this year. Deadline is next Tuesday, September 28th

Poster Designed by Jon Daniels, AIGA member and Graphic Design Senior

Speaker : Ray Rivera : Recap

Thanks to everyone that came to Ray Rivera's talk about Resumes. For more information about UW-Stout's Career Service check out their webpage. Here is a recap for those that didn't take notes or those that couldn't make it.

HOW TO GET A JOB

1. Find the positions:

• Networking - meeting anyone and everyone to learn about what they do and what you can do for them. Majority of your time should be spend Networking and Prospecting
  
• Prospecting - calling companies.
  
• Applying to job that are advertised. Internships are almost never advertised.

2. Approach the employer

• Target what your employers want to see
• For Graphic Design majors and Multimedia majors: Employers will hardly ever give you an interview without seeing a sample of your work. You should link a webpage or PDF portfolio when you send your cover letter and resume to a potential employer.
  
• Your work will get you the job. So will your responsibility and dependability and personality.
  
• You have 10 seconds to "wow" the employer so they will read more and call you for an interview

3. Resume

• Contact info on Top. Name, Number E-mail, Address. Make sure your answering machine message is appropriate for your future employer to hear. Make sure you state your name and say in the message that "you will call them back".
  
• Cover letter - some companies read them, some don't. It's better to be save than sorry. For larger companies a cover letter is needed to state your objectives because HR may get to your cover letter before it gets moved to a designer
• Objective - needs to state what an EMPLOYER wants. Not "I want a job that will advance my skill..." Instead: A position in Graphic Design where there is a need for effective client relationships and the ability to create excitement in customers through the use of "client-centered" design.
  
• Highlights and Qualifications. For many job searches they lay out what exactly they are looking for. Tell them that you meet these requirements. Include Highest Education. Include Experience. Include Skills. Include Performance Skills. Under experience: "8 year work history noted for exceeding expectations and promotion" Stating that you have 8 years of working under your belt (even though it is not in a graphic design field) can say a lot about you as an individual. PERSONAL STORY: My first internship gave me the job BECAUSE I had been a server at a restaurant for the past 3 years. The employer knew the people-skills it takes to wait tables, how organized the job required me to be, that I could work under pressure and that I showed commitment.
  
• Education: GPA. List other things that you were also doing during that time. "3.6 GPA while working 25 hours a week".
  
• Computer Skills: Many employers will take your resume and put it into a system to scan for words. Make sure you have listed what they list as needed qualifications and skills if you want your resume to be picked up
• Professional Membership and Activities:
  
• Work History: List all your work histories, what your title was, what your tasks were, what company it was for, where the company is located and how long you had the position
  
• References Available Upon Request

Ray is available for individual critique and help with your resume. If you've never written a resume or cover letter before I would suggest making an appointment or going to the career conference.


Career Service Finding Job Video - in depth strategy on finding opportunities

Other resources:
AIGA- Presenting your portfolio
AIGA- Insights on Writing your Resume
AIGA- 10 common mistakes in resume and cover letters
AIGA- What Designers Must Learn
AIGA- A guide to internships

Contest: Global Solution

AIGA multimedia students (or graphic design students) check out this contest!

Citizens for Global Solutions Multimedia Contest 2009

$4000 in prizes is up for grabs!

This year's theme is "Choose your Global Solution" - we're looking for submissions where:

1) The stories or games have options which can lead to different outcomes and

2) the viewer/player gets to choose between those options.

We all know that the global challenges we're facing right now have many different solutions and we want you to show your audience how different choices lead to different outcomes for them and the world.

We want artists, designers, poets, activists and others to get involved and are looking for submissions in flash animation, spoken word, digital video or any other format. The only limit is your own creativity and imagination (and the rules and the criteria…but they're only there to help you, we promise!)

Message to Newbies
Don't have multimedia skills? Then team up with someone who does! Some of the best submissions in past years have come from teams of people with different strengths - someone who knows the issues, someone with tech/art skills, etc.

Important Dates:
The Deadline for submissions is November 17th, 2009

Entries will be judged by a panel of expert judges AND by all of us! The judging panel will determine their 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place awards, and we will ALL be able to view the top entries and vote on a people's choice winner.

Winners will be announced on December 17th, 2009

Speaker: Ray Rivera from Career Services

Our next meeting is Tuesday, September 22

Ray Rivera from Career Services will be speaking about Resumes, Portfolios and the resources that Stout can offer students looking for a job.

All Art and Design majors are welcome!

After Ray's talk, AIGA will briefly meet to collect checks and answer any questions that you may have about resumes and portfolios.


Poster designed by Junior and AIGA Graphic Design Director Kelli Fox

Monster Inspiration

Katy sent me this link that I would like to share with all of you to get your creative juices flowing! Just a reminder that a vector image of your monster is due by Tuesday September 29th.


Stefan Butcher DAILY MONSTER

1st Meeting Recap

Thanks for everyone for coming to the first meeting. Here are a few highlights:



MEMBERSHIP: payment due by TUESDAY, September 22nd

Option 1) National AIGA membership $50/year
Recommended for Juniors and Seniors who want to start getting involved and gain some experience

• OFFICIAL MEMBERSHIP recognized under Minnesota and Nationally
  
• receive discounts on AIGA funded events
• personal profile and portfolio on AIGA website
• access to job postings and member/company listings
• publication discounts
• able to attend meetings
• on the AIGA Stout mailing list
• able to attend University hosted events

Option 2) University membership: $10/semester.
EVERYONE has to pay this fee to be part of the Stout Organization

• unofficial membership not recognized by AIGA
  
• able to attend meetings
• on the AIGA Stout mailing list
• able to attend University hosted events

DESIGN CAMP [link]
If you don't have a National Membership already I would suggest signing up for one through the AIGA site because the checks we are sending in will take too long to process.


MAKE/THINK CONFERENCE [link]


BUSINESS CARD PRINTERS

• Vista Print
• Moo Cards
• Ideal Printers

TSHIRT DESIGN
We voted on a "Monster/Zombie" theme for t-shirts this time around. The goal is for as many people as possible to draw an original monster and submit it to AIGA@uwstout.edu
The board members will then arrange the monsters on a shirt - the front, the back, on the bottom, on the sleeve... Print them and Sell them. Posters to advertise will be up soon.


NEXT MEETING: TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 22nd
Ray Rivera from the career services will be speak to all Art and Design majors about resumes and portfolios. After the meeting you're welcome to ask the officers about their personal stories and questions because Design resumes are a bit different than business resumes.

If you have any questions please email AIGA@uwstout.edu

First Meeting

Don't miss our first meeting of the school year. Come check us out, ask questions GET INVOLVED!

Tuesday, September 15th :: 5:45pm :: AA 210

Poster Designed by Lindsey Bock, AIGA UW-Stout President and Graphic Design Senior

Designer: Paul Rand on Design

One of our goals as AIGA members is not only to learn about what's happening in the world at this very moment but to also take a look back on some of the most influential designers. This week's short shout out is for Paul Rand, an American graphic designer best known for his corporate logo designs.

[Photo via paul-rand.com]

Here's a short video of Paul Rand. If you like the video style take Stout's Design Course: Type in Motion




For more of Rand's work check out his website

[photo via: denniswilms.wordpress.com]

Competion: Flux 09

Check out AIGA's Flux competition. Entry fee is cheap. Submit things and make us proud!

AIGA at the Backyard Bash

It was great meeting so many new students and catching up with friends at the Backyard Bash tonight. In case you missed our booth our first meeting is Tuesday, September 15th at 5:45 in Applied Arts Lecture Hall 210