Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with design

tool to reblog and share a collection of web pages?

incandescentman — Tue, 21 May 2013 08:54:29 -0800

Is there a tool that will let me store/archive web pages or parts of web pages, and then create a little mini library of reblogged content along with navigation links? I'm planning a road trip with some friends, and I am collecting information from various relevant websites—national parks, campgrounds, Google Maps, etc.

I want a way to easily share this web content with my friends.

All the obvious ways to do this seem suboptimal:

1. Send an email with a bunch of links (they have to click through to see the content)
2. Copy/paste web content INTO an email, which gets long and cumbersome and is hard to reference/search/find later on
3. Build a website from scratch with relevant content

Is there a tool that will let me store/archive web pages, or parts of web pages, and then create a little mini library of archived content that we could all refer to and browse through? I'm envisioning a little mini website, with hierarchical navigation links in the left pane, and the reblogged web content in the right pane.

Sharing an Evernote notebook kind of does this, but there doesn't seem to be much control over the navigation on the left, nor the ability to easily add my own content.

Graphic file formats, master files, Inkscape and me

Biblio — Sun, 19 May 2013 16:01:38 -0800

How do I get Inkscape files ready to be worked on in Illustrator? I have some SVG files that I need to give to a professional graphic designer. These are files relating to a logo that I designed myself for our church. The designer is the husband of a church board member who has agreed to give us some design help.

The logo was created in Inkscape and saved as color, grayscale and b and w SVGs. I also exported the files into PNGs.

The designer says neither of those files are standard and he needs them to be EPS so he can use them to create master files in Illustrator. He shouldn't actually need to edit the logo itself.

I feel like I'm getting some weird attitude from this board member because I created this logo without being a bonafide designer like her husband. So I'm trying to make sure anything I send her at this point is exactly what she and her husband want. I downloaded a trial of Illustrator to see what would happen if I sent him the files the way I have them. The last thing I want is to hear back that they can't get the files and now we have to start all over again.

The SVGs open fine, but don't render as smoothly as in Inkscape. Lines are jagged and colors look desaturated. If I save the SVGs as EPS files in Inkscape (at 300 dpi) I get the same result in Illustrator. If I open either file in Scribus they look fine on the screen. If I print any of these files from any of these applications they print almost 100% perfectly. If you look closely, though, there is still some jaggedness on the diagonal lines.

I know I could just send him the EPS files as is, but I want to make sure that:
A. My original vector will print as smoothly as possible even after being converted to other formats
B. My EPS is saved the best way for this guy to work on in Illustrator
C. There isn't a better way to get him the files that he and I are missing

How to find a Web designer to improve a current design?

mark7570 — Fri, 17 May 2013 11:00:15 -0800

I have mostly completed a website design for a small company - logo, colors, info architecture - but the visual effect of all the elements together isn't.. quite.. "there" yet. How would I go about finding a Web designer who could improve the design "the rest of the way"? For example - take the existing elements and, either modify some, or add a couple of touches here & there, to pull the design together into a more attractive, visually "tight" design.

I know how to go find a design agency to create a new idea from scratch, but how do you go about finding a designer (or design team/agency) to take an existing design & *improve* it?

Free (or cheap), clean, minimal, mostly text Wordpress theme

codacorolla — Thu, 16 May 2013 18:08:38 -0800

I'd like a place to put up a CV and occasionally some writing. I'm looking for a minimal, clean, and if possible free Wordpress theme. In terms of references, I really like the look of Grantland articles (for example, the first thing I clicked on their frontpage). I love the running header, the minimal navigation, the centered space for an article, the white space, the blocking, and the running foot-notes on the side.

I want in the industry, but how should I take the first step?

Saydur — Thu, 16 May 2013 17:49:45 -0800

I'm trying to get a specific job title, but it is a difficult one to find. What is the best course of action to take here? I have found that I am deeply interested in a specific job title in a specific industry which is a fairly narrow position. There are quite a few open positions for this job title, but they consistently demand experience in that exact job title.

What I speak of is a "Game Monetization Designer" which is based around making video games profitable. The biggest obstacles I have found are that it is particularly difficult to find people with this title that I can speak to in order to become more familiar with the community and make professional connections, the specific nature of the job means that I haven't found any other positions in other fields which would provide more than a little bit of relevant experience, and the demand for experience before obtaining the position.

I would be willing to take a different position if it would be a likely path towards what I want in the long term. I have not found any positions which do not demand experience. I would not be able to take an unpaid internship, but starting off at the low end of a livable wage is quite fine. Statistical analysis and sales research are enjoyable to me in general, but the fast pace of the industry is a very serious attraction, so another position in the gaming industry would be quite fine. I would also be interested in similar work for the casino and gambling industry, given that it is also a relatively fast paced entertainment field.

So really, my question is, what's the best direction to take here? I am having an extraordinarily difficult time making connections, so I'm looking for the next best options. I would have more confidence in most other industries, but this title is so specific and experience demanding that I don't really know where to begin.

Hacks for Graphic Designers

oceanview — Wed, 15 May 2013 12:06:51 -0800

I need some hacks to help me try to decrease the amount of time it takes to complete a graphic design project. Hey all,

I've gone to design school but am finding that it takes me a looong time to put together a brochure, webpage, poster--whatever.

I need some design hacks, i.e. a list of things I can try that may improve the design while hopefully speeding the process along. Things like:

-Use google images to look at other designs for inspiration
-Add a textured background
-Make elements as aligned as possible
-Fix any wonky type spacing
-Ensure space between elements is balanced as possible
-Ensure there's an optimal amount of space between elements and the edge of the paper
-Add an illustration
-Add a photo
-Obey the rule of 3rds as much as possible.
-Is the page size the best size for the amount of information presented? Should it be bigger or smaller?
etc

Has anyone ever come across a list like this. If not, can you offer more items to add to the list?

Graphic designer desperately needs a better job!

Ursula Hitler — Sat, 11 May 2013 16:34:31 -0800

Somebody I am very close to is a senior designer at a graphic design firm in Southern CA. She has been there many years. She is ridiculously overworked and underappreciated, and while she has achieved some authority in the company she has also hit the glass ceiling pretty hard and she is dealing with some covert but undeniable workplace sexism. She desperately wants to quit and work someplace else, but for a million special snowflakey reasons, it is very difficult to make that happen. Help? She has no connections outside her current firm, she basically works from when she wakes up to when she goes to bed 7 days per week (so she really has no time for "networking") and she is so depressed and demoralized that she claims there's little point in looking for another job because she'd just face the same sexism and underappreciation at the next firm. (I disagree, and think her current firm is super fucked-up.) For various reasons she can't afford to earn less than she's earning now, and she can't risk her bosses finding out that she's looking elsewhere. She is not the freelancing type, and rejects that whole idea.

So.

Is there any way she can find out more about the office culture at rival firms? How can she find out if a firm works people to death or is run by assholes, short of getting hired there and finding out the hard way? (Again, it would be extremely challenging for her to go out and network without causing problems at her current job.) Is there some sort of insider-y design message board or something? Some magazine or website that runs in-depth profiles of firms?

Online job ads aren't very helpful (I get the feeling that most firms don't recruit online) and research suggests that headhunters aren't very helpful either. Is there some viable headhunter service she should try - somebody who knows the field and can actually find her a better job?

I'm leaving a lot out, partly to protect her privacy and partly because this question is too long already. What it comes down to is, how the heck can she find a new graphic design job that doesn't make her totally miserable?

Looking for examples of beautiful programming cheat sheets

primer_dimer — Fri, 10 May 2013 02:42:28 -0800

I have an urge to make a series of cheat sheets for a project that currently lacks them (the Grails web framework, if anyone's interested) and am looking for design inspiration. It's easy to find cheat sheets online, but most of them are (perfectly functional!) variations on zebra-striped tables. Googling for "well-designed cheat sheets" and similar gives results that contain cheat sheets for designers - I am looking for examples of well-designed cheat sheets that use color, typefaces etc. in a way that's information-dense but also pleasing to the eye. If anybody has links to examples of cheat sheets (for programming languages or otherwise), please leave a comment.

Can you please help me find an example website with "floating" text?

jefficator — Wed, 08 May 2013 14:28:47 -0800

I'm trying to find an example website to send to my web developer of "floating" text. I'm sure there's a better name for what I'm trying to describe. Basically, I literally mean that different lines of a short paragraph are "floating" in different directions and different fonts over an image. Does this make sense? Can someone think of better words to describe? Best yet, can someone link to a site that has similar text? Thank you in advance!

Getting Your Creative Motivation Back After A Long Dry Spell?

Anonymous — Tue, 07 May 2013 09:56:30 -0800

I went on a long, long break form my creative career cause I was feeling burnt out due to some failures and now I can't seem to get back into it, possibly because I no longer have a financial incentive to do so. How can I fix this? Warning: Long, super privileged person problems. Back-story: Due to some very lucky sets of circumstances I got to basically retire at 30. If I keep my expenses small and baring some horrible catastrophe, I don't really *have* to work ever again. I can devote all my time to my creative career(s). To celebrate this, I took a six-month break from working.

During this break I wasn't eating bon bons on the couch - I learned how to cook, to clean, to garden, went to the gym five days a week, got boots on the ground involved in politics, I helped friends out with their creative projects, spent a lot of time with my SO, and traveled around the world.

I had a set time to end this "vacation" where I didn't think of or work on anything "important". It passed three months ago. I still can't concentrate on my work. I sit with my brain and go "This is what we are doing now. We are working on THIS now."

And I can't. It's not block, I know what block feels like. It's not depression, I know what that feels like. I know exactly what I have to do and made charts and graphs and research notes for years and then I sit down and a fog descends over me and I can't physically make myself think about what I have to do. It's a complete and total fear response. Just thinking about the work ahead makes me literally start to sweat and want to flee the room.

My last two/three big projects have been flops or didn't perform as well as expected and now people are starting to not return my calls/e-mails. I've had success before, I know I'm not untalented. I know I am good at this. But I'm not getting a lot of ....external validation that I should keep trying now that I no longer *have to* for economic reasons.

What do you do when one of the one things you're really very good at just stops being fun? Like at all? I'm getting a little tight-chested just writing this but I can't take another failure, it takes so much effort for so little reward, and it makes me feel weak and self-involved that I'm hurt so much by professional rejection or lack of recognition.

And then I feel guilty for being such a whiny bitch who has a perfect fucking life and is totally an ideal situation to do whatever they want that people would kill for so buck up, shut up, and just do it. Everyday spent avoiding it is another day wasted.

And then I don't do it and feel worse. I'm terrible with self imposed deadlines cause I know I can ignore them and that makes me feel even worse. All my other successful projects have been contract work, with strict deadlines attached. Now I'm doing mostly spec and it's impossible to visualize the end-game.

So, how do I get myself out of this funk? And it really feels like a funk, like I crashed from the highs of the vacation and now can't will myself out of no matter how I try and chant CBT slogans to myself. How do I get my desire to work back? How can make myself do things I don't *have* to do? Where did my ambition go and how can I get it back?

Look at the chimneys?

teststrip — Mon, 29 Apr 2013 01:49:40 -0800

Looking for a design project: A few years ago I saw a design project where someone made a set of black and white business cards or similar, that told people to look up at chimneys/roofs when they were down, as the light stimulated some sort of happy-chemical. But now I can't find it! I would love to see it again, if any of you lovely people have a clue what I'm talking about - or if you know of any sort of similar niftily presented data snippet about happiness tips and tricks I'd be interested in that too.

How to Create a User-Friendly InDesign Template - Best Practices

Hello Darling — Sat, 27 Apr 2013 15:23:38 -0800

I need to create a user-friendly InDesign template for a client that they can re-use and customize slightly over and over. Normally I'm the one doing the customizing so I'm a little leery of my ability to produce an editable template document that will be easy for someone else to use with less InDesign knowledge. (I'm somewhere between being a beginner and an intermediate user.) Fellow designers, could you weigh in with tips, warnings, and resources? There will be about unique 10 page templates, each of which will have master elements that should be able to have their color changed en masse but not their position. 2-3 of the pages will need to be duplicated over and over as a set but I'm not sure how to make that easy to do. I Googled "how to make an InDesign template" and am attempting to sift through the morass of old tutorials. Tips and advice along the lines of, "Always do X, never do Y" are appreciated. Document will mostly be used in PDF form, though eventually I'll be working to help the client print and bind it. Thank you!

This is not for the boss I described in a previous AskMe last month, in case any one asks.

Human Vision Heuristics?

ZenMasterThis — Fri, 26 Apr 2013 08:48:49 -0800

Are there any rules of thumb that human factors experts, graphic designers or user interface designers use regrading how much detail a typical human eye can resolve in different commonly-encountered situations? The company I work for makes oil & gas drilling instrumentation that puts wiggly lines on 300 dpi B&W and 600 dpi color paper multi-track strip charts. Trained experts (our customers) then use the wiggly lines to make decisions about what to do next while or after drilling a well.

I would like to find some commonly-used graphics / human factors heuristics to help guide our new product requirements. In other words, where's the point of diminishing returns where most people couldn't tell the difference and it's pointless for us to improve upon the source measurement or wiggly line resolution any further?

Are there any rules of thumb that human factors experts, graphic designers or user interface designers use regrading how much detail a typical human eye can resolve in different commonly-encountered situations?

Are there any online resources / articles in this area?

Thanks, hive mind!

Test-retest reliability design: How can I measure participants?

whalebreath — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 07:12:52 -0800

I am conducting a study in which I want to administer the same questionnaire to participants at two times (one week apart). I am trying to figure out if there is a way to do this all online, either through SONA software (which is accessible to me) or through some other software that I could link to from SONA. Thanks for your help! Pertinent details:

- I will be administering the same questionnaire twice, with a one-week interval between administrations.

-I need some way to track participants in order to compare their first questionnaire to their second one. Maybe a confidential participant code that they could enter at each administration.

- I will be using SONA participant pool in order to recruit participants. I am hoping to be able to have them just click a link, take the survey, and then receive an email a week later prompting them to take the survey again.

If anyone has done this or has insight into SONA or other software that could help me achieve this, I'd love to hear from you!

Pick a color, any color...

erskelyne — Sat, 20 Apr 2013 17:51:15 -0800

This post on the blue reminded me of a site i saw some time back. Essentially, you picked up to, I believe, three colors, and the app would find images all across the web that matched those colors. Fairly useful and entertaining resource that has slipped my mind until now. Any clue as to what and where it was?

Help me bring my fabric design idea to fruition!

orrnyereg — Tue, 16 Apr 2013 00:55:58 -0800

An enthusiastic but unskilled n00b needs help putting together a Spoonflower fabric design. I have [what I think is] a terrific idea for a fabric design to be printed on Spoonflower. I want to put an array of roundels from various national air forces on a steel gray background.

The problem is, I have zero design experience and no access to design software except for MS Paint. Can the designer cadre of AskMe point me in the direction of web-based software or apps that will help me put this together? Please halp!

(I mean, look at Brazil! Isn't that awesome?)

Modula? Modula? Wherefore art thou, dude?

Chrischris — Mon, 15 Apr 2013 16:29:06 -0800

Who or what was Modula? Not the typeface, or the programming language, but the album cover designer of such bizarre creations as Fleetwood Mac's "Mystery to Me" and Camel's self-titled album. Numerous google searches turn up nothing.

Hey, Art!

heyho — Sat, 13 Apr 2013 18:26:37 -0800

Please tell me of your favorite art/design/architecture blogs, pages, and websites — the more obscure, the better. I see a lot of art, but I don't see enough art. I'm looking not so much for current-happenings type links, but rather pretty much everything else, including no-longer-updated-but-still-standing art/design blogs that are very well curated.

Or a particular art/design school's website that is brimming with interesting galleries. That sort of thing. Something I'm not likely to find by tripping down a Wikipedia path. An extremely fascinating (amateur) Flickr or Instagram account, even. Or an art or artist fansite that is particularly detailed or otherwise compelling. Or a small-museum website that can't be missed. Or the site of an obscure-but-amazing artist who no one seems to be aware of.

I'd rather not describe which styles, periods, or media I tend to prefer because I'm getting bored with my own direction, so show me what's great!

Resources for desiging a fitness room for our public safety building.

maleru — Fri, 12 Apr 2013 16:54:44 -0800

Can anyone recommend resources for designing a fitness room for a public safety building? Including: blueprints for room dimensions equipment recommendation anything else I can't think of? I have been tasked with developing a proposal for our city council as we move forward with the design of a new public safety building. This building would be a functioning Fire Department, Police Station, EMS, and 911 Dispatch.
Seeing as the building serves the needs of two different departments, we would need to account for physical fitness training for all responding Firefighters/Emergency First Responders and Police officers. The requirements I know of now include an area for takedown drills for the Police Department, enough space for up to 4 people to work out, various aerobic stations for the Fire Department, as well as upper body strength training.
I am not looking for a lot of single purpose machinery, we are working on a fitness program with a minimal fitness routine (pushups, pull-ups, sit-ups, squats, dips, etc.), would want basic free weights, a treadmill or two (or equivalent cardio trainer that is NOT a stationary bicycle).

More information, our city has been fighting funding this every step of the way! Our current fire department floods when it rains or snows, we don't have enough space to park our apparatus as it. In the winter we get months at a time with sub-freezing temperatures, with regular winds around 60mph.

If anyone has designed a space for this purpose, or works in a fire department with an adequate fitness room, PLEASE advise me. Thanks!

The visual equivalent of 'Prisencolinensinainciusol'

Gordafarin — Sat, 30 Mar 2013 03:25:24 -0800

There are Latin fonts designed to mimic Cyrillic, Asian characters, and many other scripts. What are some examples of foreign-script fonts which mimic Latin characters?

What font has been used in onscreen text of Zero Dark Thirty?

amar — Fri, 29 Mar 2013 19:46:25 -0800

The other day I was watching the movie and like the font. First I thought it's TNR then I thought maybe some Sans but I couldn't figure out. I loved the clean spacious fonts. Which one was it? IS there any way I could find out such info without asking anyone? Maybe if I have original DVD/BR file or so, the text must have been inserted/embedded somewhere after the film was shot.

Chicken or Egg? Who comes first, copywriter or designer?

gravitypanda — Wed, 27 Mar 2013 11:44:39 -0800

I want an awesome website and I have wireframed the whole thing. I am planning on using the design contest process on 99designs and I have found an amazing copywriter on Odesk. Who should do their part of the work first? So, if I hired an agency to build this, obviously the copywriter and designer could talk, get coffee, have meetings and brainstorm. But I don't think I have that luxury. The way 99designs works I can get revisions, and in theory I could have my Odesk copywriter give input on the designs I get on 99design. But still, the essential question remains:

(1) --Who should do their job first?'

----1a----Do I get all the copy and give it to the designer with the wireframe?
----1b---Do I give the wireframe to the designer and give that output to the copywriter?

(2) How do the pros do it? What is the website building process in a crazy-cool urban shop?
(3) I am assuming that I bring in my coder once I have the photoshop design files from 99designs and the copywriting finished. Is this assumption correct? Is there any reason the coder needs to be brought in earlier?

Bonus Question.... As I go through this process, I don't have a budget to go around twice. Any tips for me to manage costs and get what I want as I go through the outsourcing process?

**Thanks to all of you that take the time to answer. I am continually amazed at the generosity and intelligence of the mefi community.

Scrolling past the most recent 20 articles at io9 and deadspin?

mediareport — Tue, 26 Mar 2013 06:11:15 -0800

I get that Nick Denton has some sort of fixation on breaking the simple functionality of scrolling backward through a blog's archives, but the last time Gawker sites redesigned, you could work around the breakage by going to "blog.[gawkersite].com" to get it back. Is there currently any way to scroll back past the most recent 20 articles at the front pages of io9 and deadspin? Note: I've tried, but don't care about the Kinja comment system at all; I just want to read the posts on occasional visits. Is Gawker Media just writing visitors like me off or is there a workaround to the elimination of easy access to older stories?

simple electronic ciruit

ortological — Mon, 25 Mar 2013 19:17:17 -0800

I have a circuit whose output drives a beeper(piezoelectric transducer). It beeps at 1200 Hz 3 volts and a duty cycle of 1.5 seconds. I would like to get a DC whenever the beeping starts and 0.0 volts whenever there is no beeping signal. Can anyone help me design a simple circuit to do this? The end goal is to drive a small DC motor that is used to produce vibration in a cell phone. Thanks in advance, Ortological

Pump Up The Soap. Pump Up The Soap. Pump Up The Soap. Pump It Up!

Rewind — Sat, 23 Mar 2013 14:22:17 -0800

How the hell do you get everything out of a bottle that uses a plastic pump dispenser? Pump Dispensers. I love them because they allow for easy access to vital items such as liquid soap, Purell, moisturizing lotion, olive oil, hairspray, and Windex (to name just a few.) However, one aspect of their design has annoyed the fuck out of me for years. Specifically, what exactly do you do when the volume of the substance being dispensed reaches a level below that of the long stick portion of the dispenser that sits inside the bottle and which the substance is supposed to travel up?

For really liquid items such as hairspray and Windex, I generally go through this bizarre ritual that involves a lot of tilting of the bottle, such that the last remnants of the liquid just barely touch the tip of the stick thingy inside, and then I quickly start pumping to maximize the amount I get. However, half the time I end up spraying myself in the face rather than the intended target because of the direction of the tilt.

For slower moving items such as gels and soaps, I feel my only option is unscrew the dispenser portion itself, tilt the bottle, and then sit there for an eternity while the substance slowly crawls its way to the open end where my anxious hand awaits. And, for REALLY slow moving items like moisturizing lotion… well, I’m just screwed. Turning the bottle upside down and opening as necessary is, of course, an option but it usually involves a precarious balancing act against a wall or shelf and the bottle is easily tipped, thus ruining everything. Plus, when you do open the top using this method, shit just comes flying out the open end, causing a mess and making everyone involved very cross.

At times it’s enough that I just give up, rinse out whatever’s left, and throw it into the recycling bin. But, there again, in the case of liquid soap, there’s often enough left that I’m sitting at the sink for several minutes filling and emptying over and over again until all the soap is gone. Maddening, I tell you!

So – finally - my question, in two parts:

a) Can you offer any tips on quickly and easily accessing the last remaining bits of goodness at the bottom of a plastic pump dispenser bottle without causing a mess?

b) If your answer is to rinse and recycle, how do you minimize suds and save water without leaving residue behind that will piss off the staff at the recycling center? Oh, and can the pump itself be recycled easily, since it’s a combination of plastic pieces AND an internal metal spring in one unit?

Thank you in advance, hive mind, for helping me solve this critical puzzle of our time, and restoring a small piece of my sanity.