So, in the coming weeks/2-months, as I finish this blasted degree and start my real job (yay!), the site will probably be pretty boring, because I want to add things one at a time to make sure everything is clean and working and looking good. So many ideas, so little time– but May 9th is the freedom date.

Anyway, here’s the link on how to do thumbnails in WordPress 2.9.

Quick Tip: How to Use the New “Post-Thumbnail” Feature in WordPress 2.9 | Nettuts+.

Here’s a more in depth article on it:
New in WordPress 2.9: Post Thumbnail Images

There are many, many things I’d like to be doing here– but I’m not sure what this blog’s purpose is. I’ve thought many times of just scrapping the whole thing. Starting over. I’ve actually done that a couple of times. And now I’m pretty sure I just have no idea what I’m doing here.

Steve & I watched Julie & Julia a few nights ago, and I really, REALLY related to both of those women. The ups, the downs, the being passionate about what you’re doing… Steve said several times “Holy cow, that’s so you!” For instance when Julia Child happily said “Ta-Da!” when she finished chopping her onions before all the other dudes in the class, or when Julie gave her spiel about having A.D.D., and “That’s why I’m bad at housework.” Of course, when Julie’s husband was shoving chocolate cake in his mouth, I got to say “Holy cow, that’s so you!” to him, but that’s not the point. The point is, I loved watching this film, and it made me want to do something spectacular.

I also just found two books on Gardening by one of my favorite bloggers, Gayla Trail at You Grow Girl, and ordered them both. I hadn’t been watching her blog for a while, but every February I just get sick of all the snow and start thinking green, and thinking about growing things that will feed us. Amazon had just replenished my Christmas Gift Card amount after my Meggs History of Graphic Design failed to be delivered by the 3rd party seller (grr), and I just wanted to start thinking green, and now I’m reading over her blog going “OH! Paw-Paws!”

There’s something there that I just don’t have. One, I think, is time. The other, I think, is focus (“I think I have A.D.D.” ha ha). The site itself needs to be about my art & my business, but I think the blog needs to be rethought.

I’ve got my first “real” graphic designer job lined up already, which is super, super, super cool (especially that it’s local. And even more especially that it’s for another artist!) So if I can just survive this 21 credit hour mad race to the finish line that is Graduation… We’ll see what happens.

I’ll be thinking about what I’m doing here. I’ll get back to you.

In the meantime, here are the spiffy books & the movie that have inspired me this week:

Super cool. Found this here. You can find the link to the actual site here, too. 7 rules to understand design & designers | TypoJungle.

Not only is Magenta not really a color (see this article. It explains), but apparently it’s owned by T-Mobile. This is a really interesting, and a little frightening article about big-business starting to own rights to something as universal as color.

Color: The Next Limited Resource?.

Consider them documented:

Marian Bantjes:

Her handwritten typography, swirly flourishes, and work with ball point pens (no kidding!) made me an instant fan. She has an incredibly convenient section in her “About Me” that includes answers to Frequently Asked student questions, that allows you to learn a lot about her, and her inspirations, influences and References.

Laura Smith

Retro, Art Deco, illustrations and typography… I love the colors and the style here and on her site. These things make me happy!

To be fair, on the first post, I really liked Italian Graphic Artist Alberto Seveso and Logo Designer Graham Smith. But in looking at the roundup of 7 females, I realized that in all the listening and reading I’ve done in the last couple of years, the mention of boys in the podcasts far outweighs the mention of girls.

In discussing this with Prof. Benjy, he attributes this to 3 things that have absolutely nothing to do with talent or ability, which are at least equal in men and women. 1. Male’s competitiveness and drive to be #1, while Women are more prone to work cooperatively, 2. Male discrimination, and 3. The woman’s possession of the uterus. This third one is changing as men become more involved in the lives of their children. There may be more than this, these are just the things that are immediately clear to him, and make perfect sense to me.

It has nothing to do with the idea that boys are better than girls, it’s just that girl’s names tend to get lost in the jumble.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not really angry about this. It’s just the way it is. There are women out there, fantastic, talented women like Laura Smith and Marian Bantjes, for me to up to. It’s just a matter of finding them, and maybe becoming one myself. Both are things I plan to do.

So, the moral of this story? It pays to look in the comments of the blogs you read

ps. If you are angry about the oppression of women in the world of art– Benjy says check out Guerrilla Girls. And I ask that you put that anger to better use than to just complain about it.

BrushView QuickLook PlugIn | BrushViewQL.

I can’t believe I didn’t know this existed! Here I am, with Leopard on my Macbook for a year, and I didn’t know this existed!

Do you have Leopard? Find a font file on your computer. Click on it once, without opening it. Hit the space bar. You’ll see the contents of the file! Magic!

With this BrushView plugin, you can see the contents of your photoshop brush files, so you don’t have to have every single one of them loaded all the time. My sanity has been saved!

QuickLook– use it, love it!

*edit*

Found a plugin for AI Files, too! YAY! Here.

:: YOGAmazing::502.896.9642::.

Be sure to check out “Yoga for Geeks” for stretches at your desk =)

Also “Yoga for Musicians” and “Yoga in a Gallery” Yoga in a Minute episodes.

I’m now watching “Yoga for better Memory.” He’s entertaining, charismatic, knowledgeable, and you wouldn’t know he’s from Louisville, Kentucky until he says “Fire” or “Prior” (Fahr or Prahr). Fun.

If you’ve been interested in it but never really gotten into it before, it looks like this would be the one to help. I’ll try and stick with it this time!

Dustin shared this with me, it’s funny ’cause it’s true.

I added it to my links. It’s a shame, because all my best content is in the links section. Wish there was a way to automatically add links to posts, or at least include additions in the RSS feed.

Oh well.

Here’s a sneak-peak preview of what’s coming up in CS5… interesting stuff with paint & warping. It’s a bit corny, but the techniques are cool.

(These guys found it first, I’m just passing it on to you.) Photoshop CS5 Sneak Peek Video: Wet Paints & Warp Tool | GoMediaZine.

Enjoy ♥

This just made me smile. There are many more = Cute Sleeping Animals..

For now, here are a couple of my favorite type-related finds of the day. Enjoy.

Awesome headline font available for free.

“It’s free, not only in price, but in freedom.”

The League of Moveable Type — League Gothic .

Also, a nice “Sleek Pressed Letter Design” tutorial from myinkblog.com to go with it.

Create a Sleek Pressed Letter Design.

Photo by pedrosimoes7 (from the LifeDev post)

This article was talking to me today. Rio’s Financial Aid/Accounting/Human Resources departments have been taking a toll on me the past few weeks. I’m almost convinced they want me to starve (not so much Accounting, they seem to be pulling for me). Not to mention feeling busy to the point of exhaustion, and Reni’s new schedule tearing me up. The thought has definitely crossed my mind that it might be easier to just give up & get whatever work I can get.

But Benjy & some other art faculty and friends have been encouraging me. So have newfound FOF friends. And of course I wouldn’t be anywhere near this point without Steve. God keeps telling me I’m on the right track, just keep dealing with these obstacles. I’m almost done. Just need to keep my eyes on the prize and hope for a better future.

Anyway, here’s the article:

Don’t Sell Out! You Were Born For a Reason | LifeDev.

JUST KEEP SWIMMING!

via Skitch.com > jeskagwen > Dreamweaver.

Stephen’s Character narrates as Wesley goes through Mrs. Drablow’s Affairs.

The language is going to be very old-fashioned, adding to the mood of the play. Mr. Kipps goes through is nights of horror as he is haunted by the woman in black.

If you have a spare hour (it’s looking like it won’t be much longer than that) on the weekend of the 9th, 10th, and 11th (between Farm Fest, Homecomings and Todd Agnew! ARG!) you should definitely come check it out.

I don’t know who schedules these things, but they really need to get together and go over their calendars. It seems like you go through weeks and sometimes months with nothing going on, and then all these things happen at the same time.

Anyway, if you’re at all able on Friday Night of the 9th, Saturday Night of the 10th, or Sunday afternoon of the 11th, you should definitely come experience this one. Steve and Wes are doing a great job. More Info | Buy Ticket (type “ariel.”)

Decided to make art for art’s sake this morning. Actually really liked the result. You can get the poster on Zazzle, and I added it as a special edition magnet in the Magic Magnets.

FlexCal powers iCal with a hotkey. It’s just a preference pane for Mac OSX that allows you to add events or tasks to iCal with a hotkey. And it’s free. Things is super cool for task management, but the hotkey was really what sold me on the program. Now I can do it with iCal, which I already had. Oh well.

It appears that you can only do one or the other, though– events or tasks. And since Things syncs up with iCal’s ToDo’s, maybe it wasn’t a complete waste of money I had at the time. But for those of you who are looking, look into FlexCal before you spend any cash, and just use what you already have. Time will tell which one wins with me, because one of them has to.

Steve wanted a “Pollock” for his birthday on Friday. In fact he’s wanted one since I told him about seeing this film in Movies About Art class last year. So, Reni & I obliged =)

Then we had to scrub off the oil paint!

Having an artistic Ohana is definitely a blessing in my life. Reni was excited all week about surprising him with this, and in the process she got a lesson in art history from my describing to her what kind of art Jackson Pollock did. It was a fun project! And if you’re not afraid of getting messy I encourage you to try it next time you have kids with nothing to do.