Blogging and all that malarkey

With modern CSS properties including Grid, Flexbox, Multi-column, and Shapes, designers have countless opportunities to make diverse, and engaging designs. Sadly, many of us haven’t had the memo which gives us permission to make more interesting work, so I decided to write that memo. Feel free to modify the message for your company or organisation and of course, circulate it to the designers on your team.

One message I wanted to put across when writing my new book was that there are already examples of art direction on the web, in products and on websites. I wanted to showcase some examples in a series of case studies.

While I was researching typefaces for a new project, I came across Dalton Maag’s case study for Universal TV. The type is beautiful, of course, but it was their graphics which got my attention.

Last year, Rachel Andrew wrote an article that took a new look at CSS Shapes in which she reintroduced readers to the basics of using CSS Shapes. In a new tutorial for Smashing Magazine, I expand on the topic of Art Direction for the Web with CSS Shapes to create exciting and inspired new design ideas.

I’ve written plenty of times before about how important it can be to look offline for inspiration to improve the things we make online. Last year, a few friends and I met in London for an inspiring visit to the Photographers Gallery.

To help celebrate the launch of Art Direction For The Web, Smashing TV’s Bruce, Scott and I spent an hour talking about my new book. The video from that conversation is now on the YouTube.

This Art Direction for the Web video course is for web designers and developers who want to understand art direction and how to make digital products and websites better.

As I mentioned on Friday, it’s taken much, much longer to produce, and is itself much, much longer than I’d planned, but my fourth book, Art Direction for the Web, will be published tomorrow. Here’s a little more about what you’ll find in the book’s almost 350 pages.

Did you buy my Art Direction for the Web video course on Vimeo? If you did, you’re entitled to free copies of the ePub, Amazon Kindle, and PDF versions of my new Art Direction for the Web book.

It’s taken much, much longer to produce, and is itself much, much longer than I’d planned, but my fourth book, Art Direction for the Web, will, at last, be published on on Tuesday 26th March by my friends at Smashing Magazine. Here’s the story behind how it happened.

I didn’t study graphic arts when I was at art school in the ’80s, but I’ve been doing a lot of catching up recently. A few years ago, I became incredibly bored with what was passing for creative design on the web at the time, and so I started to look elsewhere for inspiration for my work.

Over on 24ways, my fourteenth contribution in as many years is a tongue-in-cheek look back at how we developed websites when I started my company in 1998. In ‘Designing your website like it’s 1998’ I explain how I would’ve developed a design for ‘Planes, Trains and Automobiles,’ one of my favourite Christmas films.

It’s 20 years to the day since my wife, and I started Stuff & Nonsense, our little studio and my outlet for creative ideas on the web. Over on 24ways, it’s also my fourteenth article, this time how to Design your site like it’s 1998. It’s a tongue-in-cheek look back at how we developed websites when I started my company, complete with not so old favourites like font elements, frames, layout tables, and spacer gifs.

Yes, yes, I know. It’s the week you’re bombarded with discounts on everything from electric toothbrushes to vacuum cleaner bags, but somehow never the things you want. Well, that’s about to change my friends because this weekend only, I’m offering you up to 50^% off my Art Direction for the Web video course on Vimeo.

If, on the off chance:

• You’re reading this entry using Safari Technology Preview 68, and
• You’ve already upgraded your MacOS to Mojave 10.14, and
• You’ve selected Dark appearance in System Preferences

You’ll have noticed that I’ve implemented a brand new dark mode version of my website.

Working with CSS Grid is a lot of fun, as well as making distinctive and original layouts easier and with less code. However, using Grid does occasionally come at a cost and that is semantic markup. Fortunately, there’s a new CSS display property which—when used thoughtfully—can overcome the problem of ‘flattened HTML.’

For the past few weeks, I’ve been working with Equfund, refreshing their visual identity, redesigning their website, and developing a consistent brand experience for customers across different channels and touch-points.

For the past few weeks, I’ve been writing about the books on my studio bookcase, why I bought them and how they inspire me. (Catch up on parts one, two, and three.) Here’s the fourth and final part.

For the past couple of weeks, I’ve been writing about the books on my studio bookcase, why I bought them and how they inspire me. (Catch up on parts one and two.) Here’s part three.

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been working hard on a new ‘Art Direction for the Web’ video course to accompany my new book and I’m pleased to announce it’s now available to buy on Vimeo and watch on Skillshare.

After I posted a photograph of my updated shelves on Twitter, several people asked about the books I’ve collected. Last week I started writing about them (catch up on part one) and here’s part two.

Our shipment arrived home from Australia last week, and I had the chance to choose which of my design books and magazines to keep in my studio. After I posted a photograph of my updated shelves on Twitter, several people asked about the books I’ve collected, so over the next few weeks, I’m going to write about them.

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been working hard on a new Art Direction for the Web video course to accompany my new book. Today, I wanted to share a preview and the first episode of nine in the course.