Apr 12
My article in Design In Flight
2005 at 02.20 am posted by Veerle Pieters
About 8 months ago or so I took a subscription on Design In Flight, a PDF magazine targeted to graphic design professionals and web developers. Soon after I subscribed Andy Arikawa asked me if I would be interested in writing an article for the magazine. I was honored he asked me and of course I said yes, how could I not.
I felt a certain pressure to meet the high level set by the previous publications. You see, designing stuff is like a second nature to me, but writing about it is something else. Of course my blog gives me a lot of exercise (especially on my English! ;-)) and it gets better by experience.
Not that the subject was the most difficult part of the task but, it sure helped that some readers of the magazine gave me a few ideas: drawing pixel art, color theory and changing the user experience with styling form controls (good or bad). This way I knew that people wanted to read about these subjects. Since I found them all interesting I decided to pick one of these.
At first I was aiming for issue #3. December 2004 still seemed like a long time away. But it became November and I still hadn't made a decision on what I would write about. November and December were such hectic months that I couldn't find the time to write, so I decided to go for the next issue. By the end of January I decided to do a writing about Color Theory because I felt that this subject is something that I feel good at. Colors are so important in a design and it isn't always obvious to pick out the 'right' ones.
Since I didn't made it for issue #3 I thought I better plan, otherwise it could end up the same way again. These are the steps I took:
- do some research and gather some information and source material
- set up a basic structure for my article
- write the article (rough version)
- make the illustrations and do some fine-tuning in the article
And now the big moment has arrived, my article is published in issue #4. Hope people will enjoy reading it and learn from it. Other contributors in this issue are : Hrant H. Papazian, Kevin Cornell, Yasuhisa Hasegawa, Mark Boulton, Suw Charman, Gilbert Lee, Khoi Vinh, Molly E. Holzschlag and Damien Newman.
Each issue costs $3.00 but if you take a subscription on the first volume (including back issues 1, 2 and 3), it will cost you only $10.00, which is really great price for such quality stuff.
18served
1
Really loved the article in DIF (Great magazine for those who are interested, definitely worth the $10).
Especially how you made the connection between the theory about colors and how to use them in a design.
I do think you need to make a correction the current April 2005 issue IS issue #4, not #5.
2
@Benjamin, oups! You’re right I jumped an edition :-S I’ve fixed my error. Great you like my article :-)
3
Veerle,
Your article is great!
I really enjoyed the entire magazine. I know that it is not an easy task to produce such high material, but I would pay for more than 4 issues an year. What do you think?
4
Loved your article and the links and the colour movie. WOW. I watched it 5 times already and dare I say for $10/year Design in Flight is simply amazing!
5
cool magz!
BTW, can i add u in my blog since i need references in graphic design development.
yeah, i work as a graphic designer. :)
thanks.
6
I read and enjoyed your article.
I’ve been with DIF since issue #1 and have never regrettet it. It’s a great magazine.
7
Congratulations, Veerle.
That’s a really nice article and a good magazine in general.
8
The colour looks good :)
9
Thanks for a great link and for a great article… So I hope I’ll get a copy of Design In Flight this month… ;)
10
Nice one Veerle. It’s a fantastic article on dispelling some of the mysteries around colour.
11
Looking forward to reading your article. Downloading it as I type.
12
Nice to see a picture of veerle ;)
13
@Humberto: It would be nice if there where more issues but only with a promise that the quality would remain the same at least that’s what I think.
@Amit: The movie is lovely I know ;-)
@Marc Boulton: Still have to read yours and the others. Damn too busy right now. Clients hé! Planning on some reading in the weekend.
@All: Thanks for the nice words. It sure feels good that everyone likes it ;-)
14
Dang!
I have issues 3 and 4 waiting on my drive to be printed, but I just didn’t get around to it yet; this certainly is all the more reason to make that time!
15
Great article in DIF, Veerle and I’m glad they posted a little photograph of you on the last page so I can finally see what you like like. You’re cute but we could’ve guessed as much :-)
16
hi! i really enjoyed your blog. it seems you have a great work!
by the way, where are you from? you said about improving English…
17
I’m really impressed with your blog. It just shines through that you have fun doing what you do. And you’re good at it.
thx for all of this,
rm
18
Hi Veerle -
I finally got around to getting your copy of Design in Flight. It is a great publication and your article on color was right on target for planning web sites. You have a great eye for color, and you are absolutely right - don’t try to change the logo - but build your site around the existing logo color(s). (At least that is what I thought you said!) At any rate, I took this advice, and decided to apply it to the web site I have been working on.
Glad to know about Design in Flight - the other articles in the magazine were also very enlightening about web trends, and proportionality in design and art. I really enjoyed reading it.
_ Jackie