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Dürer and Da Vinci

Most of us are familiar with da Vinci's analysis of human proportions. This drawing is from his sketchbook dated 1487. Dürer's studies of human anatomy bear a striking resemblance from nearly 50 years later.

Typography from the renaissance

Albrecht Durer's fascination with typography predates mine by more than a few centuries. The construction of letters by means of geometry is demonstrated in these examples published in 1532.

Pages from TypeCity

Not really cities, but all very beautifully done.

Type City

This small promotional booklet contains many interesting pages of typography. This is the cover.

Pages of type from fashion magazines

More about drawing ... and ideas

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Here is one of the page spreads from David Macauley's book, Rome Antics. The block of text in the lower right says, "Sun-warmed terra-cotta rooftops are tempting places to land. But a pigeon must be careful." You'll see why when you enlarge the photo.

Macauley's idea is to show views of Rome, which is not in itself very new, but to do it through the eyes of a carrier pigeon ... now that's clever.

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Yesterday my design colleagues and I made a presentation to the staff in our office. We talked about the most important part of graphic design which is ideas. In the process we made people laugh. I hope we made our point well too.

The title of the presentation was "Strategies for creative design." 

The strategy is very simple and can be described with one slide and it's this: Before you begin any assignment have the client work on a creative brief, which comprises these 6 questions:

1) What is the business challenge?

2) What are the marketing / communication objectives?

3) Who is the target audience? (demographics, psychographics, mindset)

4) What is the key message?

5) What are the important copy points?

6) What are the mandatory inclusions? (phone URL legal disclaimer)

Imagine going to a tailor and saying "Make me a suit." And if you're polite you say please, but then you dash out of the shop without letting him take your measurements. It's unlikely the suit will fit. And if it does it'll probably be the wrong color. And without a good creative design brief what you're likely to get from a designer is a poorly made piece of graphic design that doesn't fit your needs.