Focus on Imaging – Birmingham, UK

January 31st, 2007 by Jim Kidwell

Focus on Imaging 2007 Focus on Imaging is Europe’s biggest annual imaging show is scheduled for February 25th-28th this year. The show includes everything from cameras and hardware to digital asset management software and output devices. Whether you are a professional image maker or processor, a buyer of image making equipment or a keen hobbyist, Focus on Imaging will have something for you.

We’ll be attending the show, so if you plan on being in Birmingham, be sure to swing by stand L24 to see our Portfolio 8 Digital Asset Management Solution presentation.

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20 questions with Christie Hjelm

January 31st, 2007 by Jim Kidwell

What’s your job title?
Accounting Supervisor
How long have you been with Extensis?
1+ year
Where is your cog in the Extensis machine?
Huh?
What is your favorite Extensis product?
The one with the highest revenue!
If you were a font, which font would you be?
Hhhmmmm… I suppose I’ve never really given it much thought.
What’s at the top of your iPod playlist?
Regina Spektor – Fidelity
When were you most happy?
Honeymooning in Hawaii with my best friend in the world
What is your greatest accomplishment?
I hope this isn’t my greatest accomplishment, but my husband and I bought our first home last October, and it was really exciting.
What is your biggest regret?
No regrets…why focus on the negative?
What is your biggest passion?
All things dance
What do you like to read?
US Weekly – celebrity gossip.
What is your most treasured possession?
My house
What food can you not live without?
Chocolate
How are you a weekend warrior?
I’m currently studying for the CPA exam, so I think I’m more like a weekend accountant, not so much a warrior.
What’s the strangest thing on your desk?
A jar of peanut butter
What is one thing that people don’t generally know about you?
I love movies that make me cry (it doesn’t take much).
Which website do you visit daily?
Google. How did we live before Google?
In another life you were…?
Do we get more than one? If so, I would like to put in a request to be a millionaire in my next one.
What’s your ultimate destination?
Hawaii
What do you want your dying words to be?
Way too much thought required for this question. Sorry, I’m out of time.

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Happy Birthday Helvetica

January 30th, 2007 by Jim Kidwell

Helvetica is 50 years old this week!

Posted in fonts, fun and games | 1 Comment »

Typecon 2007 dates and location

January 30th, 2007 by Jim Kidwell

Typecon 2007

SOTA just announced the dates and location for their ninth annual festival of type, Typecon.

Since this next year’s event is just up interstate 5 from the Extensis headquarters in Portland, expect to see quite a few Extensis folk at the event this August. Hopefully we’ll see you there!

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Adobe CS3 Icons – alternate icon creation contest

January 30th, 2007 by Jim Kidwell

Nothing seems to bring out the consternation of software users more than the details. Right now one of the biggest controversies in the design world deals with product icons. For the next release of the Adobe Creative Suite, Adobe has done a complete conceptual redesign of all of their icons based on a color wheel / periodic table model. It’s an interesting concept, yet has left many users feeling that their favorite applications are now branded with a boring, nondescript chip of color.

New Adobe CS3 icons

In what seems to be an effort to sway Adobe’s mind about their choice of icons, the site Quark vs InDesign is holding an icon design contest. There are quite a few fabulous prizes (OK, here’s a question, why are prizes always fabulous? Can’t they be something else? I think that I’ll make up a word here… Jamtastic! Yeah that’s it.) So, there are many jamtastic prizes, some of which we contributed!

Creating good icons is a skill that I highly admire, and unfortunately do not possess. So, if you’ve got the creative chops to work on a pixel-by-pixel basis, I recommend checking out the contest.

Posted in Adobe, creative fuel, design, InDesign, QuarkXPress | No Comments »

Casino carpet – designed to fit the space

January 29th, 2007 by Jim Kidwell

Casino carpet Walking into any large open space, say an convention center or gymnasium, it’s likely one of the first things that you’ll notice is what’s on the floor. Since there’s not much else to look at, your eyes immediately focus on what covers the wide open expanse.

Casinos, well, they’re quite another beast. The ones that I’ve been in have practically every square inch of usable floor space covered with devices that are designed to relieve you of your time and money. I suppose that’s why casinos can be so creative with their carpeting. Author David Schwartz has avoided security guards to collect quite a fine group of images from casinos across the US that show just how ornate and outlandish one can be with floor coverings.

The Casino Carpet Gallery

I can almost hear the coins clinking and people cheering.

Posted in creative fuel, fun and games, photography | 1 Comment »

Does your email look professional?

January 29th, 2007 by Kelly Guimont

I found this study through Matt Haughey’s site, and basically it says that the font you use for email can cause people’s impression of you-and your message-to change before they actually have any idea the content of said message. From the results:

This finding suggests that documents presented in typefaces that are viewed as less appropriate are seen as less serious and less professional in nature. The appropriateness of the typeface also affected the perception of the email author in that the email using Gigi created a perception of an author who is less professional, less trustworthy, and less mature. Finally, the typeface that was lower in appropriateness led participants to conclude that the author was a lower level trainee employee.

So to sum up: Using goofy curlicue fonts for meeting notes not only makes the notes look bad, but the author too. That message could have been sent by an (gasp!) underling! That’s not to say there aren’t times when a not-so-standard font is called for, I’m sure, but most people are reading email for email’s sake, they generally aren’t looking for the design flaws in it. Set your default to Arial or some other such standard-issue font and call it good.

Posted in creative fuel, design, fonts, tips & tricks | No Comments »

Macworld 2007 – Extensis design application panel discussion audio

January 29th, 2007 by Jim Kidwell

Font Management University This is the second of two panel discussions that we recently presented on the show floor at Macworld Expo. The first focused on the art of type, and this second one focuses on working with type in design applications.

This lively discussion included Adobe product manager Thomas Phinney, design expert and author Andrew Shalat and our very own Extensis VP of Corporate Solutions, Martin Stein. The junction of good design, applications used to create good design and type is a critical. Check out what our experts thought about the issues:

Introductions