My Work: Orange Tree Holiday Card

I designed this abstract orange tree holiday card as an e-card for my department to send out. It had to be somewhat generic but still graphically interesting and, if possible, include some aspect of what we do (Florida agricultural educational materials). A fun little project.

Indie Film Posters

Last week Smashing Magazine had a post featuring 40 indie film posters. These three were my favorites:

• Zoo, for the startling and unusual cropping of the horse
• Paris, Je T'aime, for creative use of the Eiffel tower, subtle background texture and the typography border
  
• Taxi to the Dark Side, for texture, composition and use of the US flag as a shadow

Farmer's Market

The cute little curl on this can of pumpkin puree first caught my eye when I was flipping through an issue of Real Simple magazine. Worth a second glance, Farmer's Market's design is a cozy mix of old and new. Their webpage has a slightly vintage feel mixed with plenty of white space and well chosen typography.

Photoshop in Real Life

I've seen this real life recreation of a blank Photoshop document a few places on the web recently. Still, it's too cool to not share here. My favorites &mdash the tool bar (especially the paint bucket and the hand) and the transparent sheet for Layer 1. An outstanding idea that's been beautifully executed. Created by Bates 141.

Izze

I really like Izze's simple packaging and ultra-modern look. The logo is stunning in its simplicity &mdash fruit pips in a circle. Izze's logo and packaging are designed by tda advertising & design.

Izze tastes great but you can also make your own sparkling juice at home. Just combine 1/2 cup sparkling water and 1/2 cup fruit juice.

My Work: Lotus Henna card

I designed this colorful card for a traditional Indian wedding I attended recently. The lotus and henna patterns both respect the traditional element and are arranged in a simple composition with this love quote I found. Thanks to keepdesigning.com for the free mendhi/henna vector art used here.

Grady McFerrin Photo Album

I seem to be attracted to autumn colors lately. I love the warm browns and golds in this photo album cover. The beautiful and delicate strip of pattern on the left contrasts nicely with the rough texture and simple butterfly art.

Unique Ampersands

These are some of the ampersands that caught my eye in a recent logo typography search. Just for fun, here is bit of history on the ampersand's origins:

An ampersand is a symbol representing the word "and". The symbol is a ligature of the letters in et, Latin for "and". Traditionally, in English-speaking schools when reciting the Alphabet, any letter that could also be used as a word in itself ("A," "I," "&" and, at one point, "O") was preceded by the Latin expression "per se" (Latin for "by itself"). So the word ampersand is a corruption of the phrase "and per se and".

Over time the way the ampersand was written evolved into the symbol we use today. In some of the examples above, the ampersands are interpretations of the modern ampersand symbol and others are more closely linked to the older Latin et.

This short description is cobbled together from the full Wikipedia ampersand article.

Autumn

The wind is blowing and drops of rain tingle in the air today — autumn is here. This dreamy illustration captures that autumn spirit. It's desktop wallpaper from vnwallpapers.com

Jeffrey Fisher Notecards

I love the creativity, color and handmade styling of these charming Jeffrey Fisher notecards.