"Do you validate other people’s markup? Yes? You’re an asshole."

lol.

But that's not the point, the point is that I feel renewed and refreshed mentally. I've defocused and took on several really geeky projects lately. And it's been great for me. I know that going forward, I'm going to be pressing much less to come up with new ideas. I'll simply let them come to me.

So, unless you're really just hurting for money (and I understand, trust me) and have the time, take a step back, defocus, work on your own geeky project or whatever makes you happy and that's not purely graphic design.

I think you'll find yourself less likely in the position of trying to fit a square peg in a round hole on the next design project you take on.

It's been months since I've updated this one. Who has the time? Between Twitter and Facebook, I feel like I do all the writing I can do.

Agree or disagree? I bet I don't see many comments on this post, which will just reinforce the argument for me.

Who knows though? Maybe this will get me writing in my own blog more often...if only for myself.

I think I've almost seen it all; stacks of crinkled paper, projects mounted horribly crooked on matte boards and scrap books with food stained projects inside plastic sleeves.

If you have no respect for your own work, why should anyone else?

You might as well show up to the interview wearing greasy overalls and no shoes. You might be a great designer—and a more than worthy hire—but, typically, would you expect to get a job dressed like that?

The same goes for the presentation of your work. It needs to be sharp. it needs great craftsmanship.

And it's not about spending a lot of money on a fancy aluminum case or a box made out of Lucite; there are an unlimited number of creative options—purchased and/or handmade—that you can implement to present your work with the dignity it deserves.

But for God's sake, before you go to that interview or client meeting, take a hard look at how you're presenting your work.

Stacks of wrinkled up, food stained photocopier paper ain't gonna cut it. Not unless your last name is Sagmeister or Chantry anyway.

Simple. Beautiful. Click to embiggen.

At times, It's amazing what you can find in a small town. XWA? Xtreame Wrestling Association?

On second thought, I'm not surprised...not surprised at all.

Certainly a recognizable logotype...with an appropriate usage of Copperplate.  I took this one in Boston in 2008.

We all had to come up with a word that describes something that type does. These words then had to relate to the words the people directly on either side of us had come up with. First we drew the type spelling out the word. Next, we drew a version of it that describes the word itself.  Finally, we drew a version that was somewhere in between the other 2.

At the end, the instructor collected all of our type specimens and combined them into a video that you can see below.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5RDWZs-mgI

I thought mine was kind of lame (what can I say? I'm not a morning person.) but there are some great ones in this. See if you can guess which was mine.

Nevertheless, I wanted to challenge myself by putting my work up against the work of others working in my field, and  also under the scrutiny of some of our professions best. I have to say I was pretty damn nervous about the whole affair (ie ready to hurl).

I made it to the review though, and had overwhelmingly positive feedback. It was a great experience and I recommend it to anyone who ever gets the chance to attend a HOW conference.

Anyway, I thought I would share a PDF copy of what I put together.  So, here it is. It's as small as I could compress it; so I hope you have a decent connection.

DOWNLOAD PORTFOLIO  (PDF 9.9 MB)

Look for my post later in the week about my overall experiences at this year's conference. It was a great one.

More later this week...