409 dezign

The Art of the Disc.

Music has always been strongly connected with art and there have been some fantastic album designs over the years. We’ve had picture discs, gatefold sleeves, concept booklet inserts and goodness know what else. Of course, many of the best ones of all about back in the time of twelve inch records; although there have still been some jolly clever CD packages as well. Compact discs may be a great deal smaller than their vinyl predecessors, but this has not stopped the more discerning recording artist from having album designs that really stand out from the crowd.

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A shrinking world

With the world we live in, getting smaller, there is a constant need to cut down on clutter. A few well thought out changes can bring about a significant alteration in the appearance of the place we live in. It’s actually quite easy to do this even in a small studio apartment. Even major corporations now follow this principle. Be it Microsoft or something like Diesel North Wales, everyone wants to have a sleek and clutter free appearance.

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Love, love, love your Mac

You are either a Mac-lover or someone who has never used an Apple Mac. Bit of a bold statement maybe, but I have never heard of anyone who has used an Apple Mac computer who doesn’t prefer it to Windows and PCs.

Of course, Macs were the original machines for creative types, since it was on that platform that programs such as Photoshop, Illustrator, Quark Xpress and InDesign were originally developed. So in years gone just about every designer of More

DVD boxed set designs.

My DVD collection is something that has diminished in recent year as things have gone digital and I now store more and more movies electronically without the need for hard copies. In many ways I now see hard copies as simply things that will clutter up my life.

However, I still get excited when I see cool designs for DVD Packaging and there are some really cool things out there. I think if studios want to keep people buying DVDs More

Blogs as inspiration

Looking at blogs nowadays, it’s hard to remember how we got design inspiration before they came about. In times before, design spread through portfolios only, and by word of mouth. For this reason, it was slow to progress, and the exchange of ideas took a painfully long time to cross the oceans of the world.

But now, more than ever, design is something which is being changed and evolved by a largely underground generation of bloggers who are not going More

Design Ideas For A Corner Fireplace

If your home has a corner fireplace then consider yourself lucky as many lofts east London and other places in the city does not have one. Now a corner Fireplace occupies a lot of space in a room. But, if you have some nice decorating ideas, you can change the look of that room completely and make it look attractive.

A corner Fireplace usually contains a fireplace mantel. Some fireplace mantels are triangular and some are gently curved in structure. More

Get yourself noticed

If you are planning a career in the wide and wonderful world of design, then you’re not alone. This is great news in that you will always have lots of colleagues to support you in projects and to bounce ideas off; but it’s bad news in that you will always face lots of competition for jobs or when bidding for commissions.
Standing out from the crowd isn’t always easy. Short of using email marketing software to send begging letters to More

Wean Yourself Off Coffee With Exercise

When working in design it’s important that you stay on top of your game, keeping your mental stimulation at a high in order to ensure that you work is good, and that you are always ensuring to dot the i’s and cross the t’s. Without out this sort of concentration, really good design can very quickly fall down and become bad design. So you need to make sure that you are mentally ready to work, even when More

Product testing for creative types

One of the great things about being a creative type is the fact that there are so many relevant excellent products that are available for free online. Design oriented types will find a plethora of free fonts, designs, templates, and open source software programs suited to their line of work, and all available for free. These can all represent a great opportunity for professional development, and can be an excellent source of new ideas for designers, artists, and creative types. More

How to know the difference between art prints and reproductions

If you have a knack of collecting art pieces or love decorating your walls with art works and paintings, you might know the actual difference between art prints and reproductions of oil paintings. Though these terms are often used in the art world, they differ greatly. Therefore, knowing the difference is important if you are considering purchasing some art pieces.

Defining Art Prints

All copies of works of art which are identical to the original are known as art prints. More