One of the most important assets you can have as a designer doing print work, whether you are new or old is an understanding of how to correctly set your files up for printing. There are multiple ways to do this and I am not saying that my is the only way but, mine works and this will teach you fundamentals of how to correctly set up your file so your printer does not send them back to you and waste time in the printing process. There is however, some technical jargon in this article. I have included a glossary at the end that tells you what “the jargon” means. So veterans, students and anyone in-between will be able to read and take something away from this article.

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Computer – check. Photoshop – check. Lots of free time – check. It seems that this is all that is necessary to call yourself a ‘designer’ these days. I believe that there is far more to a designer than software, computers and free time. Designers should have critical thinking skills, understanding of design principals, knowledge of grid systems, typography and much more.

Read the rest of my guest post over at Design Reviver and join the discussion in progress!

So it looks like Photoshop just rang in another birthday! Photoshop just turned 20?!?!?!? Holy crap that’s a long time for software. I don’t know about you but Photoshop was my first ‘design’ program starting with version 6. I admit that I cheated a bit and also tinkered with Gimp for a bit. But I mainly have font memories of an online course with my less than legal version on my PC back in the day. I remember being so fascinated and intrigued by Photoshop and what it could do and I was SO EXCITED to learn. This tinkering that I did in high school is what pushed me to become a designer.

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In the wake of the popularity of the Clients From Hell site I thought it would be appropriate to talk about good experiences with clients. I had a chance to have a chat with Liz Andrade from CmdShiftDesign and discuss the topic.

What do you think?

Have you had good (or bad) experiences with clients? What was it like? What did you do to foster the client/designer relationship? Leave a comment and join the discussion.

Social design communities can be found all over the web and can play a vital role in growing and learning as a designer. I will be reviewing four of my favorites: Flickr, DeviantART, Coroflot and Behance and discussing the positives and negatives of each community.

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It’s super easy to make diagonal or custom guides in Illustrator! Just grab the line tool or pen tool, draw the line and then go to view guides make guides. If you are into keyboard shortcuts its apple+5 on mac or control+5 on PC. Walla!

Have a suggestion for a quick tip? Wondering how to do something in Photoshop, illustrator, indesign, dreamweaver, any program? Ask away!