@twitter

I love Twitter. 

I just wanted to share who I follow, why I follow them and why I might not follow some.  Twitter is such a wonderful business tool and a great way to take a peek into someone else's life.  This is especially fun because there are tons of awesome people tweeting throughout the day!

Celebrities I follow:

Barack Obama - BarackObama

- Our President!  There was a lot more activity here before the election, but we are told updates will keep coming.

Henry Rollins - NotHenryRollins

- Pretty much the best.  We have all his books and albums and dvds.  I'm a huge fan and I think it's awesome that I can have a glimpse into his life.

Yoko Ono - yokoono

- She doesn't tweet very often, but when she does it's about her ImaginPeace movement.

Elijah Wood - elijahwood

- He doesn't tweet very often, but it's still fun to follow him.

William Shatner - WilliamShatner

- Oh Bill.  I will always be a fan.  Most of his tweets are in regard to appearances and his own talkshow.

LeVar Burton - levarburton

- I was probably the most excited about being able to follow him.  I went on a youtube crusade to find and watch all the Reading Rainbow I could ^_^

Brent Spiner - BrentSpiner

- LeVar Burton actually got him to twitter...how cool is that?!  Gordi & Data!  I had a huge geek out with this one.  Lot's of retweeting questions people have sent him, which is actually really nice. 

Wil Wheaton - wilw

- Gah!  Aside from being a Heroes party, there's a Star Trek convention tweeting too!  Wesley Crusher!  He's very active and has great updates on what he's up too.  Plus he's friends with everyone.

James Gunn - james_gunn

- Director of Scooby Doo (lol), Dawn of the Dead (Awesome) and Slither, among others, I'm his friend on myspace and he always great blogs.  He updates a lot and is absolutely hilarious!

John Cleese - JohnCleese

- The original Minister of Silly Walks himself.  Not as active as some, but his dry humor is wonderful.  Also talks about what's going on over the pond...I love when he comments on the media over there :)

Shaq - THE_REAL_SHAQ

- Um.  You just have to read to understand the appeal lol!

James Kyson Lee - jameskysonlee

- OMG Ando from Heroes! It's really a Heroes party on twitter, and he's one of my favorite characters.  I told my roommate, who is on as well, and she flipped out!  Monday's are a great night of all of us.

Greg Grunberg - greggrunberg

- Ok, so for years I called him Shaun, his character from Felicity, and he was in like every show I loved (hello Alias).  He was even in Lost for a minute!  Now he's the King of Heroes tweeting and posts great pics and links for all things Heroes and is huge advocate for Epilepsy.  

Brea Grant - breagrant

- aka Daphne the speedster/nemisis ^_^ got Grunny on twitter and created a monster lol! I heard about her twitter account when she made an appearance on Attack of the Show.  So much awesome in one place!

Joel McHale - joelmchale

- Doesn't ever update.  Ever.  But I like knowing that I'll catch it if he ever does.

John Hodgman -  hodgman

- He's PC in the Mac commercials and is a contributor to The Daily Show.  Also, he is very funny.

Paul F. Thomkins - Twitterkins

- Host of The Best Week Ever.  He's just hilarious!

Doug Benson - DougBenson

- Again with the hilarity.  When he gets together with Twitterkins up there, hilarity ensues.  They were both on Best Week Ever asking people to follow them lol.

Rainn Wilson - rainnwilson

- Very new to twitter and I'm looking forward to seeing more from him.  I can only guess it's going to be good.

Ed Brubaker - brubaker

- Comic book writer, I first got to know his work when he revived Catwoman for her own series.  His run was a amazing and I really wish he would have kept writing it! It got pretty awful without him...

Brian Wood - brianwood

- Another comic book writer.  He wrote Supermarket (one of my favorites), DMZ, Local, The Northlanders, Demo, The Couriers, Channel Zero.  They are all wonderful and really get your mind engaged, unlike a lot of the smash-pow-thwak kind of writing. Love it, read it.

Kristian Donaldson - prodigalnine

- Artist who drew, Supermarket, and for all you Etsy people out there, is a featured artist in TinyMeat's shop. (i won't hold it against you for purchasing that for me)

Felicia Day - feliciaday

- She is super popular on twitter too.  An actress and creator of the show Guild, she's always got something fun and geeky to say.

Diablo Cody - diablocody

- Creator of the movie Juno, she has cool stuff to say when she says it.  Unfortunately it's only in spurts.

Sarah Lane - sarahlane

- I was a fan of hers back in the good ol' days of Tech TV and the Screen Savers.  Those were the days!  She tweets a lot and it's always good.

Kevin Rose - kevinrose

- He is the winner of twitter.  Aside from Obama, he has the most followers.  He is the creator of digg...you can imagine that wasn't a bad idea ^_^ He tweets all throughout the day with fun tech things and pics and videos.

Olivia Munn - oliviamunn

- Olivia "Pie" Munn herself!  She was one of the first people I started to follow.  I love Attack of the Show, we watch it everyday and can't get enough!  She updates pretty regularly and she's so funny!

Kevin Pereira - kpereira

- The other host of Attack of the Show.  I love that he posts so many personal pictures, I think he really embodies why we are on twitter in the first place.

Chris Hardwick - nerdist

- Start the Nerdist revolution.  A regular on Attack of the Show, he was actually the host of that old MTV show Singled Out lol.  He's a regular tweeter and posts pictures too.  Love it.

Mike Phirman - phirm

- Chris's partner in crime, they both form the comedy group Hard 'n Phirm.  Check out their newest video...Trace Elements.  LOL!  I love them!

Aside from all the cool celebrities, there are some great Etsy people tweeting too.

We have a whole team of tweeters!  The Etsy Twitter Team Blog has a feed of tweets from members and featured shops.  It's a great way to stay connected!  There are tons of people in it and here are some more That tweet their hearts out:

Etsy

RobWhite

stellaloella

sweetestpea

ohsoretro

tinymeat

ashleyg

UnlessDesigns

JenniferPerkins

HelloCrafty

MissStockton

theKateBlack

SamyStClair

AlwaysAmy

Jelene

boundto

boygirlparty

LelephantRose

I think that's more than enough for one post.  I'll be adding more on the twitter front...etiquette...why i won't follow you...things like that.  Until then, I hope you find some new people to follow and you enjoy them!

CMYK is for Printers

My buttons were featured on two blogs today! 

Design Milk is a blog I found through twitter : twitter.com/designmilk they are one of my favorites and I subscribe to their RSS for inspiration every day.  I'm so happy they gave these buttons a spot and tweet today :)  Check it.

And from there another blog picked it up.  Called The Daily Dairy, they gave the buttons a nod as well...TaDa!  I'm really glad they did because now I know about them.  Love it!  Perfect for a geek like me.

Star Wars lol

So apparently this has been making its way around the interwebs and I just  saw courtesy of Chris Hardwick on his site Nerdist

I love Star Wars.  More than lots of things.  Please watch the whole thing...it's hilarious!

Star Wars: Retold (by someone who hasn't seen it) from Joe Nicolosi on Vimeo.

Along those same lines:

Etsy: Your place to buy & sell all things handmade thepinksamurai.etsy.com

Lightbox Adventure

I was getting really tired of trying to take pictures of my black buttons and getting glaring reflections of my camera in the shots.  So I made a light box from some mat board.  It was stupid easy to make, just taped four sides together.  Nothing hard.  Then taped a piece of presentation paper to the back and got my lamp in on the action.  My bulb isn't ideal, just 150 watts, so I had to do a little tweaking in Photoshop with the color balance and brightness/contrast but they turned out great!

You can get these buttons here btw :)

  

On the Jason Ellis Show!

So I spent some of yesterday moving my blog back over to Blogger from Wordpress. That's why there are so many posts from the 9th. Wordpress is great for CSS savvy...unfortunately that's not me!

But the highlight of the day was being on the Jason Ellis Show! He's awesome human with an afternoon radio show on SiriusXM's Radio Faction channel 28. http://www.teamellismate.com/ is his website so you can learn all about him if you don't already know. I made some buttons, as I'm prone to do, for the show. There were some for him, some for segments on the show and for his producers/friends :) I loved making them and was just beside myself when they started talking about them on the air! Here are said buttons:

Ha! I sounded totally lame on the phone, but I was just so nervous. I thought of some great things to say after I hung up! Oh well. I'm just glad they liked them so much. Jason said his favorite was Raw Dog's. I cracked myself up making that one. It was a big decision whether to put the finger in or not, but I felt like the anticipation of it going in was what made it so successful. And Tully was so nice on the phone and said that he never thought he'd put and "Cowfucker" stuff in his home, but the magnet I made is going on his fridge. I really tried to be more classy with that one, you know, expose the more sensitive side. And the "Dude, am I a slut" one is just so gross!

I don't mind that I'm not in Awesome World...I feel like the buttons fulfilled my highest expectations so I'm more than happy to leave Awesome World to the Chad Reed's and women who have given birth.

Fun with Packaging!

So I'm in a graphics class right now that focuses on the design of packaging.  We've been concentrating on branding and logos for one product with two different demographics.  After refining these ideas came the mock-ups for the actual package design for said product.  Being the opportunist that I am, I chose to do my own product.     

My comic book buttons are my best selling product so I came up with a brand name and some packaging.  I'm testing it out now in my shop and each button order is going to be shipped in these:

   

I decided to call them RESCUED! since they were taken from old and forgotten comics.  I'm really happy with how it all turned out.  They were made from the covers of real comics, so all of the comic book is used and non goes to waste.  I'd love to know what others think about it!

BIKE!

My boyfriend Dick loves bikes. He's fixed them up, sold them and just made me the best bike ever. We still have to strip it of some gears to make it a single speed, but it's all painted and tuned up. Bask in it's glory.

Before & After

Terrible Typography: The Battle Against Awful Fonts

I'm just gonna say it. I hate Papyrus. It's everywhere. From now until I get so tired of it that I go insane, I will document all the places that Papyrus pops up and haunts me. Exhibit A: I was having a wonderful time the Renaissance Festival with some friends this weekend when I see this.

I was just looking for some handmade jewelry and saw it.  I love Echo & Wild's silver jewelry, but frown upon their company identity.     Then today, I was reading a Game Informer magazine that came in the mail.  I was looking through it, just thumbing through and then set it down.  And guess what I saw on the cover?  The COVER! 

 

Dammit!  It's everywhere.  Maybe by documenting all the ways that this offensive font invades my life, I can convince at least one person to be more creative with their typography.    The battle has begun.

Comic Book Advertising 101: Lesson 2

A crucial part to any advertisement is celebrity endorsements.  Just make sure that they stand the test of time.

I'm pretty sure if you send it in you'll still get that autograph.  I'd be careful about putting a return address tho...

The Creative Process

So being a graphic design major in the BFA  of it all, it was ingrained into my head to sketch sketch sketch, and have thumbnails encompass my whole being before even touching the computer. Damned if my teachers aren't right.  I'm in a time crunch right now actually working for my mom. She's going to a lunch this weekend and needs business cards to pass out.  Her shop, Donna Pool Designs gets all kinds of business...and a cards are must for this event.  So here's what I've got so far:

These are super-simple sketches just to get an idea of placement for the cards and the overall layout.  I googled business card design and just saved some really cool ones that I found.  Research and gathering influences is a must for me.  I need to see what else is out there...what it is...why it works...why it sucks.  All that stuff builds into a unique design.  Along the same lines as these sketches are some for a logo for her business.  I'm going to build these designs into a whole new aesthetic for her online shop.  Please excuse the rushed nature of the sketches....again they are meant for rough ideas!  I just play around with whatever is in my head and they all kind of evolve with each thumb.  And like some, I draw something I know I'm probably going to hate, but getting it down on paper might mean that I can come back to it and make into something awesome later on.

 

I called her today after sending the sketches and we narrowed the card design down to the second row and the logos, if numbered going left to right, 3,4 and 6.  If that makes sense ^_^   I would love feedback!  These need to be 100% done by at the latest on Thursday.    More detailed and specific sketches come next...then color!  I'm a busy bee!

-:::::-:::::-:::::-:::::-:::::-

So I gave all of those sketches to Mom and I played around with the designs she liked:

She really like the top left the most, so I worked with that one and played with color and composition.   She really liked a lot of elements from each of the cards so she went to her friends in the Cafemom Etsy Moms group and got some opinions from there.  They liked the bottom two and different things about them.  So we brainstormed a little more and came up with the final version!  I took the second one's logo in the middle and the third one's information on the bottom.  Together they make sweet business card love.  And I extended the line on the top of the logo to bring it all in.

  I'm pleased.

Comic Book Advertising 101: Lesson 1

If you are a hardcore fan of comic book, a casual reader or an advertiser trying to sell to the afore mentioned demographics, this online course will be very beneficial to you.  Advertising in comic books is becoming much more prevalent.  I mean really...they are on almost every other page now. So in order to tap into your market and study the transformation in advertising we are going to focus on how the 90's handled it in this first lesson.

What you can take away from this example is how EXTREME they make it.  Comic book fans in the 90's only responded to the most extreme of advertising.  It's like they're comin' attcha!  Everyone looks a little maniacal  and I feel like Professor X is trying to fart.  So remember that.  Try to employ insanity and farts as much as possible if you're going for the 90's aesthetic.  Not really sure why a poster in the underwear package makes the briefs un-boring, but we're just gonna go with it.

And always be sure to label your advertisement as an "advertisement" because comic readers are so dumb they might actually believe this is part of the story they are reading.  Especially if the ad has nothing to do with the book in which it's published.

Next Class we'll travel back to the good ol' 60s and 70s for some REAL learning material.

Fashion Designer Geek-Out in three...two...

Holy Crap!  So Dick and I went on a trip up to Philadelphia with our school for the annual College Day that the city holds.  We decided to ditch the group and go walking around the city by ourselves.  We've visited there a few times before and just enjoy being there.  So we're just strolling around looking at shops and having a good time when someone comes out of a store right next to me...

JAY MCCARROLL!  He was about 6 inches from me and all both of us could do was lose our minds for about two minutes haha.  Of course I'm kicking myself for not saying hi or asking for a picture.  I'm a big Project Runway nerd and Dick is a fan of his too!  And we absolutely went into the store he came out of. It was Lush, a store that has fresh, handmade cosmetics.  I got some shampoo, conditioner and a shower fizzy they call Emotibombs and a free one of these just because they are awesome.  Love it.

Most Phallic Comic Book Cover Ever.

So we've been going through all our old comic books seeing what to try and sell and what we can use for other, more artistic, endeavors.  Then we came across this.    

Just take a moment to absorb the whole composition.  Please note Nick Fury's Ruffie coma and compromising position.  The determined look in Strucker's eyes...and the giant phallic gun are really accented with the lovely white smoke that one can only describe as "oozing" from the tip. I applaud you Marvel.