Blog Archive » How Do You Market Yourself as a Designer? Marketing yourself is hard work but it is also a necessity. Why? Good designers are a dime a dozen these days. Having a strong skill set isn’t enough anymore. An advanced knowledge of the Adobe Suite is just the beginning (and it’s easy to get overloaded by the Photoshop tutorials and free typefaces lurking around every corner). Competition in this economy is stiff and chances are that you’ll be going up against 10 other designers that are just as good as you.
So, what can you do to stand apart from the rest? Now is the time to start viewing yourself as more than just a designer. Marketing yourself will require some key elements, both big and small. The Marketing Mix. Product: What are you trying to sell? Pricing: How do you set your pricing? My general rule is to set a rate that I feel is fair and as I take on more jobs and demand increases, I raise it. Placement: How is your design work being sold? Promotion: How are you promoting yourself as a designer? Logos. Business Cards. - StumbleUpon. AI: Creating a ribbon. Ever wondered how you draw a ribbon in Adobe Illustrator? A while ago a reader e-mailed me with this question. A prefect tip for a step-by-step tutorial, I hope you enjoy it :) Step 1 - draw the first part of the ribbon A basic knowledge on how to use the pen tool and how to draw bezier curves is needed to get started with this tutorial.
Draw a curved line that looks similar to the illustration above. Step 2 - break the curve into 2 parts Because we'll have to apply different shades and we need to create depth into the ribbon, we need to cut the ribbon into different segments. Select the Scissors Tool and click on the location on the path as shown in the picture above. Step 3 - close the paths Close the paths as shown in the picture below, so the ribbon exists of 2 segments. Step 4 - rotate and duplicate the 2 segments of the ribbon Chances are that both segments don't perfectly match. Step 5 - merge the middle segments of the ribbon into 1 segment Our ribbon is now divided into 3 segments. PS: Photographic Edges. Excerpted with permission from Element K Journals Application: Photoshop 5/5.5 Operating systems: Macintosh, Windows Have you ever wanted to add a unique element to an image, but weren't exactly sure what it needed?
An easy way to add impact to an image is by creating photographic edges. This technique originally stems from photography, but in Photoshop you can create similar effects like those shown in our cover image. The Technique Modifying pictures through the use of photographic edges is a fairly simple process that can add impact to ordinary images. Creating a Quick Mask To begin, open an RGB image you want to work on and then use the Rectangular Marquee tool to make a selection, leaving a 0.5-inch border around your image.
Figure AThe red overlay around the image shows where we applied the Quick Mask. Applying the Spatter Filter We'll use the Spatter filter now to create a jagged edge. Figure BTo create this ragged-edge effect, we applied the Spatter filter. 1) Block texture. Facebook Symbols, Symbols for Facebook.