Archive for August, 2009

Graphic design is a very small part of my business, yet my trifold brochure design tutorial is very popular, and a reader recently emailed me for help with ideas for brochure template design inspiration.

For do-it-yourself brochure design, there are some online resources to consider for inspiration. If you use Microsoft Word they have a fairly good selection of standard templates for brochures with a choice of 65 different brochure templates created for various versions of Microsoft software products.

In addition to brochures, you may search for other graphic artwork ideas and templates for cards, mailers, stationery, newsletters, flyers, data sheets, and much more.

The illustration below shows the 6 steps used in the avatar photo edit tutorial to create a new graphic for this Life with Corky puppy website and his CorkyStory Twitter account.

The large photo left is the original photo of the dog taken while going for a ride. The large photo right is the new avatar with a more dramatic look including a blurred background and better contrast on the puppy’s face.

Tutorial steps from before (left) and after (right) are included below the illustration:

Tutorial sequence for avatar photo edit in 6 steps marked A through F:

A: Original photo without any edits. Zoomed in to trace the puppy’s head.
B: Photo mask filled form (in red) made by tracing in the previous step.
C: Clipped puppy’s head in vector artwork with all background removed.
D: Original photo (A) cloned with blur applied to the entire photograph.
E: The cropped head from (C) is placed on top of the blurred photo (D).
F: Brightness adjustments of the cropped head creates the final version.

Besides the links above to the home page and the Twitter account, the original photo of Corky the puppy before cropping may be viewed on Corky’s website on page 3 of his Fleet Peeples Dog Park photo gallery at LifeWithCorky.com.

Each year I release free custom business card calendar artwork in August, and the 2010 business card calendar download is now available. You do not need to register or reveal an email address, so click the image below or use this link for your free 2010 business card calendar download (zip folder, 1.1mb size). Artwork is in 300dpi JPG CMYK 4-color ready for print.

The zip folder includes 3 versions of the 2010 business card calendar artwork with your choice of backgrounds in light granite, grey marble, or plain white as illustrated above. Readers can still download the free 2009 business card calendar for this year, also.

A special thanks to the many readers who took the time to email me to express their appreciation for the free calendar downloads, the visitors who left blog comments, and the many blog and website owners who link here, also.

A new page for Blogger custom blog design pricing has been revised to include a custom WordPress blog design price. In addition, the price page lists a new service for converting a Blogger template and moving to WordPress. Here is an excerpt from the new blog design price page linked above:

For owners of Blogger format blogs interested in converting a Blogger template and moving to a WordPress template and theme, we can provide optional services. For existing blog designs in Blogger to export from their format and import into a custom WordPress theme, our technique will capture all blog posts.

Visit this blog converted from Blogger to WordPress to see a live example custom WordPress theme and matching main website.

The custom WordPress blog design price page includes the optional service to export from Blogger to WordPress with details on the process involved to maintain all posts, labels, archives, and search engine friendly (SEF) file names.

A long overdue tribute blog in honor of my late grandmother, Beth Parkman (1893-1975), was created and launched in WordPress last weekend. The custom blog features original poems that Grandmother Parkman wrote that were discovered and compiled by her late daughter and my aunt, Eleanor Parkman Heath.

The topics include poems about God, nature, love, and family by Beth Parkman, and more. Her daughter, and my Mom, Blanche Parkman Degerstrom commented about the new blog stating “What a legacy for her children, grandchildren and all to follow. Thank you so much!”.

The WordPress blog features a custom black and white top header showing my Grandmother enjoying the woods of Maine plus a collage of bust portraits of her as young, middle aged, and then later in life. The blog sidebar lists each of her 37 original poems by title in alphabetical order.

A special thanks goes out to my brother, Eric Degerstrom, who took the mimeographed copies of the poems and scanned them using optical character recognition (OCR) to provide digitized plain text of each poem. A lengthy biography of Beth Parkman is included on the About page, also.

Several unique related sites for Commercial Door and Access have relaunched with custom matching graphics and a custom WordPress themed blog on their headquarters website. The corporate headquarters site is at www.cda-solutions.info with a matching blog at www.cda-solutions.info/blog.

All three sites are custom cms web designs that allow the owner to add, edit, or delete content using simple plain text without a high level of technical skills in advanced xhtml or css. Some of the work was in collaboration with my son, Roger Degerstrom, of www.CodeRepair.com for design and seo assistance, yet I will handle ongoing support for this family of sites.

CDA Solutions, Inc. is in the business of commercial construction, maintenance, and security products and services for the Treasure Coast of Florida including the counties of Brevard, Indian River, St Lucie, and Martin. CDA Alliance Inc. has advice for local or national service and maintenance companies and Commercial Door and Access Inc. provides door, lock, security, and related work including construction, so customers have a dependable source with the expertise and credentials to assure quality work.

The CDA family of sites with the matching WordPress blog launched with the new color scheme to provide a consistent look and familiar corporate brand across their range of service, product, and advice websites.