The greeting card industry takes in around 20 BILLION dollars a year (US!) so it’s a pretty big, important area, and you have the skills to get started as a greeting card designer!

Of course, it is the festive season, so you may wish to make a card for someone for Christmas/Hannukah/New Year/etc., but greeting cards are often also given for occasions like:

• Birthday
• Congratulations (marriage, baby, new job)
• Farewell (going to a different job)
• Retirement
• Condolences (death in the family)

If you’re making a card for yourself, feel free to put whatever text you want in there.

If you’re making a more general card that others might want to use (even buy!), you would  leave a lot of blank space on the inside (although it doesn’t have to be white! Just make sure it’s light enough to write on and read.)

They can be funny (in appropriate ways and appropriate circumstances) or sincere.

Some tips/suggestions:

Bright, colourful, and creative are really important in a card. You don’t want it boring and dull, and you don’t want your card to look like other cards out there. Have fun with it!

HIGH QUALITY, especially ORIGINAL artwork is a MUST! If you’re googling random card elements and backgrounds, you won’t get the marks or have the success that you would if you designed something yourself! Think about using Photoshop or Illustrator to design elements! If you absolutely need to insert images from somewhere else, consider a place like UNSPLASH where you can get really high-quality photographs that you have permission to use!

InDesign is DEFINITELY the right application to use to put it all together, but you could design elements or pages in Photoshop or Illustrator and then place them into the InDesign document.

Ideal InDesign document setup:

If you want to ensure that there’s no white border around your printed page, you can add a BLEED

Having your background images & colours extend off of the page will ensure that you don’t have a white border. It’s not essential, but it does look a lot better in the end.

Page layout:

On your Pages panel you’ll notice that the pages start out laid out like this:

We want those pages to all be side by side, instead of those lonely pages 1 and 4. At the top right of the Pages panel, there are three little lines. Click ’em!

Turn on “Allow Selected Spread to Shuffle”

And drag your pages so that they are all side by side

Remember that when your card is folded, the pages go like this:

Remember that in this program, everything goes in a frame. You’ll PLACE your files into frames (File/Place or Ctrl + D).

When you are done, you’ll PACKAGE your file to drop it off!

 

Help decide who should be Artist of the Month for December!

Screen printing is one of the most common ways of decorating clothing with a design. There’s a lot of setup and cleanup involved, but outside of that, it is very quick, easy, and inexpensive. You can incorporate multiple colours, but this increases the time, difficulty, and expense. We will keep it simple and use one colour.

Basically, your design needs to ultimately be printed out in BLACK and WHITE. Not greyscale. One colour of ink on one colour of material. The design needs to be printed as BLACK. You can apply whatever colour of ink you like after that.

You will design something that is made up of simple shapes and text. Using text and things like icons from The Noun Project or simple shape-based drawings would work.

You can design this on whatever software you wish (Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, etc.)

Set up your page to be 8.5 inches by 11 inches. You can decide whether it’s landscape or portrait.

Here are some examples of logos and designs that have worked well in the past:

Building on our previous activity using the tools in Illustrator to come up with single-coloured artwork, this time, we can incorporate full colour!

This time, start with a file that’s 27 inches wide and 8 inches tall. You do not need to fill up all of that space. We could make the page taller if you feel like you need to, but talk to me first.

As always, before you start, SAVE your work on your computer in OneDrive (and make sure OneDrive is running!)

If you draw your own art to put on a sticker, GREAT! You can skip the next section.

For this assignment, you can PLACE in raster images that you download from elsewhere.

This is a good time to mention that you shouldn’t be using copyrighted artwork without the creator’s permission. Any time someone designs something or takes a photo, they get to choose what happens with it. Without permission from the creator, using artwork or photos that you didn’t create/take is ILLEGAL!

That having been said… So long as you’re creating stickers for your own use and it’s for a school project, you could use logos or artwork or characters from the Internet if you wish.

BUT, make sure that they’re HIGH QUALITY. Use Google Images!

Click on the Tools button

And limit your search to Large images. You may also wish to click on color and limit your search to transparent images (ones without a background.)

in the search results, click on the image you want to download

It’ll open in a box on the right hand side. RIGHT CLICK on that and choose Save Image As…

Put that in your Downloads or in your Graphic Tech folder or wherever. You need to know where to find it afterward!

Go into Illustrator and go to the File menu and choose Place

Find your file wherever you downloaded it (probably in your Downloads folder).

You can save yourself a step if you TURN OFF the check mark next to the word Link:

If you don’t do that, you need to remember to Embed your image once it’s placed in!

If you ignore me and leave that link on:

you will need to EMBED. I’ll get to that in a minute! Don’t rush me!

Whichever way you chose, you’ll see a tiny thumbnail version attached to your cursor. You can either click on your Artboard (page) to Place the image full size OR draw a box for it to go in:

Remember that Embed business? Click on one of your images. If you haven’t turned off the Link box, you’ll see the option to Embed your image just above the image, under the menu bar:

Or on the Properties panel:

If you don’t Embed your images, the images won’t transfer to me along with your Illustrator file, so your stickers won’t look good.

You can make sure that your placed images are all embedded by looking at the Links panel. If you see something listed and it has a little link of chain, it means that it’s a linked file and should be embedded.

You can have as many different images as you want on your Artboard. You can use as much or as little of the page as you like.

If you have multiple images on the page, PUT THEM AS CLOSE TOGETHER AS POSSIBLE (without touching). Leave a bit of space between, but put your images CLOSE TOGETHER. If you have a bunch of blank space between stickers, I will make you MOVE them BEFORE I will PRINT them!

This is wasteful and annoying:

If you hand that in, I will ask you to move the images together before I will print them!

 

This is much better:

Again, you don’t need to fill up the page, but you do need to put your images close together (WITHOUT TOUCHING.)

 

Every sticker needs to be properly outlined, though, in order for it to be cut out.

For that, see the next set of instructions: Roland Cut Outlines

It’s now time to start with a simple look at one of the more complicated but important programs we’ll look at this year, Adobe Illustrator.

Illustrator and Photoshop create and manipulate images in very different ways. In order to understand this, you need to know the difference between RASTER and VECTOR images

Open Illustrator

The first step is to create a new file

Make your file 14 inches wide and 6 inches tall. You can make your document taller later if you need to, but we won’t be able to print/cut any wider than about 14 inches.

Before you even start your work, you should always SAVE your work. In this case, clicking Save (Ctrl + S) OR Save As will do the same thing:

When you save your work, make sure it has a name that reflects the contents. We are making single colour stickers.

Make sure you save your work On your computer.

Hopefully you have already opened OneDrive today. If not, do that now!

Save your work into your OneDrive folder. You might even have a Graphic Tech folder to organize your work (NOT the one with your name on it that you use to hand things in. Only put your work in there when it is DONE)

You don’t need to change anything in this box:

Up on the top right of the Illustrator window, you will be able to choose the way your panels in the program are laid out. You can always change this later. I like my Workspace to be set on Essentials Classic. If you want your screen to look like mine, choose that Workspace. You are free to choose whichever one you like, but keep in mind that your screen will look different than mine.

Up across the top of the screen you will see the program menus. Perhaps the most important one is the Window menu. If you can’t find a panel or want to change your workspace, go there.

There are a couple of ways to look at your primary toolbar. For right now, mine will be set to Basic.

The basic toolbar usually shows up in one column like this:

But if you want, you can change it to two columns with the little arrow at the top:

There are many more tools that you can see by clicking the three dots at the bottom:

The tool we use the most is the Selection Tool. It looks like a grey arrow outlined with white. You can activate it by pressing the letter v on your keyboard:

NOTE: There is another selection tool that we won’t use nearly as often. It’s the one that’s filled in with white. That is the Direct Selection tool, and it works very differently. We’ll ignore that one for now:

The other tools we’ll work with for now are the shape tools. Yours will probably look like a rectangle. You can activate that tool by pressing m on your keyboard:

If you hold your mouse button down on that tool, you’ll see the other shape tools hiding underneath:

If you wish, you can Float those tools by clicking the tiny triangle on the right.

This will pop out a separate panel that you can move around

On the right side of your screen, you will find another super important panel, Properties

Each shape is made up of two parts, the Fill and the Stroke. The Stroke is the outline and the Fill is what’s in the middle.

If I draw a shape with those Properties, my rectangle will have a black outline and will be filled in with white:

To change the Fill, click on the little square next to Fill. Choose a colour to fill your shape in with:

NOTE: We are making stickers that only have ONE colour. The colour you choose here means absolutely nothing. We are going to cut shapes out of coloured vinyl, so the colour of vinyl that you choose will determine the colour that your sticker is. It really does not matter what colour you choose right now.

You could also change the outline by clicking on the Stroke square (swatch)

You could also make that outline thicker or thinner

My rectangle now looks like this:

NOTE: if you want to draw a square instead of a rectangle, hold SHIFT as you drag out your shape:

I really recommend that you turn OFF the Stroke for this assignment. Pick a fill colour and turn the stroke off by choosing the empty white square with the diagonal red line through it:

To move or resize a shape, use the Selection Tool

If you look in one of the corners of a rectangle, you will see a tiny dot. If you click that dot and drag it in, you can round off the corners of your shape:

If you want to rotate a shape, move the Selection tool outside of a corner and click and drag to rotate:

Another interesting tool is the Polygon Tool. This one draws flat sided shapes but you can choose how many sides it has. Choose that tool on either the main or floating tool bar:

If you want, you can double click on your page (the Artboard) to choose how many sides before you draw your shape. You can also choose the size.

OR, you can draw the shape first.

On the right side of the shape, you’ll see a little diamond. Drag that down to add more sides:

Or drag it up to have fewer sides:

For today, just play around and draw something using these simple tools! Feel free to explore and play around. Figure out other tools if you’d like!

If you want to get to know more about Illustrator, you can click on the Help menu and go to Illustrator Help…

Click on Discover how Illustrator artwork is unique

There are many more tutorials that will help you to get to know the program. You can access those from the Help menu, then go into Tutorials…

If you’re looking for a good one to help you get started, click the link below:

Get to know Illustrator tutorial

 

There are so many cool things you can do with Photoshop. I love messing around with that application probably more than any other. I wish I had time to teach you everything, but it just isn’t possible.

So it’s your turn to learn something new that interests you!

There are a LOT of great Photoshop tutorials online, both via Adobe and on the web and on YouTube. Your job is to pick 3 tutorials that teach you new skills and help you create things that you didn’t know before.

You’ll pick a tutorial, learn a new technique or project, then create something using that idea and your own creativity. I do not want you to hand in the exact same photos/results as in the tutorial! I want you to take that idea or technique and apply it to something different and original. Ideally, you will even use your own photos!

Once you are finished a tutorial, you need to provide some information in a reflection. Most people just create a Word document and hand that in alongside the finished .psd Photoshop files.

Remember that in Photoshop, I ALWAYS expect/want to see a copy of the original, untouched photos! You should always be making a copy of every photo and leaving one copy untouched and turned off or hidden.

For each of your 3 chosen tutorials:

1) Provide a link to the tutorial you chose

2) Explain the techniques & tools used. Explain the major steps involved.

3) Explain what you LEARNED that was NEW TO YOU. If you didn’t learn anything new, you picked a bad tutorial!

4) Try to think of ways that you could use these new skills & techniques in Graphic Design. What kind of products could you create using this technique? How could you use those skills to help a potential customer?

I don’t want you to hand in the sample files. Most tutorials give you sample files and show you how to create the exact same picture described in the video/write up. I don’t need to see that. I need you to find YOUR OWN IMAGES and create something ORIGINAL and CREATIVE! Grab a camera and take your own photos!

There are so many great Youtube channels with Photoshop tutorials! You probably want to look for ones that are fairly recent, not from years and years ago when Photoshop looked and worked differently!

Here are some great channels you may wish to use (but feel free to find your own. It would be very wise to ASK ME if a tutorial looks like one that will get you full marks!)

https://www.youtube.com/@PhotoshopTrainingChannel/videos

https://www.youtube.com/@LetsPS/videos

https://www.youtube.com/@NewWorldOps/videos

https://www.youtube.com/@BLTV_Photoshop/videos

https://www.youtube.com/@TutorialsJunction/videos

As the leaves turn colours and fall, and the thoughts of winter start to creep in, I am already starting to think of all of the places I’d like to go to get away, and the fun things I’d like to do on a vacation. Here’s your chance to go on a vacation to the land of your dreams!

You’re going to choose or invent a place to go visit. You’ll come up with a name, find a photo (or multiple photos) showing what you’d see there, and you’ll even design a flag for this new land! You will incorporate a photograph of yourself visiting this land. Put the name of the place on the postcard using those Photo Letters we did in an earlier project!

Your postcard should be 6 inches wide and 4 inches tall. Like your trading card, it will have a front and a back side, so you will need more than one page/artboard.

NOTE: This is not quite what yours should look like! You need to read the instructions and make sure you are including all of the right elements:

A postcard also has a back side. That side contains an area to write your letter, an area for the address you are sending the card to, and a stamp. You should draw lines like the ones you see below. You should design a stamp to put in the corner.

NOTE:

• You are not finding a photo of a postcard and putting that on. You are DESIGNING YOUR OWN.
• You are not finding a photo of a flag and putting that on, You are DESIGNING YOUR OWN.
• You are not finding a photo of a stamp and putting that on, You are DESIGNING YOUR OWN.

You should know how to do all of these things by now, so I’m not going to show you step-by-step instructions. If there is anything that you’re not sure about ASK FOR HELP! It’s far better to be sure than to have to redo something because you didn’t ask a question so you didn’t do it right.