bitts {on graphic design}

/Some of my favorite resources

At last night's design meet up many of you asked if I would post a list of my fav sources and blog about my experience + struggles + happy moments of starting out as a freelancer. Lets start with the goodies, this should hold you over until the weekend :) Post your comments linking to other sites or articles you love, follow a noteworthy blog or just want to say 'gracias.' So get your delicious tags ready, happy exploring!//

Resources

Freelance Switch has a job board, forums and a ton of resources about making the switch  

Creativebits writes for the design community, offers critique posts, jobs and design news

Keep Designing vector freebies

Strip Generator 

DesignMag freebies, resources, jobs, freelancing, tuts

QVectors free vetors

Famous logos in vector format + share site

Colourlovers love this site! Make your own color palettes, share or choose theirs

CMYK/HEX/HTML/color chart conversion. Color happiness.

Freelance Rate Calculator

Portfolio + Network sites

Coroflot great national + international exposure, agencies + recruiters

DesignRelated portfolios, network, jobs, inspiration

Flickr lots of awesome designers + groups, network

Twitter follow your fav designers, they post tips, links, resources, follow me

Our facebook meet up group

Deviant Art  portfolio site

Talent Database International Design network

Creative + Inspiration

abduzeedo blogs about inspiration, interviews + tuts

Creemy CSS web design showcase

Web cream web design showcase

Blogs

Chad Engle hosts a twitter forum #DCTH on Thursday nights 7p EST and writes about trends, tuts, freebies

Youthedesigner writes about freebies, forums, contests and jobs

WebDesignerWall this blog is often featured for inspiration and design trends, they write about techie news, web trends and post tutorials

Just Creative Design Jacob writes about logos, design, fonts, must-know articles + resources

David Airey (UK) logos, type, copy writing, blogging

Bittbox Jay blogs about trends, freebies (lots), has a large following, flickr showcase group

Technical + apps

35 absolutely essential mac apps list of handy tools

Billings3 awesome time tracking + billing software, 21-day trail, LUV this! Make my life easy. Mac friendly.

Need to send large files? If you don't have access to an ftp site this one is free (100MB) or check this list.

/Lets get real

In a time when some people are seeking work, I find myself completely swamped. I am totally thrilled to have this experience, but it has its pros and cons. I have to schedule my day to manage my time effectively, making the best of the hours in my day, working 14+ hours a day so I can keep up with the demand and I love (almost) every minute of it. I must say I love my life. I feel incredibly blessed to have an outlet for my creativity, have clients who keep returning, referring and praising my work. The downside, well I'm behind on chores, and lets get real, I am STILL looking at my Christmas Wreath lol. I'm also running into new demands and opportunities to rethink the way I manage my day to day opps. I'm looking at a couple of new time tracking and invoicing tools I recently ran across an older post from Ivan's article on essential apps for your mac. If you have any recomondations, please post your comments below.

Update 3/10/09

I downloaded Billings3 and love it! Its user friendly, easy to manage projects/clients/invoices etc. This tool is such a life saver.//

/Cool app for web presentation

Found Calameo, a french company, while looking for a web based file viewer. The app allows you to upload just about any formatted document and turns it into a 'catalog' style viewer. Click to view catalog. Super awesome.

103 really really cool advertisements from around the world

Check out these super creative, fun and stunning ads from around the world. Awesome technique, bold statements and killer graphics. Gotta love. Read the whole post at Outlawdesignblog

//featuring {blogger business cards}

Adding to the collection of "blogger business cards," a challenge set up by Brian Yerkes of Brian Joseph Studios in Florida. I love checking out other designers cards - so take a peek at this ongoing gallery of pics. If you have a cool card you want to add to the list, follow Brian's instructions and leave me a comment, so I can check it out.

This weekend I was perusing the shelves of my local Borders and found myself flipping through my newest fav book Best Business Card Designs 8, a visual gallery of the coolest, aesthetically pleasing calling cards. Books like this are great references which I love to use for inspiration.

/Trying hard to be creative?

If you don't know where to start when you have 'creative block' check out this list of "to-dos'. Kudos go to author Blake Phillip an Art Director for Vibra Design in North Carolina.

/Creative Advertising

Picked up a new book this weekend. "Creative Advertising" by Mario Pricken. Its the 2008 edition which includes some awesome international ads, including this one by PEPSI (BBDO/Canada) done in 2000. I had a good laugh. The book challenges you to think creatively, by asking a different question in each spread. ...what makes ads memorable? -This book explores a wide variety of fun, stupid and entertaining ads. Check out more international ads here.

/unique calling cards

At last nights graphic designer meet up, Randall and I had a fun conversation about calling cards. Often the first impression of your talent (as a designer), cards can set the tone when you meet an new contact or client. I love changing up my design every few months. Check out this collection of cards from around the world, and this one by inspiredology.com

/make music, the iphone way

I'm totally excited about the new apps that will be released July 11th along with the new 3G iphone. Specifically an app called <band>. It offers a variety of instruments and lets you play, mix and record track right on your iphone (using the touch screen technology). Late night jam sessions won't be the same. Can you imagine sitting around with your best buds, jamin'- on the iphone!? wow.

/piclens

I recently came across PicLens on one of my late night searches. PicLens transforms your browser into a full-screen, 3D experience for viewing photos and videos across the web. With one click, PicLens makes online media come to life in a full screen wall of images. Each image links to the original website where the image is hosted. It allows you to look at lots of images super fast. Gotta luv this. Watch the demo.

         

/yum

I'm always looking for brilliant photography. Matt's pix make me drool.