moamoa Jan 2, 09, 7:41 p.m.

Your site's down! Just went to check your folio and get a look at the scalable images, since I'm considering doing the same for my site. Instead of the site loading, I got some really weird looking error.

Anyway, if you're doing maintenance and were already aware, as you were. But, on the very real chance that MikeJ has taken his crush into the realm of hacking, thought you might care to know.
At any rate, Happy New Year :)

Stay or Go? Dec 22, 08, 9:21 a.m.

Just found out I'm getting a generous bonus this year and some additional investment in my 401k, but no raises for any of us. I've carved off a healthy pound of flesh for the company this year, and feel I should be making 10–20k more.

Poll: Should I stay and be grateful to have a job at a prestigious firm that allows me to make ends meet, or should I dust off the resume and set dynamite to metagramme.com to make way for the new 'folio? Even with the bonus, I will most likely have to take on some freelance work since I am a new father and since my wife wants to stay home with our son as much as possible.

The Devil Nov 26, 08, 11:14 a.m.

and his had me down. In love with the dark side I fell, dabbling all the way down. But you changed that all for me—you lifted me up, turned me round.

...Incredibly redemptive words from such a doubting Thomas.

Deep Fried Sep 19, 08, 8:08 a.m.

Have worked every weekend for two months straight. Worked 8:45 AM till 3 AM the other day. Am on the verge of total burnout. Have developed an annoying twitch in my left eye from lack of sleep. Our first baby is coming very soon and I will be extra pissed if I can barely pull myself away from work to spend time with him.

So glad the weekend is upon us. Thanks for listening,

[ end rant ]

Halp Dec 29, 08, 3:16 p.m.

Stuck down here in the land of casseroles and kudzu, AKA lower Alabama. Staying @ my wife's aunt's house while visiting the rest of her family. The family and their house is quite nice but there's nary a drop of booze in this town, and zounds but the boredom is palpable.

Right now: we are actually watching a beauty pageant on TV that my wife's cousin was in. The prize at stake: being the female representative of the lower southern peanut industry. I shit ye not.

*stoves head in with corner of laptop

Senior Thesis Apr 17, 08, 2:34 p.m.

Regardless of your stance on abortion, I think we can all agree that this is twisted and horrific:

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2…

moamoa Oct 15, 08, 7:30 p.m.

Here you go, please try not to make this a train wreck.

This does not communicate Mar 20, 08, 3:06 p.m.

what's that site that has the stickers. Cannae find it in the filter.

shanks, gramme-pa

gramme Jr. has finally arrived! Oct 10, 08, 7:37 p.m.

Graham Benjamin Steel was born on October 8 at 4:21 am. He weighed in at 7 lb. and 19.25" long. Both mother and baby are doing fine, we got home this afternoon and are looking forward to not sleeping in a hospital tonight.

And no, I did not name my son after my screen name.

http://www.facebook.com/album.ph…

Logotype Critique Aug 30, 08, 11:58 a.m.

OK, I swear I usually do work for people outside of the church ;)

This is for a friend's college ministry in the research triangle area of NC. It's a huge group as far as those things go.

The name of the church affiliated with the ministry is Church of The Good Shepherd. So, I thought a simple logotype would be most appropriate. I've narrowed it down to what you see here. I wanted to subtly hint at a shepherd's crook with the lowercase f, rather than try to make some gimicky shield or crest like I was asked (ugh).

I typically think containing a logotype in an oval or circle can be a cop-out, but in this case it reinforces the idea of a flock or group being unified. I'm leaning towards one direction but would appreciate some feedback first.

http://metagramme.com/Flock_dd1_…

Let 'er rip.

East London Phrases Feb 28, 08, 1:46 p.m.

I'll start.

So I was getting my whiskers boxed at the sheriff's pantry, and along comes this musky duckling, springin' hot biscuits out of her ruffly truffle, and I said "Oi. There's only enough French bacon in this barrel to catch a geezer by the greenery, a'roight luv?"

ZOUNDS! Nov 7, 08, 8:45 a.m.

Now that's one heavy slab of water. I don't know if that can even be called a wave.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/…

*shudders

ichunes advice Oct 3, 08, 9:15 a.m.

Got a hankerin for some new music. I like Deftones but not Taproot. I like Iron & Wine but not Belle & Sebastian. Considering Spoon. Perhaps something heavier, though I can't abide heavy music that lacks melody. Advise me.

Style Guide Question Aug 7, 08, 8:57 a.m.

For those that have designed & written style guides: if the guidelines are mainly for in-house secretary types (who are just now learning InDesign) rather than designers, and you want to make sure no one ever tries to re-create the logo from scratch, what is the point in showing the logo's construction? I've seen/done both ways. Sometimes people diagram the crap out of the logo, and then again sometimes they just show it without describing what's under the hood, so to speak. Just wondering what you guys think.

Dino dos Santos Jul 2, 08, 7:35 a.m.

There's a website that shows some of his fonts, and it isn't dstype.com (his foundry's site). Any ideas? Can't seem to find it in my links or on Google. I was specifically looking for design information on Glosa, dstype isn't very informative.

thx,
gramme

Typeface suggestions pls May 12, 08, 11:28 a.m.

I am FINALLY starting to work on the new identity for my church, after talking about it for a year. We're Presbyterian, orthodox, and fairly traditional, but very involved in the local community. There is a growing number of young people like myself, so it feels less stuffy and buttoned-up these days.

Would like to gather some typographic suggestions. I'm liking fonts that have a 17th–18th. c. feel to them, like something you might find in an old Scottish or Dutch book. Also working with some more contemporary American options. Have been using Mercury, Caslon, Benton, Minion, Gotham & Trade Gothic. I'm avoiding fonts that feel very Italian or French like Bembo, Jenson or Garamond. I think Trajan works for some of the directions I'm taking, but I'm SICK of seeing it everywhere. I've been eyeing Penumbra as a possibility.

I feel like I need more options. Suggestions please, and thanks billions.

Rant Mar 19, 08, 10:23 a.m.

So we designed this print campaign for our biggest client. It's a 107 page book and six brochures, all of which come slipcased in a kit. Total beauty piece – gorgeous photos, intricate illustrations, good writing and typography, several different cool papers throughout. My boss and I worked super hard on this over the course of about 4 months, and I spent many late, almost sleepless nights making sure it was as close to perfect as possible. The week before the press check I worked maybe 100 hours. The printer, one of the best in the country, totally dropped the ball on this one. For some reason, the book is about a quarter inch shorter than it should be, so now it's a different size than the accompanying brochures. It now flops around in the slipcase that was engineered for an exact 6 x 9 fit, since the books are too short. This also messes up our layout. The printer also fattened the type waay too much, b/c they were concerned it wouldn't hold up on press. They forgot to fatten type on one page, and it totally looks fine. Some letters are now running into each other. The varnish appears to be tainted, since many photos now look milky, even thought they were crystal clear when we did the press check.

Grrrr...anyone else have bummer print stories like this? It's just a letdown when you work really hard on something that then gets pulled down by production mistakes.

Hanging Punctuation Feb 20, 08, 2:33 p.m.

In InDesign. The Story (optical alignment) doesn't always seem to work very well. Is there another way to automate it, or do I have to do it the old fashioned way and make another text box to the right or left? Any ideas?

Cheers,
gramme-pa

Ugh Feb 6, 08, 4:21 p.m.

Typesetting product names & numbers, in two languages, for 200+ little tiny product swatches. Flipping between ID files and between ID/Excel. It's a bit like playing Tetris. Minutes away from a frozen wrist.

Anyone else working late on something mindless?

What would Bringhurst do? Dec 3, 08, 3:36 p.m.

So, I know in proper typography, small caps are used for acronyms, but not pronouns. I've always thought it's best to use a single letterspace in pronouns such as C. S. Lewis.

My question is, when typesetting U.S. or U.S.A., do you add space after periods or not? U. S. looks a bit odd to my eye, but I could be wrong.