How This Book Works

This book is for designers, students, teachers, and other creative types who have a basic experience of Photoshop and Illustrator and are looking for a new way to learn graphic design. Each chapter contains a topic and a project based on an online lesson developed by a faculty member at Sessions, online school of design. Each chapter explores a specific design discipline, ranging from digital imaging to logo design and packaging design.

Figure 0.3. Each chapter in this book is created by a Sessions.edu faculty member. The Sessions.edu faculty is a team of industry-leading artists, designers, and educators.

In each chapter, you'll learn design principles and techniques, gaining insights into the professional design process. Throughout, the text features artwork generously provided by award-winning artists, designers, publications, and agencies. In fact, some of the best graphic design created in the United States today is contained in this little book. We hope you like the pieces, because we loved researching them.

Figure 0.4. Gloves offall projects in this book are hands-on! Digital illustration project by student Greg Hawthorne.

In the last portion of each chapter, you'll find a step-by-step design project that challenges you to apply the skills and concepts you've learned. As in a real-world design job, you'll be asked to work creatively within constraints: for creative direction.

What you do with that information (as in a real-world design job) will determine whether you too will produce excellent design work. Working through each project in this book will expose you to a range of concepts and challenges that any professional graphic designer should be able to tackle. Take each project to its creative limit, and you'll have a collection of design work to put in your portfolio and show potential employers.

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Projects in this book mirror the challenges encountered by graphic designers in the professional arena.

And here's what's really new and different: You're not doing this alone. Some how-to books come with CDs inside; this one comes with instructors. Each project in this book can be posted in an online learning environment for critique. Just complete each project to the best of your ability, and log in to a Sessions discussion forum to post your work for a critique from a Sessions instructor.

Figure 0.5. Don't just read this booktry out the projects using Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator, and then log in to the Sessions.edu Web site to post your work for an instructor critique.

In the online forum, all readers also can post work and comment on each other's work, so you can share feedback and perspectives with other students and readers. This is an important feature of any graphic arts program: the ability to learn from and discuss how other students approached an assignment you're working on. Constructive criticism is the rule; please show the same respect for other artists' work that you would expect them to show yours.