Lon
is a freelance graphic designer working in San Francisco in both Print
& Interactive/Web Design. He has done work for clients including
SegaSoft, Imagine Media, Arnold Worldwide Advertising. Lon studied film
& photography at Bard College, The San Francisco Art Institute and
the San Francisco Academy of Art College.
Like many Adobe After Effects users, Trish and Chris Meyer's book ''Creating Motion Graphics with After Effects'' has long been Lon Clark's Holy Grail of AE information. (Besides Creative Cow, of course!) The pages of my copy are dog-eared and coffee stained from countless sessions of late-night referencing, and I regard it as an indispensable book in my collection. The Meyer's second AE book, published by CMP Books (the publishers of DV Magazine) is ''After Effects in Production: A companion for Creating Motion Graphics,'' and as excellent as CMG is, ''After Effects in Production'' is the perfect sequel.
When you import vector artwork into a pixel-based program such as After Effects or Photoshop, its edges are determined by the outmost edges of the art. Sometimes, you want to extend the image area to allow new possibilities in your designs. In this article, Lon Clark demonstrates that by creating crop marks, you define a new edge/size for the file and that can open up new design opportunities.
When you're creating text using Illustrator, it's easy to simply type it out and call it a day. Lon Clark demonstrates by spending a little time fine tuning your letter spacing by making tracking and kerning adjustments, you'll wind up with a slicker and more professional type treatment.
