Holiday cards are ready! The cards I started a couple weeks ago arrived over the weekend and are all set for the holiday craft fairs.

I’ve illustrated all four by hand, colored in photoshop, and had them printed by Moo. I’ll probably put a few sets in the Dull Roar Shop after this week’s fair, if you’re interested!

In a few months Red Hat is moving to new digs in downtown Raleigh. The renovation of the new space involves setting aside casual meeting space with wall-sized illustrations created in collaboration with the opensource.com team.

I’ve been working on several of these in the past few months, so I thought I’d share a couple of my favorites. These, of course, have been re-cropped so that they can be used as editorial illustration on the opensource.com site (so not wall-sized, at least not yet!).

In March, I spent a week learning to screenprint at Penland School of Crafts. This is my second print: A series of hand-drawn type studies in the form of a little conversation.

The films for each screen were created by hand, using rubylith, opaquing pens, and a xerox machine. I used four screens and produced a signed edition of 35 uncut sheets. 12 additional sheets with minor defects were cut to postcard size and printed with mailing indicia on the back.

In progress | This is a snippet of a flier for a craft fair my colleague Mike is organizing the for Red Hat employees and spouses. The Dull Roar monsters are making an appearance, so I’ve been helping out with the promotion.

Have some feedback for me? Post it on dribbble.

Posters for SignalFest, an electronic music festival coming to venues in Raleigh and Chapel Hill in the next couple weeks. Though the basic structure of the poster is the same each time, the elements change to reflect the tone of the music played at each venue.

Open Source For America is an organization that works to raise awareness of open source in the federal government.

A couple of years ago, Tim Kiernan and I worked on a video to help OSFA promote their mission. Type and layout by me, motion and film by Tim. Logo courtesy of an over-zealous web designer who, in the wake of Obama’s election, couldn’t keep his gradients off this logo, which was a collaboration between me and Critter.

(Source: youtube.com)

Libby Likes | Here’s the highlights from June and July 2011.

1. Free layered typefaces based on lettering by Indian street painters
2. Gorgeous abstract photos, from Stephen Coles’ iPhone, no less
3. A collage of typographic stripes by Hugo Werner
4. Turn-of-the century sign painting from the Library of New South Wales
5. Unexpectedly graphic crystals of glucose isomerase, from these scientists
6. A little work-life balance (and playful lettering) by Jeff Rogers

Want to see more? It’s all over at libbylikes.

Libby Likes | Here’s the highlights from April and May 2011 (I’ve gotten a little behind).

1.  An incredibly colorful mural by Matt W. Moore
2. “Improvements” to Damien Hirst’s LSD by Banksy
3. A huge collection script logotypes, via we love typography
4. My most popular post ever: Matilda poster by Andrew Bannecker
5. Paintings by Jaakko Mattila that look like out-of-register prints
6. Chili Con Carne made entirely of paper by Sarah Illenberger

Want to see more? It’s all over at Libby Likes.

Libby Likes | Here’s the highlights from March 2011 (I’ve gotten a little behind).

1. Gorgeous poster by Martin Venezky and Appetite Engineers
2. One of 101 pattern explorations by NCLZ
3. More amazing hand lettering from Sarah Maxey
4. A frightening beastie by Hylton_Warburton
5. Delicious posters by Lucas Melborne for MunchaCruncha
6. Letters made of yarn by Kelsey Oseid

Want to see more? It’s all over at Libby Likes.

I have a jar of rhinestones on my desk, leftover from an ad concept that never worked out. They might make crappy ads, but they make beautiful type.

Another type-driven illustration for opensource.com, this time for an article on doctors sharing their notes with patients.

Read the article here.

The best new typefaces of 2010 | Variations between sans-serif types are subtle. They are stripped of the flourishes that set other types apart from the crowd, so it’s all about details carefully considered and beautifully executed. For my top sans-serifs of the past year, I looked for typefaces that used those details to create a unique personality without sacrificing utility (and they all have large families, too!)

Above, in order of appearance: Acorde OT, Aktiv Grotesk Std, and Sense OT.

Un-watermarked type previews from FontShop.

Like this? There’s more of the best new typefaces of 2010 here.

I would just like to note that for the first time, all the handles on my anchor points are at right angles. I resisted this “proper” method of drawing for a long time, because it didn’t seem worth the effort. I was wrong.

The final illustration should be posted in the education channel on opensource.com in the next week or so.

Libby Likes | Here’s the highlights from the past month.

1. A zebra in a tree by Paul Rand, found via Display
2. 16 different ways to say “yes” from Telegramme Studio
3. Circles Colour Structure Studies by Bridget Louise Riley
4. A inscription from a Cuban schoolhouse, as photographed by Paul Keller
5. A parachute instructor from 1942, from the Library of Congress
6. The Capital by Heng Swee Lim

Want to see more? It’s all over at Libby Likes.

Tuesday type | You can call it “inline,” “hand-tooled,” “open,” or “engraved.” None of that really changes the fact that’s it’s fun, unusual, and decidedly old-fashioned. Above, in order of appearance: Smaragd, Geotica One Engraved, Matrix II Inline, Dominus Modern Engraved, Geotica Three Open, and Saphir Com.

Type previews by FontShop and MyFonts.
Quote by Alice Roosevelt Longworth.