Carlton Hibberts Design Blog

iPad magazine app design

2012-02-06T13:47:00.000Z

Future Publishing, the company I work for, has recently undergone a fairly big restructure. Amongst all of the changes I'm now working on a couple of titles, one traditional print mag, Guitar Techniques, and one iPad mag, Guitarist Deluxe. It means that now I'm a digital designer as well as the usual CMYK print version. It's been very interesting getting to grips with the skills required for iPad app creation. I use Adobe's Digital Publishing Suite to produce my work - it's great to work in a truly multimedia fashion.

You can buy Guitar Techniques from My Favourite Magazines, and you can get Guitarist Deluxe from iTunes.

Time to change

2011-10-10T11:35:00.000+01:00

This site seriously needs an update, and it will do soon. In other news I'm about to embark on a new phase in my career. I'm going to be working on a new magazine, I'll post which one once it goes to press, so stay tuned!

Busy times

2010-02-22T10:56:00.000Z

Apologies, I've rather neglected this blog. I've been busy with lots of different projects at Future, plus I've also been hard at work on my children's site Patterns for Colouring. The pattern site is entering a new phase and I'm currently polishing off the finishing touches on a site redesign. Magazines are still my main focus - I've recently art edited two issues of Procycling. I've also had stints on ImagineFX, What Mountain Bike, PC Format and Linux Format amongst others. There are lots planned for 2010, so stay tuned.

Mine: Make it personal

2009-03-26T21:27:00.000Z

Time Inc has developed a new way of consuming magazines. You personalise them by giving the customer a choice of what should appear in their unique edition. The publishing company makes available a number of articles from its top brands, and you get to make a choice. Unfortunately you don't get to edit out the ads, targeted advertorials are also included. Despite this sting in the tail it represents a move that I'm sure all publishing companies will be watching carefully. I know I will. More at MagazineShift where they are dubbing it "Printernet"...

Google everything

2009-03-07T16:38:00.000Z

Just spotted this link via TechCrunch's Twitter: Conceptual/Graffiti artist Filippo Minelli has put together a great series of photos where Google has a hand in everything. Google Answers is possibly my favourite. There is also another category where he plasters well known website and business names onto a variety of contradictory scenes, the Facebook one is possibly the most apt.

Elsewhere, Edge magazine (produced by Future Publishing for whom I work) has produced an amazing 200 limited edition covers for its landmark 200th edition. That is an awful lot of work and a very ambitious celebration. Phew! By the way you can now follow me on Twitter by clicking the T next to my RSS feed icon.

Mens mags become poorer

2009-03-07T13:31:00.000Z

Arena closes its doors. A sign of the difficult times that newstand editions face.

Magazine round-up

2009-02-19T22:55:00.000Z

Design Week seems to be taking a certain amount of joy in Condé Nast doing a slight repeat of a prior NME cover. Beth Ditto has posed nude for their new launch title 'Love', however the NME first featured her nude in 2007. Though I would hardly call the original a triumph! Personally I don't really see the problem. Here's a star that likes to celebrate her size and femininity, so its not surprising for her to pose in the all together. Lets face it no one bats an eye when Pamela Anderson does it and she's appeared on countless covers. Love's version is far more accomplished but it doesn't really move me enough to drag me to the newsstand.

Elsewhere at Condé Nast UK they are busying themselves launching a new version of 'Wired'. I hope it lasts the course this time.

In the world of corporate communications McDonalds has received an award for its internal mag 'MDUK'. The title is designed to be read by its young staff that serve food to McD's customers. It looks like the title loves to use copious amounts of DIN, which isn't such a bad thing!

iPhone gems

2009-02-16T12:54:00.000Z

Two neat little apps if your a typonerd and in possession of an iPhone. WhatTheFont and hugeType are fun little programs that are dedicated to typefaces.

WhatTheFont is a great utility that I've used many times on my desktop computer when I'm trying to figure out what font has been used in a inspirational piece of design. Now you can do it on the move. Spot a poster on your travels and can't quite figure out what font the headline is set in? Get your iPhone out, take a snap and upload to the server and the rest is done for you.

On the other hand, hugeType is just a bit of fun. Its an app that displays Flickr snaps of individual font characters. So if you happen to have a bunch of friends all holding iPhones, then you can get creative.

Bloody Omaha

2009-01-28T15:46:00.003Z

I don't usually stray too far from print design here, but spotted this video on Drawar and had to share it. Its a short clip of how 3 designers donned WWII gear and recreated the D-Day landings with a lot of running about, plenty of green screen, a dash of mini explosions and a truckload of CGI...

'Iconic Design' stamps

2009-01-15T10:20:00.003Z

These look cool. The Royal Mail is releasing a new series of stamps celebrating British Design classics. It includes tasteful shots of the designs on a simple white background (very DK!). Including in the collection are the Mini, Concorde, Penguin books, etc.

I'm surprised that more modern design isn't represented. Surely Jonathan Ives' iMac and iPod should get the nod?

BTW HNY, it's been a while ;)

WPT Poker magazine issue 35

2008-10-14T16:00:00.000+01:00

Roland de Wolfe makes another appearance under our masthead. Its the first time we've re-featured a player on the cover. Inside the issue you can get his opinion on the cost of tournaments these days. It was an incredibly busy issue for me, not only did I have to put all of the design together, as usual, but I also had to shuttle to London several times to cover the WSOPE. I got to meet a lot of the big star players, along with bagging quite a few for covershoots.

Features in this issue include:

16 pages of tournament coverage from the WPT at the Bellagio and the GUKPT Bolton.
Pro on pro with Robert Romanello and Tony Cascarino
Has poker killed off its gangster and Wild West desperado image?
Why LAG is the new TAG
Pros and cons of staking
A cash game walk through with a pro

Buy it now!

I wonder where their brain is?

2008-10-07T14:46:00.000+01:00

As mentioned below the MPA has anounced its winner. Yawn!

Architectural inspiration

2008-10-07T14:41:00.000+01:00

How many architects would site Michael Schumacher as their inspiration. Hands up LAVA. The mind boggles!

Cover of the Year: US

2008-10-04T14:21:00.000+01:00

The MPA awards for the best cover of the year are being decided as we speak. Here are the contenders. Some nice shots but as mag covers I'm not impressed. I know that the US market operated in a different way to the UK but none of these examples makes me think "Wow". Obviously Jessica here is rather alluring but it not that special a cover, is it? In terms of pure look I'd have to choose the "T" japanese cover, but I'm still left thinking "So what?"

WPT Poker magazine issue 32

2008-07-25T20:11:00.000+01:00

I think its safe to say that the first issue AFTER a redesign is always difficult, this one was no exception. A lot of blood, sweat and tears went into creating this little beauty. Despite the pain it turned out to be a great issue.

Joe Beevers of The Hendon Mob is our cover star. He was very obliging considering that the shoot was right after he had just busted out of his Poker Nations heat! Read his profile to see how he's become so successful (despite this hiccup!).

This month we have...

World Series of Poker coverage (part one)
WPT Bay 101 roundup
GCBPT report from Bristol
How to make the most of casino gamblers who wander in to the cardroom curious about poker
Small Ball poker book extract from Daniel Negreanu
What Evelyn Ng thinks of her fellow poker peers

Get down to your local stockist and pick up a copy now!

Busy times: Redesign of WPT Poker and new pattern website

2008-06-22T21:14:00.000+01:00

Its been a very busy last few months for me. Firstly I had to do a redesign of my magazine, WPT Poker. My colleagues and I have produced a more focussed product aimed at the established poker playing community. We've added far more input from professional players, giving the reader far more chance to immerse themselves in the practice and atmosphere of cardroom mentality.

The look of the magazine is now more sophisticated, with a whole raft of new features. We've given the cover a matt finish which make the whole package very tactile. New articles include: Action, our front news/analysis section; New regular columnists, Doyle Brunson, Antonio Esfandiairi and Jim Mcshane; Floor, tales from tournament directors; Every Question Answered, your chance to put your questions to a poker pro; Real Life, a stars chance to share a life changing event; and many more.

The cover star this issue is Neil Channing, telling us about his big win in the Irish Open and his preparation for the World Series.

If you want pick up a copy of the No.1 resource for serious players click here! On sale now.

The other project that has kept me up late is a new pattern site. Its for all those (kids through to pensioners!) who love to colour in abstract patterns. I used to love spending hours as a young'un filling in bookloads of these kind of designs. I did a websearch but found nothing beyond a few ancient sites with awful images on them. So I decided to create my own patterns for an eager audience to download, print and start colouring in. Its a great activity for when the weather is chucking stair-rods at the world.

Check out the blog for the full list of patterns you can download. More to be added regularly.

Memories of Crayola

2008-05-25T16:00:00.001+01:00

Colourlovers has put together a list of all of the crayola colours, which brings me right back to childhood when I had a huge box of the things. I remember going through them one by one, trying to use each of them equally, ending up with pages covered in abstract rainbows. The list helpfully gives you some print and screen colour values to recreate each one. Beyond this article, Colourlovers is a great place to immerse yourself.

Local design school proposal

2008-04-23T23:45:00.001+01:00

James Dyson unveils his design school to be based in Bath, just a few minutes walk from where I live. Its an interesting plan. At the moment the whole face of Bath is being redeveloped, some good like this project, others bad like the Riverside development. The design schools aim is to give 14 to 19 year olds a foothold into the product design and engineering industry. It does seem a shame that its not going to cover other creative disciplines, but I guess there is only so much space on the site. The architectural plans of the building have been revised, quite rightly, to retain more of the original features of the warehouse that is to be converted into the school. More info about the project can be found on the Dyson site.

Absolutely Smashing

2008-04-23T23:34:00.002+01:00

New to my blogroll is Smashing Magazine, a great resource for design inspiration. One of their posts is all about Beautiful Handwriting, Lettering and Calligraphy. Great eyecandy!

WPT Poker magazine issue 28

2008-04-15T21:24:00.000+01:00

I've been so snowed under recently that I've been unable to update you on our latest issues. Well let me fix it by pointing out our latest corker of an issue. Cover star Liv Boeree kindly gave up some of her hectic schedule to do an exclusive photoshoot for us. The results were great as you can see. We recently went to a recording session of a Pokerstars televised event. We had a bundle of these copies with us and they barely saw the light of day before many interested parties whisked them away for closer inspection. So get one while you can. Inside we profile her career as well as get her to interview Andy Black.

In this issue you'll find articles on:

Barry Carter tells us of his experiences playing a televised event.

How to play Omaha if you're a main game is Texas Hold'em

Carl Sampson relays a tale of his past on the backstreet poker circuit

Tips to keep that ego in check when chasing a pot

Is it a good idea to sit at a cash table for only half the max buy-in

Dash down to WHSmith right now.

Our Favourite Typefaces of 2007

2008-03-31T23:06:00.001+01:00

Crikey, I very nearly forgot to bring your attention to the typographic oscars at Typographica. I have to say that a good proportion of them leave me cold. For instance J.N.Scripts? Kinescope? Fab? I guess they can't all be FF Meta Serif in stature.

Modbook Tablet

2008-03-31T22:55:00.001+01:00

Should I suddenly find myself to be rather rich I may be tempted to fork out for a Modbook Tablet. It makes any creative drool with the idea of being so in touch with a device. Yes, I know there's plenty of PC tablets out there but none of them have OSX in them!
However, if I really was that rich, I'd be more likely to be down the golf course than grappling with a Mac, no matter how creative it would make me. Oh well!

Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Typeface

2008-03-31T22:45:00.001+01:00

I just found this article about typefaces by Michael Bierut at Design Observer. A good read about the thought processes behind typeface selection. Its not a step by step - it just underlines how designers can approach a project with their eyes, emotions and knowledge.

Deserted streets

2008-03-06T10:31:00.002Z

Creative Review has posted up a series of images showing prominent streets of London by Austrian artist Gregor Graf. He basically photoshops out all of the usual street clutter - people, cars, shop signs and branding - leaving you to guess where the street actually is. I'm more amazed that he's captured London with blue skies and fluffy white clouds, or is that just more photoshoppotrickery?

Badly Kerned

2008-02-27T21:57:00.000Z

David Friedman has coined this new word to describe a common typographical mistake. Setting characters too tightly to one another can now be described as "keming". The idea seems to have caught on, even Boing Boing is running it! Kem is what you see when the r and n in kern are too close to each other.