Design Books

First off, I have to say this book is absolutely perfect for all first-time freelance graphic designers. My business partner and I recently started our own design agency at [...] and didn't have a clue about where to get our hands on the legal forms needed. We were referred to this book from another source. And since my partner's father-in-law is a lawyer, we decided to let him take a look at it to see what he thought. He said everything was solid. He couldn't find any holes on any of the forms inside. So after making a few small changes to custom fit our business, we were set. I can honestly say this book should be on the shelf of every aspiring freelance graphic designer. I highly recommend it.

I have only serious clients who are willing to pay me because I take a contract to our first meeting and make them sign it. These contracts will protect you and your clients! They are worded with the legal stuff but easy to understand. He even explains what it all means. It even has a CD so you can pop it in your computer right before your meeting (as I have done) and print a contract.

This book has EVERYTHING you need ... and then some. When you think you're not going to need one of the forms in this book, you later realize that YOU DO! As a freelance artist, using these forms made me feel as though clients noticed that they were dealing with a real professional. Absolutely a great investment.

In starting out and gathering information it's hard to determine what books will be helpful. This is great. It is filled with tear out forms you can make copies of and use over and over. Great information. And the CD-ROM includes all the forms in pdf format, as well as Pagemaker and Quark XPress so that you can make changes to fonts and style, logo additions, and more, to suit your own home business. Files are compatible with Mac and IBMC platform, which is great for me being a designer working mostly on an IBM computer. Excellent book!

Our small graphic design firm had been relying on the legal forms and contracts from this book for about one year. Finally, we decided that perhaps we ought to visit with a lawyer to make sure we were doing it right...$560.00 later for an initial consultation, we realized that this $29.95 book was the best business investment we'd ever made! The lawyer confirmed that the contracts that we had been using were airtight and were great (he had a few other pointers...but, none worth $560.00).

We have had many comments from our clients that over all the creative teams they'd worked with over the years, our design firm had surpassed them all in business professionalism. If you are serious about running a firm, or just want to protect yourself, you really can't go wrong with this book! Such a small investment for such a large return!

I had hoped to use this book as an introduction to using CSS and to help me update my online portfolio. While I did learn a good deal about CSS, this book was not nearly as easy to use as I had hoped.
First, a significant portion of the book is dedicated to a lengthy and repetitive sermon on why CSS is superior and should be used for all your presentation needs. It seems to avoid discussing the shortcomings of the system, or point out where you might need to resort to other solutions, such as JavaScript.
I am a person who learns by analyzing examples and learning to expand on the ideas in them. This, I think is where this book fails. The code samples in the book are incomplete and presented as fragments interspersed with explanation. The more advanced examples are so full of hacks to make presentation identical on all browsers, that they become unreadable. And the final straw was when I downloaded the dynamic-looking photo browser pictured in Chapter 12 and found that the dynamic functions simply don't work! (samples available at http://www.friendsofed.com/download.html?isbn=159059231X).
This is probably a good source for a designer already familiar with CSS. For a beginner, I recommend looking elsewhere.

Do you want to learn really how powerful CSS can be? This book takes you from the ground up and helps you to understand not only the how to use css for layout but also why you use css. Starting off with the basics you get a good feel for how to write css in both the page itself as well as in an external stylesheet. The authors also explain the advantages and disadvantages of each way to include the styles. Then the book takes you through typography, which unless you are already an expert, you will gain a great understanding of exactly how the type settings really work with the text on a web page. Next, it dives into how to use the css to control your page layout with many different known techniques. You also will understand how these designs work so you can review them and walk away with the knowledge of how to leverage existing patterns and modify them to your needs. If you want to know how to design a page using css definitely get this book.

I have seen this book as very good reference for css. I just would like to have CD also with samples. It is must buy.

This book does an excellent job of explaining CSS. My main focus is seperating content from presentation being my sites are search engine friendly.

Great for CSS beginers, I found everything here I needed to know to get started.

This book is great! I would recommend this to anyone 12+, because the shelters are quite hard to build. It is excellent for boy scouts. I got this for Christmas and in my troop were starting on plans already! Great for any wilderness lover and I recommend all the related books!
1/16/08

I know that most people will find this book to be anything but "green" however, I found this concept to be perfect in a world that sometimes forgets what it is like to be young at heart. Some of the shelters are not safe and one should always supervise young children who if left alone will build forts and such, yet there is a certain allure about thinking you are back in time and surviving on your own wits. Great ideas for survival campouts or if you like getting out "there" and just might once or twice get too far out "there" and find yourself in the need of an overnight shelter. Loved the book and will use or adapt many of the detailed plans.

Great fun book of information not necessarily pertinant to our currnt lives but very educational and fun in any case.

This book is great! I would recommend this to anyone 12+, because the shelters are quite hard to build. It is excellent for boy scouts. I got this for Christmas and in my troop were starting on plans already! Great for any wilderness lover and I recommend all the related books!
1/16/08

This book is geared towards building structures that were used by outdoorsmen from years past. It covers how to make a bed from natural materials, a log cabin, Native American log house, and how to work an axe just to name a few topics covered in this book. The drawings of the dwellings in the book are simple (but not in depth plans or charts). The author does a great job of explaining how to construct these devices, but as I said a drawn picture is all your going to get if your a visual learner. Over all the book does what it says it will do, gives the reader good information, and I personally wouldn't be caught dead without it if I was trapped in the middle of nowhere by myself.

I love the paperback version of this book because it is spiralbound. It has laminated pages, great for the garden, keeps it clean. The book is organized by flowering month that helps find plants you can't identify or to locate plants for a certain month that you need more color in your garden. I live in the Chicago area and it seems to cover a lot of plants for my planting zone. Each plant has the information I need to choose for certain areas of planting. It's a great book!

This book has taken the puzzle and work out of perennial gardening. THanks to Pam, I now understand the way to keep my garden in color all season!

I have many books and enjoy them all. But this book had some ideas and information I had not read about in the past. A very fine purchase.

Continuous Bloom is one of those books I refer to over and over again. Pam Duthie shows that it is relatively easy to keep perennial beds and borders looking good and in bloom from March through October in eastern North America. Two hundred and seventy-two of the best perennials, each with a full-color photo, are arranged in order of bloom time. For each plant, there is necessary information for home gardeners such as: plant hardiness zone, height/width, descriptions of flower and foliage, bloom time, light and soil requirements, care, propagation, and potential problems. A good investment for beginning as well as experienced gardeners.

This book is a novice gardener's dream come true!
The flowering plants & colorful bushes are arranged by month of blooming time, each page has a picture of the plant & a detailed description of it: Type, flower size, foliage color, bloom length, light preference, care problems, tips, etc..
There are planting & seasonal garden care tips at the end of the book.
As a novice gardener I'm glad that I found this book to help me create a continuously blooming garden.

I had three main reasons for buying this book:
1. To bridge the gap between the control theory from school and the systems that I now design and build
2. To gain insight on how to improve the performance and reliability of real motion systems
3. To find ways to apply advanced techniques to help meet challenging performance requirements

I got all of this and more from this book. The topics covered clearly and concisely in this book span three courses I took at Cal Poly SLO: basic controls, digital controls, and modern/advanced control theory. Mr. Ellis does a great job of quickly introducing these topics and getting straight to the practical implications.

The free software and examples work well to illustrate his points quickly and easily while helping to commit the insights to memory. I also hope to use it as a training tool for our techs.

I highly recommend this book to anyone working with control systems, especially grad students and people getting started in the field. I look forward to reading his book on observers.

The author attempts to bridge the gap between theory and practice, and does a good job at it. Familiarity with control concepts will help one to get more out of the book, because the book focuses more on the practical aspects. The explanations in some of the sections can definitely be more complete, and thus I have to give it only a 4 star rating. Overall it is a good book.

This is a really good book that simplified control system for the real world. Most text spend too much time on theory and analysis and end the discussion with a bunch of equations and graphs without explaining how to implement the design. This book covers both analog and digital control, and lets you download a software from the author's web site. This software, ModelQ, lets you play with various parameters so you can see how the system behaves when it is not optimized.

One drawback with the book is it only covers PID control and its variants, but doesn't cover state-space control. While state-space control may be considered "overkill" by many control engineers, state-space is used in industry. The decision to use state-space is often not in the hands of individual engineers, so it may not be an option to ignore state-space. It would be nice if Mr. Ellis could cover state-space in his next edition of the book.

Ellis has made a fantastic book on PID and similar control loops. He takes a very different tact than most controls books -- he writes with a voice similar to a handbook, but delivers enough content to compete with more traditional textbook-style controls books. It is light on the math in comparison, but I don't find myself wanting for more math.

I do a lot of controls design, consulting, and teaching. I recommend this book often and find that people that buy it uniformly track me down and thank me for the recommendation. I can't think of much higher praise for this book.

This book is a great guide to problems and solutions for modern control systems. Many text will have page after page of formulas with little link to the real world of control system design. Mr. Ellis provides answers to the problems faced by todays engineers.

Instead of repeating what others have said, I will summarize: 1) Great Designs and Patterns; 2) Incredible and Doable embellishments to make the purses/handbags attractive and desirable; 3) Romantic but also give a vintage-feel to the purses/handbags; and 4)GREAT Inspiration for all interested in fiber/fabric arts as these can be applied to other items, dresses, belts, scarves, hats, etc. IF you are so inclined. Compared to my other purse books, I will definitely refer to this one more frequently for inspiration than any other one, yet each purse design book does provide this to one degree or another. Enjoy!

Unless you've got a really nice collection of antique laces, trims and appliqués, these projects are going to be expensive, and probably not as scrumptious as if they were made out of original materials. When I'm in DIY mode, I'd rather not spend hundreds at a couple stores to make one purse, I want to use what I have on hand --and be able to make substitutions, even big leaps of substitution. This book tends to use the same materials (looped fringe for example), and if I don't have it for one handbag, I'm not going to have it for another either. So a special trip for all the materials in one handbag would be required.

Yes, the purses are awesome while serving their purpose: holding your stuff. But know that your project will probably be very expensive, and if you don't bother to spare the expense, you're going to be highly disappointed (if you have good taste.) Also, these are all busy, frilly, Victorian handbags, so don't buy it thinking you'll get anything but.

Very rich book with great ideas! It needs some experience because does not explain step by step process, but it is worth enough to get it.

Very good tool for the handbag designer. Love all the detailed instructions and photos. Easy to follow patterns. Fun designs.

The book has beautiful photos of purses which would inspire even the least creatively challenged. There are detailed instructions, a material list, preparation, and construction instructions, and there are patterns in the back of the book(which you need to enlarge). There are at least 14 bags, all beautiful and distinct. I would highly recommend this book to anyone wants to create a lovely purse.

There are a million expensive plugins out there, and each does only one thing. You can buy each of them, or you can invest in your ability to learn Max's subtleties. This guy has apparently been doing great work since before there was a big plugin market, so buy his book, and you'll save all kinds of money. Plus you'll have a FAR better understanding of the various methods that can be used to perform relatively complex and difficult tasks. It's an exciting read for the right kind of 3D geek. You will probably find yourself thinking "I didn't know you could do THAT with THIS!"

Pete Draper knows his stuff! The tutorials are in color and quite easy to follow, except for the complex materials, but Pete explains what each one does in detail.

The author makes use of the Particles Systems a lot which you will be very good at by the end of the book. I own a bunch of books on Max, and this is by far, hands down, bar none the best book currently available.

Be warned this book does not cover everything in Max(such as Mental Ray), but after you finish this book you will have an arsenal of things you can do.

I recommend this book to beginners and experts alike, both will walk away with a lot of new ideas and knowledge about 3DS Max.

If you want to learn particle flow this is the book for you. Pete does things I never thought 3DS Max was capable of. The tuts in the book are great and there are a couple of bonus video tuts on the accompanying DVD. Buy this book!

This book has EXCELLENT tutorials, very descriptive and in-depth, the only complaint I have is it needs more tutorials on water, such as a running faucet tutorial, would've been helpful for my 3d animation class.

If you want to know how to use 3ds Max's Particle Flow...this is the book you should buy. One word of caution...make sure you brush up on your PFlow basics before digging in. The book definitely assumes that you know what you're doing when wiring up PFlow's Operators and Tests. There's screen shots to help you along, start and completed scene files, and a real nice handful of cool effects covered. More for the Intermediate and Advanced user.

Extending the hand dealt to you by the development package is where the quality programmers are separated from the mere developers; often the difference between an adequate product and a great one. If you are a developer using Delphi and want to advance to a higher level of production, this book contains the necessary boost. Anyone moving into Delphi component creation will find it essential. From properly choosing components from the Delphi Visual Component Library (VCL) to building your own components and interfacing with OLE and COM, most of the major topics are covered in detail, with sections of example code to really drive the message home.
The book starts off with a brief explanation of the models used in Delphi, basic concepts of a component, and the analysis and design of new components. This is followed up by an examination of Implementation Details, the fundamentals of polymorphism, virtual methods, exceptions, RunTime Type Information (RTTI), streaming, messaging, OLE and COM interfaces, and optimization techniques. "Design Time Support Tools," opens with an overview of the Integrated Development Environment (IDE) and emphasizes the interface issues. Danny Thorpe wraps it all up with chapters on property and component editors, and experts and add-in tools.
This book contains many insightful points. The chapter on virtual methods and polymorphism contains the best explanation of the implementation details of virtual methods that I have ever seen. This chapter could serve as a reference in any study of object-oriented programming. I've incorporated many of these points into my own training course. As one whose main approach to OOP has been via C++, I found this material invaluable when teaching a course in advanced Delphi recently. The clear descriptions of the underlying implementation distinctions between virtual and dynamic methods may save you in the area of performance. Knowing and understanding why virtual methods will defeat the smart linking of the Delphi compiler/linker can reduce the size of your EXE.
When I am presenting exceptions and exception handling to experienced programmers, they always ask the following question: "What is the real difference between this and how we have traditionally handled errors?" In only a few pages, the author answers this question and puts forward two lists, "Rules of Thumb for Implementing Exception Handlers" and "Rules of Thumb for Raising Exceptions"; solid advice for both developers and educators who develop developers.
Optimizing code when there is "abundant" stack space (surely a hint of heaven!), multiple threads and different system-defined string types differ from traditional tricks. These topics are all covered in the chapter on optimization. Just because this space is available is no reason to misuse it. Knowing that the stack will never shrink over the lifetime of the thread should force you to rethink overuse. Understanding that long strings are allocated on the heap rather than the stack should cause an occasional re-examination of approach. It is also gratifying to see that there is also a short section on sledgehammer techniques, or put another way, "genuinely useful hacks."
There is also an occasional sweet sprinkle of humor. From polymetamorphicdata (care to guess what that is?) to TypInfo ("tip info") and GUID ("gwid") the jokes are appropriate and blend well into the message. However, they are grains of seasoning rather than the bulk of the flavor.
Delphi is a development environment that provides the opportunity to do many things quickly and efficiently. Add in a copy of this book and you are ready to harness the true power of Delphi by creating your own components and pushing things to the leading edge of software creation. Some sections can be read and appreciated just for their insights into object-oriented programming and design.

Published in Journal of Object-Oriented Programming, reprinted with permission.

This guys are crooks. They advertise a book they DO NOT have, get your money and never reply to your e-mails.

The book is supposed to be great, by the way.

This is purely a Delphi programmer's guide, but it unquestioningly well written, informative, and well-rounded: Anyone seeking to learn how Delphi's VCL component libraries work, how to development components of their own, or how to extend Delphi VCL components already available from Borland or third parties, should read this book. There is simply nothing else that comes close.

Mr. Thorpe's writing style is clear, concise, and does a great job of exploring the topic at hand. Any competent Delphi programmer will be well capable of undertaking VCL development on their own if they have this book at their side. One point to note about this book is what used copies go-for on Amazon.com (and elswehere): I typically see prices of between $50 and $100, even though the book was first published about 10 years ago. How many other technology books, particularly for a specific software technology, remain in such high demand after such a long period of time?

"Delphi Component Design" was written for the VCL [Borland's Acronym for "Visual Component Library"] as it was implemented in Delphi 3.0 - back in the mid to late 1990's: the implementation of VCL it describes is still the foundation underlying VCL as implemented in Delphi today, and is close enough to the modern implementation to still be a very useful text. However, since Delphi's product direction is to pursue .NET as opposed to enhancing the older VCL, the book's usefulness is limited to those who are seeking to maintain or enhance existing Delphi VCL-based applications. Even though I no longer work in Delphi, I still find myself called-upon often enough for Delphi support that I'm not going to give up my copy of "Delphi Component Design" quite yet - even despite the used copy prices I see!

The book is a breath of fresh air and covers a good basic foundation: attitudes of programmers, basic structures of OOP with objects:- various virtual methods, basic construction of building blocks, streams, other forms of communication and a few peculiar things to watch out on. I personally have no interest in databases were some may have. 32 bit is the way to go as I can now see access to the windows API with the assistance of the book and Delphi Pro.
Danny points out its not necessary to understand every base object behind the object you are building off from.
This is true if you wish to add a minor adjustment to a component. But this I believe this is a major miss conception if you are building a new and different component. And for this purpose the book dose not begin to address threading, what is happing in TObject, as TObject is not in Delphi Pro to view and is the fundamental object that every object is built from!!!!!!. This is no different than the Pascal 7 days when every one wanted to read the OOP code for them selves at an enormous cost for a copy.
I'm not saying the book should cover the windows API as that's another subject on its own, but how a action is handled through the Objects, or how a windows event is managed though OOP:- draw, mouse button.....
I need a book that should cover enough to be able to install an object into a base object like a speed button into an editor or a listbox connected to a speed button so something like TCombobox or TGraph is understood how each piece interacts and is constructed together as a unit. When the OOPer's get hold of this understanding the tools for Delphi could become available will become limitless to the users. VB definitely has this advantage over Delphi today because we do not understand enough to create something different or new. Give it another go Danny with an extra book, as it is easy to understand what you have written, be cursus to get such a difficult subject right. And you have made a breath of fresh air already into the subject that is very useful to those that have read your first book but some of us need to go further.

This book is all about what goes behind the curtains. If are a crazy developer like me and interested in knowing how Delphi designers implemented different mechanisms such as WIndows messaging OLE COM this title is a must

i just bought this book with "tres logos" and wow, this book is amazing. this one explains the process, the reasons, etc of how to get to a great logo and the other book is a collection of great logos. this book stimulates your creative juices and guides it in a fashion that leads to great concepts for logos which from there can spring into many other medias and beyond (collateral pieces, ads, web, etc). this is a must have book for anyone at any stage of their design career. five stars to rockport and this book for another success. i have just about all the books published by rockport. awesome book.

Logos 01 is an excellent examples of the modern approach to corporate identity logo design. Case studies and examples illustrate the requirements and execution of a wide variety of businesses in regards to the need for a mark to help themselves in their marketing efforts. I have actually purchased and given this book to my marketing practice clients and prospects in order to provide good direction for their expectations and planning on this subject. The book is also beautifully designed, easy to read, and even though I use it as a tool, could easily be an attractive table-top book for the office.

A well designed, designer resource. The samples are large and the explanation text is informative. A great book for designers to have on hand.

This book is exceptionally well written and compiled. It speaks clearly and concisely to both beginner and experienced professional. Whether you are in need of new insights into logo design or just occasional reviewing, this book is for you.

This volume on design is both beautiful and insightful. In a bookcase full of vacuous logo "collections", Capsule's effort stands out as a genuinely intelligent, useful, and inspiring work.

Mr. Bartle's writing is precise and his facts carefully researched, even the ones he experienced himself. This is a huge, superbly constructed history of the tools and philosophies developed over the years in experimental and commercial development of online virtual worlds. Because of Mr. Bartle's personal knowledge as a long-time designer and his sharp memory for the significance of trends and details, this book will raise anyone's appreciation of whatever virtual worlds one comes across on line or on disk, whether they be famous commercial ones or those developed by enthusiasts for their own pleasure. I would think it would be a must read for gaming students. What a grand, satisfying, fascinating book! And when one considers that this exciting history is only the beginning of VW development... Wow!

This book taught me the theory behind Virtual worlds and I beleive nearly everything I read in this book.

I didn't simply believe everything because it was a published book, I beleived it because Richard used examples from real games. With all the experiance Richard has you would expect him to have learnt everything the hard way, he has but he's also smart enough to realise that sometimes you can learn from others mistakes instead of making them yourself.

The book is aimed at the 'Dungeons and Dragons' (and most of his examples are) type of game but there is no reason the information cannot be used in other genres.

The most amusing part is how right he can be.
Richard states that 'you cannot allow players to carry items over from the Beta testing to the online game, even though your players will try to convince you otherwise'; something I didn't really think and didn't really agree with.
My family and I were all about to join 'Pirates of the Caribbean' when it started; when the announcement was made that players form the Beta test would be allowed to keep items my daughters asked what a Beta test was, I explained and now they don't want to play as they consider that to be cheating. We have all decided not to play.

Learn from others (like Richard) or pay the price.

James

Covers all the aspects of virtual worlds from a psycological perspective; the intentions, the types of virtual worlds.
Doesn't include indepth technology and the development issues related to designing virtual worlds
Good primer on virtual worlds.

You're getting it straight from the horse's mouth since this book is written by the grandfather of the modern MMORPG.
Rest assured - if you are a game designer, developer, or just love reading about game theory, this book is worth every penny.

I have read many other books on the subject and not one of them are packed with as much depth, knowledge, and wisdom. Bartle covers every avenue that a designer needs to consider in order to be successful. This book will help you and your team create an active, emergent virtual world.

As a game developer, I learned many valuable lessons on what made other games lose subscribers, or worse -- catastrophically fail.


Richard Bartle's writing style is very creative and detailed, and like his games, it gives you the 'just one more page' syndrome. For example, in this book it mentions how often a player must be rewarded in order to retain interest. He uses this same technique for writing by giving you something insightful to read atleast every 10 pages.


Bartle has covered all the bases. Designing Virtual Worlds is a great book, very entertaining. I give it 5 out of 5 stars - a must read.

More than 700 well-written pages packed with valuable insights, and it still leaves you begging for more.

To begin with, this book is not a programming book. There is no code, no discussion of VRML, MPEG-4, or X3D. Instead, this book stands back and takes a "big picture" look at the design of a virtual world from the viewpoint of systems engineering, social engineering, philosophy, history, and psychology. Ethical considerations are even tossed in for good measure.
The book starts out with chapters on the history of virtual worlds and the cultural influences that affected their characteristics. Next, there is a fly-over view of the "production line" of building a virtual world. Bartle then turns his attention to the players - who they are, what they want, and how a virtual world can meet their needs. World design is examined from the standpoint of virtual geography, virtual world citizens, and finally the physics required to implement your world. Chapter 5 is about the specific sociology and physiology of the virtual world - skill levels, individual characteristics, how virtual inhabitants divide themselves into groups, combat, and even the meaning of death in the virtual world. The final three chapters are very philisophical in nature. Chapter 6 is basically a liberal arts syllabus through the prism of virtual world design. The last chapter, on ethical considerations, talks about censorship, and also looks at the player as a person and how game playing in virtual worlds can hurt more than help some kinds of people, particularly those prone to addiction.
Bartle's social commentaries may be a bit long-winded for some people, although I found them interesting. Some readers may also be somewhat frustrated by the fact that the book talks more about what can go wrong in the design of a virtual world - overly complex and static story arcs, characters that players do not get invested in, characters in which players get too invested, etc - than what can go right. I really enjoyed the book, mainly because it moves the focus of the potential virtual world designer from the artistic and technical viewpoint to the player's viewpoint - why they plays games, and why a player would pick your game versus someone else's game.