Author Archives: Brian Lawler

About Brian Lawler

Brian Lawler is an Emeritus Professor of Graphic Communication at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo and was a Guest Professor at Hochschule München from September, 2021 to September, 2022. He writes about graphic arts processes and technologies for various industry publications, and on his blog, The Blognosticator.

The Bishop Peak Portrait Project comes to a close

Posted on February 17, 2017 by Brian Lawler

Last year about this time I was preparing to install my remote camera on the roof of the Kennedy Library at Cal Poly. I built a weatherproof box, designed and built a circuit board, tested the system, and then carried … Continue reading →

Posted in Photography, Photoshop techniques, Printing and Printing Processes, Technology | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Meet Lorem Ipsum

Posted on February 15, 2017 by Brian Lawler

I’m not making this up. Three years ago I was looking at my roll sheet for my Introduction to Graphic Communication course at Cal Poly. About a third of the way down the list I stopped at the name Lauren … Continue reading →

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Line Art – colorizing engravings

Posted on February 4, 2017 by Brian Lawler

Each year I create a ticket. It’s a personal project, and in recent years it has become something of a personal challenge. I recently read a book about security printing. It was simply awful. Bad illustrations, meaningless text, too much … Continue reading →

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Line Art – the One and Only True Bitmap format

Posted on February 2, 2017 by Brian Lawler

This is the second of several blogs about scanning and reproducing line art from 19th century copper engravings and similar artwork. When converting scanned line art into printable line art there is only one file format that will work without … Continue reading →

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Reproducing line art with digital technology

Posted on January 29, 2017 by Brian Lawler

In the pre-halftone era (printing before the 20th century), illustrations printed by letterpress (relief printing) were made by engraving into wood or copper to make an image. It was a laborious task, and the quality was determined by the skills … Continue reading →

Posted in Art, History, Photography, Photoshop techniques, Printing and Printing Processes, Scanning, Software | Tagged , , , , | 8 Comments

A photography day at the Monarch Grove in Pismo Beach

Posted on January 21, 2017 by Brian Lawler

Last week my wife and I with our cousins visited the famous Monarch Grove in Pismo Beach State Park. This is the site where twice each year thousands of Monarch butterflies gather to mate, and to impress visitors with their … Continue reading →

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Out with Barracuda and in with SpamExperts

Posted on January 1, 2017 by Brian Lawler

I have my own e-mail server, hosted by an ISP in Michigan. I have been a customer of theirs for many years and they have treated me very professionally. A couple of years back I asked them for help with … Continue reading →

Posted in Mistakes you can avoid, Software, Technology, Web | Tagged , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Printing on a 126-year-old press, and loving it!

Posted on November 24, 2016 by Brian Lawler

I am engaged as a human printing engine this week (and next). The president of our university and his wife want a letterpress Christmas card this year, so have engaged the design and production forces at-hand to produce these cards. … Continue reading →

Posted in History, Printing and Printing Processes, Technology, Typography | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Accidental art with my camera

Posted on November 14, 2016 by Brian Lawler

I take a lot of photos. Most of them are carefully exposed, carefully focused, and most of them are acceptable and sharp and useful images. Once in a while I take a photo under extreme circumstances, and it doesn’t come … Continue reading →

Posted in Art, Photography, Photoshop techniques, Software | Tagged | 1 Comment

A hole in future history

Posted on September 23, 2016 by Brian Lawler

I took over 400 CDs and DVDs to the shredding company this week. This was a collection of old System disks, software that won’t run anymore, and 828,000 photos in an archive that I once thought to be impregnable. Optical … Continue reading →

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