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 most exciting thing I saw at GraphExpo 2014

Posted on October 9, 2014 by Brian Lawler

I troll the hallways at GraphExpo, looking at the many booths showing exciting technologies to potential customers. There are people selling software, hardware, firmware, middleware, and usually – pretzels. This year there was no pretzel vendor, nor an ice cream … Continue reading →

Posted in Business, Gadgets, New technology, Printing and Printing Processes, Technology | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Making things I designed in Illustrator
– CNC routing

Posted on September 16, 2014 by Brian Lawler

In previous blogs I have described how I have designed things in Illustrator, then built them out of wood in my shop. The shop in question is located in my friend Jim’s barn. We consolidated shops in 2005 when I … Continue reading →

Posted in Gadgets, New technology, Technology | Tagged , , , , , | 11 Comments

Drawing on the Photoshop side of the brain

Posted on September 8, 2014 by Brian Lawler

A few blogs ago I wrote about how to use AppleScript to crop a Photoshop document with pixel precision. As part of that same project, I needed to add white space to the canvas and trim marks top and bottom … Continue reading →

Posted in Photography, Technology | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Burning questions, answered

Posted on September 4, 2014 by Brian Lawler

My wife and I went to Burning Man last week. It was something we had wanted to do for several years, and now we have done it. The legendary counterculture festival is held on a dry lake bed in northern … Continue reading →

Posted in Adventures, Art, Bookbinding, Photography | Tagged , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Making things I drew in Illustrator

Posted on September 2, 2014 by Brian Lawler

Last summer I built a nice Adirondack chair. It was based on an existing chair that had rotted-out, a victim of years of being out in the weather. I decided for the clone that I would make it entirely of … Continue reading →

Posted in Adventures, Art | Tagged , , , , , | 8 Comments

AppleScripting Adobe Photoshop

Posted on July 31, 2014 by Brian Lawler

I get involved in some pretty big stuff: This was my 58-foot GigaPan photo of San Luis Obispo as it appeared in the San Luis Obispo Museum of Art in March. That photo was printed in 17 sections on glossy … Continue reading →

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

I can stop griping now – Adobe has finally fixed Photoshop!

Posted on July 17, 2014 by Brian Lawler

For eight years I have been complaining loudly (the blogger’s “pen” is mightier than the sword, but much slower) about the “feature” in Adobe Photoshop that causes your type to be erased – without an undo that will replace it … Continue reading →

Posted in Photography, Photoshop techniques, Technology | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

You wanted kerning! You get kerning!

Posted on July 16, 2014 by Brian Lawler

Last week I promised to write a blog about the next step in making my Lining Livermore typeface. I thought I was farther in the process than I was. Getting letters to fit adjacent to each other is a difficult … Continue reading →

Posted in Art, History, Software, Typography | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

80,000 readers and growing

Posted on July 14, 2014 by Brian Lawler

Good day! The Blognosticator reached 80,000 readers this week, thank you. When I started this version of the blog, 33 months ago, I didn’t know how many people would visit the site, and how many would return many times. Writing … Continue reading →

Posted in Business, People | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Drawing the lozenge for Lining Livermore

Posted on July 1, 2014 by Brian Lawler

…continued from yesterday’s blog I’m probably never going to need the lozenge character in any typographic project I do. Nonetheless, it’s there, ready for me, whenever I choose to use it. That’s exciting. The lonely lozenge. I don’t know what … Continue reading →

Posted in Art, History, Typography | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments