When designing, sometimes all you want is a nice & simple clean font. Here are three of our favorite clean fonts! Download them for free!

Quicksand

Designer: Andrew Paglinawan
Source: http://www.fontsquirrel.com/fonts/Quicksand

Champagne & Limousines

Designer: Lauren Thompson (Nymphont)
Source: http://www.dafont.com/champagne-limousines.font

St Marie

Designer: Stereotypes
Source: http://www.fontsquirrel.com/fonts/st-marie

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It’s amazing how big a difference typography can bring to a lifeless webpage. However, custom fonts and the web don’t play well together. Once fully implemented, CSS3 (and CSS2) includes a feature called @font-face that allows almost any font to be used on a web page regardless of the user having the font installed on their computer. But who knows how long we’ll have to wait on the implementation of that feature into every browser? So, what’s a web designer to do… avoid using anything outside of the few web-safe font list? Lenker Design has come to the rescue with a few helpful resources for using custom fonts on your website NOW!

Here are your options:
1) Use images: definitely not my favorite choice, but you can always use images of your headings, logos, or titles using your custom font. If you must go this route, always be sure to optimize the images for the web. If you’re using Photoshop, just save for web as a jpg. I usually save at 80 or higher to keep my fonts crisp and readable.

2)  cufòn (http://cufon.shoqolate.com/generate/): this website allows you to upload your custom font and it will output the code you need to embed your font on any webpage. When using this method, be sure the licensing for the font you’re using allows web embedding.

3) Google Fonts (http://code.google.com/webfonts): the good folks at Google have recently created the Google Font Directory that allows you to very easily use any one of their custom fonts by simply including one line of javascript (and some css) on your webpage. Click on the link to view a complete list of available fonts.

Hope this helps inspire you to create awesome, typographical, out of the box web designs! Enjoy.

Brushes are a great way to add texture to your design, and we’re always looking for new ones. Whether you’re doing print design or web design, you can never have enough brush sets.

One site that has hundreds of free Photoshop brushes is Brush King. To be exact, they have about 7,373 brushes in 394 packs. If you need halftone sets, bokeh sets, splattered paint sets…. they have it!

Click here to search through hundreds of free photoshop brush sets!

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“Web Safe Fonts.” Three words that make a print designer cringe. Arial, Georgia, Times New Roman… we see them over and over. It’s time to break out, and Google is one company that is helping all web designers do just that. They’ve created a font directory which allows web designers to use fonts available through the Google Font API.

Today’s featured fonts are all fonts from the Google Font Directory!

Crimson Test

Designer: Sebastian Kosch
Source: Google Font Directory: Crimson Text

Josefin Sans Std Light

Designer: Santiago Orozco
Source: Google Font Directory: Josefin Sans Std Light

Lobster

Designer: Pablo Impallari
Source: Google Font Directory: Lobster

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Can’t get enough of handwritten fonts? Well here’s one more to add to your font book! This handwritten font was created by our Creative Director, Jason Lenker.

Now writing notes from the boss saying “You have my permission to take the day off” is even easier…. Thanks Jason!

Download the file here

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Every Wednesday this month we’re featuring our 3 favorite fonts that we found that week!

This week we wanted to focus on alternative fonts that can be used for body copy. Anyone else getting sick of Times New Roman and Arial being used for EVERYTHING? We are. Below are fonts to replace your everyday serif and san serif fonts:

District Thin

Designer: Garage Fonts
Source: http://www.fontsquirrel.com/fonts/District-Thin

Mrs Eaves

Designer: Zuzana Licko
Source: http://new.myfonts.com/fonts/emigre/mrs-eaves/

Museo Slab

Designer: Exljbris
Source: http://www.fontsquirrel.com/fonts/Museo-Slab

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We thought we’d try something different for Freebie Thursday! Every week, we search through design blogs for inspiration, freebies, advice and more. So, instead of only giving away design freebies we’ve made – we’re going to start leading you to great freebie showcases that we’ve found that week!

This week we came across a great showcase on Web Design Ledger called “20 Elegant Fonts for Clean Design”. This showcase includes a variety of clean, sleek fonts that are all free to download!

Clean fonts are great for body copy or a bold header. Let us know which font on the page is your favorite!

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Every Wednesday in the month of August we’re going to feature 3 fonts for the week. Read the details below each one for information on the type designer, about the font, and where you can download them.

This week our featured fonts include a script, a blocky serif, and a grungy font.

Sheila

Designer: Laura Worthington
Source: http://new.myfonts.com/fonts/laura-worthington/sheila/

ChunkFive

Designer: The League of Moveable Type
Source: http://www.fontsquirrel.com/fonts/ChunkFive

Dirty Bag

Designer: Billy Argel
Source: http://www.dafont.com/dirtybag.font

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In college, most graphic designers are required to take a typography class. In this class we learned about the history of typefaces, the anatomy of fonts, and why there is so much more to picking the right font other than “I thought it looked cool!”

Many of us who took one of these classes probably had a “Typographic Portrait” project. For this project, we were asked to illustrate a self-portrait or portrait of someone else using only typography. This forced us to study and learn the anatomy of typography in a completely different manner. It allowed for the designer to see fonts as more than just letters, but study the differences in style and weights.

To see more examples, visit this gallery called “45 Amazing Type Faces – Typographic Portraits.” It contains a collection of typographic portraits from a variety of different artists and designers. Of course, this one may be our favorite….

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Last week Old Spice proved that a great social media marketing idea can go a long way.

Old Spice came up with the idea to have tweeps ask the “Old Spice Guy” (aka actor Isaiah Mustafa), ANY question they wanted to. They recorded Isaiah’s response and posted 87 short and hilarious videos to YouTube. A simple idea and yet it generated nearly 6 million views in less than 24 hours.

Old Spice’s Twitter followers increased 1,000% and they now have over 600,000 likes on Facebook. Successful? We think so.

Here’s one of our favorites: The Old Spice Guy responding to Kevin Rose (@kevinrose) the founder of digg.com and wefollow.com

Click here to view the Top Ten Funniest Old Spice Guy Responses.

Nicely done, Old Spice Guy. We salute you and your “wildly handsome face parts.”

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