Atlas — Visual Communication by Brian Nelson">Atlas

Great flickr set of Golden Guides. I remember these gems from my childhood and always thought they had something special to them. The covers are straightforward and streamlined like they ought to be and the texture of the paper coming through on the covers definitely seals the deal.

Some nice work from Scott Campbell out of New Orleans. I particularly like his use of halftones in his work, they bring out a nice but not to heavy texture. More great work over at his site where most of these posters are also available as prints.

Above is the poster I created for this year’s AIGA Always Summer Poster Show held in my hometown of Jacksonville, FL. For the event you’re asked to choose a song that reminds you of summer and design a poster around it. I chose the song “Nightcall” by Kavinsky which also features Lovefoxxx from CSS. This poster was a lot of fun to work on because it’s a departure from my usual style. Also, I wanted to choose a song that made me reminisce of summer nights instead of the days like I created last year. This song and poster reflects upon nights just driving around the city listening to music, lying on a beach or just looking out at the stars. I referenced such things as 80′s horror movie posters and the classic Goosebumps books that I used to read when I was a kid to give it a mysterious movie poster type feel. Be sure to listen to the song below.

Kavinsky feat. Lovefoxxx — Nightcall

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Being the space geek that I am these NASA mission patches are true beauties from the past. I love the simplicity of the illustrations and the textures of the first two. There are plenty more over at this flickr set.

I’ve really been enjoying the work of Austin design firm McGarrah Jessee lately. The Shiner, Whataburger and Central Market projects are my favorite. Great overall execution and consistency throughout each brand.

A nice array of Belgian design work dating back to the late 19th century and up through the 1980′s courtesy of Veerle. It’s awesome seeing the variety of style and approach throughout different decades and how different time periods influenced specific trends and techniques. What’s great however is that most of the work looks like it could of been created yesterday. Quality design is that which can stand the test of time.

Check out more work at Veerle’s Belgian design gallery.

Most matchboxes are no more than a couple inches in size, yet that didn’t constrain the awesomeness you see above in these old European matchbox covers. All of these could easily work as posters if they were 10 times larger, yet their small size sort of makes you appreciate them that much more. And even though I can’t translate most of the type, all of which is amazing by the way, there is something about different languages that I have always admired, especially within design. The imagery and play on words, no matter what language it might be in, can still communicate effectively and allow you to grasp the overall experience and concept the designer set out to get across. This in my opinion is what continually pushes the visual arts as a universal language around the world.

Check out more of these covers at Shailesh Chavda’s photostream.

Such great use of color and composition in these science fiction book covers by German designer Eyke Volkmers. Created in the 60′s and 70′s, the vintage airbrush style Volkmer used brings out a nice texture throughout each illustration. These however are only barely scratching the surface, he designed 163 in all for the “Goldmanns Weltraum Taschenbücher” series which can be viewed in its entirety here.

Via but does it float.