Product Description

Idea Index kick-started a revolution in graphic design books, unique in size, feel--and most important--wealth of ideas. Layout Index is the next step, a compendium of layout idea-generators that will help designers explore multiple possibilities for visual treatments each time they turn the page. The visual and textual suggestions are divided into eight major areas, including newsletters, flyers, posters, brochures, advertising, stationery, page layout, and Web pages.

Each of these examples are designed to inspire effective solutions in the viewer's mind, rather than simply give specific answers to design problems. The tone and temperament of the design problems, as well as their solutions, vary from traditional to cutting-edge, from corporate to crazy. Designers will learn to solve their design problems, produce fantastic work and become better, more creative thinkers.

* Both creativity books and layout books are extremely popular
* As proven by Idea Index, the format of this book is a proven winner with designers

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #51549 in Books
• Published on: 2001-05-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Turtleback
• 312 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9781581801460
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

About the Author
Jim Krause has worked as a professional graphic designer for twenty years, in the last decade as a one-person design agency. He has produced award-winning work for a variety of clientele, including Microsoft, McDonald's and Seattle Public Schools. He lives in Bellingham, Washington.

Customer Reviews

More of a great thing
I wrote a positive review of J. Krause's first book, the Idea Index, and have to remark on this one as well. Filled with lots and lots of images and very little commentary, these books are a bit hard to explain to non-designers, but they make perfect sense to people in the creative visual arts. I constantly use the first book, Idea Index, to help me get ideas flowing for logos and images. The new book, Layout Index, is packed(!) with full-color idea-starters for all kinds of print and web media. There is hardly a spread in this very fat little book that does not capture and hold my interest for one reason or another; hardly a page that does not offer serious fuel for creativity, no matter what the project. As the author says in his intro, these are NOT answer books, they are "WHAT IF" books. They get your mind cranking on all kinds of possibilities very quickly. I have shelves full of design books, but I keep these two on my desk, within reach at all times. A superb duo!

Definitely a sequel.
While Idea Index provides actual ides for nice graphical renderings, the layout index is very simple and very scarce when it comes to layout ideas. It has a limited number of sample ideas which only look good due to the images present in the layout. The layouts provided don't really add much to the presentation of the information in the examples. Also, the web layouts are especially horrendous - despite looking semi-pretty, they do not consider at all the medium (e.g. giant images take longer to load, etc.). I was pretty disappointed by this book after liking Idea Index so much.

Overall, the book is so-so. Going through it at a library will give you all the layout ideas this book could ever provide - there's no need to keep it on your shelf for future reference. If you're looking for good, or at least original print layout ideas, you better look elsewhere.

Amazing book
Like other reviewers of this book, I am a professional designer. This book is one of the most helpful tools I have ever found. With all due respect, I would like to emphatically disagree with the comments of some other reviewers--I beleive that it is very easy to misunderstand a book like this. The author mentions in the intro (I'm paraphrasing) that this is NOT a book a answers, it's a book of suggestions. A person might think that some of the layouts are unfinished, or plain (not always the case--some layouts are finished and beautiful); I think that this is because a significant effort has been made to avoid presenting layout ideas that leave no room to build. The essentials of good design are never dated. If you are able to look at this book as a treasure chest of ideas, rather than a showcase of someone else's finished work, you will find endless fuel for your own work. As for the size: i LOVE the small format and the plastic cover!! It sits unobrusively on my desk at all times--easy to grab at a moment's notice. This is an amazing book, not like any other in concept, content or form.