• Complete Guide to Anime and Manga Terms

    Complete Guide to Anime and Manga Terms

    This glossary explains the different terms related to Japanese animation and comic genres If you're looking to venture into the world of Japanese manga and anime but don't quite know where to begin, this guide is for you! Whether you’re on the hunt for a new favorite series or movie, or you want to learn how to illustrate your own comics inspired by these styles, getting to grips with some of the most commonly used terms is sure to help you discover what suits your tastes and needs. Anime vs. Manga Manga is the name given to graphic novels and comics from Japan, or those that adhere to this school of illustration. The term means "improvised images.”

  • 10 Key Tips for Editing a Fashion Magazine or Blog

    10 Key Tips for Editing a Fashion Magazine or Blog

    Learn some basic tips to perfect the content of a creative magazine Content, editing, and consistency are at the root of a project's success. They help it to stand out in the digital world but aren’t always easy to achieve. Creative director Pedro Saldías (@pesaldias) has managed to successfully combine all those elements in his many innovative fashion, art, and design projects. Specialized in digital marketing, storytelling, and branded content, in his 10 years of experience, Pedro has developed work for Dolce & Gabbana, Tiffany & Co, among others. To develop editorial formats, use the following 10 tips he has set as a guideline to help you create relevant content and make the most of social media.

  • The Pomodoro Technique: The Key to Successful Time Management

    The Pomodoro Technique: The Key to Successful Time Management

    Get to know this way of working–your brain will thank you! You'll have already figured it out by now: human beings are not machines. Although many of us would love to be able to perform at a steady pace for hours at a time, inevitably, our attention wanes, our brainpower deteriorates, and we can become prone to procrastination. To perform well, to make the most challenging days productive, we must understand how our brains work and organize our planning around that information–that's what the Pomodoro Technique is all about.

  • Lettering, Calligraphy, and Typography: Do You Know the Differences?

    Lettering, Calligraphy, and Typography: Do You Know the Differences?

    These three concepts all refer to disciplines involving letters, which is perhaps the only thing they really have in common Creating letters is a whole world, and it is not surprising that people who are not fully familiar with this field have some doubts. In this blog post, we take a look at what exactly is lettering, calligraphy, and typography, and the differences between them. We describe the characteristics of each discipline and show examples to help you recognize which is which. Hopefully, after reading this post, you will be able to avoid any of the confusion that novice designers, or those specializing in other areas, often feel. Calligraphy

  • How to Crop a Photo

    How to Crop a Photo

    Learn how to best crop a photo in Photoshop, with self-portrait photographer Laura Zalenga One of the simplest yet most underrated and effective ways to enhance your photos is by cropping them correctly. It may sound simple but knowing what to take out of your images is just as important as what you leave in. Laura Zalenga is a photographer specializing in artistic self-portraits, with commercial clients that include Adobe, Disney, Sony, and Mercedes Benz. In this tip, she shares how to best crop a photo using Photoshop and basic photographic principles.

  • Top Tips for Creating Successful Online Events

    Top Tips for Creating Successful Online Events

    Social communication expert Natalie Koutia shares some tips to help you organize online events efficiently Nathalie Koutia (@nathaliekoutia) is a freelance designer and social media enthusiast who is the communication director and social media manager of the international creativity event OFFF Festival. In her recent Domestika live, Nathalie tells us how a large live event was transported into a virtual world. She advises on how to ensure your online events, however small, are also successful.

  • 7 Tips to Succeed on Facebook Like a Pro

    7 Tips to Succeed on Facebook Like a Pro

    Experts reveal their secrets to exploit the potential of your brand on Facebook Despite the fact that every year we hear that a new social network is gaining popularity among users, Facebook continues to be a powerful ally of brands. With a wide portfolio of tools that is constantly updated, creatives, brands and services of all kinds can promote themselves and reach their target audience. So that you too can improve your Facebook marketing practices, experts share their best tips and practices with you. To read the article that interests you, just click on its red title.

  • Sourcing Inspirational Images for Your Next Embroidery Project

    Sourcing Inspirational Images for Your Next Embroidery Project

    How to use Instagram to find images that will inspire your next creation Courtney McLeod, also known as Dearest Q (@dearest_q), is a textile artist based in Philadelphia who creates colorful framed embroidery art inspired by fashion illustration and 90s pop culture. Working with clean lines and minimalist compositions, Courtney produces figurative illustrations on fabric. She sells her work on her online store and has been commissioned by Brie Larson, Peppa Pig, and the magazines “Today’s Parent,” “Love Embroidery,” and “Koel.” Courtney first learned to embroider while studying textile art at OCADU in Toronto. She picked it up again after graduation while working at a restaurant as a relaxing and portable activity she could easily do during her breaks. She started off embroidering lots of plants and copied popular motifs that she saw other artists recreating. However, as her skills evolved, Courtney quickly developed her own style and found herself drawn to fashion illustration, embroidering shoes, colorful socks, and women wearing vintage denim.

  •  Top Tips for Using Copywriting to Strengthen your Personal Brand

    Top Tips for Using Copywriting to Strengthen your Personal Brand

    Copywriter Carla González lists the importance of language when building a communication strategy and offers tips to improve your texts Marketing is not a religion–although some may disagree, but we think the following biblical verse is fitting: “in the beginning was the Word.” For Spanish copywriting specialist Carla González (@carlagoon), great brand ideas and product concepts are shaped and developed on strong linguistic foundations. Copywriting has an essential role in this process. It is vital to know how to select the appropriate tone and the best words and create a unique style to strengthen a personal or company image. Nowadays, we need to choose our language carefully in order not to offend different sensibilities. We asked Carla three questions about the importance of editing when creating promotional text. Based on her answers, we have put together three great tips on using copywriting to strengthen your brand. Let’s have a look at what she suggests:

  • Dos and Don’ts of Client Presentations with Katya Kovalenko

    Dos and Don’ts of Client Presentations with Katya Kovalenko

    Learn the dos and don’ts of client presentations so you can present yourself and your projects successfully, with presentation and data designer Katya Kovalenko Client presentations are a part of almost every professional’s life, whether you work in an office or for yourself, we all need to know how to get our ideas across, clearly, concisely, and, most importantly, convincingly. Katya Kovalenko (@katyakovalenko) created a business that helps startups become brands, using the expertise she gained over a decade in the advertising business to help them design their data and present themselves. In this tutorial, Katya will share the dos and don’ts of client presentation to help ensure that your next presentation is a success.

  • 5 Low-cost Ideas to Improve Your Video Call Backdrop

    5 Low-cost Ideas to Improve Your Video Call Backdrop

    If 2020 taught us anything, it’s that the walls of our homes have a lot to say Your wall–and no, we’re not talking about Facebook or Instagram, but the physical one behind you–sends a message. As a result of lockdown, last year, many of us had to quickly transform corners of our homes into impromptu office spaces. In 2021, these spaces can tell our colleagues, clients, and collaborators a lot about who we are. Among the interior design trends to look out for in 2021, your walls, now visible to others, have become a tool for connecting with the world. Therefore, it’s time to start thinking more carefully about how we present them (if you weren’t already!). Below, interior designer Sofi Saraví O'Keefe (@decolookbook) shares her top tips. 1. Be careful about what can and can’t be seen “By now, many of us have realized that having the ironing board, an unmade bed, or a bottle of laundry detergent visible during a video call doesn’t make a great impression. However, sitting in front of a plain, empty white wall is not the solution either. While the latter was acceptable during the first week of lockdown, that is no longer the case–it can suggest that the rest of that person's house is a mess. It also transmits that you couldn’t be bothered to make a little effort. After all this time, could you not have come up with something more interesting? If you're creative, this is your moment to shine.”

  • Creative Tools and Techniques to Revamp Your Professional Profile

    Creative Tools and Techniques to Revamp Your Professional Profile

    Learn to enhance your professional profile with some of Domestika’s best-selling courses With the new year comes a renewed impulse to boost your personal and professional lives. If you are looking to create or revamp your brand, or improve your professional performance, we have gathered some interesting resources to guide you and help you get the best results from your creative business or endeavor. ‘Five hats’ technique Mònica Rodríguez Limia (@rodriguezmon) is a business consultant who teaches the Domestika course, Time Management Techniques for Creators and Creatives. She offers advice for creative professionals looking to fix their time management problems. She teaches all the steps involved in planning a full year of work using technology to your advantage so you can prioritize activities, control distractions, and have a successful business while saving time, money, and energy. One of the methods used in her strategy is called ‘the five hats technique’ and is based on Dr. Bono’s ‘Thinking Hats,’ a creative tool also used by actors when they need to take on different personalities. When it comes to time management, if followed with discipline, this technique helps you define roles and associated tasks to improve your results and reduce your stress levels. The five hats are: CEO: refers to your role as owner or founder of your project, holder of your objectives’ vision. Administration: the management role, dealing with money, finance, and paperwork. Design and production: your favorite role and the most attractive side of your business. However, this role should not take over, especially during the first three years. Sales and business affairs: you may not like this role, but it is essential to your product or service’s commercial survival. Communication and marketing: you need to communicate your services and give access to your product. All five aspects play a key role in developing your creative business and should be approached positively.

  • Dos and Don'ts When Drawing From Photos and Videos

    Dos and Don'ts When Drawing From Photos and Videos

    Laura McKendry shares tips and techniques for taking references from photos and videos to create art inspired by nature Laura McKendry (@laura_mckendry) is an educator and illustrator who has developed an approach founded on curiosity and experimentation. Her creations have been licensed worldwide for book covers, gift-wrap, homeware, fabric, greetings cards, and more, working with clients such as Waterstones, John Lewis, Laura Ashley, Woodmansterne, and Profile Books. Inspired by the natural world, she looks to what she says makes life fascinating, beautiful, and delicious: fruit, herbs, wild animals, the sea, the changing seasons, and much more. She works mostly in watercolor, ink, charcoal, and colored pencils.

  • Writing Maps: Writing Prompts That Will Inspire Your Next Story

    Writing Maps: Writing Prompts That Will Inspire Your Next Story

    Prompts that will inspire you to transform people, places, objects, and memories into stories Shaun Levin (@shaun_levin) is a writer, artist, editor, bookbinder, and creative writing teacher. He is also the creator of Writing Maps: a platform sharing illustrated maps filled with creative writing prompts to inspire writers to transform people, places, objects, and memories into stories. Since the release of his first novel, Seven Sweet Things, in 2003, Shaun has published a number of books and creative writing resources including A Year of Two Summers, Isaac Rosenberg's Journey to Arras: A Meditation, and Snapshots of The Boy. He has taught creative writing for over twenty years in colleges, schools, and adult education centers, and run workshops in public spaces. He also founded and edits The A3 Review.

  • Choosing Colors and Materials for an Interior Design Project

    Choosing Colors and Materials for an Interior Design Project

    STUDIOLAV talk choosing colors and materials when designing a space For Loukas Angelou and Vasso Asfi, interior design has the power to boost a person's mood, get their creative juices flowing, and improve their wellbeing. This design duo focuses on creating meaningful emotional connections between people, objects, and their surroundings. Founders of the interior design studio STUDIOLAV (@studiolav), Loukas and Vasso have had their work exhibited in museums such as the Royal Academy of Arts in London and MUDEC in Milan. Their projects have been recognized by Elle Decoration Design Awards and the European Product Design Awards. In this blog post, Vasso talks us through the duo’s process for choosing colors and materials for an interior design project and shares some of her top tips.

  • Basic Settings for Editing Photographs

    Basic Settings for Editing Photographs

    Photographer Nicanor García shares some fundamental editing settings to apply to all your photographs Adobe Photoshop was one of the first programs created for editing digital images; it became popular because it enabled the user to change and manipulate images for creative purposes and to fix mistakes. Editing, or post-production, allows photographers to go a little further than merely taking a photo. Besides lighting and framing, you can take advantage of other basic editing settings to achieve optimal results. You can refine a picture by correcting the perspective, geometry, exposure, contrast, or highlights. Expert photographer Nicanor García runs us through the basic editing settings that can help us achieve amazing photographs.

  • Naming a Brand in 5 Easy Steps

    Naming a Brand in 5 Easy Steps

    The right name transmits what a company does and has communicative value for the user The process of choosing a name for your brand can be summarised in five key points. Xavier Grau (@xgrau) has over 20 years of experience in this field. Today, he presents the questions you need to be asking yourself when you undertake this task.

  • 10 Tips to Market Yourself Better on Pinterest

    10 Tips to Market Yourself Better on Pinterest

    Natalia Escaño shares some simple tips to boost the position of your pins among the top search results Pinterest is one of the most visual social networks, with a search power comparable to that of Google, but basing its content strategy on aesthetics and being a tool to find inspiration. This makes it a handy tool for creatives, artists, designers, illustrators, photographers, and even companies who want to share their products differently. Natalia Escaño (@nataliaescano) is a designer and illustrator and one of the most prominent Pinterest influencers in Spain, with more than a million followers and a portfolio of clients that includes brands such as L'Oréal Paris and Disney. As a great connoisseur of this platform, at both a user level and business level, she knows what it takes to stand out with attractive, eye-catching, and extremely visual content that will surely resonate with the audience. Here are the 10 fundamental tips from Natalia Escaño to improve the SEO of your Pinterest pins:

  • The 10 Funniest Lorem Ipsum Generators

    The 10 Funniest Lorem Ipsum Generators

    "Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet..." Forget the boring classic fake text and use one of these instead. A Lorem ipsum, as you probably already know, is a text commonly used in design and layout, which allows you to check that the spaces are well distributed and the fonts work correctly. It is a Latin passage extracted from a text by Cicero, De finibus bonorum et malorum. However, you don't need to stick to it in your projects. New fake text generators are constantly popping up and can help you give your designs a twist, even for provisional text boxes that are not meant to be read. If you are one of those who wants to have fun with Lorem ipsum, here are some ideas: Strangeripsum Our obsession with Stranger Things, the Netflix show that dusts off our eighties memories, has led us to Strangeripsum, a Lorem ipsum generator inspired by some of the show's scenes.

  • Krizia Robustella’s Upcycling Tips to Renew Your Sportswear

    Krizia Robustella’s Upcycling Tips to Renew Your Sportswear

    Get inspired, learn to customize your sports garments, and create stylish clothing through upcycling Barcelona-born Krizia Robustella (@kriziarobustella)has been working as a fashion designer for over ten years. Her mother was a fashion wholesaler and named her after the Italian fashion brand she had seen in Vogue in the 70s. Her fate was decided on that day. She presented her recycled 90s tracksuits in the Ego de Cibeles catwalk in 2007. The press called her style Sport Deluxe. From that moment, her collections have been part of the Mercedes-Benz Madrid Fashion Week and the 080 Barcelona Fashion. She also sells them in her shop in the Catalonian capital. Read on to discover how she creates two sports outfits out of an old sweatshirt, using upcycling, and see a gallery of her pieces.

  • Make Your Digital Fantasy Portraits Sparkle in Photoshop

    Make Your Digital Fantasy Portraits Sparkle in Photoshop

    Learn how to make your digital portraits sparkle in Photoshop, with Bearbrickjia The final touches that we add to an illustration can completely transform the end result. Take your digital portraits to the next level and make them sparkle. Karmen Loh (@Bearbrickjia) is a digital illustrator whose surrealist style fuses fantastical worlds with everyday reality. In this video, she reveals how to make your portraits shine in Photoshop. Watch the video below:

  • Work Out Your Instagram Color Palette

    Work Out Your Instagram Color Palette

    This tool will show you which colors you use the most on your Instagram profile Color can be a window to your personality and an essential tool to create visual harmony. Use it correctly, and you'll be able to convey emotions and messages in a much clearer fashion. It doesn't matter if your Instagram account is personal, professional, or you are representing a brand: if you take color seriously, you need to explore Color Kuler, a service that analyzes the most prominent colors in the images you post on your feed, giving you a good idea of what palette represents you, and greater control over what your profile looks like. Try this tool, discover the colors your followers associate with you, and compare it with others.

  • Design Better Websites Using These Wireframes

    Design Better Websites Using These Wireframes

    A good wireframe is the first step to a successful website and these are the different types Wireframes are schematic drawings of a web page that help us plan the distribution of content or communicate to a client how the users will interact with their page. Javier Usobiaga (@htmlboy) is the founder of Swwweet, a web design studio in Barcelona that has worked with numerous companies and institutions. Over the years, Javier has created countless wireframes for his own projects, and he classifies them according to their design and function: Bird's-eye view This is a global view of the website's navigation tree. It explains how users would move through the different pages and approximate the UX elements they'll encounter.

  • 5 Tips for Working With Embroidery

    5 Tips for Working With Embroidery

    Get expert advice on how to improve your techniques and turn pro People have embroidered for centuries, using this technique to decorate and customize garments and make them more special. Over time, this practice has evolved. Once embroidered pieces were something only the rich and powerful could afford. Now, they are commonly owned by people from all different walks of life. Embroidery is a versatile form of expression with few restrictions, popular across numerous cultures, from east to west, and which has become a very accessible art form. Paula Linard (@paula.linard) has over five years of experience as a professional embroiderer. For her, this medium offers infinite possibilities, from decorating paintings, personalizing clothing–both old and new–to making more elaborate pieces. "There’s a great demand for pieces made for babies or to give as gifts. We just need to develop our drawing skills a little more in order to put our stamp on a piece. We need to focus on the artistic side of this craft, which is a form of expression. It's good to try and create your own drawing, evolve your own line–it doesn't have to be perfect. I like to observe and appreciate the imperfections in my stitches and drawings. It doesn't always look so attractive at first but the final result always makes me happy, because I have created it with my own hands, from start to finish. That is invaluable", she says.

  • 4 Great Tools to Manage Your Social Media Activity

    4 Great Tools to Manage Your Social Media Activity

    Manage and optimize your brand’s social media activity with top suggestions from an expert Hana Klokner (@hanajayklokner) is a social media marketing specialist who works with major companies like Amazon, the United Nations, GLH Hotels, and smaller personal brands. In her Domestika course, Hana helps build a community management strategy and establish effective relationships with followers and customers using popular social media platforms. To ensure you build a thriving community around your brand and are on top of your social media strategy, Hana recommends using some practical tools and apps to make this job more manageable.

  • Find the Perfect Gift for Creative Minds at Domestika

    Find the Perfect Gift for Creative Minds at Domestika

    Find out how to gift a Domestika course in a few easy steps Creative people love to learn: for their professional development, to discover new techniques, and to learn new skills. A restless mind will always enjoy the opportunity to learn something new. Find out different ways to buy a Domestika course as a gift, following a few easy steps: Plan your gifts by making lists If you enjoy planning and want to save a list of the courses you would like to purchase for yourself or others, use the option Course list. Simply access the Lists section of your profile page, and click on Add new list. You can make these lists public or private, and make as many as you wish. You can also add courses directly from the Courses page (without needing to go to your profile page) by clicking on the +List icon that appears when you hover the cursor over the course name. You can see some examples of lists shared with you by Domestika teachers on this link.

  • How to Curate Your Instagram Grid Layout

    How to Curate Your Instagram Grid Layout

    Find out how you can make the most of Instagram to show off your creative portfolio Customizing your Instagram feed is a great idea if you want to use your account as a portfolio. A well-curated feed can transmit what you do in seconds. If your work is visual, knowing how to order your posts–so that they stand out more as a whole–is key when it comes to attracting new followers and showing off your work. Or maybe you are just interested in experimenting with your personal page. The well-organized and harmonious effects you achieve when you plan your posts in advance are known as Instagram Grid Layouts, Puzzles, or Mosaics. To incorporate them into your feed, all you need to do is follow different publishing methods and try out some of the tools that photographer Pati Gagarin (@patigagarin) recommends in her course, Instagram as a Photography Portfolio.