Color Drawing: Design Drawing Skills and Techniques for Architects, Landscape Architects, and Interior Designers, third edition, has just been released. A revision of this best selling drawing book continues the tradition of offering a complete body of illustrated instruction that demonstrates the development of design ideas from initial concept through presentation drawing. Starting with simple, easy-to-grasp concepts the content builds to offer step-by-step execution of complex illustrations. Versatile enough to be used as a textbook in a course or as a self-teaching tool, this new edition presents new and more efficient ways of creating color drawings by integrating both hand drawings and computer techniques.

About the author: Michael E. Doyle (Boulder, CO) is Vice President and Senior Designer at CommArts in Boulder. He is also an architect and former instructor at University of Colorado.

This is the time of year when Amazon spreads glad tidings everywhere with their pre-order specials for books that are destined to debut within the next month - at almost 50% off. One book, Mastering Materials, Bindings, and Finishes: The Art of Creative Production (Design Field Guide), is geared toward the designer who loves to incorporate bells and whistles and special features into her designs to make them stand out. Often these special treatments are the element that makes the audience really connect with the design. The challenge is that these special embellishments are usually expensive and getting them right can be extremely difficult. But this book provides a complete reference to hundreds of special treatments, with information on how to approach them in reference to your design job, what to consider, the challenges, pitfalls, and the inside scoop from experienced designers who have both successfully and, not so successfully, implemented each of the effects featured.

The author, Catharine Fishel, specializes in working with and writing about designers and related industries. Her writing has appeared in many leading publications, including PRINT, Communication Arts, Graphis, ID, and many others. She is editor of the website LogoLounge.com, and is the author of many books about design, including Design Secrets: Packaging: 50 Real-Life Projects Uncovered (Design Secrets), Minimal Graphics: The Powerful New Look of Graphic Design, Redesigning Identity: Graphic Design Strategies for Success, and The Power of Paper in Graphic Design, among many other books.

Adobe Photoshop CS2 for Photographers: A Professional Image Editor’s Guide to the Creative Use of Photoshop for the Macintosh and PC: I picked this book up at a bookstore the other day because I was curious about the amount of copy within this book - in other words, I couldn’t just stand there and read it in the store. But, the copy didn’t detract from the images that were scattered throughout the book - just enough to support the text and to show how to follow photographer Martin Evening’s advice. There are 704 pages filled with content plus 30 pages of Photoshop Shortcuts on the free CD-ROM. And, while Adobe does justice to explaining DNG (Digital Negative) files and its Bridge, Evening goes further to make these tools part of the professional photographer’s personal arsenal. A must have for any digital photographer. The only problem is that I paid too much for my book - it’s cheaper at Amazon.

The authors in this book offer a history of the movement toward socially conscious design and showcase more than 80 contemporary solutions to such urgent needs as basic shelter, health care, education, and access to clean water, energy, and sanitation. Edited by Architecture for Humanity, Design Like You Give a Damn: Architectural Responses to Humanitarian Crises is a compendium of innovative projects that demonstrate the power of design to improve lives. Featured projects include some sponsored by Architecture for Humanity as well as many others undertaken independently, often against great odds. Proceeds from the sale of this book will support the work of Architecture for Humanity.

I don’t care what design business you’re in - you always need a business card, and this book provides the answers to your business card questions. Special techniques, such as die-cutting, embossing, foil stamping, and much more are included; cards printed on unique substrates and those that are simply downright unusual and memorable are a specialty. This volume contains no text aside from design credits, which allows for pages packed with business cards, highlighting front, back, special elements, and materials used. An unrivaled resource, The Best of Business Card Design 6 (The Best of Business Card Design) provides professional designers, corporate executives and in-house marketing departments with essential identity and branding insight for all types of clients.

A reader wrote to ask if there were any books that could help her understand the design basics in a simple way. I suggested The Elements of Graphic Design: Space, Unity, Page Architecture, and Type, as this book contains the basics along with terminology that helps the beginner feel more confident about their budding design work. If anyone else has some other suggestions, please comment!