Business and Legal Forms for Graphic Designers (3rd Edition) [Paperback]

Eva Doman Bruck (Author), Tad Crawford (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1581152744 | ISBN-13: 978-1581152746 | Publication Date: May 1, 2003 | Edition: 3rd

New Third Edition! Business and Legal Forms for Graphic Designers provides 40 essential forms and checklists—all ready to copy and put to immediate use in any graphic design studio!



Each form includes step-by-step instructions and can be used as is, or easily tailored to meet a specific business situation. This latest edition features brand-new forms for employment and lease agreements, as well as revised examples of letter of interest, estimate for client, preliminary budget and schedule report, purchase order, status report, contracts with illustrator/photographer/printer, nondisclosure agreements, copyright application, and much more.



Business and Legal Forms for Graphic Designers also includes standard contractual advice, surefire business systems, and hundreds of no-nonsense tips for managing the office, getting clients, and negotiating the best deals. Plus, an accompanying CD-ROM offers electronic copies of all these forms in both Mac and PC formats.




• Provides 40 ready-to-use forms and checklists for virtually any situation

• Features a CD-ROM with electronic versions of the forms in both Mac
and PC formats

Editorial Reviews

Review

An essential book for all design offices -- (Communication Arts )

"For designers who are about to set up their own office or for those who feel their design practices lack real organization, this book could be immensely helpful. It provides straightforward information, a usable business system as well as a variety of business and legal forms that can be copied and put into immediate practice in any graphic design studio." (Step-By-Step Graphics )

About the Author

Tad Crawford, Publisher for Allworth Press in New York City, graduated from Columbia Law School, clerked on New York State’s highest court, and served as general counsel for the Graphic Artists Guild when he practiced as an attorney. He originated the course titled “Law and the Visual Artist” at the School of Visual Arts and wrote Legal Guide for the Visual Artist (now in its fifth edition) to serve as the text. He is the author or coauthor of more than a dozen books, including Starting Your Career as a Freelance Photographer, The Graphic Design Business Book, Business and Legal Forms for Fine Artists, and Business and Legal Forms for Graphic Designers. He lives in New York City.

Product Details

• Paperback: 160 pages
• Publisher: Allworth Press; 3rd edition (May 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1581152744
• ISBN-13: 978-1581152746
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 0.6 x 11 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #64,205 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #23 in Books > Law > Business > Contracts
  • #63 in Books > Law > Taxation

More About the Author

Allworth Press publisher and founder Tad Crawford is an author, attorney, and artists' rights advocate.

Born in New York City, Crawford grew up in the artists colony of Woodstock, New York. Interested in writing both fiction and nonfiction, he majored in economics at Tufts College and graduated from Columbia Law School in February 1971. ("That explains the unusual amalgam of my activities," Crawford says. "A lot of legal skills are crucial for helping the artist and for running a publishing company. Of course, writing is an excellent background for publishing. So it's come together very well.")

Crawford clerked for a judge of the New York Court of Appeals, the state's highest court, then went to work for a small general law firm in New York City while writing and teaching writing and literature at the School of Visual Arts. Until he took the teaching assignment at the School of Visual Arts and learned of the need for materials to help artists understand their rights, he had not envisioned being an advocate of artists' rights.

"I found nothing in print to help artists deal with such legal matters as copyrights, contracts, income taxes, the 'hobby loss' problem, estate planning, or even how to get grants," recalls Crawford. And so, responding to what he saw as "an extreme need," he wrote a book dealing with those and other relevant issues, titling it Legal Guide for the Visual Artist and using it as a text for the "Law and the Visual Artist" course that he taught at the School of Visual Arts. Published in 1977, Legal Guide for the Visual Artist is now in its fourth edition and has one hundred thousand copies in print.

He followed this with The Writer's Legal Guide in 1978 (which has been updated and reissued with The Authors Guild as co-publisher and Kay Murray, the General Counsel for the Authors Guild, as co-author). With Arie Kopelman he wrote Selling Your Photography in 1980 and Selling Your Graphic Design and Illustration in 1981. At the same time Crawford served as Chairman of the Board for the Foundation for the Community of Artists, legislative counsel for the Copyright Justice Coalition (which had many arts groups as members), and general counsel for the Graphic Artists Guild. In 1982 Crawford was asked to help publish books for some of the organizations that he had represented as an attorney. In response, he became publisher of Madison Square Press, which issued annuals for such artists'organizations as the Society of Illustrators, the Society of Publication Designers, the Art Directors Club of New York, and the Art Directors Club of Los Angeles.

In 1988 he decided to strike out in a new direction, "to create a press that would offer the kind of information that was more like what I had taught, written about, and lobbied for." Crawford saw the need for a publishing company that would provide practical information to creative professionals, such as artists, photographers, designers, and authors. He knew first hand the issues faced every day by such creative people and could envision a spectrum of books to help them survive and prosper professionally.

In the Fall of 1989, Crawford published Allworth Press's first book, a revised edition of his classic Legal Guide for the Visual Artist. Ten more titles followed in 1990, offering information about marketing, promotion, pricing, copyright, contracts, health and safety, and much more. The first edition of Business and Legal Forms for Photographers was published in 1991. "The information in these books,"Crawford says, "can make all the difference in terms of success and prosperity." Today Allworth Press has a backlist of more than 250 books, publishes 12-15 books annually, and employs a staff of six very talented people.

Crawford's last involvement as an active lobbyist was in 1986, and he's given up active practice of the law to devote his energies to his publishing and his writing. The full list of books that he has authored follows:

AIGA Professional Practices in Graphic Design (editor)
The Artist-Gallery Partnership (with Susan Mellon)
Business and Legal Forms for Crafts
Business and Legal Forms for Fine Artists
Business and Legal Forms for Graphic Designers (with Eva Doman Bruck)
Business and Legal Forms for Illustrators
Business and Legal Forms for Interior Designers (with Eva Doman Bruck)
Business and Legal Forms for Industrial Designers (with Eva Doman Bruck and Carl W. Battle)
Business and Legal Forms for Photographers
Legal Guide for the Visual Artist
The Money Mentor
The Secret Life of Money
Selling Your Photography (with Arie Kopelman)
Selling Your Graphic Design and Illustration (with Arie Kopelman)
Starting Your Career as a Freelance Photographer
The Writer's Legal Guide (with Kay Murray)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

41 of 41 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars It's a $29.95 Lawyer!!, February 19, 2004

By 

lp (Minnesota) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Business and Legal Forms for Graphic Designers (3rd Edition) (Paperback)

Our small graphic design firm had been relying on the legal forms and contracts from this book for about one year. Finally, we decided that perhaps we ought to visit with a lawyer to make sure we were doing it right...$560.00 later for an initial consultation, we realized that this $29.95 book was the best business investment we'd ever made! The lawyer confirmed that the contracts that we had been using were airtight and were great (he had a few other pointers...but, none worth $560.00).

We have had many comments from our clients that over all the creative teams they'd worked with over the years, our design firm had surpassed them all in business professionalism. If you are serious about running a firm, or just want to protect yourself, you really can't go wrong with this book! Such a small investment for such a large return!

28 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Must have for freelance designers!, July 31, 2004

By 

RiDeZign (Philadelphia, PA USA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Business and Legal Forms for Graphic Designers (3rd Edition) (Paperback)

In starting out and gathering information it's hard to determine what books will be helpful. This is great. It is filled with tear out forms you can make copies of and use over and over. Great information. And the CD-ROM includes all the forms in pdf format, as well as Pagemaker and Quark XPress so that you can make changes to fonts and style, logo additions, and more, to suit your own home business. Files are compatible with Mac and IBMC platform, which is great for me being a designer working mostly on an IBM computer. Excellent book!

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Must-have book has another version with all forms on CD, March 17, 2000

By 

tropic_of_criticism - See all my reviews

This review is from: Business and Legal Forms for Graphic Designers (Paperback)

While this book should never be said to replace the advice of a competent lawyer--especially if you're dealing with larger, more complicated arrangements wherein partial rights are being transacted--the forms provided herein do afford basic protection for the small graphics firm. It's an absolutely indispensible collection of work for anyone just starting out in the field--or anyone doing fairly routine contract work.