Design and digital culture NEWS // March 2004
Interesting
layering visual fx to present projects on Sekizotuzki site,
a visual communication student.
Oh
my.. Subdisc relaunches! The refinement
in actionscripting and visual mini-details to this and that and of course
is extraordinary work. Flash adepts fly there!
Ideas!
A closer look at creativity by Carole Guevin
“One of the most daunting task for a designer is to generate ideas.
Sometimes this task is considered a minor undertaking for unknowing people.
Why so? Because the results may look convincingly simple.”
After
1.5 year of soul baring and hard work, Thom
Collins is doing a pre-release announcement for his upcoming RED
loop cd which are all high quality 22,050 - 48,000 16 bit stereo wav
files.
ndle1: If
you remember he's the famous designer who returned to his first luv:
music. There was so much traffic that his site had to be shutdown.
Recommended
readings to get a hang of what CSS design and shorts are about:
Doug Bowman -> Hi-Fi
Design with CS + CSS:
The Good, the Bad, the Ugly
Dave Shea -> Hi-Fi
Design with CSS + CSS:
The Good, the Bad, the Ugly
exopolis|design?
You just want to see more and significant drop in the creative pond.
Uber talent at work here showing a well controlled polyvalence. All the
projects are groomed with a refine sense of color - layout balance and
sheer imagination. LUV (opening sequence) it!
Soothing
chromatics and original idea in how the vectors fill in the screen on Trudy
Design. Mouseovers on thumbnails includes project description. Upcoming
designer who is doing true multi media (media as in means of expression).
Someone to watch for.
Oh
boy! Another installment from the mega car manufacturer who has in the
past year - invested in ultra immersive mini-sites... jus let the movie
roll to see what was concocted for Nya
Volvo V50...
This time - must say - the integration and storyboard is movie-like
but in a most realistic way. Some people are having serious creative
fun here. Hats off to the team at Forsman & Bodenfors.
MUSA
MACHINA: Créateurs d'univers sonores (creators of sound
scapes). Put your headphones on and head to this compelling sound concept
and experimental site that mixes video + music (excellent mix btw).
Click the moving rounds to see... hum hear addtional loops.
New
industrial design firm on the block: Tipadesign.
Dealing with product innovations and co-founded by xtra talented Tal
E. Ben Shlomo.
For
people who make websites:
CSS Sprites: Image
Slicing’s Kiss of Death by Dave Shea
“Say goodbye to old-school slicing and dicing when creating image
maps, buttons, and navigation menus. Instead, say hello to a deceptively
simple yet powerful sprite-based CSS solution.”
Be
warned extreme visual movements and colors on Pinilopei explorative and
immersive site whereas as the author told me: “there are no style
guide, no sense, no usability, everything that is wrong, build up completely
on mistakes.”
S.M.A.K. Municipal
Museum of Contemporary Art, BE. Why? Because it's minimalist & a
bit edgy.
Corporate
dips into funky visual fx check Phinney/Bischoff.
Their marketing maxims makes you think... twice!
Now
this is a fabulous find: Gabi
Lungu portfolio won't disappoint you. Be it print, web, illustration,
branding... wow!!! Yepp scrolling to the right and worth the scroll...
This time you just want to see it all! This designer knows about communication
design big time!
And
the winners are for SXSW04 interactive? What is great is that CSS Garden
was chosen as a developer resource and as BEST of Show!!! Kudos!
In
Mac's own words: “Seeing that I had to present about 350 pictures,
I decided to make a minimalistic site that doesn't get in the way and
let's the pictures speak for themselves.”
Well you did. Wanna see how he resolved this? Runboyrun!
This
is not a new concept - using one's logo in different photographs to convey
a message but Derzeitgeist does
it with a touch of originality. Plenty of space given to visual invitation
- it works - it pikes your curiosity.
FontShop claims
having 25,000 fonts!!! Their web site is actually quite funky and interesting.
Worth browsing through and fonts are affordable.
Check the bitmap ones too.
Hilarious
and incredibly creative Koneisto v.2003 is a stunning site visually!
Watch out for the fun random animations! A must see! Visit from top to
bottom and check v.2002 as well!
Get
a true pitch!!! Firewheel Design (cool logo too) does exactly what is
said in the snapshot with a lot of fruity candor! In the news, John Marshall
of Pixelpalooza fame
has join their team!
Gotta luv pixel design.
Meat
Collective 
luvs
what they do and it shows. Cool '70s presentation and their portfolio
shows different styles of design. Luv the logo - they should include
it in the subsequent pages.
Welcome a new powagirrrl!
“Since
our background is architecture and we did not get any education in what
we do we don’t really know the industry, especially not what a
common advertising/design agency looks like and what an Art Director
is supposed to do/be compared to a Creative Director. Things get worse
with Senior and Junior Executive Directors and such.
For us creativity cannot happen inside hierarchical structures but by
enjoying the freedom to experiment and being honest and individual, by
providing the personal touch.”
One of my all time favorite design shop Transporter*
has got a nice interview on CB.
P22
Type Foundry launches Fred
Goudy and in The
Terminal, a journal of typography & lettering arts, you learn
more about this font and others.
The
Pixel Plant claims to have full ISO-8859 and flash ready pixel
fonts (Mac/PC ready)!
Low-budget
photoexperiments and visual design?!?! Rumorebianco grundgy,
spunky, edgy and certainly not low on talent!
Minimalism
goes creative to display mostly corporate projects! Todd
Miller came up with an ingenious way of presenting his work much
like as on a full screen within same browser window.
Finally - a break from the pop-ups. Very professional. Luv the rotation
of background screens that are present as a ghosted layer between transitions.
Life
After The Oil Crash. “Deal with Reality, or Reality will
Deal with You.”
_ _ _ _ _ _
via John Finnell
FlipStart another
mini-widget for the age of when heavy laptops are bound to disappear
for mobile computing?!?!
Pixeltable (hats
off JF!) is proud to be introduced “as a very cool site designed
only with CSS” in Yoko
Arisaka wonderful book which includes in-depth and detailed tutorials
about CSS layout named “Stylesheet
Stylebook”.
Published and just released in Japan / 04
Simply
hilarious: Chipotle: Gourmet Burritos
and Tacos
Makers
of recycled junkyard fashion: L O W + T I G H T
Vision
Design walks the talk - their work is rich and mature in experience
with a side kick of spunk. Their print work is outstanding and their
web sites simple. The next step?
Why not attempt at css only design since the layout they use are very
similar to such?
You've
gotta see this a gelly like interactive content holder for Neave!
Mouse over or click on the borders and see what happens... Mouse on the
icons... oh my this is fun.
Leave
it to Imago to grab your attention
with cute 3D like animal characters! I like the mix of photograph and
character animation! The copy is awesome! A very good presentation!
Ever
wondered who did this kind of illustration? John
Coulter does!
Did
you know??? “Microsoft reserves the right to not deliver any e-mail
message sent to any MSN Hotmail user for any reason.” Read the thread
provided by Rich MacKinnon who is the founder and CEO of LESSNetworks,
a company that is dedicated to providing free Wi-Fi access. Scroll down
to Feb 26 - sorry no permalink for now.
_ _ _ _ _ _
ndle1: For
'hotmail' users who have tried to join our elist - please be aware that
the 'confirmation mail' may have NEVER been delivered due to above M$
policy. Please contact me if you attempted to join and never go the confirmation
message.
Grungy
with a touch of elegance? BongSeg knows
about moving images. Excellent storyboarding skills.
The
site is not finished yet but has a bit more to show than when initially
launched. If you luv pixel design - watch out for Adept!
Probably one of the top in the genre.
Luv
design collectives. This one from Portugal to Everywhere ::: MUSA :::
with excellent designers + edgy designs.
Savebiogems.org:
If you wish to take action on keeping oil rigs out of the western arctic
reserve.
Selfstock
/ 01ccd completely redesigned! Intriguing
pixelated arty fx prior to loading full photograph.
He's
probably one of the most prolific and gifted industrial designer alive
today and what I particularly like about Karim
Rashid is not only is luscious and breath taking approach to design:
from simple curvy to elegantly complex. While I viewed an interview with
him - the passion for his craft can be felt. Really - he comes across
as an all around nice guy.
So cheers to not becoming a whining diva like so many others have. Luv
his pitch: “I want to change the world”. Well we do have
this in common ROFL.
_ _ _ _ _ _
ndle:
BTW I would not say that his website is up to par with his extraordinary
collection of work, but the array is dazzling. Perhaps someone wants
to pitch him?
New
wiz kid on the block! You have gotta see demo-reel THE
CREATOR which is the output of a one man show (3d, compositing, animation,
sound, music composition, and web development) by Dan Filip Radu.
Luv
illustration style byjerome! The fatsy characters are funny and unique.
Explore
the site of brazillian art director Tales Simon - bit dark - but excellent
projects. I particularly like the visuals on Terracota Estudio and the
sound tracks are really good.
Donna's
has redesigned her site. Uber talent displayed on ----yes
indeed! Excellent
web skills and illustration talent for this powagirrrl. Good use of flash.
Elys
Muda is
into design, illustration, fine art and even photography. Her best
work is in editorial design / packaging and her paintings are promising.
Emerging talent to watch for.
Her site could definetely use less windows but her work is well worth
it. Welcome to a new powagirrrl!
Hassel says “Our
business is planning and design. Is design important to you?” One
thing that is evident is that the almost bare site serves their pitch
well... because design is important to me - so in I go! Luv how the space
they dedicated to completed projects and the Next/Back/Menu nav system
is a new way to lead the user.
Actually wherever you drag and click - that's where the semi-transparent
layer will appear. What it does - as shown in the snapshots - is that
you get to 'see' the project in a different perspective. Impressive concept.
B
R E T T is a must see site! First of all for its simplicity - just
a list of links which displays projects as “a love letter to
mac os chrome like stack of files” is a genial idea.
But the work, oh the work, is absolutely top of the line print projects,
design expertise at its best and copy written in a way that you are drawn
in!
Mediafix -
communication globale decided that they were going to print and publish
a book - (in French 'book' = portfolio - yeah I know the word is in English....
one of those idiosyncrasies).
64 + 4 is a real book. Intriguing because you can see on the site snapshots
of a book and on first glance - definitely a unique way of presenting
clients work.
Creative
Class War. How the GOP's anti-elitism could ruin America's economy by Richard
Florida*
A must read article as to the emergence of creative communities:
“...cities in other developed countries transform themselves into
magnets for higher value-added industries. Cities from Sydney to Brussels
to Dublin to Vancouver are fast becoming creative-class centers to rival
Boston, Seattle, and Austin.
...For instance, most of the decline in science and technology immigrants
in the National Science Board study was due to a drop in applications.
... inspired the fury of the world, especially of its educated classes,
with its my-way-or-the-highway foreign policy. In effect, for the first
time in our history, we're saying to highly mobile and very finicky global
talent, You don't belong here.
...As talented individuals, eager for better career opportunities and
more adventurous, diverse lifestyles, move to the innovative cities,
the hinterlands become even more culturally conservative.”
*Richard Florida is the Heinz professor of economic development
at Carnegie Mellon University and the author of The
Rise of the Creative Class which is a must read book.
Civil Rights/Human Rights. “Mr Ferrer can't be with us tonight”
- Artists from all
over the world are being refused entry to the US on security grounds by
Editorial news/Commentary
_ _ _ _ _ _
via thread on Metafilter
Webmonkey,
RIP: 1996 – 2004 by Paul Boutin
I ran early research studies on virtual work aka the new dream job on
Wired eons ago. The archive of past
hubs are available if you are inclined to revisit web history.
“Designers,
when they are good, possess unique talents that they take for granted:
problem-solving, problem definition, visualization, organization, etc.
Most people are deficient in these skills.”
Excerpt from an Interview
with Andrew Blauvelt by Jason A. Tselentis
Houston
we've got a problem!!! What is the difference between #1 and #2??? Well
is #1 a copycat of #2 or the other
way around???
#1 Admitted in a public
forum to the rip. Now let's move on.
5th
GLOBAL WOMEN’S STRIKE! Calling all men to join with women to: STOP
THE WORLD AND CHANGE IT! INVEST IN CARING NOT KILLING!
Strike demands:
“Payment for all caring work – in wages, pensions, land &
other resources. What is more valuable than raising children & caring
for others? Invest in life & welfare, not military budgets & prisons.
Pay equity for all, women & men, in the global market.
Food security for all, starting with breastfeeding mothers. Paid maternity
leave, breastfeeding breaks & other benefits – stop penalising
us for being women.
Don’t pay ‘Third World debt’. We owe nothing, they
owe us.
Accessible clean water, healthcare, housing, transport, literacy.
Non-polluting energy & technology which shortens the hours we work.
We all need cookers, fridges, washing machines, computers, & time
off!
Protection & asylum from all violence & persecution, including
by family members & people in positions of authority.
Freedom of movement. Capital travels freely, why not
people?”
This
is NOT a new site (the design is kinda cool but the navigation sucks
/ TV folks should hook up with savvy user experience designers). Still,
it is a little pearl found in the jungle Why
are you creative? and some of the interviews are well worth the wait!
Find thoughtful insights from David Bowie, Stephen Hawkin, Mel Gibson,
Steven Sodenbergh, Milla Jojovich amongst others.
Citing Dennis Hopper: “Everybody is creative. The difference between
creative and non-creative people? Creative people just do it!”
This
powagirrrl knows about interface / web design and has been art directing
for many years and presently on the look-out for a new challenge.
Meet K e l l y G a g n o n one
of the very first to be displayed in the portfolios+ directory. Recently
relaunched her site - check the web projects category. Interested anybody?
How (and
why) to get rid of unprofitable clients by Mary-Lynn Bellamy-Willms
“An advertising agency collected data over a one-year period.
They were shocked to discover that a full 80% of their time was spent
on clients who brought in only 20% of their revenue. This means they
were spending too much time on work they couldn't bill while also shortchanging
their profitable clients. The clients who took up most of their time
and energy were the ones who didn't see the value of their work.”
_ _ _ _ _ _
via How
newsletter
Upcoming: GIRL6 an
interactive movie. “Girl6 tries to reflex the problems in Bankok
society today. Murder, students fighting in public, stealing, rape...these
things happen everyday. People are living under lots of pressure and
rules and are forgetting their own pure souls.
Girl6 tries to point that sometime some things are not nescessary for
us. We should try to relax, relive, and accept ourselves as who we are.
After that the smile will return to our faces.”
_ _ _ _ _ _
Brought to you by Bangkok2
MACBA (Museu
d'Art Contemporani de Barcelona) shows connection with new media design
and cool factor. Nice flash banner rotations. Long live museums!
New
label, Olydig (disobedient in swedish). We sell handmade bags and accessories.
Mostly 50-s, 60-s & 70-s fabrics! cool site too.
(¯`·.¸
système D ¸.·´¯) has a cool page sig,
a fruity desk and a fly for nav tool. Excellent web work and polaroid
like placemats for the print projects.
Wanna
see what I think is a great use of flash? Check upcoming Sidewalks
of the World upcoming project! The animations are very smooth and
feel like a movie with real actors playing. The illustrations are simply
delicious.
Pay attention in the 'Art' section - the girl on the left is actually
rotating drawings... Excellence, attention to details, perfect perspective.
How
to present yourself has a cutting edge design, youth and xtreme sport &
entertainment studio and show no-nonsense? Gotta luv this! Try Clark
Studios.
Naive
illustration is always a favorite and Dave
Warnke aka Dave knows how to create characters for street arts, paintings
and even ported these to products as well... Why not tote bags and toys!
The nav elements are yummy.
Year
of the rounds? Greyscale has got a unique and dynamic navigation while
the illustrations are kind of floating on the screen. The roaming fish
gives depth and dimension to layout.
Sitting
on the far side _ xtreme designs by The
Chemistry.
Drag
and drop the circles to navigate - luv the idea on Webtronik.
Stop
motion studies - Tokyo by David
Crawford for those interested in this type of photographic projects.
An
upcoming industrial designer who is seeking a junior position, Paolo
de Jesus shows his work in an interesting way.
Utility
or toy or both? Mitsubishi
Electric develops 'reversible' LCD.
Jan
Collier represents “staggering
geniuses” now that's a rep that really believes! If you're cynical:
it's a good pitch. How we approach it is irrelevant - check the collected
talents. The presentation is different and I like the play on words.
Cheers to a powagirrrl!
Need
a dose of funk design??? Visit The
Designers Republic and let it roll. Massive talent assembled in this
collective.
Another
innovative and naughty navigation with line art + pixel illustrations
for korrupte signal.
Need
a [daily dose of imagery]? topleftpixel is
the photography work of Sam Javanrouh. Get a simple view of his day to
day visual experience. One photo a day is posted on the web site. It
could be untouched or altered. It is an experimental project for visual
practice.
Fotoblogs a new vogue?
Make
professional-looking logos with LogoCreator by Brad Cook
Stupidity and arrogance hit another record high: “Need a logo
for your company but facing a financial crunch... macXware's
?!?!?!) LogoCreator may be the answer.”
and LogoYes launched claiming
to have designed 20,000 symbols which makes it easy to get a 149$ logo!!!
developed by 2advanced...
_ _ _ _ _ _
via tangente
For
people who make websites:
Designing
for Context with CSS by Joshua Porter
Often asked: “Why design with css?” My answer is invariably:
“To be ready when all devices interconnect”. This article
looks into exactly that aspect.
Innovation
boyz & girrrls! Mean Tangerine launches
Super Pixel / Bitmap / Screen Fonts for Flash and Display. Drill down
till you find an interesting font and click on the font and type! Granted
some are smallishy so you may want to check their .pdf file. Now they
offer the whole collection (82 fonts) for a cheap-ole price too.
Noteworthy: The site design IS the logo! The products are WITHIN the
logo! The logo and the navigation and the products are all made of the
SAME components: pixels!
An
explosion of warm colors awaits you and a really cool and innovative
navigation for NEODG V'04.
Designers
about design:
“For me, design is ultimately about communicating ideas” by Björn
Dahlström
“The process of design raises questions, and clients must be prepared
for this, because each project should lead somewhere new.” by Emmanuel
Dietrich
“The future can be bright for industrial design, as long as we
don't feel the need to operate under the old dictates of mass production”
by Elephant Design
“The less you see the designer's effort in the work,
the better - effort should not be a visual commodity; it's simply a means
to an end.” by Sam
Hecht
Brought
to you by 226Design who has
a great site and projects too, a fotoblog simple design and interesting
concept to set pictures in their best light: Carte
Blanche Pedicure.
What
I like about Brendan Dawes site
is the orderly feel with some pizzaz. The rotating banners are intriguing.
Check his Sketches for imaginative explorations. As good in design as
programming.
Can't
pass up on this one. This is an example
of a dichotomy in purpose. A marketing firm... would by definition
be intent on showing their capacity to position clients in the megalo
business sphere out there. Though I don't judge their skills of which
I know nothing... having looked at their presentation and see (hear -
open your speakers) for yourselves... I am not convinced (especially
that audio loops are broken and not edited to smoothly transition.
Now for those of us who were exposed to passé rule of “the
only thing that matters is that they speak of us (in good or bad)”
as underlying rule of engagement in pitching to a to-be client - is irrelevant.
Yepp I was surprised and yepp and I am writing about it and nope I am
not interested in learning further about it.
If you look only at the snapshot (without sound) then the contradiction
is even more apparent. Well, at least they are consistent. Our role in
the virtual sphere is to make sure that we can carry a message to an
audience swiftly without wasting their time. THAT's the new rule of engagement.
Respect
“time” which is the most important asset of an audience.
For
people who make websites:
Helping
Your Visitors: a State of Mind by Nick Usborne
Another oh so important prerogative since time is our most valued asset,
wasting an audience “time” is the greatest pitfall of all.
“What does “helping your visitors” mean exactly? It
means writing your sites, newsletters and emails in such a way as to
help each visitor achieve his or her goal.”
Play.Subvitamine.com is
back. Oliver's talents are multiple and his renderings extremely personal
from a conceptual point of view. Especially like his usage of photographic
stock to fuel his designs. Refresh homepage to see different screens.
Habitat
Seven in-dwelling of a looking to be hired fabulous designer and
vector artist. Check him out.
click
5 | interactive ingenuity is displayed in taking origami to a new level.
Excellent projects.
Pimping
news - Netdiver listed as a Top
10 Web Sites by How Magazine.
-> more news
^
