Netdiver Mag

It’s the time of the year for the Holidays too often referred to as the ‘gifts’ season. The greatest gift of all is – LOVE – which costs nothing and is immensely powerful.

From us 2 you may LOVE find you.

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— temporary supension — enjoy your vacation —

See ya in 2012.

Surprised that Once upon a forest which was first Joshua Davis playground back in the wee-wee-wee early days of the web is still running. Wanna have a little piece of his randomness engine to play with and create beautiful mobile desktops?

Get the Reflect app.

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Grafikas is the non-commercial works of Drew Europeo. The 365 days project – Alaphabet series.

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Odd Worlds.

Beautiful mix-media series Au cours du temps by Miriam Schmalen (photography) and Ekaterina Koroleva (illustration).

Multipraktik is a multi-disciplinary platform. Constantly pursuing new practices, they cross fields with design, photography, video production, music, events and art. They operate as an ever-growing collective of designers, artists, musicians, producers and programmers.

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Just received in the mail two fabulous samples of their work: Oknai – Ain’t a Dream and K4 Format 2009 compilation.

Top of the line mid-range digital camera: Fujifilm X10 has now replaced other camera – which touchscreen is no longer operative. Shucks after barely 3 years quite a bummer.

Originally got the Olympus E-PM1 (no viewfinder – no macro – no zoom – all available separately adding $$$ to costs). Check the DPR comparative review.

The brilliance of this X10 is that it has a real view finder (glass not plastic) adjustable to your eyesight – true macro and super macro and zoom capabilities. Hyper sensitive sensor.

Nice retro-looking casing – w/ plenty of manual knobs for adjustments and Leica lenses makes this the perfect point and shoot.

Tom Speirs art direction, brand design and typography. Sooo many cool marks.

Kim Høltermand and I go sometime back now. I have followed his photography career from almost the beginning and it still eludes me how he garners such poetry from sometimes so dire locations.

Wish he would make series of postcards or blank greeting cards from some of these.

Showing some of my fav. Head-on over.

Idea Exhibit is about sharing your ideas and letting them grow. Nice scrolling right website – the only thing that bothers me is the fact that there are other items listed under the fold which – on first visit you will neither see or read of.

The other thing – what happens to these ideas? Isn’t this opening the door to idea snatchers?

What do you think works or not?

Michael Byers is a fellow Canadian, a prolific illustrator who specializes in editorial design and has worked with prestigious magazines. He started drawing way back in grade 1 and after being undecisive, earned a bachelor degree and fast forward today..

His volubile characters – striking perspective and odd palette don’t skip a beat in grabbing your attention.

Took some time to be amazed. It’s good for creativity. Varia motion reel, adverts and music videos to view.

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‘Until Now’ 2010 by Umeric

Master at VFX, design for film, TV and advertising reel.

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In MY Fridge by Fabian Kreuzer

The process of food management in a futuristic scenario.

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BT Vision Christmas 2011 by weare17

Pure eye candy visuals advert.

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Rat Vs Possum ‘Fat Monk’ official music video by Lucy McRae

Gotta love Yuna Kim opening index is a pure minimalist delight. Using color keyed geometric shapes which serves as direct access to projects which you get a preview upon mouseover. If you pick one of the top section – the project will slice-up the upper part and open a content panel. Site is all coded in HTML5.

Her interactive reel is brilliant – using 3 iPads to do so. Must see.

148 posts, 904 comments and over 2.5m visits later — Design Assembly turned 3. To mark the occassion they have retired the site and produced a book — 3 in fact — archiving the past 3 years of discourse and showcasing new and exclusive material from leading industry professionals.

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100% of profits from the sale of the book will be distributed globally between 3 Cancer charities.

Who wants fonts? Download the gorgeous Pompadour numerical font by Andy Mangold.

Substratum is a series of inspirational interviews. Digging the geometric shapes and mesh designs that identifies each issue – that are themed around intriguing concepts.. Wish they would have carry part of the unique identifying issue ‘color’ to format the ‘questions’ area – which is surprisingly all white – and boring.

Once you start and there are no other choice but to go back to the homepage – instead of current issue. Sadly – you cannot pick an interviewee from a list. None available.

Not so for the content. Questions are smart and so are some of the answers.

Justin Gabbard is a New York based illustrator. He draws inspiration from pop music, storefront signs, bright colors and loud people. He creates likenesses from a combination of strong shapes and graphic hand made details that capture the eye.

He excels at portraiture.

New book showcasing the stunning hand-drawn map work of Pentagram partner Paula Scher. MAPS presents 39 paintings, drawings, prints and environmental installations.

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Check out the New York City’s Queens Metropolitan Campus – installation pictures. The finished mural consists of over 100 panels.

No kidding – now this is thinking HUGE.

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via: Bitique

Toormix has got a lot going on. Not only are they a spear-heading design studio for almost 10 yrs now – they have a lot going on their website as well.

On mouseover of top nav – huge – but I mean really huge section is highlight and layered over and individual have a bright yellow div frame that appears.

You like?

Jimmy Raheriarisoa aka Nerisson is an art director and graphic designer based in Strasbourg – his website is based on a monsterism theme.. Don’t know if this is as strong a concept as the charcoal layered cubes that show-up as portfolio preview.

What do you think? Works or not?

Summarizes current moto and state of mind. I’ve thrown-in learning how to use my fab Fujifilm X10 – extend my knowledge of Lightroom – and continue work on the Bubble project.

Stay Hungry Stay Foolish poster.

House Industries: Interview with Ken Barber by Gestalten

House Industries has been producing their premier league retro design and their true love…Fonts! Fonts! Fonts! since 1993.

Drawing will make you a better letterer. If you’re into typography – this one’s for you.

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Wanna buy some of their products?

RoAndCo is a multi-disciplinary design studio devoted to holistic branding that serves a range of fashion, art, and lifestyle clients. By thoughtfully distilling a client’s inspirations, ideas, and motivations, they generates fresh, sincere, compelling brand messages that engage and resonate.

Digging the mini-animated-thumbs and centered visuals. You can choose from 3 different sections: print, art direction and interactive. Quick work overview? Checked.

The best 365 css websites 2011 book by Awwwards available for pre-order. Rebate offer ends December 31.

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Smart content presentation. There is a lookbook preview and all jury members bios and url are available.

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via: Alex Antuna

James Warfield loves to engage an audience. This is the ‘best’ self-promo intro I’ve ever read:

Tease, tempt, wow. Make them laugh, get them involved, spread your butter, love your brand, sit their bums firmly in their seats and open their eyes a little bit wider.

That slight turn of the head, placing one ear more closely to the speaker, that’s the effect I have. This goal isn’t bound by media. I’ve strategised, digitised and advertised. Bring me more.

Mission accomplished? You judge.

Walter Vasconcelos is an illustrator and designer. He lives in Rio de Janeiro / Brazil and works for clients all over the world.

He likes the idea that an illustration must be "read", deciphered, he doesn’t think of this as a kind of "hermetism", but rather as a way to preserve a "dynamics of creation". It is sometimes good to break the rules and build your own Universe.

Funky characters living in a mix-media collage world.

Richard Holt aka Holster® is a graphic designer in London.. and future time traveller with very nice projects to show.

Designful. The work of Jack Dayly. Eyeful. Beautiful. Insightful.

Brandhaus is a space that nurtures creativity and encourages thinking rather than just designing. Clients can step outside their corporate safety-nets and be involved in conceptualising new ideas and ways of communicating their message.

Smart agency concept!

Love their new space.

Branch is an independent design consultancy based in London and an experienced team working across many disciplines. They believe that the key to good design and communication is simplicity.

Ditto! Showing a small sample of their fab projects.

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The Graphical Tree

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Uniqlo

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Born in SoHo

This is a hair-pulling-frustration-triggering day! Had to put on my geeky-nerdy-tecky gloves. Love to hate technology and all ingredients amply supplied to feed it – thank you. Not that I have ‘debugged’ everything.. but enough that workstations can now be accessed.

And as talented Bram Vanhaeren who offers an idea everyday – aptly says in this poster: The person that works the hardest wins!

Send me the prize. I deserve it.

Allan Sanders aka Loopland was born in a small grey shipbuilding town in the North West of England. After a brief career in computer programming he came to the conclusion that it would be more interesting to make drawings for a living. Proficient in character design.

Glad he did.

A start-up company that offers coordinated wrapping paper lines, each featuring a unique concept and original designs. Proof? Use one of each and you get?

Introducing the Cheeseburger set by Gift Couture.

Yepp you read – see correctly.

0 cal indulgence.

Field Notes are insights into the work and projects of Ian Coyle. Documenting the process (including snapshot of code snippets) using javascript to animated images and diagonal colored lines to hint towards hidden parts of the interface as well as being hook to a block colored text link.

Description is a bit hairy. See for yourself.

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via: Daniel Howells founder of 52

EXHILO brand film Supported by four hundred bass transducers of the “bodysonic” floor at London’s Fabric club, Exhilo film, a new brand concept of DediPower, was premiered at BIMA awards party on 10th of November.

Soundtrack? Motion? Visual Fx? Those flexible (metal-like) strings are quite impressive to watch.

Handywork of Korb – hailing from Vilnius (Lituania).

Presenting the gorgeous cuties Eggpicnic resin collector’s toys by Camila De Gregorio and Christopher Macaluso.

Limited edition of only 10 of each toy. Handmade resin toys dressed 100% in crin, in collaboration with Marcela Sepúlveda, artisan from Rari, a town located in the Andean foothills 300 kms south of Santiago, Chile.

The tradition of horse hair weaving is a technique passed on from generation to generation for the last 200 years. The horsehair is washed, dyed, and woven by hand.

Simply huggable.

First 100 people to pre-order the calendar as early supporter of the Gifted Co project will get some exclusive goodies!

What a niiiice project and website. Love the shift between white and gray background and keeping to a strict color grid that makes for a very pleasant UX.

Nice play on words: ‘gifted’ meant as ‘talented’.

Salute Dushan Milic who is a tangent jumping, pun making, endlessly curious curmudgeon and who’s been illustrating and designing for over a decade.

Specializing in people, concepts & portraits that are drawn via pen and ink, or with Wacom and digitally coloured, movement and gesture dominate with a quirkiness generated from a drawn-from-the-gut approach that breathes life into his illustrations.

He is like a director. You sense there is a very real script behind all he does and what we get to see, is the capturing of a precise moment. The scene was carefully picked.

The richness of every project is based on human likeness… something that we can all relate to, without further explanations. We have ‘seen’ these before.

Each of his projects tells a story. It fires us. We recognize the analogies, the facial expressions, we understand, we see ourselves at one time or another of our life.

I don’t think I have seen yet character illustration and 3D figurines with such intense emotional presence.

Chris Sickels – a true master!

150 People. 21 Languages. Endless curiosity. Ambitious for clients. Optimistic for the world. Meet Wolff-Olins. Love their website with comprehensive sections and loads of pretty visuals.

After all these years, an agency that is still is a top creative hub.

Food for thought by Peter Saville.

Our role as designers is a privileged position. A position that should be personally treated with respect and carefully nurtured. Our everyday job is one where we must think, observe, discuss, research, question, debate, create, design and transcend culture, trends and stale thinking. Absorbing everything we see, touch and use with a critical mind making educated judgements on what is good and bad.

People need ideas, new thinking, different approaches to old problems and creative solutions. We are required to become experts and consultants in a particular market, sector or subject with every new and evolving project with clients constantly seeking answers and rationale for our work.

I believe a great designer is one with a pliable and evolving mind, who is keen to learn, is inquisitive, appreciative and not afraid to explore new subjects, avenues of working, thinking and creating. Our ability to analyse and think creatively, strategically and objectively needs constant development.

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Sample posters.

This sentence lies heavily on my mind as I am working on a new projects. What do you think. Is Print Dead or Alive!?

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via: Poster via First Issue

Games We Played is one of the many initiatives under the Singapore Memory Project, an ambitious undertaking to curate the people’s memories of Singapore through the ages, so that generations of the future can have a past they can hold on to.

Oh so lovely A-Z animated project.

And what about these ‘tunes’?

Kern Type, the kerning game. How much do you know about typography. Test your skills and see.

Domino Party is new a daily comic brought to you by Sonni Studios. Reflections on current society issues.

And we are multi-tasking into multi-projects both commercial and personal. The Underwood illustration by Mike Lemanski exemplifies – at least for me – the different aspects of my current activities.

Seeking talent to review – contributing to social networks – answering emails – compiling past writings for a book – working on my music albums – reading design books and finally..

Starting a fresh new week of research into my photographic folders to assemble a selection for a new self-inititiated project.

Typographic elements for an online app created by Kin Design for Wallpaper* magazine’s ‘Handmade’ issue. Art Direction by Meirion. Motion design by Anthony Burrill.

Great idea. Seamless. Perfect making-of.

Quand mamie balance de la typographie, c’est du lourd ! When Grandma throws you typographic posters – watch-out! – (liberal translation) is a in-you-face photographic / typographic essay by Jonathan Menet.

Granma has got this don’t mess with me assertive attitude. Statements are hilarious.

A it’s Friday must-see.

With Associates is changing their website every month with an aim to experiment, play, discuss and learn more about the ever evolving nature of the digital environment.

That is a risky venture because I think it overlooks the fact that ‘potential’ clients may visit and be confused by the change – since online we ‘read’ and ‘memorize’ interfaces.

Is this something you ever considered doing?

Liverpool born Adrian Johnson (b. 1974) has developed a unique and strongly identifiable body of work. His trademark economical, highly crafted, graphic work is constantly evolving, whilst always maintaining a healthy distance from current trends and passing fashions.

He knows the real potency of communicating with images.

Irresistible minimalist colorful signature.

3 Tips For Designing A Work Space That Embodies Your Brand by John Edson

A workspace is as much an opportunity to express who you are as a company as it is a functional place to get work done.

More precious furniture and fixtures once we have more clarity about our needs and preferences — and even then, we won’t build anything that can’t be upgraded, improved, reconfigured, or summarily ripped out.

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Have you organized your ‘space’ so it is creatively stimulating?

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Past w/e got rid of a huge workstation table that was engulfing not only the physical space – but my ‘creative’ space. Having two separated workstations was not – as I initially envisioned – conducive to my double-tasking either editorial work or pure design.

The ‘nagging’ design workstation became a silent reproach of sort: ‘you’re not working here enough’.

Embarking in new projects – I joined both workstations. I can switch in a snap. A huge empty wall will be posted with in-progress comps. Newly emptied space in book and paper / past work shelving units – offers room to ‘grow’ again.

You can see the way it were here (page 16).

Impact? Never felt so charged.

We Are Draft™ is the London design studio of freelance designer and art director Chris Smyth and I like what they do. Excellent portfolio of interactive, branding and print projects.

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