Design news | Dec 05
Sending wishes? Need blank cards to do so? Want a really nice gift idea? Then hop to Potion Brand who just released their new line. Beautifully designed, crafted and packaged!
Printed with enviromentally responsible inks.
Well done Melissa!
Just discovered VOICE (AIGA Journal of Design) worth bookmarking as an information resource covering the industry.
On December 1, 2005 was launched the FlashTV Podcast featuring the best in Flash Digital content (shorts). On December 12, the founder received fantastic news from Apple who decide to feature the podcast in the New and Notables section; since, it ranks at #62 right smack between The Rolling Stone mag and HBO podcasts!
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ndlr: Hats off Nic! Great reward for an independent project to reap recognition from the big league muscled players! Lesson? Never ever give up your dream!
Yahoo Devours Del.icio.us! by Associated Press
“Del.icio.us will continue to run its own website, which allows users to create a personal account so they can create a page devoted to their favorite online articles, music and reviews. The material can be shared with others simply by sending along the web link. The content also can be identified with labels, or tags, to make it simpler to find.”
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ndlr: Always luv the subtle subdomains that make up the name! So smart! After Flickr (picture sharing) and Upcoming (event sharing), it is now confirmed that there is a stealth battle for social networks buyout. Corporate gluttony in my book, usually leads to tragedy.
Addendum to color wheels: Color Blender let's you do precise palette building, including Pantone® match (provide as is)... and you can save your palettes for future session to make comparisons.
The button Photoshop Color Table will export an ACT file that will open in Photoshop and import the 6 swatches.
Nations Pledge Climate Talks by Associated Press
“MONTREAL -- More than 150 nations agreed Saturday to launch formal talks on mandatory post-2012 reductions in greenhouse gases -- talks that will exclude an unwilling United States.
For its part the Bush administration, which rejects the emissions cutbacks of the current Kyoto Protocol, accepted only a watered-down proposal to enter an exploratory global dialogue on future steps to combat climate change. That proposal specifically rules out negotiations leading to new commitments.
The United States is the world's biggest greenhouse-gas emitter, and Clinton's vice president, Al Gore, was instrumental in negotiating the treaty protocol initialed in 1997 in Kyoto, Japan -- a pact the Senate subsequently refused to ratify.”
Bush 'Flat Wrong' on Kyoto by Associated Press
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“Former President Clinton told a global audience of diplomats, environmentalists and others Friday that the Bush administration is "flat wrong" in claiming that reducing greenhouse-gas emissions to fight global warming would damage the U.S. economy.”
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via: Wired
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ndlr: The US make up 25% of emissions! We need to get this message across to them: fresh air is NOT an option for the human race (survival). Enough is enough!
The power of dreams indeed! Too bad was not taken into account fossil fuel depletion - pollution and making fresh air a not so important option of the human race life. Anyway, indulge in this cinematic wanting to redeem itself advertoperatic clip.
James Goggin working under Practise excellent portfolio is a must see! Luv the presentation of his projects. Clean, well documented and nice visuals.
When thoughfully executed, it's a good idea to let backgrounds images serve as an extra visual real estate to show portfolio pieces or hint at your personal design space or style.
New issue of WAG MAGAZINE is now alive and kicking.
Contributors include Michelle Blade, Ryan Casey, Matti Djateu, Ellen Van Engelen, Nobuko Hori, Adam Janes, Angel Karagiozov, Shadrach Lindo, Timothy McCormick, Michael McGrath, Anne Michaux, Alberto Pagliaro, Brandt Peters, Simone Sbarbati, Edwin Ushiro, Jurgen Vanbrabant.
For furniture and industrial design fans: the House of European Design represents some of the most respected European furniture designers working today.
Stuck at the Edges Of the Ad Game by Julie Bosman
Women feel sidelined, in subtle ways.
New York Times / November 22, 2005
“The status of women in advertising can be summed up with one of the industry's most famous campaigns: You've come a long way, baby. But despite their notable rise in the ad business, women have a long way to go, especially as creative directors, the people who ultimately are responsible for the output of an agency.
Among the 33 top agencies, as ranked by the trade publication Adweek, only 4 have flagship offices with female creative directors.
Neil French said to an audience of both men and women: That women don't get ahead because they don't deserve it!”
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via: Diane Love
One of the ultimate resource: MoCo Loco - Modern contemporary design & architecture web magazine. Broken down by cities if you prefer: Amsterdam / Montreal / San Francisco / Tokyo.
This is a jewel: Alvin Lustig (1915-1955) a modern design pioneer.
The is a repository of his work which spanned across many disciplines: the design of books and book jackets, magazines, interiors, and textiles and the web site let's you see examples of each.
Suggests you visit the architecture and interiors section! Wow really beautiful! Just my kind of strong lines and utilitarian design with the right touch of funky. By far, his interior design skills were his strongest!
“By the time he died at the age of forty in 1955, he had already introduced principles of Modern art to graphic design that have had a long-term influence on contemporary practice. He was in the vanguard of a relatively small group who fervently, indeed religiously, believed in the curative power of good design when applied to all aspects of American life. He was a generalist, and yet in the specific media in which he excelled he established standards that are viable today.”
Actually it so happens that I found Sara De Bondt a London based graphic designer who sometimes collaborates with James from Practise, and I can't pass up adding her portfolio.
Luv the fresh and vibrant approach she has to design. Some of her projects are sternly minimalist, others extravagantly buzzing with details and yet still others, very haunting and mysterious. At ease, she spans her experience across quite diverse fields.
Welcome a new powagirrrl!
Oh my, I've rediscovered one of the sites that was originally published on Netdiver way back in '98. Eyesaw is a must see! Now think, this was cutting-edge and innovative design then!
Guess what? It still is very much so today!
Oh my! The Brand Gallery flash site uses a mouse on/over fx in their work section to agrandize dynamically images and a spinning square maze to navigate between sections. Reminescent of the logo perhaps?
Exceptionally innovative approach to online presentation and communication and technically interesting given their field of work: commercial TV branding.
WIWP Remixed Vinyls now available for grab and viewing. See a unique track of urban designs applied to an old media.
Really cool initiative!
Excerpt from an interview with LMAC (les minimal autistic children)
“I try to be a very positive individual and I must say the street wear culture has grown in leaps and bounds with everybody doing their own thing and coming together in the right circumstances. It’s great! Many new labels sprouting out everywhere, it’s great to see more and more peeps believing in themselves and taking hold of their future.
As with every game and forte, the hard working will continue to move up the ladder.”
Portfolios sites to discover.
/ Ginger Beards graffiti and doodling taken seriously. Gorgeous Tees.
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/ Nicholas Deakin mix media and unique character illos
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/ rocketdesign designer and illustrator always on the move!
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/ Rob Dunlavey specializes in iconographic illustrastions
We are what we do! Who they are?
“We’re not another charity. We’re not an institution. We Are What We Do is a movement. We’d like to inspire people to use their everyday actions to change the world. Whoever they are. And wherever they are. And that includes you.”
How do you calculate the monetary value of your design?
51% I have a sliding scale depending on the size and type of client.
25% I have a fixed rate based on my costs and overhead.
27% I have a project rate based on what I think the client can afford.
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via: Icograda
What Do Women Game Designers Want? Focusing on a few women that are involved in women and gaming, the article fleshes out the current state of women and gaming.
“I do agree the sexualization of women in games has something to do with the lack of female gamers. Take a look at any gamer magazine and you will see some great examples of this fact. Recently I noticed an abundance of scantily clad women in a variety of unnecessary forums throughout the magazines.”
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via: Misbehaving
Color Scheme Generator 2 helps you build easily build a complete palette so you can compare directly on your monitor. Smart tips and comments available about poor vision and color blindness.
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4096 Color Wheel Version 2.1 offers a similar tool but uses a different visual approach to display a palette. Offers the web-safe, web-smart and unsafe color options.
“We eliminate the word art and replace it with work and develop the following descriptions...”
Watch the Hilman Curtis video for incredibly rich insights MG gives about design. Inspiring.
Just for the pleasure! You've gotta see this little piece of character 3D animation: watch the Dancing Beeno v.3.
Pay special attention to eye / body movements and expressiveness. Just wanna hug the little fella!
If you're using Firefox (highly recommend 1.5) as a browser, there is a Developer Toolbar that JF uses all the time. There are some nifty commands (like testing a change to the CSS file on the fly) and seeing the path of images and validating the page, and much much more.
For the complete Firefox extensions + for the Dev Toolbar.
Tom Judd Everyday amazing illustration project.
“365 PAGES AGO I HAD A VERY SILLY IDEA. Draw a page everyday for one year. Each day I spent around 1 hour on the page, sometimes more, sometimes less.”
Less Rain is looking for a senior Flash genius. You should have a minimum of three years of experience in Flash front-end programming, an eye for animation and detail, and a feel for good interaction design and usability.
Send links to online portfolios with relevant examples to jobs at lessrain.com. Please include personal, artistic work - we prefer to see your favourite projects, not your biggest brand names.
Keep any CV’s short, but do include salary expectations in your application.
NYC studio Edge Lab is currently looking for a Senior Designer. The Sr. Designer will work closely with the Creative Director to develop complete branding and identity solutions, advertising campaigns, and design and marketing materials.
When they say the create edgy, gooey, strategic deisgn, one look at their experimental interactivity interface on their website will convince you. Excellent projects delivered!
MediaLab / Madrid organises shows, festivals, workshops and seminars. By means of these activities it brings together creators and researchers from different fields with the aim of generating dialogues and productive interactions between diverse concepts, outlooks and practices. This provides a critical, exploratory platform that endeavours to articulate a heterogeneous cultural environment where art, science and humanities converge.
Portfolios sites to discover.
/ Ripe Studio flash deveveloper excellent nav system and project viewer
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/ In the Habit new domain for Fiveonesix.
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/ Architecture in Helsinki a brassy grungy band with a nice flash site.
Creative Rescue houses Ray Noland's funk designs who specializes mostly in the entertainment and music markets. What impresses me most, is the sheer quality of conceptual prowness demonstrated in a lot of the work he has completed.
Some are brimming full with beauty and display exemplary technical skills, while others, are rich with effective social (activism) undertones.
LUV it!
Microsoft says technological freedom is political manifesto by Ryan Paul
“Microsoft has been far more agressive than usual lately with its public attacks on open source software. Earlier this month, Microsoft representative Charles Fitzgerald rejected IBM's on-demand business model as crazy and dismissed open source enthusiasts as dorks...
Microsoft also continues to assert that the cost of software is not relevant in developing countries in places like western Africa, where the average annual salary is less than the cost of Microsoft Office.”
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ndlr: Some think with their head. Some think with their head and heart. Others with their... and really need their dirty little butts whipped clean so they shake out of their monopolization trance. Hello, planet Earth calling here! Gheez that makes me angry.
Lecturing the United Nations (from a 5 post blog) about the non-value of the open-source movement can only come from a technology hijacker who for years now, shoves our puters and networks with more security holes and green code (read: unnecessary or non revised code or even malicious code) than there are sand on the beach!
The courts now act as ex monopoly suits junkward, condemning from one hand and repleneshing the treasury from the other hand. Of the 250 something companies who have tried to be heard because their wings were not clipped but violently pulled off from their startups or software, how many have won?
Truth being said, what's the new propogranda message here? Beware (scared?), change does not profit the one in power. Were they drilling for helium on Plutanium for the last 10 years?
It makes me feel good to reinstate that this is the age of possibilities for the hoi polloi (the small people and companies). Thank God, this tamtrum was well identified by the board.
Mary Dail has established a roster of talented photographers who shoot still life, food, interiors, travel, lifestyle, fashion and more. Big Leo Production offers its clients photography, styling and full-service production for advertising, catalog and editorial for film and print.
Consistency throughout! When you manage multi assignements and multi talents it is not always a given that the level of output for each assignment can be superlative.
But it seems that the conjunction of the group's talent and Mary's management style while picking the jobs for her protégés, work extremely well together.
Hats off to a Powagirrrl!
Excellence throughout! It's amazing that so many high talents were scouted and such a high quality maintained. It definitely says a lot about the kind of clients that call to source projects.
It says even more about the absolute passion, dedication, imagination and creative energy at play. Shots after shots are mesmerizing and inspiring.
Big Leo Prod? Success between art and commerce defined.
First two thumbs show the works of stylists
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Following thumbs show the works of photographers
Interface[s] Montréal Digital Meets Business an initiative created by the Society for Arts and Technology had their closing conference last night and I must admit that the premiering of this series of conferences about the future of technology and impact on business, was a great success.
It got a lot of people excited about what it means to be connected. Many facets and new possibilities were explored. Can't wait for the second round.
Winners and Losers of Corporate Image 2005 by Naseem Javed
“Corporations that develop clear messages and clearly communicate their stories to both the internal organizations and the external forces are the real players. The rest are either still discovering who they are or just making stories as they go along or periodically falling flat on their faces.
When it comes to corporate image, corporations must also try to have images of honesty and respectability. Therefore they have no room for false claims or overly silly, wildly humorous image campaigns. Money and business both are serious issues. Customers and shareholders alike want to do business with the sober teams, and not the beer-commercial-happy bunch.”
Bravia color like no others short film is pure magic and ravishing eye candy! Wow that's powerful advertising!
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ndlr: The making-of the advert with more footage to view. cool!
Tx Loic
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ndlr: If anyone knows which agency produced it please let me know!
The agencies behind are Fallon London and The Mill (you can read a bit on the assignement on both sites. Amazing, 15,000 balls were used!
More info from Ad Land with links to the images # 1 / images # 2
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via: Kevin Airgid + Kenneth & David
Dear Mr. B is a cutting edge internet based movie. The film is not the same every time you watch it. One scene was shot in three different versions, which are shown by random.
“We know the EU isn’t primarily concerned with issues like this one. But the health and well-being of citizens has a way of affecting the health and well-being of the economy.
Alcohol-related problems cost the EU countries at least 200 billion euros every year, according to an estimate by the WHO (World Health Organization). That’s a lot of money.”
The cre824 You have 24 hours, What can you accomplish pre-selection competition is over. A brief was distributed and it deals with immediate issues.
I find the event even more interesting now. The brief enclosed the process within set parameters, contained and not a free for all creativity fest. Not that it ain't good, but in view of the so little time involved to build the sites and to facilitate best judging the entries, smart to make the competition follow predetermined objectives.
Wanna see the submissions?
Bonsaimai is home to Maiko Gubler lovely illos, characters and 3d models. Welcome a new powagirrrl!
Mia&Jem are awesome Sydney based graphic designers. Their work range from identity, print work. Outstanding are all their editorial projects.
Portfolios sites to discover.
/ e---f a talented lifestyle photography duo
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/ ourmachine makes you see things others don't (check their self-promo videos.
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/ Anne Geddes the top and incredible children photographer
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/ Tyler Askew art director magnificient!
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/ Evan Hecox urban pulses in his illustrations
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/ The Art Institute of Chicago a great institutional website!
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/ yU+co. one of the longest lasting experimental site!
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/ Aesthetic Apparatus fantastic print and graphic design talent
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/ Non-Format creative direction and design with a grungy feel
No more chromeless popup windows? by Roger Johansson
Oh you've certainly not seen anything quite like Orange22 design lab, who I think is a rising star paving tomorrow's living, today!
Say urban feel! They've got it. Say hip and stylish! They've nailed it. Say Fresh and bold! They do it. Say beautiful down to the last detail. They design it. A design shop with a strong liking for furniture, product and environmental branding projects, all immersed in and conceptualized with a sense of cutting-edge technology.
In the words of Dario Antonioni, founder and creative director: “Today, with over 10 years of professional experience, a 2000 square foot product showroom, and design projects worldwide, I continue to grow with my clients, providing them with dedicated passion to transform ideas into inspiring physical experiences that evoke emotion and deliver meaning.”
Snow is in the air! Elan Snowboards launches its new collection as well as a community blog.
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New site designed by talented Subtotal
Emigre: An Ending by Rick Poynor
“So it's over. One of the great - as in all-time great - design publications has come to a close. Issue 69 of Emigre will be the last. Emigre the type foundry will live on, but founder, editor and designer Rudy VanderLans has commissioned his last article, conducted and transcribed his last interview, and composed his final message to his readers.”
Visit Emigre Magazine archive for back issues.
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ndlr: Issue #58 is a must have reference book for all designers looking for challenging and deep set thinking about our trade. Everyone is a designer manifest is one of the best book in my collection!
Discover the photographic work of Felix Holzer in the new MagWerk issue. Minimalist and simply awesome! Too bad the pixies are so small on his site.
Oops how is this possible? Well Pixar was missing. Guess I was taking for granted that everyone knows about this incredible, independent, best, really, the best ever animation studio who ain't afraid to kick out some seriously fantastic movies against the crumbling major veterans and old...er studios.
Creative imagination at work! Jaime Hayon designs familiar objects that are like pieces of art and offsets our modern contemporary perceptions.
Quirky and beautiful, view the AQHayon Collection.
