I read the Christian Science Monitor’s story on “What’s behind Chicago’s high-crime summer?” & curiously found no mention of the Foot Clan. ★2010/08/31
Using low-level acidic substance to simulate rash from laundry detergent in order to get girlfriend to do my laundry. #lifehack★2010/08/27
@greghaerling — We paved the way for these spoiled shits. "We" being slightly less-spoiled shits. ★2010/08/24
And what have we found? That over the years of domesticating cows and selective breeding, we’ve ended up with a mentally retarded version of the species former selves. GREAT FOR BUSINESS!
Both types of cattle show evidence of natural selection in genes that appear to be involved in making the animals — large, horned and potentially dangerous — docile. In some breeds, specific variants of behavior-related genes are “fixed,” or seen in essentially every animal. Curiously, some of those genes are in regions that in the human genome seem to be involved in autism, brain development and mental retardation.
Great for any fans of the Wire. BONUS: Also great for fans of inner city crime and bureaucratic mess. BONUS BONUS: A fan caught Simon before his appearance with Moyers and took him out to lunch. I like this David Simon character. If you haven’t started the Wire yet, start now. And you can’t stop until you at least finish a season; they start off decidedly slow.
Stephen Anderson makes a great case that good looks in design go more than skin deep:
The more we learn about people, and how our brains process information, the more we learn the truth of that phrase: form and function aren’t separate items. If we believe that style somehow exists independent of functionality, that we can treat aesthetics and function as two separate pieces, then we ignore the evidence that beauty is much more than decoration. Our brains can’t help but agree.
An in-depth look into Wes Anderson’s style and choices through the first few minutes of The Royal Tenenbaums. Some of the analysis is a little manufactured, but most of it is pretty interesting. Make sure to pause often. If you’re an Anderson fan, be sure to check out parts one, two, three, and four.
The music industry makes records louder and louder and have pushed beyond reason in an effort to stand out amongst the rest of the radio. This drives me nuts. Every time I listen to a Lily Allen record, I can’t stand the fact that the drums are distorted to make a buck; and I particularly can’t stand the fact that the people who perpetuate this problem know about it, but deny that it’s a problem in the first place:
“Somebody told me about [people complaining that the Guitar Hero version of Death Magnetic sounds better]. Listen, what are you going to do?… …The Internet gives everybody a voice, and the Internet has a tendency to give the complainers a louder voice. Listen, I can’t keep up with this shit.” – Lars Ulrich
Lebron James may end up having the greatest basketball season in the history of the NBA this season. And the funny thing is, he’s still got flaws in his game: His post-up game; Spotty outside shot; Stands still and dribbles too much. I’m betting that he’s going to end up being the best player to ever play in the NBA. Case in point:
Back in 1986, actor/director Beat Takeshi, a man who doesn’t like video games, wanted to show people how foolish they were for liking video games by making the most annoying video game of all time for the Nintendo. For example: A level where you must sit in front of the TV and hold the select button for 60 minutes. Apparently it’s coming to the Japanese Virtual Console on the 31st of March.
In a similar vein, Penn & Teller created a video game for the SegaCD in which you must drive across the Nevada desert in real-time for 8 hours in order to get “1 point”. There’s a torrent available for the brave.
GOOD Magazine’s guide for reducing your water footprint. I need me some low-flow toilets. FYI: Getting local WA State apples in Seattle doesn’t use as much water because of the lack of transportation.
Yes, it’s true that a team at Google couldn’t decide between two blues, so they’re testing 41 shades between each blue to see which one performs better. I had a recent debate over whether a border should be 3, 4 or 5 pixels wide, and was asked to prove my case. I can’t operate in an environment like that.
This particular point set off Mr. Stevenson to put into words concepts that I’ve always been aware of, but have always struggled to articulate as well as he did in his post:
The most contentious point between software engineering culture and visual design culture is the question of whether important things can be always seen in absolutes. The engineering approach values measurable, reproducible results which can be represented in a graph or a checklist. Unit tests and benchmarks illustrate progress. [...] Visual design is often the polar opposite of engineering: trading hard edges for subjective decisions based on gut feelings and personal experiences. It’s messy, unpredictable, and notoriously hard to measure. The apparently erratic behavior of artists drives engineers bananas. Their decisions seem arbitrary and risk everything with no guaranteed benefit.
Through out my career, I’ve regularly been in similar environments; and one of my biggest problems has been figuring out how to hurdle that divide. I feel that part of my role is as a visual taste maker. You might test to find the most crowd pleasing shade of blue at the first pass, but I might come up with a blue that might not be your instant choice, yet will grow on you when taken in holistically. Like Henry Ford said, “If I’d asked people what they wanted, they would have asked for a better horse.” There is a point with visual design where logic starts to breakdown in ways that only experience can answer.
The coolest way to find out that the weather is shit in Seattle. The site uses Twitter status messages in various vicinities to draft a picture of not only how crappy it is outside, but what people think of it. Make sure to use a modernbrowser.
I don’t think that I tweet enough to get as thorough of a journal of my life (and thank the Maker™ for that), but I love the idea. I post too many shortened URLs for it to make any sense. Maybe one day…
Just finished up a project for one of my clients, Mind Opera. They’re a digital media company that specializes in storytelling through video, motion graphics, design, media installations, digital art, and creative concepts; and they hired me to design and develop their website.
Mind Opera wanted to work with me based on the design of my blog, particularly the “dark” background and the use of icons. After talking about the need to show off that they were a creative agency, we decided on a “hand-made” feel to the site.
Outside of some slight variations, the first design I handed them was what they went with. One of Mind Opera’s directives was that if they were going to use a mark, that it would be their pre-existing mark. Otherwise, the logotype could be all new. Based on how drastically the feel of the new design direction and the old mark were different, I decided to leave it out and focus on making a distinct logotype. One of my earlier attempts was in the “hand-made” vein, a wooden sign. After concern about the sign translating to other mediums, we decided on the four-color logotype that is currently used.
Being that Mind Opera worked as creative-types, they spoke a similar visual language and made the project very easy to dive into. Make sure to browse their new site and their page on my portfolio.
So, once again, I am a free agent. It’s now official: FOR HIRE.
I’ve recently been laid off by CultureMob.com. I was an employee of a company where a weak economy shows it’s head much sooner than I expected. The company’s current revenue source is from investors; and the market suddenly became a tougher place for investment (which is too bad, because we were beating all our projections).
For those confused on how I could be laid off from a company that I co-created, I never invested in the company financially as some of the other members had; and therefore never had “co-founder” status. With my primary role in the company being the designer, my position wasn’t as necessary as some of the others (which makes sense to me).
Now, that being said, I’ve been enjoying my time off so far. I’ve taken the time to get my portfolio in working order. I’ve taken in a couple freelance gigs and will start to evaluate what offers are out there. I still wish the best to the folks at CultureMob and am rooting for them to make a great product even better. In under a year on the market, we were able to come close to feature parity while giving the competition a 5 year head start.
So, if you’ve got a great lead for me, by all means, toss it my way. I’d appreciate it.
We’re (CultureMob) throwing our first event in Seattle on Thursday June 5th at Neumos. ?uestlove of the Roots is performing a DJ set, and the night is hosted by Black Thought. One of my first thoughts after booking the gig was that I was excited to work with the iconography that is BROther ?uestion. I rushed to get a poster done so that we could get it out as soon as the details. Apparently, there was a little confusion between us and the venue: Neumos is using their own flyer under obligation from the artist’s management. But that didn’t stop me from doing my own run…
My original idea was to do a visual play on Shepherd Fariy’s Obama “Change” poster, but decided against being overtly political. So I moved on and decided to play on the vinyl/afro metaphor in combination with the mystery elements implied by the question mark.
