November 28th, 2011
The holidays are fast approaching and not sure about you but I notoriously have those moments where the spirit of family and friendly gift giving gets a bit lost amongst the over-saturation of holiday-time consumerism, sale advertising, and societal expectations. Although it’s tough to make time for it and can’t cover all aspects of holiday preparations, I try to put together some home-made gifts to feel more connected to the spirit of giving, enjoy the creativity, and add that personal touch. Here are a few wonderfully creative DIY gift making ideas that I discovered and found particularly inspiring — from the pickled green beens (delicious by the way) to the magazine basket bowl (simple, colorful and sturdy). HAPPY HOLIDAYS!
1. Recycled Vintage Cameras Nightlight Project
Visit Instruction Page
2. Branch Salt Bowl & Spoon
Visit Instruction Page
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October 27th, 2011
Love the iPad and it’s seamless integration with all of my devices and technology tools, especially some of the latest updates with iOS 5. I’m continuously amazed with all the creative apps that are available. But, have to admit that it’s tough to keep up with everything that is out there and narrow it down to what is truly useful instead of just another icon in the continuously growing number of my swiping pages. Spent some time recently honing in on which ones I really make use of and enjoy as a web/interactive designer and developer. The list below are 8 of the best free iPad apps that I have found particularly useful and inspirational.
The Guardian Eyewitness
Showcases the world’s most distinctive and provocative photographs, providing a daily, visual reflection of global events. Bringing thought-provoking imagery direct to your device on a daily basis. Includes pro tips written by award-winning photography team to offer technical insights.
WordPress
Easy management of your WordPress blog or site from your iOS device. Moderate comments, create or edit posts and pages, and add images or videos.
Typefaces
Wonderfully done typefaces app that will display individual characters, paragraphs, and full typeface info.
Cool Hunting
Daily buzz on ideas and products in the crossroads of art, design, culture and technology. Also looks at the people who produce them.
Web Designer Magazine
Premiere magazine for aspiring online creatives and industry professionals. Cutting-edge practical projects, industry news and view, showcase of the finest design talent.
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October 17th, 2011
Ok – I fell for it. Went into the purchased section of the Mac App Store and saw the little “x” next to the word INSTALLED and just had to click it. As you may suspect, the app disappeared. I don’t really know why I clicked it, but I did. And it wasn’t a $.99 solitaire game – it was the $29.99 OSX Lion app. Ooops!
To get it back, a ton of places online said to simply go into the store and option-click the word “installed”. Not sure why but that didn’t work for me.
With some luck, I wandered into the “View My Account” section under “Store” in the menu bar. After logging in, I noticed that that one of my purchases was listed as “hidden”. There it was! Just unhide it, and the app shows back up in the purchased list.
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August 26th, 2011
I’m sure all of the tech world is wondering if Apple Inc. will be the same without Steve Jobs? Not sure the answer but would like to pay a bit of homage to his vision and persistence pointing us in the right direction. Steve Jobs single-handedly has shaped a new future of innovation by raising the bar and demanding a new level of standard and expectation that is truly inspiring. Albeit Apple is not struggling for cash by any means, I truly believe that innovation comes first with them and always has. Hope it stays that way.
Even though at the moment the company seems a tad over dominating in too many markets, I can’t help but feel they deserve the reward of all those years of struggle. I will always appreciate how Jobs’ demanding persona made everyone rethink the mobile phone and its role in our lives with the large screen, open source apps, and touch technology. Everyone else seems to still be struggling to keep up and more and more of the general public are hopping onboard the Apple/Mac train with their technology expectations raised, no spyware/spam to deal with, ease of workflow, graphic appeal and inspired simplicity/design .
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April 19th, 2011
Not sure about you, but sometimes I feel overwhelmingly inspired to want to do something with no strings attached, something that isn’t involved with commercial design work, something I can do because I am able and not for reward or money … something to simply help out someone else, something to make a contribution to positive change. Here are some things that I’ve found incredibly rewarding to have done and others I have yet to do. So many people do so many things every day for positive change, both consciously and unconsciously, and you are most likely one of them but in case you have these similar inspirational moments and you’re not sure what to do, these ideas may be helpful.
Here are 5 great ways to be the change you want to see in the world. Enjoy!
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March 30th, 2011
I’m so inspired when good design can break the boundaries that we build around ourselves based on current technology, social norms, and perceptions. These incredible new designs have reminded me to keep looking and working outside our own perceived limits.
1. Live Anywhere Lighting by designer Linda Allen
Linda Allen, who has years under her belt as an established interior designer, just launched her first line of lamps called Live.Anywhere, which are exclusively available at David Sutherland showrooms.
Why the name Live.Anywhere? Linda wanted to create a line of lamps that could be used literally anywhere. When she realized that the technology for what she was trying to create didn’t exist though, she decided to invent it herself.
Linda Allen has re-designed the LED bulb to 7 watts, which emulates the power of a 50-watt bulb. The lamps are wireless, rechargeable and waterproof. They can be used indoors or outdoors, and might revolutionize the way we use outdoor space. They give consumers the ability to put a lamp in the middle of a room without cords to trip over, or on an outdoor deck for reading after sunset. Using this patented technology, you can — as Linda says — live anywhere.
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January 18th, 2011
Nate Williams is one of my favorite current illustrators and he has come up with an amazing list of Ideas on Generating Ideas. The piracy advertisement is a perfect example of “juxtapose/context” and it’s brilliant. Thanks Nate, I’m inspired by your interpretation and examples of design/layout principles. Highly recommend taking the time to visit Nate’s site to Read Full Article.
Idea Categories:
Once you have “defined” your subject you will now have lots of material floating around in your head to work with. By looking at various creative ideas we can classify them into “idea categories”. With your subject in mind look at each category and see if any ideas come to mind? Are there symbols I can merge to illustrate “music piracy”? Can I change a physical characteristic of a pirate to make the association of music? etc.
Merge
Word Play (Pun,Rhyme, etc)
Juxtapose / context
Physical Characteristics
Non-Physical Characteristics
Comparison / Analogy
Function
Can & Can’t / Is & Isn’t
Time / Consequence
Irony / expectations / literal meaning
Parody
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November 17th, 2010
There is a new web browser out there and I like it!
It’s called Rockmelt and its built on top of Chromium, the open source platform that Google Chrome was built on. The Rockmelt press release says it’s fast, secure, and reliable and it seems to be. I was leary at first as I’m not a fan of applications that need to have direct connection to my Facebook account information, posts, friends, etc. However, once I got past that and starting using it I must say I’m impressed.
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October 1st, 2010
Attended a fantastic lecture by Dana Arnett at University of Hartford hosted by AIGA CT. Dana was really inspiring and surprisingly relatable. He had a wonderful arsenal of quotes and actually wrote several of them down so I wouldn’t forget them. I’ve listed a few of my favorites below.
In addition to Dana’s inspiring words and down to earth humor, he mentioned a book that he highly recommends – Shop Class as Soulcraft by Matthew Crawford. This book looks amazing and I immediately felt connected to its message. Already started reading the digital version.
Amazon Link | E-Book at B&N
Quotes:
“It takes courage to grow-up and become who you really are” ~ E.E. Cummings
“We are happy when everything inside us is corresponding to something outside us” ~ W.B. Yeats
“I do what I want to do, it’s just fortunate that other people like it” ~ Georgia O’Keeffe
“Design can be a force for social good” ~ Dana Arnett
“Behavior is the new marketing” ~ Dana Arnett
“Design has no rules, question everything” ~ Dana Arnett
“Where is the knowledge we lost in information” ~ T.S. Elliott
“Imagination is more important than knowledge” ~ Albert Einstein
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August 8th, 2010
The web’s governing body has launched a new validation tool called Unicorn that checks the quality of your website’s code against multiple web standards at the same time.
You can find the new Unicorn “all-in-one validator” on the Worldwide Web Consortium (W3C) website at validator.w3.org/unicorn/.
The W3C maintains a number of free web-based tools for checking whether your web code is valid, and Unicorn makes several of these tools available under a single interface. Just plug in a URL and you can see your results for all of these tests on a single page:
- HTML/XHTML markup validator
- CSS validator
- Atom or RSS feed validator
- mobileOK, which tells you how friendly your site is to mobile visitors
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