Fred Herzog
09/01/10
This collection of older color photographs by Fred Herzog is simply stunning. Is use of light and perspective creates an incredible story within each image.
(via Yewknee)
[+] Open the Meta Bar Tag: inspiration. There are 121 posts tagged inspiration. Open the Meta Bar to choose a different tag.
Cole Rise
08/18/10
I’ve had Cole’s site sitting open on my laptop for weeks. Every so often I scroll back through it again just to take in the images. They’re deceptively simple. When you look closely, you can tell they’re highly-crafted in post. He also plays with a lot of texture. It doesn’t always work for me, but when it does, it’s powerful.
He shares a lot of b-side and in-progress photos on his blog as well, so be sure to check that out. This fifty & two thirds post, for example, has two of my new favorite photos.
I’ve been there. I know exactly what that fruitless cycle feels like. In a way, it’s nice to know I’m not alone.
Over the last couple weeks Chimero has been putting out a series of related essays. I would encourage you to read all three. I hope there’s book in there somewhere because I’m really enjoying reading his thoughts in long-form.
I told him how I was scared that the search for substance in a bottomless well might make me fickle. About how I’d go to one site to look for things, then to a second and a third and fourth, and then after the circuit was finished, I’d go back to the first site just to see if anything was new. I told him about how whole mornings disappeared that way. I pictured a guy looking for his keys so he could get his day started, but he searched by lifting up every item he owned to look under it. “Not under the rug. Not under the fridge. Not under the laundry, or the paperclip on my desk. Not under the silverware tray in the top drawer on the left in the kitchen. Maybe I should check the rug again?” It was a different, special kind of neurosis.
I told him about how I behaved on the sites. I’d move down, glancing, skimming, my scrollbar ever careening downward, endlessly scrolling. Then, picture after picture, on and on for infinity, witnessing flashes of color and form, my mind moving like a rock skipping across an edgeless ocean, never quite sure of what’s under the surface. Maybe nothing. Or water all the way down.
Frank Chimero, The Back Side of Your Gullet is Decadent and Depraved, Part 3
08/17/10
Es Bueno
Version 6.5 of Noah Stokes’ Blog
08/02/10
Noah Stokes revamped his blog, Es Bueno yesterday. It’s safe to say that the new Es Bueno es bueno (sorry, couldn’t resist).
The background photo is of Banff, Canada, taken by fellow designer-extraordinaire Phil Coffman.
Noah talks a bit more about this site in this post to Dribbble.
Great point. I also think it’s easy (and somewhat of a cop-out) to do meta stuff, but it’s not solving real problems. I love his idea of picking partners in other disciplines and helping solve their design problems.
Many designers waste an opportunity to make new, meaningful things by instead letting someone else pretend for them and making work that is overly referential
Frank Chimero, Lazy Hammer
07/31/10
Panasonic Note
07/19/10
Absolutely brilliant packaging for Pansonic’s Note headphones by Scholz & Friends in Germany.
Truth.
If you want your life to be fun as an entrepreneur, I suggest going into it with realistic expectations and to measure your success in different ways than financially. I’ve done well financially with Threadless, but if I had to give up one thing, the money would be the first thing to go. The happiness, relationships, enrichment in others’ lives, the community that now exists; the opportunities brought to artists—that’s the success that really matters for Threadless. Build your business in a way that lets you say that, and mean it too.
Jake Nickell, Advice From Founders Who Bootstrapped Their Way to Success
05/05/10
How To Design A Two-Room Apartment With Style
05/02/10
I have a small apartment (smaller than this one, believe it or not). I wish my place looked half as good as this. I’ve got some work to do.
(via Joshua Blankenship)
Inspiration is for amateurs. The rest of us just show up and get the work done. If you wait around for the clouds to part and a bolt of lighting to strike you in the brain, you’re not going to make an awful lot of work.
Chuck Close, On Inspiration
04/22/10
Animal Trivia
by Jason Sweeney
04/20/10
I’m a big @sween fan on the Twitter. And his tumblr is excellent too, overall. More specifically, though, he has been collecting some of his captioned animal illustrations under the tag, Animal Trivia. They’re excellent.
Gowalla for iPad
04/09/10
I’m a big Gowalla fan. It’s a gorgeous app and the icon (they call them items) gaming element is what hooked me.
I’m also incredibly excited to start designing apps for Apple’s new iPad. If you’re a ui/ux designer and you’re not excited, you probably haven’t seen this thing in person yet.
Keegan Jones from Gowalla posted a set of behind-the-scenes photos of their new app for the iPad. It’s beautiful—and it takes me places in my head: what will a Facebook app for this device look like? How about a recipe app, or schematics for repairing stuff? If you can dream up something for this incredible 10-inch screen, you can make it happen in a way that you couldn’t on either the desktop or a mobile phone. And that is why I’m so excited.
(feel free to stalk follow me)
The New Carbonmade(.com)
04/06/10
- Fact 1: Unicorns make it better.
- Fact 2: Dave Gorum is good at making the internet.
I did a stint at the beginning of the year helping out the amazing Carbonmade guys (and have another one coming up shortly). It was fun to watch Dave cook up their new marketing site as I was working on other stuff. If you haven’t checked it out yet, you owe it to yourself to take a look. Carbonmade is a web app that serves up online portfolios for its users, but the site is wonderfully unlike every other web app site out there, and that’s kind of the point.
As designers we could improve a lot of things by taking this idea to heart: the human experience is dominated by feeling.
We are human beings; our first responses to anything are dominated not by calculations but by feelings. What Ive and his team understand is that if you have an object in your pocket or hand for hours every day, then your relationship with it is profound, human and emotional.
Stephen Fry, The iPad Launch: Can Steve Jobs Do It Again?
04/03/10
sneak peek: fitzhugh & lyndsay
of the brooklyn home co.
03/26/10
I know I’m a fan of hyperbole on this blog, but wow. This is one of the most amazing homes I’ve seen. I’m really into the abundance of white with natural wood touches. There’s also a few repurposed or stylized boat/marine lighting fixtures that I’m really in love with.
(via @piraja)
Jónsi Live Show
by 59 Productions
03/17/10
The band Sigur Rós is known for having amazing live shows, but their lead singer, Jónsi, seems to be taking it up another notch for the tour supporting his new solo album. He’s hired a production company out of London that typically builds sets and designs lighting for theatrical products, not music live shows. What they’re working on looks amazing.
Blogoliolio
by Ben Newman
03/16/10
Illustrator Ben Newman has a fun, colorful style and he shares a lot of his work on his blog. I especially love his character development.
(via @lifterbaron)
The State of The Internet
by JESS3
03/02/10
As always, I’m a sucker for good info-graphics and good motion-graphics. Put the two together and you’ve really got me.
You have to watch this a couple times to really internalize some of the numbers. In particular, Facebook’s overall dominance is simply staggering.
(via @micah)
Poison & Wine
by The Civil Wars
02/09/10
Props to Joshua Blankenship for posting and thus reminding me of this amazing video. I don’t know when I first saw it, but I remember thinking it was one of the most captivating and haunting music videos I’d seen in a while. Unlike a lot of videos it enhanced the story of the song, Poison & Wine by The Civil Wars
The short film was produced & directed by Becky Fluke.
Joy Williams, one half of The Civil Wars duo (and I name I keep hearing more and more about) says this about the song:
“Poison & Wine is a musical snapshot about the dichotomy of love—that while it can be the thing that destroys you, it can also be the very same thing that beckons and builds you. JP [John Paul White] and I are both married have been for several years now – and we got to talking one day about what a tug and pull our individual relationships can be. The longer you know someone—and the longer you allow someone to know you—the more the light and shadows inside each person become more vivid. This song was our attempt at being as brutally honest about the dangerous and beautiful process of knowing and being known.”
(emphasis mine)
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