A pristine ‘temple of the dead’ has been uncovered in Peru
By George Dvorsky from Gizmodo.com: A massive royal Wari tomb has been unearthed in Peru — and it’s full of mummies and artifacts made of silver and gold. Remarkably, the 1,200 year-old site has never been touched by looters, which is a rarity as far as these things go. Above image: A pair of heavy gold-and-silver […]
The Lowly Luggage Tag Gets a High-Tech Makeover
By Damon Lavrinc from Wired.com: We shop for flights on our laptop, book hotels on our tablet, and have a QR code boarding pass on our smartphone. So why are we still walking up to the ticket counter to get a printed sticker when we check our bags? British Airways and Designworks asked the same question […]
Desktop Backgrounds Designed to Make You Smarter
From Mashable.com: Anyone can throw an image of the periodic table onto a desktop and call it a background, but the creations in the gallery above combine useful information with strong aesthetic appeal. 1. Periodic Table of Typefaces Study the popular, influential and notorious typefaces with this background. Image courtesy of Flickr, Jeff McNeill 2. […]
Prairie dogs’ language decoded by scientists
Human-animal translation devices may be available within 10 years, researcher says From CBC News Prairie dogs give each other detailed descriptions of humans nearby, including the colour of their clothing, their size and whether they have carried a gun. (Hyungwon Kang/Reuters) Did that prairie dog just call you fat? Quite possibly. On The Current Friday, […]
Scientists use electron ‘ink’ to write on graphene ‘paper’
By Lisa Zyga from Phys.org: Images taken by a scanning transmission electron microscope (STEM) of electron ink on graphene paper, showing the letter “N” and the symbol “Ʌ.” Credit: Wei Zhang, et al. ©2013 IOP Publishing Ltd. (Phys.org) —Nanoscale writing offers a reliable way to record information at extremely high densities, making it a promising […]
Public Art Marks Hurricane Evacuation Spots in New Orleans
By Anya Kamenetz from FastCompany.com: Storm season is coming soon, so look for the giant stick figure to get out of town. When Hurricane Katrina struck in 2005, over a quarter of New Orleans households did not have access to a vehicle. Therefore nearly 100,000 people did not evacuate the city, creating hellish scenes in the […]
Extreme Typographic Nerdery, Part 2: Making Sense of Type Classification
By Joseph Alessio from SmashingMagazine.com: In the first installment of this two-part series on type classification, we covered the basics of type classification — the various methods people have used, why they are helpful, and a brief survey of type history, classifying and identifying typefaces along the way. Unfortunately, we only got as far as […]
Extreme Typographic Nerdery, Part 1: Making Sense of Type Classification
By Joseph Alessio from SmashingMagazine.com: In my previous article on Smashing Magazine (“Understanding the Difference Between Typography and Lettering”), I wrote about how understanding type terminology can help us better appreciate the arts of typography and lettering. This article again deals with terminology, probably more specifically than most designers are used to, and the title […]
Bigger and brighter ‘super moon’ lights up night sky – in pictures
By Jonny Weeks from guardian.co.uk: We round up some of the best images of the ‘super moon’ – an annual event when the moon’s elliptical orbit brings it closer to Earth. A so-called super moon, caused when a perigee moon coincides with a full moon, is visible over Mexico City. NASA scientists say it appears about […]
Geeks vs Nerds: An Infographic
By Diego Martinez-Moncada from dailyinfographic.com: [Full article]
English is no longer the language of the web
By Ethan Zuckerman from Quartz.com: Conventional wisdom suggests that English is becoming “the world’s second language,” a lingua franca that many forward—looking organizations are adopting it as a working language. Optimists about the spread of English as a global second language suggest it will enable collaboration and ease problem solving without threatening the survival of […]
Beautiful! Historical use of pomegranate motifs in textiles
Yes, I am a big fabric geek. By Katy Werlin from TheFashionHistorian.com: Pomegranate illustration from Dr. Otto Wilhelm Thomé’s Flora von Deutschland, Österreich und der Schweiz, 1885. Image from http://www.biolib.de/. The pomegranate (Punica granatum) is a fruit-bearing shrub, originating from the Middle East and Mediterranean Basin. Throughout history, the pomegranate tree has been used for a […]
Neil Gaiman novel inspires Portsmouth street name
By Alison Flood from TheGuardian.com: “The Ocean at the End of the Lane” will become a road as well as a read, as Portsmouth City Council honor homegrown novelist Neil Gaiman. Street smarts … Neil Gaiman. Photograph: Murdo MacLeod for the Guardian From the Carnegie medal to the Hugos, Neil Gaiman has won armfuls of […]
Social Networking in the 1600s
By Tom Standage from the New York Times Sunday Review: Men enjoying a drink and a chat in a 17th-century coffeehouse. (Hulton Archive/Getty Images) LONDON — SOCIAL networks stand accused of being enemies of productivity. According to one popular (if questionable) infographic circulating online, the use of Facebook, Twitter and other such sites at work […]
“Aviatrix” – A few of the fantastic woman flyers of the early 20th century
From formerdays.com: A few of the fantastic woman flyers of the early 20th century. (For some of those I’ve missed, the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum has a great online exhibit). From various institutions, but especially the San Diego Air and Space Museum. Matilde E. Moisant, the second American woman to get a pilot’s license, 1912. Source […]
“See America with the WPA” Posters
From formerdays.com: WPA posters from the Library of Congress, this time telling us to get out and see America! Source Source Source Source [Silly note– the day after I posted this a Jeopardy question had a picture of this fountain and you had to identify the city! You see, this is good for […]
Vintage Photobooth Animations
From The1955Hudson.com: These photobooth animations are the work of Nicholas Osborn of Square America. He describes them as: “A jittery, flickering, Frankensteinian attempt to bring old photos back to life.” [Full article]
What iOS 7 Should Look Like
Sigh. Apple’s garish new iOS 7 is deservedly getting terrible reviews all over designer-dom. Here’s one, with suggested redesigns from TristanEdwards.com: When Apple recently showed how they had redesigned iOS, I was shocked like many other UI designers. Not because it was “flat” (we all expected it to lose some of its skeumorphic elements) but […]
Buildings Based On Human Bone Structure Could Be the Future of Cities
Kelsey Campbell-Dollaghan from Gizmodo.com: Biomimicry borrows design solutions from the embedded intelligence within animals’ bodies—chiefly from other species. But occasionally, it also borrows from within the human body. For example, a new study from MIT suggests that buildings of the future could be built with super-strong materials based on the structure of human bones. In […]
A Chocolate Maker’s Big Innovation
By Corby Kummer from MITTechnologyReview: You may have seen little squares of Tcho chocolate in their brightly colored wrappers decorated with futuristic parabolas of gold and silver. They’re easily found: Starbucks has sold them; Whole Foods sells them now. Those usually aren’t the stores you visit to track down handcrafted chocolate from bean-to-bar makers, the new […]
Scientist Drinks Billion-Year-Old Water Just to See What It’s Like
By Ashley Feinberg from Gizmodo.com: This map, from the United States Geological Survey, shows the age of bedrock in different regions of North America. Scientists found ancient water in bedrock north of Lake Superior. This region, colored red, was formed more than 2.5 billion years ago. So remember about a month ago when scientists in […]
World’s Smallest Museum Finds the Wonder in Everyday Objects
By Lisa Hix from CollectorsWeekly.com: Tucked away in a lower Manhattan back alley, the freight-elevator-sized, generically named Museum is one of New York City’s newest curiosities. While it’s only open 16 hours a week, during the day on Saturdays and Sundays, the museum’s contents are viewable 24/7, lit and sealed by glass doors. Passers-by are […]
“Make JPEG Droplet” Is the Fastest Way to Convert Files to JPEGs
By Shep McAllister from Lifehacker.com: OS X: If you want to share a photo with a friend, but it’s in a large file size format, it makes sense to convert it to a JPEG before sending it along. If you don’t want to take the time to open up an image editor to convert it […]
Beautiful, functional prosthetic limbs add custom touch to amputees’ lives
These beautiful, custom prosthetics are made by Sophie de Oliveira Barata in Harlesden, UK in the Alternative Limb Project. Options are described as “Realistic, Surreal and Unreal.” With extensive design input from the amputee, Sophie can help him or her move from feeling that a prosthetic is a necessary evil to being proud of the […]
Cannes Lions: 60 Years of Ad Innovation
By Max Knoblauch from Mashable.com: The Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity — the world’s foremost brand communications conference, located in the French Riviera — celebrates its 60th anniversary this year. This infographic by SapientNitro explores the festival’s history, highlighting its growth through the decades and this year’s notable speakers. The festival, beginning Saturday, welcomes […]
‘Jony Ive Redesigns Things’ Tumblr Pokes Fun At Apple’s iOS 7
By Allison Reiber from Mashable.com. Tumblr article here: Jony Ive redesigns his passport photo. Open Mashable.com Gallery; Tumblr article here. Apple’s colorful new iOS 7 redesign has received its fair share of criticism — but none so creative as that from a Tumblr called “Jony Ive Redesigns Things.” The blog began after Sasha Agapov, a […]
10 of History’s Most Beautiful Typewriters
By Adrian Covert from Gizmodo.com — check the Comments for more pictures of typewriters: Typewriters are intricate machines—complex little boxes that require an abundance of ingenuity to produce. They are often beautiful, and they occasionally find wildly imaginative ways to conduct the delicate dance between the hammers and the keys. So much of the way we […]
7 Productivity-Boosting Tools to Fight Procrastination
By Sarah Ang from Mashable.com: You’re doing it again — spending too much valuable time on Twitter and Facebook. So we’ve narrowed down seven free and convenient browser plugins and extensions to help you stop procrastinating — now. Ed.: I’ve picked out a sound-masker, a page-blocker, and of course positive reinforcement with kittens. Other tools have […]
Quantum Invisibility Cloak Hides Objects from Reality
By The Physics arXiv Blog from MITTechnologyReview.com: Physicists have worked out how to cloak a region of space from the quantum world, thereby shielding it from reality itself. Invisibility cloaks are all the rage these days. Over the last few years, this blog has followed various attempts to develop invisibility cloaks for earthquakes, acoustics and […]
A Complete Lack of Privacy: Yves Behar’s New Office Design
By Joseph Flaherty from Wired.com: OK, OK, the actual title of the article is “An Office Landscape Designed to Kill Boring Meetings.” But to me the most striking feature of Béhar’s office design is its complete lack of privacy. The article’s one nod to this: “… in an age of noise canceling headphones, small groups […]
Thickness of the Ice Sheets 21,000 Years Ago Compared to Modern Skylines
From the brilliant comic xkcd: Data adapted from “The Laurentide and Innuitian ice sheets during the Last Glacial Maximum” by A.S. Dyke et. al., which was way better than the sequels “The Laurentide and Innuitian ice sheets during the Last Glacial Maximum: The Meltdown” and “The Laurentide and Innuitian ice sheets during the Last Glacial […]
Travel Posters Inspired by the Silver Screen
By Alex Santoso from Neatorama.com: Let’s go on a vacation! South Africa design studio MUTI collaborated with ad agency Foxp2 to create these retrotastic posters featuring places from King Kong, The Shining, Avatar, and Lord of the Rings for South Africa’s Ster-Kinekor theaters. Links: MUTI’s Behance page
Beautiful Photographs of Trash, Inspired by Botanical Drawings
By Margaret Rhodes from FastCompany.com. Visit BarryRosenthal.com for botanical photos and artist portraits. Barry Rosenthal’s series of jewel-toned garbage collections sheds new light on litter. Before photography and the Internet, developments in botany depended heavily on artists, rather than on foragers and scientists. Painters would create painstakingly technical illustrations of flora and fauna found in the wild, […]
10 Things Designers Need to Know About iOS7
Very helpful article for interface designers from creativebloq.com: Apple has revealed a radical new vision for iOS – but what does this mean for designers? Sam Hampton-Smith delves into the official guidelines to find out… Apple has long been criticised for the slightly haphazard approach it’s taken to the user interface design of its apps, […]
See an Autopsy of the Original Mac and Other Iconic Gadgets
By Joseph Flaherty from Wired.com: Bicycle — Component count: 893 Photo credit: ©2013 Todd McLellan. Photo reproduced with the permission of Thames & Hudson. In the new book Things Come Apart, Canadian photographer Todd McLellan painstakingly disassembles 50 everyday objects, including a tiny Swiss Army knife and a single engine aircraft, and carefully photographs the […]
Found at Auction: The Unseen Photographs of a Legend that Never Was
From MessyNessyChic.com: Picture this: quite possibly the most important street photographer of the 20th century was a 1950s children’s nanny who kept herself to herself and never showed a single one of her photographs to anyone. Decades later in 2007, a Chicago real estate agent and historical hobbyist, John Maloof purchased a box of never-seen, never-developed […]
Pop Culture Gargoyles Hidden in Gothic Architecture
By Laetitia Barbier from AtlasObscura.com: Fly with a spray can, a gargoyle sculpted by Walter S. Arnold for the Washington National Cathedral. (photograph by Walter S. Arnold, via Stone Ideas) Fascinating ghouls of another era, gargoyles emerged around the 13th century in European architecture with a vast array of form and function. At first, they were designed as an […]
Beloved ISS Commander Chris Hadfield Is Retiring
By Robert T. Gonzalez from io9.com: So long, Commander Hadfield – and thanks for all the awesome! Tonight at 7:08 ET, Commander Chris Hadfield – one of the most charismatic Commanders in the history of the International Space Station – will return … Read… Chris Hadfield – Canadian astronaut (the first to ever serve as […]
Unsuspecting People Get a Live Photoshopped Surprise
By Charlie White from Mashable.com: Take a look at the priceless reactions of these people who are secretly photographed while waiting for a bus, and then Photoshopped into amusing positions and implied relationships. It’s part of a “street retouch” stunt by Adobe, featuring quick-draw Photoshop master Erik Johansson. We especially liked the way people’s “street […]
Essential Guide to Living Lovecraft: The Real World Locations Behind the Horror
By Eric Grundhauser from AtlasObscura.com: H.P. Lovecraft: Author, Dark Dreamer Down a dark alley, at the corner of your eye something flickers, probably a trick of the waning light, or a stranger up to some banal task. But what hubris leads you to believe that you can understand what happens in and among these haunted […]
Paralyzed man uses brain-powered robot arm to touch
By Lauran Neergard from Timothy Betler / AP PITTSBURGH — Giving a high-five. Rubbing his girlfriend’s hand. Such ordinary acts — but a milestone for a paralyzed man. True, a robotic arm parked next to his wheelchair did the touching, painstakingly, palm to palm. But Tim Hemmes made that arm move just by thinking about it. […]
Type-o-philes Scour NYC for Urban Signage Project
By Jakob Schiller from Wired.com: [Ed. Entertainingly, this article was originally titled “Type-o-PATHS Scour NYC for Urban Signage Project.”] New York City is such a sensory overload, it’s easy to miss the details — like the graphical symphony of typography that’s playing under your visual field. Nyctype.com aims to bring that symphony to the surface […]
Mr. Bunny Goes to Work
Chalk street art by prolific artist David Zinn: Hare: the Happy Epilogue Friends + cake = jazz-handed happiness. “Hear me! I speak for the Goaterbil!”
Broidery on a medieval page
Erik Kwakkel is a medieval book historian at Leiden University, The Netherlands. He says, “I post images of medieval books and share with you what’s special about them.” His blog inspired an earlier post of mine, Cats Haven’t Changed Much,” about 15th-century cats walking with inky paws across (or urinating on) a manuscript. Holes in […]
Amazon launches Storyteller to turn scripts into storyboards — automagically
By John Koetsier from VentureBeat.com: Upload your script, choose some backgrounds, and magically created a professional-looking storyboard of your movie. Or the graphic novel version of your text-based anything. Amazon Studios released Storyteller today to allow writers and filmmakers to quickly, easily — and cheaply — storyboard their scripts. I’ve tried it, and while the […]
I’m Sorry That I Hit You in the Face With an Encyclopedia
Brilliant and hilarious artwork from British artist David Fullarton. His solo show, I Can’t Apologise Enough, is on until June 9, 2013 at The Compound Gallery in Oakland, CA (see below). . Apology 40 Of most immediate importance is the fact that I have a solo exhibition of all of my Apology Drawings on right […]
Free Font Friday!
OSWALD is a new free font from fontsquirrel.com, available as an OTF download. It was designed by excellent and prolific typographer Vernon Adams (other fontsquirrel fonts, newtypography.co.uk blog). Oswald is a strong condensed sans serif with Light, Regular and Bold weights as well as an all-caps Stencil style. It looks good in headlines and in […]
Tiny Festive Party Hats Made of Yarn For Cats, Dogs, and Guinea Pigs
I try very hard not to post about cats, but this is too good to pass up. By Rusty Blazenhoff from LaughingSquid.com: South Carolina-based Meredith Yarborough crochets tiny but very festive party hats for cats, dogs, and guinea pigs. They are all available to purchase at her Etsy shop iheartneedlework.