Kinect Hack – Hologram

Just like Star Wars! I would totally name my Kinect R2D2… All I need is Han Solo…

The Secret of the Kells

This movie is probably one of my favorites of all time. The animation and art direction is beautiful, glowing, and ethereal. I can’t say enough about it! I feel I have an emotional connection to this film, for I grew up Catholic and my father would produce celtic knot-work paintings — it really summed up my childhood for me. Even if you are a stranger to the Celtic/Christian philosophy, this movie is a feast for your eyes.

Ion Advent Calendar

I visited the studio that I interned at over the summer (Ion Branding + Design) to hand out Christmas cards and I got this in return!

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It’s an advent calendar created by the studio and I absolutely love it. The use of type as confetti is genius!

 

Old Faithful Shop

I finally was able to visit the Old Faithful Shop in Gastown on Friday and I must say, everyone should visit! It’s an amazing store, has a great atmosphere and very nice things in stock. You can tell that all the merchandise is selected with care.

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Mouse is mightier than the sword

I found this on Osocio and had to post:

So clever and well executed. I feel that it’s more powerful with no type — just a great concept.

Ira Glass on Narratives

I love you Ira!

Fast Motion Slow

The Art of Distinction in Web Design

I really enjoyed this article on designing distinctive websites.

“Distractions in a design lead to a breakdown in communication and can confuse users, paralyzing their ability to quickly determine what to focus on or where to go next.

Distinctive design alleviates this by putting forward a few fundamental principles which appeal to the user’s needs. Effectively at their core, it underlines the ideal that highlighting content based on importance rather than its position is beneficial and worthwhile.

What is distinctive design? It’s a simple goal to make important information visible.

Principles of distinctive design include:

• Not giving prominence to objects unless it has a real need to attract attention
• Limiting the importance you give to all content within the page to avoid diluting the strength of the important content
• Deemphasizing less important content
• Taking the time to help guide the user’s eyes through the page to ensure content is read in the right order
• Avoiding too much information on the page to reduce the noise
• Ensuring that what you display fits the ideas you wish to convey”

Mostardesign Studio

Fontshop recently added Mostardesign studio to their roster of type designers. I love their portfolio, the work is displayed perfectly. Their view on typography is amazing, “Typography is our favorite playground”. Mostardesign Studio is a French based studio, established in 2004 by Olivier Gourvat.