31 May 2007

Microsoft Surface


I'm not a Microsoft fan at all, but this beats the buzz...

25 May 2007

UrbanMag

Processing


And Perlin noise ...



perlinnoisefieldflow from lennyjpg on Vimeo

Starring Shapish




My dear friend is at the hospital for a few days, but don't be worry he'll be as good as new when he's back. In the mean while people are diggin' up his work at the brand new and awesome slick re-launched portfolio-site (be sure to check his Monsters of Serendip, if you are brave enough), and also CNBE seems to have indexed him, nice nice nice!

24 May 2007

OFFF interview

The OFFF-posts i wrote during the OFFF-festival will soon be online and published, they're awaiting some moderation for the moment. Anyway some girl interviewed me during the fest.. Yihaaa
→ It's over at TAGR.TV

CNBE - Creative Network Belgium


Surely a good idea, also the way this blog is displaying and archiving rows of freelance designers in Belgium will surely awake the industry soon. (yet this blog, smells like an agency urging for freelancers though...)
Creative Network Belgium

HelloColor meets ShinyBinary

Two totally awesome portfolios, you must go dig 'm. Have fun!

Art & design by ShinyBinary


Art & design by HelloColor

23 May 2007

Ad!dict # 27 on NanoTechnology


The new Ad!dict issue topics NanoTechnology, Me and Shapish starring a philosophical contribution on NanoTech and promoting the Outlandish website. Go buy it at Ad!dict or the better book/magazineStores.

View the Ad!dict # 27 NanoTechnology - inside presentation

Adobe Creative Suite 3



...has finally arrived at my desk, yeah

19 May 2007

VitaminWater


Very very awesome motion-product-presentation-website.
Check http://www.vitaminwater.com/

TYPO Berlin 12 - Gary Hustwit

TYPO BERLIN 2007 @BCC, AlexanderPlatz

12. Gary Hustwit: The making of the film Helvetica
Gary Hustwit is a producer and director. He has produced five feature documentaries, including ‘I Am Trying To Break Your Heart’, the award-winning film about the band Wilco; ‘Moog’, the documentary about electronic music pioneer Robert Moog; and ‘Drive Well, Sleep Carefully’, a tour film about the band Death Cab for Cutie. Helvetica is Hustwit's directorial debut. Hustwit worked with punk label SST Records in the late-1980’s, ran the independent book publishing house Incommunicado Press during the 1990’s, was Vice President of the media website Salon.com in 2000, and started the indie DVD label Plexifilm in 2001.
Film director Gary Hustwit reports in detail on the making of the Helvetica movie.

TYPO Berlin 11 - Uwe Flade

TYPO BERLIN 2007 @BCC, AlexanderPlatz

11. Uwe Flade
After completing a degree in film studies, Uwe Flade worked as an assistant director on movies, music videos and TV shows and as a TV journalist and fiction programme buyer for the TV station VOX. He then set up his own production company in Cologne. A friend asked him to create a music video for his band… the rest is history. Flade now works as a freelance director.
Uwe Flade will present his work as the director of award-winning music videos for Depeche Mode, Sportfreunde Stiller, Rammstein, Franz Ferdinand and many more.
A fairly variated presentation showing the audience both existing workflow and new ideas. Just too bad that such a young guy is not able to present himself to an international audience, speaking German on an international forum or conference is pretty lame in my opinion.

18 May 2007

TYPO Berlin 10 - Precious

TYPO BERLIN 2007 @BCC, AlexanderPlatz

10. Precious: Music interfaces
After a number of years with several different agencies, Christophe Stoll and Johannes Schardt set up the design studio ‘precious’ in 2005. The core team was joined in 2006 by Philipp Granzin from Berlin. In addition to their own design projects, precious is currently carrying out assignments for the band Tocotronic and the music software company Native Instruments. Also located in the vicinity of precious are the jointly-run record label ‘2nd rec’ and the audio-visual project Nitrada. Furthermore, Christophe Stoll teaches interface design at the Technische Kunsthochschule Berlin.
The Hamburg-based design studio ‘precious’ will present their work on interface designs for music software, which they produce for Native Instruments, a company based in Berlin, and share their thoughts and ideas surrounding the interface between visual design and music.
Check Type-Invaders

Discovery

Recently discovered a real cool design-news-portal » Now go and create
NowGoCreate was originally founded in March of 2002. The purpose of the website is to create, inform, and spread information regarding Design and the Arts.
 The information is divided into three sections: News, Discussion, and Showcases. Each of which are user-driven. The content is dynamically updated with the input of the members.
 The News is displayed on the index page, mainly as referrals of interesting websites for visitors. The Discussions and Showcases are shown on the Activity page in order of the last time they changed, descending. Showcases are to be used primarily for posting and receiving feedback on work. And Discussion-- this is the section for general conversations or debates.
 If you're interested in joining the community, there is a form in the Apply/Suggest section. As long as your intent is to benefit the community you will have no trouble being approved for membership. If you would rather not join the community, but would like to have your work posted in the News-- use the Suggestion form on that same page.

TYPO Berlin 09 - Kim Hiorthoy

TYPO BERLIN 2007 @BCC, AlexanderPlatz

9. Kim Hiorthøy: Puttin' on blobs
Kim Hiorthøy, born 1973 in Trondheim/Norway, studied at Trondheim Art Academy 1991–96, and at School of Visual Art, New York, 1994-–95 and The Royal Danish Academy of Art, Copenhagen, 1999–2000. He is a freelance graphic designer since 1993. He works a lot in the field of music and cover design. He is a musican also. Currently he lives and works in Berlin.
On making record sleeves that have possibly no relation to the music, or to the musician, or to anyone else. And why. Talking on record lseeves and nothing but record sleeves, finding the subject rather uncomfortable but yet.. He doesn't see himself as a graphic designer because they are supposed to solve problems.. Kim, as from his words, only makes problems. Working mostly from his undrbelly, not often listening to the music even! He mostly enjoys making recordsleeves and he sees it as not a very important job, there are so many records. He finds it important taht the sleeve is nice, and often buys records on base of their design. He didn't start out to be a designer and didn't study on it at all. As a designer he's taking the freedom with both hands letting the musicians no choice with the designs he makes for the covers. He never thinking of strategy or communicational problemsolving, the package-design is just what it is, the impression of the moment or from what he has learned earlier. Working for SmallTownSuperSound label.

TYPO Berlin 08 - Mario Lombardo

TYPO BERLIN 2007 @BCC, AlexanderPlatz

8. Mario Lombardo: The Wow Signal and The Emotional Effect
From 2001 until the end of 2006, Mario Lombardo was Art Director for the music magazine SPEX. In addition, he has been a member of the jury for various design and photography awards and has taught typography, editorial and music design at several different art and design schools. Since 1995, he has been looking after a number of music and fashion labels and magazines, such as Dummy and Liebling. Over recent years he has received over 50 national and international design awards. In 2004 he set up his own design studio in Cologne.
The “visual tree house” between selling and emotion. Memetics and memory. Pop and culture. Haves and wants. Shoulds and coulds. Mario Lombardo talks about his latest years in popular culture.


A fairly variated approach showing more than just the work, giving a bit of background to the lift the stiry onto a different level. showing a lot of SPEX issues, but also showing overall work, like Background records (especially Andy Vaz) and others (check site) Mario shows no lack of creativity and focusses very often on alternative and handmade coverlayout and designs, oftenly working analog, pasting and scanning in a rather collage-style, but none-the-less very playfull.

I like, typo interlude


http://www.detroit.aiga.org/events/308/


http://www.fotolog.com/formula/


http://www.savasozay.com/

TYPO Berlin 07 - BastardProject

TYPO BERLIN 2007 @BCC, AlexanderPlatz

7. Bastard-Project
I saw these guys last conference (Colophon2007) in Luxembourg and discovered their excistance last TypoBerlin. On the way here they took lots of pictures and then working on and with them. an important aspect of their work is having fun... off course.
Showing all their roadtrip-photos and reading a poem ;) The photo-show lasted way too long, I had the impression they didn't have a lot of content to contribute (but who am I to judge right).

On the way to Berlin a road-trip to typo something accidental coming from our hearts...

The BASTARD-Project is a teamwork venture involving illustrator Andre Rösler, photographer Christian Ernst and graphic designers Ulrich Weiß and Lars Harmsen.

Christian Ernst
Freelance photographer, born in 1965, spent many years assisting diverse photographers (including Conny Winter), then set up independently in 1996. Since then his clients have included SAP, Accenture, the parliament of North-Rhine Westphalia, Stuttgart State Ballet, DaimlerCrysler, Prof. M. Lüpertz. Lives and works in Karlsruhe, Munich, Berlin and Hamburg.

Lars Harmsen
Founder and managing director of the design studio Magma, Büro für Gestaltung. Has lived since the age of twelve in Karlsruhe, prior to that he lived in Geneva and Chicago.
Training and higher education in Offenburg, Freiburg, Basle, Saarbrücken and Boston.

Andre Rösler
Graduated in design, worked as research assistant at the Hochschule für Gestaltung in Pforzheim. Since 1997 has worked as a freelance illustrator for publishing houses and agencies. Since 1999 he has also been in charge of cartoon animation and direction for a children's magazine programme for Bayerischer Rundfunk. Awarded the ADC Silver Prize in 2005.

Ulrich Weiß
After studying design at the Fachhochschule für Gestaltung in Pforzheim, he was appointed art director with J·G & Partner in Baden-Baden. His clients there included the Deutsche Welle broadcasting station, Baden-Baden municipal theatre and the Südwestfunk broadcasting station. Today he is managing director of the design studio Magma, Büro für Gestaltung.

A ‘Bastard’ project, involving the author Sudabeh Mohafez, the photographer Christian Ernst, the illustrator André Rösler, the graphic designer Lars Harmsen and the DJ Frank Wiedemann / Âme (Sonar Kollektiv). Since February 2007, the authors of the book Bastard: Choose my Identity have been on tour, on and off, this time in a caravan which has been converted into an art gallery. On their way to the TYPO Berlin, they have captured images of people and places on the various stops along their journey, which are presented in an ‘Instant Gallery’. The caravan will be on location at the TYPO Berlin.

TYPO Berlin Night - Helvetica Film


The first screening in Germany of the movie Helvetica will take place as the concluding highlight of this year’s TYPO Berlin. With this we celebrate the 50th anniversary of a typeface that has become a worldwide success.

About the Film
Helvetica is a feature-length independent film about typography, graphic design and global visual culture. It looks at the proliferation of one typeface (which will celebrate its 50th birthday in 2007) as part of a larger conversation about the way type affects our lives. The film is an exploration of urban spaces in major cities and the type that inhabits them, and a fluid discussion with renowned designers about their work, the creative process, and the choices and aesthetics behind their use of type.

Helvetica encompasses the worlds of design, advertising, psychology, and communication, and invites us to take a second look at the thousands of words we see every day.


About the Typeface
Helvetica was developed by Max Miedinger with Eduard Hoffmann in 1957 for the Haas Type Foundry in Münchenstein, Switzerland. In the late 1950s, the European design world saw a revival of older sans-serif typefaces such as the German face Akzidenz Grotesk. Haas' director Hoffmann commissioned Miedinger, a former employee and freelance designer, to draw an updated sans-serif typeface to add to their line. The result was called Neue Haas Grotesk, but its name was later changed to Helvetica, derived from Helvetia, the Latin name for Switzerland, when Haas' German parent companies Stempel and Linotype began marketing the font internationally in 1961.

TYPO Berlin 06 - Hans Reichel

TYPO BERLIN 2007 @BCC, AlexanderPlatz

6. HANS REICHEL
Hans Reichel, born in 1949, caused a stir in the early 70s with his unusual self-made guitars. Since then he has given numerous concerts in Europe, the US, Canada and Japan and has released over 30 LPs/CDs. He belongs to the guild of improvisational musicians. In about 1985, he invented the legendary daxophone, a string- and voice instrument that operates via thin wooden blades. He designed his first typeface (Barmeno) in 1983. Since 1995 design of the font families FF Dax, FF Schmalhans, FF Sari und FF Daxline.

This guy made a so called daxophone, it's a weird kind of striking-instrument making german word-sounds. He created also a whole set of instruments that produce different sounds or better word-expressions. He's also known for the making of his weird guitars back in the seventies. Mixed announcements, revelations, visual and audio tasters, manifestos, error messages on the subject: What has ‘a’ got to do with ‘ö’?, plus: the daxophon in the age of the flatrate, plus: music for the audio play The Gappers of Frip.

Showing us a very playfull sound and animation combi, funny and joyfull illustraing his musicstudio in a very humorous way. This guy lived and worked in the east and documented a series of Sumo-wrestling events and additiionally creating music for it.

Re-designing the FF Daxline font he made a cute animation monitoring the changes he made and applying some music to the movement. He has a cd available in europe called Laurum Lurum. He used to take pictures from the stage, capturing he's tired or amused audience, showing this series.

17 May 2007

TYPO Berlin 05 - Piet Schreuders

TYPO BERLIN 2007 @BCC, AlexanderPlatz

5. Piet Schreuders
An exploration of my graphic design work for music projects of the last 20 years, focusing on: album sleeves and cd booklets for the Dutch BASTA label, especially their series of "essential reissues"; music research for special projects such as The Beau Hunks, electronic musis of Raymond Scott, the film background music of Leroy Shield, the Boulevard of Broken Dreams orchestra, and early Dutch electronic music by Tom Dissevelt, Henk Badings and Dick Raaijmakers. Illustrated with numerous images and sound examples, as well as film clips.
Worked on a large scale project involving music, Boulevard of Broken dreams. This arroused his interest in music-graphics and filmmusic. especially lifted when discovering the Roger D. Kinkel music encyclopedia. Later-on he tracked and tried to capture different music of films and especially comedianshows like Laurel and Hardy. Analysing lots and lots of musical data, carnoise, talk, dialog, music, and checked the usable pieces of the music and recombining them.
Ronnie Hazlehurst, doing tv-tunes (a laurel-hardy fan)... The music of Leroy Shield... and some more but it really couldn't catch my interest, sorry

TYPO Berlin 04 - Adobe Systems

TYPO BERLIN 2007 @BCC, AlexanderPlatz

4. Adobe Systems - creative space
A product presentation on the new CS3. the most important update is the change in industry that integrates more and more web-applications. Print and web are more and more merging, and also the more combined work with motion-work. Video, work and web, with quicker production-timetables. And of course the integration of former Macromedia contributes a great deal to this change. Consumerism is changing at the base of the profession, users are becoming designers and producers too. and therefor Adobe stears there products to give you a lead to your competitors.

Over more then 12 products are launched, combined in different, in several packages. All products are differently combined. The design suit, Premium (probably most appealing), Standard (mostly for the printing industry) Everyone is crossing borders and working cross-borders. There is a webStandard package for developers. There's a new box for video-specialists, animation, online and post-production with the possibilty to create full dvd-packages. And then there's a full-package.

The biggest problem nowadays is time, so everything is steared to less time-consuming products. The Bridge is more reworked for better integration and improved mostly the previewing-function, and of course some extra features. drag and drop from Bridge is easier and also works with for example the Dreamweaver and save for web from within the Dreamweaver or just using "copy merged". And of course this doesn't only applies to 1 but all softwares.

Most important change of all softwares is the change of the Flash-interface. And also the obligated saving of different layers is optimised by having the easy selection box per layer combined with editing options. No more import to stage or library, just drag'n'drop from the Bridge. Serving highly the webmarket but also integrating a special software for mobilephone/devices, new product called the device-center, with an integrated device-output preview on several mobiledisplays without having to buy all these devices which is off course impossible. Also comparing different devices is possible, very advanced. Making it also easy to switch existing flash-animations to device-output, being able to preload everything and check use the configuration of the interface and the buttons, special feature on this topic is the usage of lights to check the output in dark or brightlight (off course simulated).
Illustrator using colorguides now, and integrating a colordisk (chromatic circle) all downloadabe at ColorLabs (there's a widget for using these colorschemes) Kuler offers you the possibililty to download .aes files which are easily opened in all Adobe softwares as colorswatches. More and better adjusted colorschemes in stead of having to pick every color separatly. And also a complementary colorscheme user is now active.
Photoshop selection-tools are more advanced and better reworked (off course enormously timesaving in stead of consuming) also there's a new selection-dialog, temporary masks, an extended selection-preview-palette, and some others like undo-able filters called smart-filters (non-destructive filters) There's an auto-align an algoritm for aligning different layers on backgrounds, also making panoramic imagery is made easy now. And for contrasting colors there's a new filter, which easily applies the some color of all pasted photos. An extra functionallity is working with 3D-models keeping the possibilty of moving the model around like you can in the 3D programs, being also able to past patters and labels onto it! solving additionally the limitations for the functionality of angles at Vanishing Point.

Bridge is now the main 'platform' to switch between all different files-programs-applications-objects-designs well you can sort it ;)

TYPO Berlin 03 - Clive Bruton

TYPO BERLIN 2007 @BCC, AlexanderPlatz

3. Clive Bruton (Pixel picking and logo popping)
Celibrating Univers' 50th birthday, he considers it the most influencial type of the twentiest century and also of much higher quality then Helvetica for example. Always keep your old work, he worked a lot for webprojects (doing mostly digitalisation of existing logo's for Lloyds TSB, BT, handsetting every pixel carefully crafted). Using 9/9 pixelboxes making patterns with it, a project on flags, almost all European flags can be made with 9/9 (except for the British one) Important line throughout his work is the resemblance of patterns and detail, and focussing mostly on logo-design.

Discussing the NIKE logo, it influenced a whole logo-design generation; good or bad all using and experimenting with the famous/notorious SWOOSH (the swoosh jazzes it all up.)
The APPLE logo, definatly the flat logo is much better then the old 3D logo. Good but there are many designers imitating still the 3D version of the logo, like for example the new BTlogo which they tried to 3D in sense of illustrating an 'open world' but there's a problem » a logo should be plain clear and simple, if it's too complex then all prints and applications (f.e. smaller sizes) will be floaded. Same thing with the new KPN-logo, looking like a bunch of jellyfish blobs instead of nice perspective

Own work;
Fontzone-logo » simple, possibility to change colors often, always being able to recognize the basic elements, and last but not least it has to stand out and pop-up out of a pile of content even when set in very small. The goal being able to use it the size of the type, let's say let it work at the size of 10px, that's what a good logo is.
Approving the new CS3 logo's as very good, practical and usefull, in contrary of the old CS2 logo's whdere the connection was totally gone, like "why does a flower point to Illustrator, and the butterfly to InDesign) Now it is straight up, clear it says what it is Ai = Adobe Illustrator.

Ps; there's a Video-channel reporting the most remarkable moments of the conference at http://www.typovideo.de

TYPO Berlin 02 - Richard Kegler

TYPO BERLIN 2007 @BCC, AlexanderPlatz

2. Richard Kegler
A fairly poor presentation, talking about his typeFoundry/recordLabel company, but also the work wasn't really my cup of tea, anyway go check the website or check others

TYPO Berlin 01 - Steve Heller

TYPO BERLIN 2007 @BCC, AlexanderPlatz

1. Steve Heller on Alex Steinweiss (the father of record cover design)
» Lucian Bernhard was his inspiration , master of the advertising poster: leaving only the essence, no ambiguity only allmost litteral. Born in Brooklyn, Polish parents (Greenhorsn = immigrants without money) Steinweiss is white stone, went to Abraham Lincoln Highschool, they had the most important graphic design program in those days. He was a good painter and illustrator. European avant-garde and design, when it was all down to reduction. Assistant of Joseph Binder, working and introducing for Columbian records (CBS bought it later on) Point of purchase displays was what recordsleaves were. His first designed cover sold the product for a 800% more! Lateron got more interested and influenced by Art Deco. Working with the importance of evocing the music in the output of the image. When it happened it was revolutionary in America, looking at "de Stijl" (1937) Modernism was on a rise, Paul Rand for example incorporated new lessons of the Bauhaus and worked with the same revolutionary work of Steinweiss. Lateron influenced by the use of 2D forms integrated into the design. Constructivism, Art Deco and photography, experimenting with typography from the past...integrating it into these modern designs. (the germans invented branding with Peter Behrens) Steinweiss is always looking for the aura of the music.

He designed one of the first script-type design, making it for Photolettering » Steinweiss sprawl. He was a so called commercial artist. he found that the Bauhaus was ultimately to restrictive for him. His illustrations resemble very timeless, a lot of so called modern illustrators still bring the same kind of work. He was a remarkable craftsman, always renewing, but not always making the best choices. Let other people decide which of your work should be used... :) Sketching mostly everything at first and then tran slating it with overlayers (very oldskool) precision setting all marks collors and pieces into the design.

Left Colombia in 1942 as an Art director, going into the Navy, later-on being introduced to the LP, playing 22minutes instead of the older, 3 to 4 minutes before the click. Steinweiss had to make a new package, his brother in law was a printer, andfor the first time they had to be printing on the package in stead of on a different page that could just be applied or sticked on.

Abstract expressionism, had an enormous impact on the new American artists and designers, and even on typography. Steinweis would sitl combine it with decorative influences he picked up earlier.

After working on a number of recordsleaves, he got to packaging and later-on working for the filmindustry. (James Flora should be checked in this context as well) - working with very contemporarian colors and forms) 1963 Steinweiss decided to leave the music-industry and moved to Florida, and Neill Fagida took his place. Revolver was the album that changed everything, even more then SgtPeper. Steinweiss layed the foundation for LP-cover design as an artform and it peaked somewhere in the '80s.

12 May 2007

OFFF 15 - James Victore


12 may 2007 at 19:00 — Roots room, CCCB - BCN

15. JAMES VICTORE

Starting of handing out stickers that read "advertisers think you're stupid". Then talking mostly on what he is known for, posterdesign and soem of his projects working on surfboards. Furthermore a very funny but yet good speaker, teaching graphic design next to his work as a designer.
James Victore Inc is an independent design studio hell-bent on world domination. We strive to make work that is sexy, strong and memorable.
James Victore is the most furious designer of his generation; his work is extremely crude and direct, and he never has problems to raise uncomfortable questions. He likes provocation enough to often declare that graphic design is not too interesting, although his work is one of the best arguments against this. In his covers, illustrations and posters, Victore make a direct call for us to take a position and do something for the most basic political and social conflicts. His presence is an appeal to the power of visual communication, and one ofthe greatest surprises of OFFF07.

OFFF 14 - UniversalEverything


12 may 2007 at 18:00 — Roots room, CCCB - BCN

14. UNIVERSAL EVERYTHING

Math Pyke, former Designers Republic, working now from his studio in the backyard. Working for MTV, Nike, Nokia, Audi. Cooperating a lot with Robert Hodgin & Karsten Schmidt (processing) for motion and installationprojects. Next thing up is an interactive installation for a Nokia Flagshipstore, wanting to make the store react or respond to messages send to it when it's closed overnight. Cool! The processing opens a lot of doors other programs cannot handle because of the intens rendering issues. They worked a real cool ad for Audi working the processing, a motion-post production company bailed out for, check it
There's also Advanced beauty == a laboratory for audio-visual research.

OFFF 13 - MotionGraphicsPanel


12 may 2007 at 16:00 — Roots room, CCCB - BCN

13. MOTIONOGRAPHER

A curatorial space... If its' not online it's hard to get inspired by. There's a whole lot on motiongraphics, at mographwiki. There are a lot interviews and links at motionographer, so do go check it out. The first incarnation of motionographer was Tween, by Justin Cone. Motionographer doesn't make motiongraphics but it publishes, only, it's a platform. 20 to 30K visits a day! (rss feeds axcluded) the curatorial role is where the core of motionographer is. But most important is; what is motiongraphics? A mixture of animation, design and visual effects. An important trend is that print is slowly overtaken by motiongraphics. Time sugggests narrative, narrative suggests persuasive.. and it is the most relevant medium at the moment. Justin did some motiongraphics for Creative Commons » you're building the past right now. He sees it as visuals essays, with the goal of letting people know what it is and raise the interest to go and check it out, there's a lot of stuff there » check this, "Next industrial revolution"

.BIS BUCK

Talking about the importance of filtering, filtering impulses on the street, message that flood the mind daily, and narrative is a key to stick into the filter of most minds because basically you're telling a story. Always trying to get to the heart , the essence compiling as short as possible because most work is intended to play on USA channel (max30sec) and again the imhttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gifportance is the narrative. But at first it was meant to be only for the web, later on for nightbroadcast in the end it played at 9 o'clock in the morning, so scripts had to be rewritten, a lot.
Working for TvLand » all designed to create an emotional response.
And on » lateron changed names, a marketingcampagne for XionXB car...
The tower of Granville is a fantastic animation by them.They are also the motiongraphers of the animation in "An Inconvenient truth".

» Extra RE*NASCENT was here as well! and we did a movie with 3D glasses == cool! yeah ;p It was the Re:fresh OFFFestival presentation.

11 May 2007

OFFF 12 - Joshua Davis & Neville Brody



11 may 2007 at 21:00 — Roots room, CCCB - BCN

12. JOSHUA DAVIS and NEVILLE BRODY

Two of the most influential designers from the last twenty years, one on paper and the other one on the screen, sit together to converse about the great questions that serve as motto for OFFF 2007. Which is the true power of design in the world nowadays? Which should be its priorities? What things are really important, and which we could miss for ever? A stimulating dialogue in search of new ideas and urgent solutions for the most immediate crises. Davis is definetely the clown of the evening, but also known as a good codewriter and designer.

OFFF 11 - Frank Bretschneider




11 may 2007 at 20:00 — Roots room, CCCB - BCN

11. FRANK BRETSCHNEIDER, with OLAF BENDER of Alva NOto and raster Noton

Created in Chemnitz in 1998 by Frank Bretschneider, Olaf Bender and Carsten Nicolai aka Alva Noto as a result of the fusion of the seals Rastermusic and Noton.Archiv für ton und Nichtton, Raster-Noton is one of the most respected houses in the scope of the vanguard music. In his almost ten years, the German record has managed to extend its publishing nature to become synonymous of an unmistakable aesthetic, cradle in a conception of the electronic art that is translated in audio-visual exercises of austere but constructed appearance on structures of an overwhelming geometric complexity.
In their conference-performance in OFFF 2007, the three founders of Raster-Noton will expose the formal and conceptual matrix of their individual works as both their individual works and the common denominators that are shared by the set of artists who collaborate with the Germanic record house.

OFFF 10 - Motion Theory


11 may 2007 at 18:00 — Roots room, CCCB - BCN

10. JOSH NIMOY

First a small walkthrough of his work as a kid and an artsstudent. Starting of with Windows95, in 1996. Working allready with BASIC backthen, you can understand this guy has a firm scripting background. But he didn't really like being in the art-department, because they didn't like digital work at all, o he switched to the designdepartment. Working with Shockwave in 1998. Interactive pieces in 1999, hanging around at MiT, working with ACU, jT2 working with openFrameworks. Developping
Textension this is 1999 !! » what more can we metaphorise when we work with a textlayout interface. Worked with Aftereffects but quickly got back to doing the same work with doing coding and programming. Make a fair deal of plugins for MAYA, a plugin with Python for Illustrator,... noting shortly what HECTOR does with javascript for his spraycan-installation. Attended UCLA, doing interactive installations with sensoring devices and videowalls, and lateron NYU.
Working now Processing-renders for MotionTheory

OFFF 9 - GraffitiResearchLab


11 may 2007 at 17:00 — Roots room, CCCB - BCN

9. GRAFFITI RESEARCHLAB

They started off in a coding and hardware lab, everything they do is free to use for everything and everyone. They were worked into the hacker-community. With the high interest in technology and both graffiti (or anything that happens in the public sphere without permission) so that evolved into there projects. They see graffiti-artists as publicspace hackers.
They made a hack in for CounterStrike, and they really try to band hacking and streetart — the underground will become overground and they will tear the city apart.
Led Throwies: the story of an open-source perspective.
Magneties, are magnets into ties, and brainstorm way with LED throwies, there giving a workshop on it. (Playing the audience and creating a community beyond a really simple material wrap) It are wrapped LED which you can throw onto objects and vehicles..
Ward & Pat Cunningham's Throwie tackle.
Sustainability is the keynote of the group. They work with the AntiAdvertisingAgency and also Art Rotterdam, for a laserproject. They took over the INGbuilding with a lasergraffiti, and after released some code openSource for other people to work with it » C++ libraries at openFrameworks.
And the mobile broadcast unit has arrived in Barcelona!

OFFF 8 - Unit9


11 may 2007 at 16:00 — Roots room, CCCB - BCN

8. UNIT 9

Trying to get emotion into the content. In recent projects they'll focus on the process of the work.
Adobe: The Creative Mind (with Goodby and Silverstein, where Adobe is client)
» It's all about being inside the creators mind... talking to designers which allowed the navigation to go more experimental and get away from the obvious. It's about getting ionto a mental space, an amorfous site. Thrying to storytell how a creative process can be formed, but translated into a feeling you get by browsing the site and still give the content about the product a platform to present itself. The monkey is the main character (also t-shirts are maid of this host-character) He's a main navigational element, he's let's say the help-character » the backbutton. A moodboard was madup to capture the possible mind of the targetted audience. But off course a thourough testing for clarity was necessary/essential. The storytelling is only later-on merged with the overall interaction, and also there's a lot of randomstates added to the project. But the most important aspect was the linearity of the whole story. Not to forget the importance of the sound.
Foster Farms
At first the chicken-puppets from the commercials had to be used but that would never get as far as the impact of the puppets in tv. So they decided to construct them in 3D (using Maya fur-package). Trying to get the same feel of them, they were struggling to get them resemble the same but first setting them into motion with simple models. The idea is the chickens are trying to get into the farm, but the secret is they never will. an oldskool game amuses the audience but the chicken gets fat and goes down.
V-festival (Virgin mobile festival)
The idea was to get it audience on the site long enough to get the commercial message (hey it's aVirgin mobile festival site) because most people play the game and stop after having some fun... Go there and type PICKLE, it's a hack you'll get some extra's.

OFFF 7 - No-Domain


11 may 2007 at 13:30 — Roots room, CCCB - BCN

7. NO-DOMAIN

Ever since Sónar trusted them with the job of creating images to illustrate its best nights, No-Domain has become an essential name in the international VJing scene. But visuals for stage are not the only thing they do; in graphics, TV or sound this team prints its particular seal on every language it approaches.

10 May 2007

OFFF 6 - Flight 404


10 may 2007 at 18:00 — Roots room, CCCB - BCN

6. FLIGHT 404

Robert Hodgin is a co-founder and executive creative director at The Barbarian Group. Prior to joining The Barbarian Group, Robert worked as a freelance designer, and before that held positions at Arnold Worldwide and Circle.com.
Since co-founding The Barbarian Group. Robert has focused on pushing the limits of motion-intensive interactive sites. He was the creative force behind some of The Barbarian Group most visually compelling sites, and serves as creative mentor for the Boston office. He keeps an eye on creative production in Boston and New York, in conjunction with Keith, and has been delving deep into processing and java-based programming of late. Robert is also the creative force and programmer behind flight404.com - an interactive, experimental Flash site.
Cooperating with the The Barbarian Group, they started of with a small company in Boston but are spread thoughout in NYC and recently opened in SanFrancisco last week. Influenced by Sachiko Kodama, in looking for magnetism in processing. He designed a lot of cool projects in processing, investigating flocks and particle-movements. Focussing on picking the colorsets carefully and not letting maths take care of the picking. Check www.inthemod.com, but all this is "just in the frame of experimenting".
Magnetosphere is his most famous and coolest project, digg his blog for more. This shit is SUPERHOT!!

OFFF 5 - Stamen


10 may 2007 at 18:00 — Roots room, CCCB - BCN

5. STAMEN

Despite of their long trajectory (the machine to paint in Flash Splatter is already a classic), the work of the Californian study Stamen has received greater attention recently thanks to their innovating projects for Web 2.0 in which they use all class of data flows, from the GPS coordinates of taxis in San Francisco to the 911 calls in Midwest USA. Lead by Eric Rodenbeck and with talents such as Tom Carden and Ben Cerveny, their most ambitious project so far is perhaps Digg Labs, the experimental zone of the popular news social service, where the frenetic activity of the members of its community can be followed in real time.
There's very few input from this lecture because I was broadcasting the whole session to Nathalik.

OFFF 4 - Quasimondo


10 may 2007 at 17:06 — Roots room, CCCB - BCN

4. MARIO KLINGEMANN

From Munich, takes a great deal of fun in creating completely but random bitmap filters, like this one.
Symmetry the easy way; is always preferred but it is just another cheap trick. So don't use symmetry as being your style. any kind of picture no matter how dull, but flip it horizontal and it is cool or so called to be. Anyway an easy program to show how easy symmetry is you can see by viewing TRippr. Mario works with processing a lot, now. He creates so called swirls with the processing.
-Image foam and bitmaps; overlap-bitmaps-test was new in Flash 8, to see if curves conflict. Touch but no overlap and they fill like foam » But why stop with circles? » subversion
» Anavision (Greek for back-and-forth) a application that messes up visuals.
This guy urgently needs to switch working on a macintosh :) anyway randomness is his main focus, and within that lies the fantastic element of surprise - waiting for the moment when all the sudden the randomness creates this most heavenly divine visual, and than it's gone again...

OFFF 3 - North Kingdom


10 may 2007 at 16:00 — Roots room, CCCB - BCN

3. NORTH KINGDOM

Founded in 2003, they started off with a Company presentation... Now they are working from in Stockholm. PASSION is there corebusiness, focussing on details - bieng satisfied with only perfectly finished projects, but having fun is big part of the deal too. Anyway they're working a lot for ABSOLUT vodka and Vodafone, they're the creators of that fantastic Toyota minisite, the Aygo decompile minisite, and the Get the glass - game, I allready posted on "Get the glass".
About Get the Glass, they were mostly inppired by the Stella Artois vault game, which was a blistering good onlline-advertising application. With this project they wanted to step away from telling a story nor getting another online tour. Anyway they created the idea of a boardgame and give the message thru the boardgame. (Creative directors and leading people within most advertising agencies are outdated and totally unaware of what is alive online so you can figure it was allready a backbraker to sell this idea to them in the first place). In this case they worked simultaneously with several designers, sending it back-and-forth, a workflow most advertising agencies lack to do, unfortunatly. Ad-agencies will have to change there point of viewing; f.e. they are used to work a copywriter and an art director into a team but they'd never let designers come and go in teamformation..and that's just — stupid. Companies are not fully (enough) integrated yet. For example, the casting of the castle for this project was a jail but the shooting was allready done simultaneously with the modelling of the boardgame... and they didn't match. And as always the modelling guy had to build a new fort overnight.
get the glass was treated as a fully new brand boxcard game for making the game more powefull, a logo the cards, the box itself, characters, the playground - facing the limitations with pattents of PIXAR and such companies, animating the characters, making the real modell into a filmed motion and 3D animation, sequenced into an online application-game that still runs on a standard/modest computer.
» an monstorous but amazing post-production marathon was added to compile the game in the end.

Jorge Calleja is focussing not only on how to work interactive projects but also how to think interactive. He agrees that advertising agencies should credit the designers who actually accomplished the work. Now he's working Goodby & Silverstein and e's convinced that they are the new breath of what modern webvertising is going to be. Remembering that there is always someone better than you, and also that there is no such thing as a group, you're always fighting eachother to get credited yourself but within that lies freedom - but off course how much time of your life and passion are you willing to invest in advertising world. Advertising, broadcast and interactive is leading the new world order within Graphic Design, therefor Sweden is the new leader and that's why they moved there Hyperisland contributes a great deal in this evolution.

OFFF 2 - Bestiario


10 may 2007 at 13:49 — Roots room @ CCCB - BCN

2. BESTIARIO

This guy (Ortiz) was speaking solo Espagnol and I didn't understand a spick bowl of whatever he was saying, except for "interfacias" and "graphico"...
Formed in barcelona in 2006, Bestiario is probably the first Spanish company dedicated exclusively to data visualisation and information representation. Under the creative direction of Santiago and Andrès Ortiz, with an ample network of collaborators and a strong multidiscipinary approach, their "machines to ferment intuition" serve such diverse aims as helping coolhunters map emergent tendenciesin the streets, or constructing the emotional memory of a community through its photographic archives.
Even without understanding a word of what was said I understood the principle workmodel of the project presented, and that off course is essential to the accessibilty and universal compatibility of the project.

OFFF 1 - Curtis & Sagmeister



10 may 2007 at 12:37 — Roots room, CCCB - BCN

1. SAGMEISTER & HILLMAN CURTIS

First bad news is that Sagmeister couldn't make it, bohoee... There was a video-message as an opener for the festival. Well, the thing i remembered from the talk was "worrying solves less". (and aw my ears, they should silence the audio... I've you've read MTIV you can figure a bit the mind of Curtis, he just got off the plain and dropped some acid so, i guess that brakes the ice. He works in SaFran for the moment. He writes books, designes websites and make films.
Hillman is the designer of the YAHOO! homepage, the MetOPera, the Adobe housingstyle 2 editions back
Curtis is here to talk about movies, he doesn't consider himself as a minimalist designer, but yet everything has to be there and do something. Movies are more overall his experimenting.
Started with: creating short films for the web, which is the title of his new book. Rememeber his portret-project, he shot all people who came into his studio and filmed them just blinkcing their eyes.

Project: Artist series
Stefan Sagmeister lives 7 blocks away from Hillman and they were on a shortfilm-travel to Texas. But within this project he also did, Paula Scher, James Victore, Milton Glaser, David Carson, Pentagram and Mark Romanek.
Herefor he'd never bring a list of questions, the meaning was to document the interaction, between, and the conversation.. And they couldn't exceed 7 minutes because it has to be compelling enough to play on the web and people there are on the move, litterally, with the mentals...
The project was meant to celebrate the work of someone that influenced him, but also because the camera gives instant access to the person, of who they are and how they work.
* And guess what; UDP status:Good remote: » perfect Skype webcam connection. if that ain't rock'n'roll. Wanna follow the OFFF on a distance? Skype me, and I'll give you a live few minutes of your fav-speaker :)

Add Grapplica on Skype.

08 May 2007

Bert Anciaux - videolog


As an add-on to the existing Bert Anciaux website and as an extra supporting channel for the electorial campaign, for the belgian federal elections of 2007, I've tweaked and designed a videolog for Bert Anciaux.
Now who said Blogger was hard to handle and tweak? I just love Google.

Berts videolog was officially launched yesterday.

05 May 2007

Hiroaki Umeda


That's where you'll find me tonight...

Canvas LUX


Newest creation by Milk is a real pearl, a superb piece of animation graphix, detail and good sense of humor. They are without any doubt the coolest online factory on this planet, from the bottom of my heart! I've worked with these guys and they are nothing to be compared with, always striving for the best and most inventive creation without considering money as a ruling factor.

You must go and browse this, pure state of the art interactive experience at http://www.canvas.be/lux

USA bans


Apparently Europeans aren't allowed to view broadcast from the States... smells like *fish

Boosted Mobile


ATTIK just finished designing a series of mini sites to promote various up and coming artists and clothing designers. The landing page allows the user to paint various graphical elements onto the background. Boostedmobile.com