Vase Clock Is Designed To Break When The Right Moment Comes [Design]
When Georgios Maridakis‘ product breaks it’s actually an intentional feature. His Clock Vase indicates time with a little hammer that knocks against the porcelain. And at the right stroke, it shatters.
There aren’t any notes on how long it would take to wear out a vase on average, but the entire idea is to have different chime sounds due to switching the flower pots so it can’t be too long. I just hope Gerogios never decides to make an alarm clock like this, because just imagining the porcelain shards near a bed makes my feet hurt. [Yanko Design via The Design Blog]
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DF: iPad Stocks, Calculator, Weather, Clock, Voice Memo Apps Scrapped by Steve Jobs
March 9, 2010 - 15:34
Tags: Apple, calculator, Clock, daring fireball, ipad, iphone, iphone 4.0, News, Steve Jobs, Stocks, voice memo, Weather, widgets
Posted in Mobile | No comments
Daring Fireball’s John Gruber suggests that bigger, iPad versions of the built-in iPhone Stocks, Calculator, Weather, Clock and Voice Memo were scrapped by Steve Jobs:
It’s not that Apple couldn’t just create bigger versions of these apps and have them run on the iPad. It wasn’t a technical problem, it was a design problem. [...]
DF: iPad Stocks, Calculator, Weather, Clock, Voice Memo Apps Scrapped by Steve Jobs is a story by TiPb. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.
TiPb – The #1 iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch Blog
Cameron Daigle’s “Is the iPad Just a Big iPhone?” UI Presentation from PodCamp Nashville
March 8, 2010 - 23:06
Tags: Apple, cameron daigle, Design, ipad, iphone, News, presentation, User Interface
Posted in Mobile | No comments
Cameron Daigle’s “is the iPad just a big iPhone” user interface presentation from PodCamp Nashville. Note, the second slide is a gigantic “NO.”
[via Daring Fireball]
Cameron Daigle’s “Is the iPad Just a Big iPhone?” UI Presentation from PodCamp Nashville is a story by TiPb. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store. TiPb – [...]
Cameron Daigle’s “Is the iPad Just a Big iPhone?” UI Presentation from PodCamp Nashville is a story by TiPb. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.
TiPb – The #1 iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch Blog
Rumored 4th Gen Apple iPhone Parts Show Little Design Change
February 8, 2010 - 22:37
Tags: 4th gen iphone, Apple, Design, iphone, News, Rumor, screen
Posted in Mobile, Rumors | No comments
Above is a image that is claimed to belong to the upcoming 4th generation iPhone, courtesy of iPhone repair Web site iResQ. As iResQ points out, there are a few interesting things that stand out in the photo.
“The LCD appears to be factory glued to the digitizer which is more similar to the first generation [...]
Rumored 4th Gen Apple iPhone Parts Show Little Design Change is a story by TiPb. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.
TiPb – The #1 iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch Blog
iTablet to Look like Bigger, Slimmer Original iPhone 2G, Use MacBook Battery?
January 21, 2010 - 20:04
Tags: Apple, Design, iphone, itablet
Posted in Mobile, Rumors | No comments
AppleInsider is claiming “people familiar with the device” as saying Apple’s upcoming iTablet/iSlate/iPad will have a physical design reminiscent of the original iPhone 2G launched in 2007:
Nestled in an aluminum shell that leverages the Apple’s expertise in unibody construction but thinner proportionality than the original iPhone, the tablet reportedly sports all of the [...]
This is a story by the iPhone Blog. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.
iTablet to Look like Bigger, Slimmer Original iPhone 2G, Use MacBook Battery?
HOW TO: Create Custom Backgrounds for Twitter, YouTube, & MySpace
January 14, 2010 - 18:01
Tags: Customization, Design, How-To, Lists, MySpace, Photoshop, Social, social media, Social Media Lists, social networking, twitter, twitter background, Web Design, youtube
Posted in Social | No comments
This series is supported by Webdesigner Depot, a popular web design blog covering tutorials, design trends, blogging and inspirational posts. You can visit WDD at webdesignerdepot.com and follow WDD on Twitter @designerdepot.
If you’re using your social media profiles to promote your personal brand or business, chances are that pre-made themes and watermarked templates just won’t cut it. You need a custom design to make your profile stand apart from the rest and convey important information about who you are.
Some of our favorite social networks afford us this customization, but there are a few tricks that may save you some time and frustration when creating a custom profile background. While none of these can replace the eye of a great graphic designer, they should help you get a sense of the layout you’re after.
Choose an Image Editor
To start, you’ll need an image editor. Photoshop is probably best suited for the task, but there are plenty of free alternatives on the web.
Gimp is a free, open source image editing and compositing tool that has many of the layering and filtering abilities of Photoshop.
Aviary’s Phoenix is another great free tool that is entirely web based. You can edit and layer images in a Photoshop-like environment right in your web browser, then save the finished product to your desktop.
Photoshop.com also offers a free, “lite,” web-based version of the popular editor.
Once you’ve chosen your tool, it’s time to get to work.
A great Twitter background makes an impression on potential followers. It should communicate who you are and what people should expect from your tweets. Here are some examples of great Twitter backgrounds:
Dimensions: The column that contains your tweets and profile information will always take up about 760 pixels of screen real estate. What’s left for the background will be determined by the user’s monitor. Everyone viewing your profile will see it a little differently, depending on the resolution of their screen. A safe bet to ensure that your background will not be cut off or tiled at most resolutions is a 1680 x 1200 pixel image. The image resolution should be web standard 72 dpi.
Maximum File Size: 800 KB
Layout: Accounting for the 760 pixel center column, the space left over on either side will depend on the visitor’s resolution. The space at the top for the Twitter logo will remain constant at about 65 pixels, and a good rule of thumb is to leave about 200 pixels at the left for your design. This will accommodate most monitor resolutions.
Twitter aligns the background image to the top left, so it is important to focus your main content in that area as shown. The further to the left an element appears, the least likely it will be cut off on a low resolution monitor.
There are a few tools that may help you determine what your layout will look like at different resolutions. To quickly determine your own resolutions as a reference point, jump over to whatismyscreenresolution.com.
For FireFox users, the Web Developer add-on will resize your browser to fit common monitor resolutions so you can see what your layout might look like for other users.
Screen-resolution.com is also a handy tool for popping URLs into resolution-specific browers windows.
Design Tip: Don’t clutter your background with too much information. Because URLs are not clickable in a background, this space is better suited for logos, photos, or other clean graphic elements that express who you are. If you’re encouraging people to connect with you outside of Twitter, make sure the one URL in your profile links to your contact information.
Also, be sure to choose text and link colors that compliment your background.
How To Add It:
YouTube
A branded YouTube channel is a great way to identify yourself to viewers when they land on your video pages. Here are some examples of great YouTube channel designs:
Dimensions: YouTube channel backgrounds work similarly to Twitter backgrounds in that they must account for the fixed width of the channel content. The area that displays your videos and profile information is 960 pixels wide. Note that the top area that displays the YouTube logo and search is not taken into account with regard to your background. Your background image will begin below the white YouTube bar, so all content should be started near the top of your image.
Like Twitter, screen real estate depends on monitor resolution. A good image size to work with is 2000 x 2200 pixels total.
Maximum File Size: 256 KB
Layout: It is important to understand that YouTube will center your background image behind your channel content. This means that your important image content should appear just to the left and right of the 960 pixel center column. It also means that people with large or widescreen monitors will see much more of your image stretching out to the right and left of their screen. This is why it’s good to use a very wide image (2000 pixels, in this example).
Whereas your Twitter background should be focused as far to the left as possible, the content in your YouTube background should be as close to the central 960 pixel column as possible without going behind it. Again, test different resolutions with the tools above to see where viewers might be cropping your image and adjust accordingly to account for variation.
Design Tip: Because widescreen monitors may view much more of your image on the left and right, it may be useful to incorporate a fade to a solid color on each end. Then, make the page background that same color to avoid an unsightly “break” in the design.
Also, be sure to implement complimentary box and text colors.
How To Add It:
MySpace
Though MySpace has fallen out of vogue in recent years, it is still a viable platform for younger users and a destination for many bands and music sharers.
If you’re looking to make a statement with your MySpace page, a well-tailored background could do the trick.
Here are some impressive ones:
Dimensions: MySpace’s “Profile 2.0″ customization is actually very flexible and allows a few options. You can change your content size between 960 pixels, 750 pixels, or 100% (which wipes out the background entirely). Decide which layout you like best and build your background to match. The full size should account for large monitors, so something in the neighborhood of 2000 x 2200 pixels should work here as well.
Maximum File Size: Any, but best to keep it under 500K for quick load times.
File hosting: Unlike Twitter and YouTube, Myspace will not host your background file, but simply reference it from a URL. If you don’t own web space, there are plenty of places you can host an image for free, including PhotoBucket and ImageShack. Upload your image to one of these sites and paste the image URL into MySpace’s layout editor.
Layout: Again, MySpace is surprisingly flexible, and the advanced layout editor allows you to align your background against any quadrant of the screen, or center it. It’s up to you how you want to approach the layout. Simply account for your content column (750 or 960 pixels) and design around it. Then position your image accordingly. The best designs fit their graphic elements snugly against the content column so that they’ll be visible at any resolution.
How To Add It:
Others
The two other big dogs of social networking, Facebook and LinkedIn, don’t offer background customization options. While this may be a disappointment to some, many would argue that the clean, uniform look of these sites has contributed to their success.
Do you have any tips, tricks, or resources you use when designing a custom profile? Share them in the comments below.
Series supported by Web Designer Depot
Webdesigner Depot is one of the most popular web design blogs in the world. It covers tutorials, design trends, blogging as well as inspirational posts. It’s run by Walter Apai, a web designer from Vancouver, Canada. The blog is a great resource for both beginners and advanced designers looking to expand and improve their knowledge. The site is visited by Fortune 500 companies and is used as a reference by many design schools. Visited by almost 2 million readers per month, WDD is a prime resource for both graphic and web designers. Visit WDD at webdesignerdepot.com. Follow on Twitter: twitter.com/designerdepot. Subscribe to RSS feed: webdesignerdepot.com/rss.htm.
More social media resources from Mashable:
- 85+ of the Best Twitterers Designers Should Follow
- 100 Great Resources for Design Inspiration
- 5 Ways Social Media Changed Fashion in 2009
- 5 Tips for Building Lasting Online Friendships
- Top 5 Must-Read Social Media Books
- Social Media Can Change The World Through Common Ground
Image courtesy of iStockphoto, skodonnell
Reviews: Facebook, GIMP, ImageShack, LinkedIn, MySpace, Photobucket, Photoshop.com, Twitter, YouTube, iStockphoto
Tags: customization, design, how to, myspace, Photoshop, social media, twitter, twitter background, youtube
Mashable’s New Design: What Do You Think? [POLL]
January 5, 2010 - 07:21
Tags: Design, mashable, Social, social media, social networking, Web Design, Web Development
Posted in Social | No comments
New Year, New Mashable! We rolled out a new look this morning, reorganizing our content into sections, removing clutter and putting more focus on the stories.
If you’re particularly interested in a certain area of our coverage, you’ll appreciate our new sections: Social Media, Mobile, Web Video, Entertainment, Business and Tech. Each of these channels has a separate RSS feed.
Our channels are composed of subchannels, too, allowing you to drill down to your areas of interest. For example, our entertainment section contains subsections where you can get the latest on music, film, online games, sports, celebrities, food and media; our business section offers business news, advertising and marketing articles, small business advice, pieces on career development and more.
var skin = {};
skin['BORDER_COLOR'] = ‘#cccccc’;
skin['ENDCAP_BG_COLOR'] = ‘#e0ecff’;
skin['ENDCAP_TEXT_COLOR'] = ‘#333333′;
skin['ENDCAP_LINK_COLOR'] = ‘#0000cc’;
skin['ALTERNATE_BG_COLOR'] = ‘#e6e6e6′;
skin['CONTENT_BG_COLOR'] = ‘#ffffff’;
skin['CONTENT_LINK_COLOR'] = ‘#0000cc’;
skin['CONTENT_TEXT_COLOR'] = ‘#333333′;
skin['CONTENT_SECONDARY_LINK_COLOR'] = ‘#7777cc’;
skin['CONTENT_SECONDARY_TEXT_COLOR'] = ‘#666666′;
skin['CONTENT_HEADLINE_COLOR'] = ‘#333333′;
google.friendconnect.container.setParentUrl(‘/’ /* location of rpc_relay.html and canvas.html */);
google.friendconnect.container.renderOpenSocialGadget(
{ id: ‘div-2482492356873005992′,
url:’http://www.google.com/friendconnect/gadgets/poll.xml’,
site: ‘06264860231701396367′ },
skin);
We’re not done yet, of course. If you spot any bugs or issues, let us know. In the meantime, we’d like to ask: What do you think?
Special thanks to our partners at nclud for their work on this design!
Lite as a Feather: Why Simplicity Is Hot
December 4, 2009 - 00:05
Tags: APIs, Design, digg, facebook, Facebook Lite, LITE, mashable, Opinion, simplicity, Social, social networking, ui, User Interface, Web Apps, Web Design, youtube, youtube lite
Posted in Social | No comments
Today YouTube became the latest in a spate of social networks to offer an alternative design to users. It follows on the heels of Digg Lite and Facebook Lite, both attempts to strip down to the bare essentials and reduce the clutter and cruft of all the widgets, related content, menus and other bits of (usually) relevant information that have crept into most social sharing sites.
Digg’s initiative is far more developer-focused; it’s really intended as a showcase for its new API. Still, the point is equally taken: Sometimes it’s refreshing to get the Other Stuff out of the way and get back to basics. Facebook Lite is more about the user experience; since its latest big redesign earlier this year many users have complained about feeling overwhelmed. The Lite version is a way to once again focus on core features and tune out some of the more extraneous variables that tend to encrust the typical Facebook profile.
Simple Is Good
YouTube and Facebook’s Lite versions are both in direct response to user feedback. They clearly fill a need on the part of the audience to occasionally reduce the noise and boost the signal. But it’s also important to note that neither of these options have replaced the “full” default versions of the sites — they’re alternative views, not primary views. There’s still value in all the extra “related” information that accompanies the content we’re sharing, but Lite versions acknowledge the fact that there are different modes of viewing content on the Web.
The Lite trend also acknowledges the inherent value of simplicity in reducing friction, both in terms of cognitive processing and in literal page load times. It’s a busy world, and sometimes saving those few seconds can make a big difference in our perception of productivity and faster workflow. Twitter is another great example of how simplicity can reduce friction and increase user participation thanks to sheer ease of use. There’s something extremely pleasurable about using a simple interface, in that the service itself is designed to get out of your way and get you to your goal — whether it be writing a 140 character update, watching a video clip or sharing a link with friends.
Toggling Between Modes
From a user experience perspective, it’s a great thing that product managers and designers are catering to this idea of being able to toggle your browsing mode between “simple and focused” and back out again to “search and discovery” mode, where the “distractions” can often lead to serendipitous discovery and unexpectedly interesting new experiences. The Lite trend also reflects that there are different types of Internet users — some who are intimately familiar with complex interfaces and relish diving in to an information-rich environment, and others who simply don’t spend the same ungodly amounts of time on the Internet as many of us social media-fluent users do.
Take World of Warcraft players, for example, who can customize their own user interfaces to a degree whose complexity level borders on that of a jet plane instrument panel. Even so, some still choose a far more minimalist approach to managing the influx of real-time data. There’s value in both options, and either can be preferable to an individual user at different times. Building in tools to make that switch possible is a great move on the part of these networks.
Is Customization the Future?
What if you could actually customize your user interface experience on every site you visited? A number of sites already take this highly customizable approach, from Netvibes and iGoogle to the MOG music social network, who recently-launched a subscription-based music service to accompany its music news and social features. MySpace took the same approach, allowing users to customize their own profiles in an almost too open playground that admittedly allowed a number of crimes against HTML to be perpetuated.
But what about going beyond simply customizing how your own profile looks, and on into a more remixable interface for social sites in general? It’s easy to see how much value there could be in giving Facebook or YouTube users the ability to go nuts with UI customizations to a degree similar to that of World of Warcraft, where a smorgasboard of user-created add-ons makes very specific information management tasks possible.
Ultimately, users will make their own way as technology progresses: Some will stick with “as simple as possible,” some will adopt interfaces resembling complicated spreadsheets and others will jump at the ability to toggle between the two… or several. And in an Internet era already embracing the ethos of openness and third-party access to APIs, it doesn’t seem that far-fetched to imagine something like that could be possible.
Would you like the ability to customize your user experience on social networks?
Reviews: Digg, Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, YouTube
Tags: design, facebook, Facebook Lite, LITE, simplicity, UI, user interface, youtube, youtube lite
The Nissan Cube Exhibition
November 26, 2009 - 17:05
Tags: Art, cube store, Design, j.prince, jackie prince, Nissan, Uncategorized
Posted in 1 | No comments
Last night, Ben, Resh and I went to the launch party for The Cube Store, Nissan’s multimedia design exhibition celebrating their new model, The Cube.
The event was held at Boiler House in Brick Lane and featured live street-art battles, beat boxing and some very funky cube-inspired designs. We may have also had a glass of [...]
Quantum Physics Visualized [Art]
November 18, 2009 - 08:00
Tags: Art, Design, Gadgets, Julian voss-andreae, Quantum, Quantum sculptures, Sculptures
Posted in Gadgets | No comments
I wish that Julian Voss-Andreae had made some of these sculptures when I was in school. While we can’t really claim that they represent quantum physics concepts accurately, they still would’ve made reading about Bosons and Fermions more pleasant.
Julian left his quantum physics research path, but he certainly carried knowledge and inspiration from it over into his art career. These sculptures are intended to portray some incredible quantum physics ideas for which there are “no consistent mental images.” That craziness aside, the sculptures are lovely eye-candy based on artistic merit alone. [Julian Voss-Andreae via Boing Boing]
Chair Made From 374 Dowels Will Leave Fascinating Patterns On Your Butt [Furniture]
November 10, 2009 - 04:20
Tags: Armchair, Chairs, Deep forest, Design, Dowels, Furniture, Gadgets, Kibardin design
Posted in Coolhunting | No comments
Kibardin Design’s “Deep Forest” armchair is made from 374 shaped and creatively-joined dowels. It’s as if you plopped into a giant container of different-sized dowels that retained your shape after you left. Pretty, but pricey, at over $6,500USD. [Core77]