Here’s a nifty, simple trick to speed up Photoshop: Go into your preferences and set cache levels to 1 and then set image previews to “Never Save”! Hat tip to Dan Rubin!
(via designworklife)
Bolder
Last friday I had the pleasure to meet the folks behind Bolder, a site that helps people to trigger and discover experiences that make the world a little better, one action at a time. You can start a challenge yourself or browse through the challenge catalogue and do positive actions to earn rewards. Anyone can respond to a challenge and earn a reward.
Every challenge is a unique creation started by businesses or people. Challenges pose a request for users to take action, have a little fun, and be part of something that drives positive change.
Here are some of the challenges that caught my eye:
Go completely waste-free for a day
Say no to disposable bag at check-out
Make a regular work meeting a walk meeting
While talking to one of the Bolder founders he told me he used it to challenge his roomates to keep the apartment clean. Whenever they would clean something, they would ‘check in’ and mention what they did. That way they’d get recognized for their actions and earn points. Made me chuckle. I might do the same for Studiomates. But the cool thing is that if enough people meet the challenge, the person posing it has to do something in return. For example: Eric A claims that if 25 people go waste-free for a day he’ll go waste-free for a week!
But the site goes beyond the personal challenges, it invites companies to pose challenges. I like the notion of companies wanting to trigger good actions. And I am not surprised by some of the companies I see up there: Seventh Generation, Rickshaw Bagworks, Nature’s Gate…
Why don’t you go ahead and start a challenge?
Khan Academy
Khan Academy is an educational website that, as its tagline puts it, aims to let anyone “learn almost anything—for free.” There’s currently a fantastic write-up about it over at Wired.
(via Amrit)
Twitter/Facebook
Seeing a Twitter person on Facebook is like walking in on a biker while he is scrapbooking. – Alex Brace
(via Happy Place)
Pop & Lolli Wall Decal
I discovered Pop & Lolli over on CoolMomPicks just now and I am impressed. I am tempted to hit the ‘add to cart’ button on a few for Tilo’s new room. Or, maybe I can convince G to put them in our new hallway…
(via CoolMomPicks)
Comic Sans Fighting Back
While I am not crazy about the foul language in this stop animation, I am completely in love with the fact that Comic Sans fights back. The last sentence made me laugh out loud. The original monologue was written by Mike Lacher but the animation is by Joe Hollier who also created this amazing stop animation called My Visual Diary.
CreativeMornings Video: Ji Lee
Our speaker at the March 2011 CreativeMornings/NewYork was Ji Lee, at the time Creative Director Google Labs, now Creative Director at Facebook. The event was generously hosted by Galapagos Art Space in DUMBO, Brooklyn.
A big thank you to Sy J. Abudu for filming and editing the talk.
The internet kills all middlemen.
Here’s an excellent post by Ben Pieratt, force behind Svpply.com on why you should join a startup.
“The internet, at this time in history, is the greatest client assignment of all time. The Western world is porting itself over to the web in mind and deed and is looking to make itself comfortable and productive. It’s every person in the world, connected to every other person in the world, and no one fully understands how to make best use of this new reality because no one has seen anything like it before. The internet wants to hire you to build stuff for it because its trying to figure out what it can do. It’s offering you a blank check and asking you to come up with something fascinating and useful that it can embrace en masse, to the benefit of everyone.” – Ben Pieratt
(Thank you Sonali)
I didn’t see it coming
The Title of this song by Belle & Sebastian pretty much summed up my last two days: I didn’t see it coming. Beautifully animated by Lesley Barnes. Hat tip!
(Tattly was featured on Laughing Squid, Gizmodo, Gawker, Oprah, Kottke, ItsNiceThat… and many more!)
(via the experts agree)
Polia Wall Sconces
The Polia P and G wall sconces look like file folders or stacks of paper peeling away from the wall. They were designed by Manuel Vivian for Axo Light. Lovely!
(via designmilk)
DaisyDisk
DaisyDisk scans your disks and presents their content as interactive maps where you can easily spot unusually large files and remove them to get more free space. The map gives you an overview of your data, so you always know what your hard disks are filled with.
Going to give this a try. They totally got me with the infographics.
(via daringfireball)
Fantastic Flying Books
The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore iPad App Trailer from Moonbot Studios on Vimeo.
I just downloaded William Joyce’s “The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore”, an interactive narrative experience for the iPad. The app impressively blurs the line between picture books and animated film. I kept flipping pages in sheer amazement. If only I could look at it with the eyes of a kid. Magical!
(Via FormFiftyFive)
access
“We systematically overestimate the value of access to information and underestimate the value of access to each other.” – Clay Shirky
(via @fchimero)
Just launched: Tattly
I have exciting news! We just launched Tattly, a temporary tattoo store for design-minded kids and kids-at-heart. After applying many bad-clip-art tattoos on my daughter Ella, I decided to stop complaining and take matters into my own hands. I was ready to put designy, cool, typographic tattoos on my daughter, or myself for that matter. The idea for Tattly was born.
I looked through my rolodex and reached out to fellow designers I admire to see what they thought of the idea. The response was overwhelmingly positive. Within days I received my first tattoo submissions. And now, a good two months later, we have a site, a team and an impressive fulfillment-centerlike-set-up in our studio. Team Tattly is ready to ship and rock the world of temporary tattoos.
I get giddy when looking at our current list of contributing designers.
Jessi Arrington: Color Burst
Jessica Hische: Type Nerd
Marc Johns: Rabbit
Julia Rothman: You’re Late, Robot, Polaroid Instant Camera
Frank Chimero: Knucks
James Victore: Scribble, I <3 NYC
Jason Santa Maria: Aperture
Chris Glass: Mother
Kelli Anderson: Carpe Futurum
Josh Smith: Cursors, Tattone
Jennifer Ward: Speak Up
Tattlys are perfect for people like me, that can’t commit to a real tattoo and for designer parents, that want to raise their kids with style. Tattlys make a perfect small gift and sure will make your friends smile. Can’t decide which one to get? For two weeks only, you’ll be able to buy the Launch Special Everything Pack! (Shipping is included in the US and only $2 internationally. Yes, we ship *everywhere*!)
I could not have done this without my awesome Tattly team Rusty and Yoko. And our newest Studiomates member Kevin, who proved be an impressivley talented temporary tattoo model. He was even game to model all Tattlys for the Everything Pack.
And then there are my wicked smart and talented studiomates of Oak. They developed the site with all that responsive goodness. (Go resize your browser window or try the site on a mobile device!) The shop runs on Shopify, which, according to Team Oak, “was almost as painless to set up as applying a Tattly to your bicep”. (I’ll be writing about the Shopify experience in the coming days, just so much for now: Their iPhone App ROCKS!)
It’s a big day here at swissmiss studios! Tattly is born! I am so happy I might burst.
Now, the question is: Which one is your favorite?
GIF Shop
GIF SHOP – How-To from Daniel Savage on Vimeo.
When I started out in the web world, animated GIFs were all the rage. I therefore fully embrace, with a somewhat nostalgic notion, apps like the GIF Shop. It let’s you easily create and edit animated GIFs right from your iPhone. Oh, the fun that will be had with our little Ella!
(thank you Daniel)
Sunscreen
An in-depth infographic on how much sunscreen you should wear by Information is Beautiful.
(via coudal)
Piano Hanger
I just fell head over heels in love with a coat rack. The Piano Hanger is making me swoon. It was designed by Patrick Seha for the Belgian company Feld. What I love most about the Piano Hanger is that it is completely flat when not in use. Unfold numerous hooks as you need them, or hide them, when not. Brilliant! And the different levels make it completely child-friendly. Even our 17-month old Tilo could hang his jacket. And how good would this look in our studio? OH MY!
(via shoeboxdwelling)
♥ / Felt & Wire
A big thank you to Felt & Wire for sponsoring this week’s RSS feed.
Felt & Wire is about the universe of design, paper and print — from posters to packaging, from memorable mail to beautiful books, from invitations to artistic innovations. Felt & Wire reveals the fascinations, avocations and professions of the people who inhabit this continually expanding and evolving universe. It is a community, by and about those of us who are paper-obsessed.
Visit the Felt & Wire blog for daily, inspirational content and visit Felt & Wire Shop for limited edition posters, prints and artists books that you won’t find anywhere else.
(Interested in sponsoring a week of my RSS feed, learn more here.)
CreativeMornings Video: Jim Coudal
Last month we kicked off our first Chicago/CreativeMornings with a fantastic talk by Jim Coudal. GravityTank was generously hosting the event and Mig Reyes did an absolutely fantastic job as the host. Thanks to everyone in involved. I am thrilled to have Chicago on the map!
And a big thank you to the team over at Coudal, Steve Delahoyde in particular for taping and editing the event!
How to get the new Gmail Theme
I can’t say enough how excited I am about the looming Gmail interface overhaul. Google explains that Gmail will get a face lift over the next few months, but it’s unclear when the changes will go into effect. Until then, you can start using it with this trick:
First, sign in to Gmail and head to Mail settings. Next, go to the “Themes” tab and you’ll see a two new themes, “Preview” and “Preview (dense).” Select one, and your inbox will be instantly graced with a cleaner, more mininal look.
Who knows, I might actually start using the Gmail interface and no longer go through an email client. Seems like the changes are fully compatible with my swissmiss (black/white/red/gray) color scheme. YAY!
The Illuminated Mixtapes
Adam Parks runs a site called The Illuminated Mixtapes. If features a series of mixtapes he put online for streaming, each including an illustrated cover.
(How much do I love the internets? It enables sharing and creating like nothing else. Yay Internet!)
gojee
Gojee is a beautifully designed new food lover destination. Tell Gojee what you’re craving and what you have in your kitchen and they’ll spoon feed your eyes something dreamy. Got Flour? Black Pepper? Truffle-laced Whole-grain Farm-swaddled Pork Loin? They got a recipe for that.
(Thank you Adam)
