Not often do we see something so stunning visually, that we can't stop thinking about it over and over.
How was it done? What substances were they on? How many people did it? The design and final effects are nothing short of breathtaking. See for yourself:
Every now and then in a sea of copycats we see something truly new and unique that catches our attention
Physynth stands out not only for it’s musical capabilities, but most notably for great and innovative design. It uses the iPad’s accelerometer to simulate light and shadows on it’s surface. That means if you turn your device to the left, the shadows of the knobs and dials will go to the right and so forth. It all looks so “real” and “artificial” at the same time, that it really catches attention.
The app is just 1$ and it’s available at:
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/physynth/id469924626?mt=8
The Verge has posted a very detailed view on how the iOS UI has changed and improved (along with the list of added features) over the years.
It’s an impressive post, full of images, and it makes you think about revised UI in your own projects too. The image on the left shows how little really changed in fundamental elements, and yet how fine it still works today, with more modern features on top of those designs. Do you think that changing the design completely every few years is THAT important? Because the original iPod design came from the 60’s and didn’t change much after that. Some good designs are here to stay. The only thing dreadful on the image on the left is that terrible “Music” logo on the icon. Why is it dark? Why doesn’t it match the phone icon, the voice recorder icon or the SMS icon? OR for that matter the previous iPod icon. A white icon on an orange background would look MUCH MUCH better.
Microsoft is generally considered a non-creative, "suit philosophy" company. Sometimes though, it takes a step away from that and creates something cool. Bing, xbox, some recent ads and most notably the Windows Phone interface. The latter you can now preview on your iPhone or Android device inside the browser. Sure it’s not a full experience, and reminds us a bit of the Web iPad demo, but it’s a clever way to show how the interface is innovative and cool to use. Good job microsoft. To test it open this url on your phone:
http://aka.ms/wpdemo
Rating: 
Galleried is an awesome app for finding great web designs, managing a collection of inspirations (some call them "stealing enhancers") between your devices. The App is 8Eur for the Mac, and has a free companion app for both iPhone and iPad. They sync through dropbox, so you’re always up to date with your findings no matter the device. The selection is made from a couple of sites that feature good design and 9 out of 10 times it gets the right sites. Sometimes we can see something that doesn’t quite fit, but in general there’s plenty of inspiration there. I think it’s the best app of that kind for any designer so you should get it right now! It’s worth the money.
Image credit: I Love Design.com
It’s 2011, so saying that someone should update their website through editing HTML files (or as some people say “programming” ;)) sounds quite insane doesn’t it? Maybe so, but is the ease of updating worth the compromises on quality? Sure, some CMS driven sites can be pretty interesting, but it’s hard for them to have a distinct style, that doesn’t look like it’s a set of boxy templates. Apple’s website seems boxy at first, but it breaks most template rules by having each page look completely differently – as if it was designed for a fine printed book, and not through a set of CMS templates. Sure the main page is just a big banner with some smaller ones below, and that can be easily customizable through some backend, but once you get to any page it will look almost like it’s taken from a full-colour manual, rather than one-design-fits-all-template.
The point here is – should smaller websites (like a small hostel, a pet shop, a cafe) really use CMS, or go for something unique, creative and new. What I mean is that they should have each page designed as a separate website, using a set of overall rules, but even breaking the text in just the right place. Sure CMS is necessary for news sites, blogs and e-stores, but the internet itself is actually going into stagnation.
We had that Flash-explosion a few years ago where websites were made into all-flash-all-singing-all-dancing animated multimedia presentations, and that was fun … for a while. Then Flash started to recede towards HTML5 animation and simplicity. But the CMS underneath it all is I think what keeps the real creativity still in the box.
Maybe we should think about it – maybe the web after a few years of finding it’s way, is actually going back to imitating fine-printed books, magazines and brochures? Maybe the attention to every detail, every word and every image would lead us away from square thumbnails with “float: left;”, a small margin and justified text on their right side?
I sure hope so…
The guys that brought us all the previous iPhone OS GUI’s are at it again. What stands out in their work is both attention to detail and a very nice organization of the content. Everything is sorted in groups (including nested groups for smaller elements). This is priceless for UX people, who can now design the interfaces for their own apps with the right elements. It’s more of a drag&drop of lego bricks into place, than anything and we like it here.
Go to teehanlax.com/blog to download your free PSD of the iPhone GUI!
When the web first started, all websites were just about presenting content. Or to be more precise – information. It was a simple, high contrast design, with white background, black text and blue, underlined links. It’s been many years since then, although I remember using a lot of these principles when building websites back in 1998. They were easy to read, and the lack of multimedia due to slower connections at the time, was in fact a blessing that let us fully appreciate content.
Now all of that has shifted towards shocking the user with jQuery animations, smooth scrolling, effects and gimmicks. I’ve been browsing through a lot of award winning websites – mostly portfolios for online companies – and I noticed that the amount of content they communicate now can be summarized in a few bullet-points. Surely if it’s purely about the design, it’s not a bad thing, but sometimes we really want to read more and don’t want to be treaded like idiots who can only comprehend ordered lists.
What do you think? Should we simplify the websites, relying more on bullets and eye-candy, or should we balance it better with longer pieces of text, that actually say something?
A flyer is a simple, little poster to hand out, which should be informative about an event (usually) but it also should catch the eye visually, because you know, flyers usually travel in packs. And the ones that are handed out on the streets are pretty terrible. So let’s take a look at some cool examples:
More after the break.
When people use the term “business card” we usually associate it with the boring rectangle in 2 or 3 standard sizes and forget about it. Well ok, sometimes someone uses a crazy color. But that’s not enough nowadays to catch the eye now is it? Here are 20 business card ideas that I’ve found that experiment. And surely having one of these given to you, you’d remember the company. Some are even edible!
See them after the break:
Apple has always been known for superior product design. But does it also apply to it’s website? We looked back into the web archive and came up with images from nearly every year, starting in 1998. The last picture is from 2011, and there’s very little change between 2008 and today. Take a look:
All of the images were found on flickr. Click on an image to go to it’s flickr page and if you like it let it’s author know!
Whoa, that’s a pretty cool example of what web-apps are capable of. Sure this is actually pretty pointless, but proving it can be done, it opens a window for more advanced web applications of the future. Check it out here:
http://alexw.me/ipad/
Sometimes it’s cool to get off the computer and work on our creativity in a different kinda way. Like with some paper and scissors. See what people on flickr are making, and make your own maybe ?
More below.
The Picasso’ painting “Two characters” looked a little similar to me, when I saw it in a photobook recently, so I searched the web and noticed that some other sites also picked that up. It seems like the finder icon is strongly “inspired” by the painting. Sure it couldn’t be exact (aside from the obvious reasons) because it’s a bit too sad and depressing. But still, can u see it?
We tend to go towards perfection of many kinds constantly in our lives. Technology gives us HD and megapixels for clearer images, higher sampling rates for better audio. Everything is better, faster, stronger. Or whatever.
But at the same time the rising popularity of the imperfections of the yesteryear (especially in visual and sound arts) are a thing that’s really hip today. Yeah, vintage is pretty hip, but it’s not really because of the hipsters, because most of them are way too young to feel nostalgic about these things. They kind of made it their style, but the world doesn’t follow just one group. And yet the world likes noise. The world likes vintage. The world likes slightly warmer colors in photographs, and grain, and smudged borders. Why?
As I said before, it cannot be nostalgia, because yeah, some of us (like me) remember the days of the 80’s point’n’shoot kodak’s but most of the internet now doesn’t. It cannot be just a trend too though. Why you ask ?
Well let me answer that.
A good example is with sound – you take a simple sine-wave and play it. It’s the most basic sound and it’s pretty boring. But when you add some whitenoise, and some crackles, hiss and vinyl distortion you get something far warmer, harmonic and what’s more important natural. Sure we see and hear the world mostly in HD, but we don’t want the reality to be exactly what we see and hear. Especially since it actually never is. Want proof ?
Go record a concert with your phone’s camera. The sound might be getting better with each year and each phone, but it’ll never beat being there. Even with the most pro equipment (like 20 microphones everywhere and preamps) it might sound clear but it still lacks something.
Another example – colors and noise in images. Take a simple square and paint it red. Then take another square, paint it red as well but add a small amount of noise to it. Which one looks “better” or “more natural” ?
In most cases it’s the noisy one, the imperfect one. Because the computer monitor is pretty perfect already, so everything that’s just one color (or even a gradient) looks kind of like plastic. And we don’t like plastic, right?
It’s not even about a regular texture on a color, it’s about making the color a little bit imperfect to make it more real. Because in real life if we look at a red square somewhere it won’t be 100% completely red, unless it’s printed on a glossy high quality paper and it’s not worn out in any way. But give it some time and it will look different.
Those imperfections are of course also present in the videos, with more and more artists adding noise, scratches and discoloration to their videos. And the results? Well we tend to like those videos more for some reason than the crisp and clear HD footage that’s well lit and almost resembles a plastic version of reality. The video below is of an iPhone app that let’s you record some vintage videos. If you watch it you’ll see that it can make even simple shots look nice, without anything going on in them. We’ll probably see a lot more of that vintage trend to come. Because vintage is (in our heads at least) closer to that warm reality we live in.