Category: arts and letters

Bad Design Kills

Bad Design Kills—Command Z

bad design kills sticker from baddesignkills.com.

It makes sense that with business internet and insta-companies that people would looking to have instant original logos (and on the cheap).

That’s why it is so fascinating when BoingBoing pointed out a fascinating site that catalogs stolen logo designs by one such online logo design services.

Wow! talk about blatant. My favorite has to be the Ernst & Youngrip off, for so many reasons that I can’t begin to name it. It actually has me scratching my head wondering how a company like this is allowed to stay in business. If anything is cause for a lynching by a bunch of pencil-wielding design geeks, this has got to be it.
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Posted on by tychay 0

The Complete Calvin and Hobbes

Caitlin pointed out that the Complete Calvin and Hobbes is out:

Complete Calvin and Hobbes

The Complete Calvin and Hobbes, originally uploaded by tychay.

The design seem similar to the Complete Far Side which I once picked up at Costco. If that is the case, then the hardbound books should be very large in print with Sundays in color. My only complaints are that it is too large for a regular bookshelf, the books are too heavy to read in your lap, and it costs a boatload.
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MacAddict’s lowtech product shot setup

Product Shot Setup 1

Product Shot Setup 1, originally uploaded by silverkeys.

Last month, I ran across a gorgeous whiteground product shot from Dave McNally and decided to duplicate his setup when I had an opportunity.

Caitlin has decided to sell her JVC JY-HD10U videocamera. The JY-HD10U was the first camera in what is now called the HDV video standard.1 The cool thing about this camera is that it records high definition video2 with standard DV tapes. At the time, it was very difficult to work with HDV, but now iMovie, Final Cut Pro and others support it natively. She used it for filming dance instructional tapes and weddings, but has recently purchased a Sony 3CCD HDV video camera and no longer needs it.

Caitlin selling off her camera would qualify as an opportunity.
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Conference Gnomes

When I was generating the movies for my OSCON talk, I left in a little easter egg that was too hard to notice. Doing little things like this makes things a little fun when you are bored with the tedium of making hundreds of builds for your talk. I decided to get a screenshot in before all the task items get marked as overdue.

Conference Gnomes

Conference Gnomes, originally uploaded by tychay.

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Corporate tutorials

D70 Photography Kingdom

D70 Photography Kingdom, originally uploaded by silverkeys.

I noticed on Mark Goldstein’s excellent Photography blog. that Manfrotto launched some online tutorials in conjunction with Web Photo School.

Here are the tutorials.

Though I have been drooling over their monopods and Caitlin uses their tripods and heads, I’m currently a Gitzo/Really Right Stuff guy. On a quick skim it seems they are using Manfrotto products in the examples but parts of it are relevent to anyone with a halfway decent tripod.

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Pirates of Silicon Valley DVD

Pirates of Silicon Valley DVD

MacMinute clued me in to the fact that Pirates of Silicon Valley is coming out on DVD. I recorded this movie when I last had cable (back in 1999) because I was out the days it aired. I enjoyed this movie, and because of it’s high geekfest quotient, right up there with Real Genius.

I think Dave still has my videocassette of it. I had forgotten I had recorded it until a few years ago when I saw part of it with him. We had great fun watching all the 1999 dot-com boom commercials that were aired on TNT along with it (too bad the DVD doesn’t have that as a special feature.)

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Another book…

I finished Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince at five this morning. It was okay that the package came at around noon because I had to finish re-reading Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (early senility).

I’m actually a rather slow reader, it’s just that I don’t stop. Besides, I had to finish it because Caitlin was hot on my tail (and she was re-reading the entire series, not just the last book).

I should exact revenge all all you blogger idiots who spoiled the ending of Book 5 before I had a chance to finish it two years ago…

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Posted on by tychay 1