Randomness, vol. IX

~ 14 August 2009 ~

A compilation of resources, products, and inspiration spotted before, after, but not during knee surgery.

Los Angeles Times gets a makeover

A rather nice overhaul of the latimes.com site. (Here’s what it looked like in February 2008.)

Oliver Kavanagh

A rather audacious, springboard-style home page that leaves me wanting to try something similar.

DIY ring light with LEDs

…and other DIY camera mods using LEDs.

The 6 brand naming styles

Josh Levine:

The 6 naming styles add context so you can see the full landscape of choices. You can use this tool throughout the naming process: analyze the competition, organize your list, or develop more names in a style you hadn’t considered.

(via ISO50)

Design Thinking at TED Global

IDEO’s Tim Brown reviews the design-focused talks given at last month’s TED Global conference in Oxford. Talks to be posted online soon.

Daguia Tortas Finas

Not only is the site very well-designed, but the desserts look absolutely succulent.

Typophile Type Battle: Design a better CAPTCHA font

Despite the accessibility flaws that accompany CAPTCHA, it’s enjoyable to peruse the proposed fonts from Typophile members “that humans can read and machines can’t.”

Dwell Magazine reviews Never Use White Type on a Black Background

51 “ridiculous design rules” are scrutinized in Never Use White Type on a Black Background, reviewed by Miyoko Ohtake:

Though at first glance, the book appears a bit kitschy (in a way breaking Rule 29: Dress to Impress, aka make a good first impression), it proves a fun, occassionally thought-provoking read. Each rule is accompanied by a series of quotes from designers, architects, illustrators, authors, and their ilk.

The Font-as-Service

Elliott Jay Stocks guest authors at i love typography and offers a thorough review of Typekit and its alternatives, as well the adoption (or lack thereof) of @font-face.

OS X icon pillows

Geek out your couch with these OS X-inspired pillows.

How to get that perfect shave

I’ve been using cartridge blades since I began shaving, and apparently I’ve been doing just about everything wrong.

[But] don’t worry—if you want to stick with your Mach3 or other cartridge razor, that’s okay. Just adding a shaving brush and quality cream to the mix will still give you a better shave, even if you use the same razor you were using before.

(via @jasonsantamaria)

Ersinhan Ersin: Tapeography

Design Boom:

Turkish designer Ersinhan Ersin deconstructed old cassette tapes to create a series of images and typography he calls tapeography. The handmade font was originally created for a school project about music, but Ersin carried the concept to a variety of projects.

Entertaining Adobe crash reports

A fun collection of crash reports I’m sure we all wished we would have (or will have) written. “I’ve got no time for today’s crash reports, I’ve got deadlines to miss!”

Managing UI Complexity

A great write-up by Brandon Walkin with several examples and advice for managing the complexity. In particular, I appreciate that Brandon titled this “managing” rather than “eliminating”. It echoes something I espouse in my Good vs. Great Design presentations, that great hierarchy isn’t necessarily achieved by eliminating complexity, but by managing it. (via @dunstan)

9 Comments

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1 Sean Foushee ~ 14 August 2009

Great post! Love the links, just FYI the OS X pillows and UI Complexity links are 404.

Get well soon!

2 Cameron Moll ~ 14 August 2009

Thanks Sean, links fixed.

3 Jan! ~ 17 August 2009

I think your front page (and possibly your feed) needs to be rebuilt, because it still has the wrong links.

Cheers.

4 Ollie Kavanagh ~ 17 August 2009

Thanks for mentioning my site Cameron, I had a limited time frame to work on it and it will be a continuous experimentation and will keep changing and evolving as and when I get time. Some aspects of the design are not ideal for the web but I definitely did not want to be contained by typical web design issues ;)

5 Ollie Kavanagh ~ 17 August 2009

I hope your recovery from knee surgery goes well as well. I know exactly what it feels like to be laid up after Knee reconstructive surgery…. not fun.

6 Cameron Moll ~ 17 August 2009

@ Jani: You’re right, I missed a couple other links. Corrected now. Thanks.

@ Ollie Kavanagh: Sending a chest pump your way for a fellow knee bro.

7 Kaelig ~ 17 August 2009

Here is the link for “Managing UI Complexity”: http://www.brandonwalkin.com/blog/2009/08/10/managing-ui-complexity/

8 Michael Locke ~ 21 August 2009

Nice randomness, Cameron. Thanks for the nuggets (i.e. tips, ideas and inspiration).

9 Kent Heberling ~ 23 August 2009

Wow. I always new I had a lot to learn about design but I never knew how much I needed to learn about shaving.

@ Ollie: Awesome stuff, I don’t think I could ever pull off something so bold.