UPDATE: It was fake, but now it’s real. And it’s going to win everything. Download it now.
Ever since I started working in startup land, I’ve felt the need to ingratiate myself in the ever-buzzing world of *tech*. This means staying up on other companies, the blogs, and the general Silicon Valley scene. This can be very repetitive. People get funded, apps get released, and companies buy things. Sometimes a conference happens. Having spent the better part of the last few years neck-deep in this hullabaloo, I figured it was time to parody it.
As I’ve written before, I currently am working on Nosh. Download it now please, it will give you some context. One of my periodic jobs is to drum up support for our beloved application. Of course we do this the normal way (press releases etc), but when I have a free weekend, I like to try and make something crazy and unusual to help things along. I call it the Skunkworks project (achieve victory by any means possible). We had great success with the 404 page, and the Jotly project was my next move. Continue reading for the full process behind the project.
Giving back to the community isn’t always as easy as finding and sharing great design. Sometimes it requires spending time doing tedious details of a Photoshop document… and that is exactly what I’ve done for you.
Here for your use is a Twitter UI Photoshop template perfect for mocking up your page before updating it live. The template is spot on with Twitter’s current layout. In the Psd, each of element set is grouped into its respective area based on the page. Each layer is also labeled and color coded. Twitter mockups should be a whole heck of a lot easier now, enjoy!
Twitter UI Photoshop Psd (4.9 MB) | Version 1.2 — Share this
You may have noticed I’ve been a little less prolific around here lately; finally I can tell you why. I’m very excited to say that as of last November, I dropped out of my MFA program and am a cofounder of Firespotter Labs, a startup funded by Google Ventures. As cool as the concept of “stealth mode” sounds to me, I am decidedly *not* used to *not* writing about what I’m doing. Finally my sneakiness is over! In this post I want to talk a little bit about what it’s been like working full time at a startup, as well what went into the decision to drop out of my design program five months away from graduation. I really couldn’t be happier.
Of course all this would be more interesting if you knew exactly what we were doing. I wrote our About Us the other day and it’s spectacularly vague, so if you want to find out a little more, there were nice articles in The New York Times and Techcrunch last week. Continue reading →
Nearly ten months ago, I (Shelby) had an idea that was inspired by the design community, one that I became very passionate about. The idea was to create some sort of platform to share what inspires you. We’ve seen it done before, but what I have for you is something I hope and believe you’ll really enjoy.
Designspiration is the outcome of my efforts to realize my idea, evolving into a site occupied by a diverse range of inspiration curated by its users. Designspiration or DSPN for short, focuses on the core principles of sharing inspiration and utilizes some great features; like a search function that works like a Swiss army knife, which I will discuss more in the post. Little did I know when starting this project that I would be clocking in more than 1,000 hours over the past ten months.
If you’re eager to check out the site, you can hit Designspiration.net or Ds.pn. With that said, I’m really excited to share this project and process with you…
Photosensitivity, Epilepsy, Seizure Warning: Some of the imagery in this post may trigger seizures or blackouts in affected individuals.
David Ope is a “Animated GIF Artist”, something I’ll admit I didn’t even know existed. He creates various mesmerizing, if not a little eye-straining, animated GIFs. Many are his own designs — mostly black and white striped compositions — but others are found media pieces featuring everything from himself as a baby to solar flares. I’ve included stills of some of his work above, click each to view the animated version — didn’t want to get all Geocitieson you.
Be sure to check out his blog, where you’ll find all sorts of interesting work beyond his own portfolio, like this superb example below (possibly the best animated GIF ever made). Amazing to see people pushing a near-dead medium in such interesting directions.
Bernard Barry is one of the principal visual designers at Facebook. A pretty sweet job I’d say. Imagine having a guarantee that your work would always reach millions of people. Barry handles the pressure nicely; his work is exceptional. If you just briefly glance at his site, you might not notice the absurd amount of detail that goes into each of his projects. The scale of each is often staggering. Barry also has cataloged his entire collection of books and movies. Absolutely worth checking out if you’re on the search for some new books.
Before Facebook, Barry worked at the Decoder Ring and I am imensly curious is he had a hand in creating my favorite logo of all time.
I’m not really sure what to link you to first…everything about this project is exceptionally well executed. Local design firm I Shot Him put together a very slick project (maybe “experience” is more fitting) surrounding the issue of marijuana legalization.
The project is made up of a lot of pieces: a website, a video, a process box, the list goes on. Really blown away by the complexity and creativity at work. And these guys aren’t a big shop! I Shot Him is made up a just a few MFA Academy of Art grads. Well done guys!
In addition to all of the final deliverables, they’ve outlined their process in this very detailed and thorough process piece. I am a sucker for design process articles and this one is among the best I’ve seen. I’ve included some images above, but definitely check out the full piece.
While the initial reasoning for the colors chosen may be trivial, the impact that these dominant players now have in the web world will surely influence the smaller startups that want to share in the positive color associations created by their bigger siblings
