Archive for the ‘Design’ Category
Taito made a Christmas card
Saturday, December 26th, 2009
The official 2009 Taito Christmas card. Pretty sweet (p.s. I didn't make this).
Happy Holidays everybody!
Tags: christmas, space invaders
Posted in Design, Video Games | No Comments »
Wu-Tang Design Remix Project pt.2
Saturday, May 30th, 2009
So I want to take back something I said in Part 1 -- "almost all of the Wu-Tang album art was horrible" is a bit too harsh I think. Some people have really run with that and gotten quite upset, and rightfully so. There are definitely some good ones in there. I've thought about it and I think it would be more accurate to say that my real problem with the original covers was how disjointed they all looked when put in the same playlist. The cleverest thing the Wu-Tang Clan ever did was negotiate separate contracts for everybody, but since these came out on so many different labels the cover art varies drastically. The "Wu-Note Project" is my attempt to amend this all the covers work as a set.
Let me know what you guys think of Part 2, either in the comments here or on Flickr, where I'm posting each as they're made. All in all I'm pretty happy with them, although I wish there was a Killa Bees Volume 2 fit into this series chronologically so I could do that Thelonius Monk yellow/red trick.
Tags: album covers, blue note, Design, remix, wu-tang
Posted in Design, Music, Portfolio | 17 Comments »
Wu-Tang Design Remix Project pt.1
Tuesday, April 28th, 2009
A little while ago I put a bunch of Wu-Tang (both group and solo) albums on my computer. 21 of them, in fact. I inherited some mild OCD from my mom, and as anyone who has seen my iTunes can attest to, it manifests itself in weird ways. I need to have decent-quality album art for every album on my computer, which currently equals over 90 gigs. The problem was that almost all of the Wu-Tang album art was horrible (ODB's two albums being the only real exceptions) -- no offense to the original designers, but as iconic as they might be they're looking pretty dated these days. So, armed with inspiration from what Olly Moss and others are doing (as written about by me here, and later by Kottke here) and a book of Blue Note Records covers, I set out to remake all 21. The first seven are here (click for full-view):
I've changed the art for these in my iTunes and love the results:
So seven down, fourteen to go. From here on out I'm going to start uploading them to my Flickr Photostream as soon as each is done, so you guys can bug me if I'm not making them fast enough. I'll post the next set of seven here when they're done. In the meantime, enjoy, and let me know if you have any comments or suggestions.
Tags: album covers, blue note, Design, remix, wu-tang
Posted in Design, Music, Portfolio, Uncategorized | 104 Comments »
Design Remixes
Tuesday, February 17th, 2009
I've been really into these kinds of "design remixes" lately. Most of them involve taking current, not very elegantly designed products and redoing them in such a way as to avoid modern design pratfalls, which, especially in the case of books, makes them look a lot like classic-era Penguin covers (which I love). I think part of the appeal for me, apart from the great design, is my love of sets. I've always been drawn to collections, especially when they look like they belong together. The image above is of the Harry Potter books, redesigned by M.S. Corley. The bottom two are from a set by Olly Moss that features some of my favorite old video games, re-imagined as books.
I've got a similar scheme worked up for a favorite set of mine. Will post when I complete the first ten.
Tags: helvetica, penguin, remix, sets
Posted in Design, Video Games | 8 Comments »
TypeNEU update
Friday, October 17th, 2008
One of my favorite websites for modern typography (not to be confused with Modernist typography, of course) has to be TypeNEU. Still a relatively young site, they just released a pretty major update and the new design looks even more fantastic than before.
Speaking of which, I'm currently neck-deep in a designing-for-wordpress experiment. If all goes well, expect this site to change from a modified-default-theme to something actually nice sometime in the near future.
Tags: redesign, typeneu, typography
Posted in Design | 1 Comment »
3 Flickr Sets
Tuesday, July 15th, 2008
Otl Aicher's Munich 1972 poster series (uploaded by Blanka)
Vernacular Typography Polaroids (by onpaperwings)
Otl Aicher is one of my favorite graphic designers, and his identity work for '72 Olympics in Munich is worth studying if you have any interest in how work like this is supposed to be done. I don't much about the Vernacular Typography Polaroids other than there are some great examples of hand-drawn type in there. Check out the book "Handjob" by Mike Perry for more (modern) examples. Lastly, a set of posters for Int'l Male, a nightclub act. Loved this bit from the description: "Images were sourced variously and used without permission. Posters were printed digitally and thrown away after the gig." Must be Swedish or something.
Tags: Design, flickr, poster
Posted in Design | No Comments »
Adidas: Sign for your Club
Wednesday, June 25th, 2008
I don't usually go for the big-brand all-flash pretty sites of the world, but this new one by Adidas is pretty amazing (although maybe I'm just swayed by the subject matter). You customize a shirt and then "autograph" it in flash, signing allegiance to your club. They'll even send you a cell phone wallpaper of your favorite player holding your shirt.
http://www.adidas.com/campaigns/signforyourclub/content/chelseafc/sfyc/
Tags: chelsea, flash, soccer
Posted in Design, Sports | 2 Comments »
Dave Franzese
Tuesday, June 24th, 2008
Dave Franzese is a designer/illustrator living in (you guessed it) Brooklyn NY. I saw this image while catching up on Kitsune Noir and knew I had to email him -- you may or may not remember but I made a food-type illustration a little while ago and the similarities, in general and even some specific examples (the use of steam, the burritos/cheese sticks, chicken legs), are remarkable. Obviously I didn't think I invented this, but it was weird to see another designer with almost the same idea/execution, completely independent of each other. Memory refresh:
I really like a lot of the execution in Dave's (that orange!) but I also think mine stands up ok. Dave responded to my email right away and this to say on the history of food type:
Food type has been around since the dawn of food. Stussy has a shirt out now that uses this same idea. As long as people are eating and communicating, there will be fans of food type.
Well put. Check out more of Dave's work at daveisdrawing.com
Tags: dave franzese, food, illustration, typography
Posted in Design | No Comments »
UEFA Euro logos
Wednesday, June 4th, 2008
Travis alerted me to these great logos used for many years by UEFA, the Union of European Football Associations, for their "Euro" football/soccer competitions (think World Cup but just for Europe, played in the off-years). I tried and tried but could not find any info on who designed them. Whoever it was did a great job, these were used for years with just slight changes (the flag represented whichever country was the host) every year. Some may question the legibility, but I had no trouble identifying it. Sometimes recognition is more important than preserving the sanctity of each letter.
A few years ago this logo was thrown out and currently a brand new logo is unveiled for every competition. This summer, Austria and Switzerland are co-hosting the games. Their logo is below.
This is a great example of what's wrong with logo design today and how far it's fallen, corresponding (I think) with the rise of computers and design software. Every surface is shiny, the type is uninspired, and that drop shadow -- it looks like someone's copy of Photoshop just threw up over the whole thing. The idea of using the Alps is fine, but the execution is weak. Why would an outline of mountains be beveled?
If you have any info on whoever designed the older logo, drop me a line.
Tags: Design, logo, soccer
Posted in Design | 3 Comments »
Hamish Muir
Wednesday, April 2nd, 2008
The poster above is a new print by British designer Hamish Muir. I met Hamish a couple years ago while studying abroad at the London College of Communication. We got along really well, initially because I mentioned Pavement while listing my favorite bands. Hamish was one third of famed 80's design trio 8vo, and more recently designed the rather gigantic Phaidon Atlas of Contemporary World Architecture.
You can purchase the print here.
via Swiss Legacy
Posted in Design | No Comments »