Blog about graphic design, website design, branding, print design

Image taken on 07/01/2010 courtesy of NASA

We’re snowed in today, and on looking out of the window this morning I saw a snowball rolling itself across the field! The wind was so strong it was collecting snow and as it blew it along it was gaining size until it was over a foot across! PS That’s my arm holding the snowball!

Using no ink whatsoever, these 18″x24″ posters are foil stamped and embossed to create an alphabet composed of letters from many of the more famous (and some infamous) logos of all time. Printed in two different colorways, you have the choice of silver foil on black paper or gold foil on cream, both stocks are 100 lb. French Pop-Tone and are individually stamped, signed and numbered.

Available at The Best Part, Found Via Swiss Miss

Liu Bolin is a Chinese artist specializing in camouflaging himself to blend into urban landscapes.
His work is often political and the Chinese Government has gone as far as to close his studio in the past.

Found via Dornob

Photoshop is well known for being a bit of a beast and complete processor hog. There is a solution though – just a couple of settings in the preferences panel make ALL the difference. I tried it and now it flies :) Get the full details at: makephotoshopfaster.com

The nice people from Ikea just arrived! Mmmmmm flatpack goodness :)

Why is it designers are so into desks?

There are many popular web browsers in use today: Firefox, IE6, IE7, IE8, Google Chrome and Safari to mention the most popular. Many of which use different rendering engines (Webkit, Gecko, Trident) and these cause browsers to interpret HTML/CSS differently. This causes sites to appear differently, so it’s crucial to cross browser check every site build.

There are several really useful online app’s which help to do this without running all the browsers from one machine, or having to run several computers so I thought I’d share my favourites.

Browser Shots – A fantastic site which enables you to check all manor of possibilities with different browsers, platforms and technologies enabled or disabled.

Netrenderer – IE only, much simpler, but allows checking of IE versions and returns results in seconds as opposed to waiting longer for Browser Shots.

UPDATE:
Adobe BrowserLab – Covers all major browsers on Mac and Windows, it’s quicker than Browser Shots but I have on occasion noticed inconsistencies with the actual browsers results. This is my goto service for cross browser checking but if there’s any doubt it’s always best to cross reference with one of the alternative services.

Last week we made some major changes to the Attla Online Store opening the shipping to Europe, and adding dual currency to display prices in both £ and €. We also added translation for the major European languages utilizing Google Language Tools.

These changes, combined with targeted adverts in European magazines and grass roots promotion, look set to open up an entire new market for the store. It’s a very wise move as due to the current exchange rate, European customers are looking to the UK for better deals online. It’s a great example of a company turning the economic downturn in their favour – well done Attla!

Check it out here: Attla

I was just sent a link to this video and couldn’t keep it to myself!

Taken from ‘Ukraine’s got Talent‘ this is absolutely beautiful and has to be seen to be believed.

Photographer Jonathan Cherry has recently published a wonderful book of work titled ‘Blue Watch’ following the Falmouth Fire Fighters over a period of seven months. It gives an intimate and personal insight into life behind the heroic glamour.

Jonathan is gifted in picking out the subtle details which turn mundane scenes into something moving and insightful, capturing the essence of the moment.

It features an introduction by Wired UK writer Russell Davies, and a short story by Costa writer-in-residence Davey Spens.

Blue Watch is available to purchase at: www.amazon.co.uk and www.k-of-e.com/shop