19 February 09
In celebration of the much-anticipated film Watchmen, I’m going to dedicate a few posts over the next couple of weeks to the art and storytelling -form of comic books.
Unless you’re a comic book reader you’re probably wondering why there’s so much hype around this film. Simply put, when this comic book was originally published in 1986-1987 it transformed the medium and began the long road to transforming the public’s perception of the medium.
Up until then comic books where largely looked at as cartoons about men in tights. Watchmen deconstructed the superhero paradigm, added mature themes, and leveraged the medium to tell its story in a way that no other could. It garnered praise both in and out of the industry, and is the only graphic novel to be recognized by Time in their list of “the 100 best English-Language novels from 1923 to the present”. Watchmen was the first comic book to elevate the medium to literature.
The term “graphic novel” is also worth a mention. The twelve-issue series was collected and reprinted and marketed as a graphic novel. This brought comic books out of the comic book stores and magazine racks onto the shelves of book stores and libraries. Gaining visibility to new audiences.
If you’re interested a more in-depth look at the significance of Watchmen can be found here. But really the proof is in the pudding, go out and pick up a copy and see for yourself.
18 February 09
Bittbox has aggregated 17 Flickr groups that collect type and design specimens.
17 February 09
Last week Microsoft announced that they will be launching a retail store experience. This move is no doubt drawing comparisons to Apple’s successful efforts in this area. Nobody, including myself, can venture to guess what this experience might look like. With its tightly controlled marriage of hardware and software Apple has a complete package. Microsoft doesn’t.
Not to worry! Microsoft has brought on David Porter (pictured), a 25 year Wal*Mart veteran to head up creating this retail experience. Um ... what?
These guys really should have paired this announcement with more information on the (hopefully) innovative partner that they’ve chosen to design these stores ... say IDEO or Rem Koolhaas.
For some reason “cool” never sticks to Microsoft. I’ve tinkered around with a Zune in a store and think it’s pretty cool — but have never seen one in the wild. The XBox was successful in gaining market share over Sony’s PS3 — but I don’t think that the Microsoft brand has really gotten the halo effect (no pun intended).
Who knows, maybe we’ll all be surprised just like we were when we saw Surface. I won’t be holding my breath though.
13 February 09
Dubberly Design Office has compiled into a free PDF over 100 design processes from various disciplines including industrial design, software development, architecture, interactive design, and more. Unless you’re a process weenie there’s a lot in here that you’ll gloss over. But seeing IDEO’s and Doblin’s process is pretty cool. As well as the side-by-side comparisons from several interactive agencies. It’s always good to get out of the echo chamber and see how others approach design challenges.
Source @stephenanderson
12 February 09
I was recently invited to a event on the future of digital experiences. The invitation touted that presentations would be given in a fast paced and creative style dubbed Pecha Kucha. I unfortunately did not get the chance to attend, but did do a little Google search on this mysterious technique. The presenter has a little less than seven minutes to go through twenty slides at twenty seconds each. Clearly this isn’t an across-the-boards replacement to all occasions to present, but it certainly has a place and forces the presenter to get to the point and more importantly entertain the audience.
Check out this short article from Wired to learn of its origins, and the fun video demonstration above.