Red Pill

Tron's famous light cycle scene goes analog

These days, remaking the famous Tron Light Cycle scene with a computer would be too easy. These guys decided to add some challenge by doing the same scene with stop motion video and cardboard, genius!

Tron
Uploaded by freres-hueon

Via - epicfu

Enough Junk Mail Already!

Every day when I get home from work I find a pile of mail on my desk that I dread going through. I no longer dive into my mail looking for bills, letters from friends or the occasional parking ticket because I know that the majority, possibly all, of what is in that pile is a bunch of crap. Paper waste. Junk mail.

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As a graphic designer, I am constantly aware and reminded of the amount of paper waste we produce on a daily basis. I do my best to reduce and recycle; PDFs whenever possible, use old prints for sketch paper, give the paper to a school for crafts, but the reality is that our field uses paper. A lot of paper, and the results of that use has a profound affect on our environment.

I believe in our work and I am not going to stop designing and swear off using paper forever, but I do feel that all of us designers have a responsibility to stop creating as much of this waste as we can to help with the grand task of saving our environment. A big problem that exists today is the amount of direct mail that is piling up in our landfills. These mass direct mailings are sent out in daily excess and mostly thrown away. Even though our company doesn't do mass mailings, I still feel guilty because somewhere out there a fellow designer is. I know “we” aren’t generally responsible for deciding who receives it, “we” are making a communication piece; but there is some shared responsibility. At the very least, we are enablers. Shouldn’t we do something about it?

It may sound like I'm intending to create a mass protest against these companies, but really I just think we need to stop the mail we consider junk from coming to our doors and making sure that these communication pieces are going out to the right audience who wants to receive them. To do this, it means getting our names off of those famous ”lists”. Easier said than done, but not impossible. With a little work there are ways to get your name and address off of those mailing lists and make a bit of progress towards better care of our environment. Right?

So, starting today I am on a quest to get my name off of those lists and stop getting so much junk mail. I am going to try a variety of approaches and test how well they work and how long it takes, and I will let you know how it goes. And if you have any tips or things that have worked for you. Please share them.

-Danielle

World Water Day

Today is Word Water Day which I was made aware on Good magazine's website. Here is a well designed and informative video they created for World Water Day 2008:

Since we are on the topic of water, back in July I took part in Project M down in Greensburo Alabama. The experience changed my life, and also changed many lives in Hale county, because they now have access to running water. So far $35,897.75 has been raised, our goal is $127,500. If you can, please help us reach our goal or just check out the website. These are some of my photos from the trip.

the Vega Lounge - Happy Hour - 3/27

Please join us on March 27th for our monthly Happy Hour for drinks, snacks and the occasional inspiring conversation.

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The new Swiss inspired poster is ready for download, let us know if we are missing your name.

Download high quality print (22mb)

"Big Dog"

From childhood we always thought robots where cool and some day way in the future it would be possible. Well this video makes all those dreams come back to life. Boston Dynamics a company based back East developed this " Big Dog," robot . This robot walks, runs and climbs on rough terrain while carrying heavy loads. Big dog is the size of a dog or small mule powered by a gasoline engine that drives a hydraulic actuation system. The computer controlling Big Dog has a wide variety of sensors that control the joint position, steering, navigation and regulates energetics as conditions vary. This bots achievements so far have been limited to carrying 120 lb load while climbing a 35 degree slope. As well as reaching a top speed of 3.3 mph. When first viewing this you might not be so surprised until the owner kicks the dog with a disturbing amount of force, well you be the judge. The engineering is unreal! You ponder what else this company has up its sleeves, possibly a little army of these buggers. Courtesy of Robert the intern

Future by Design - Jacque Fresco

90 year old Jacque Fresco, considered by many to be a modern day Da Vinci, is both a designer and inventor in a wide range of fields. His ideas and illustrations can be seen in science fiction literature and science publications all the way back to the mid 40’s. This is the trailer to his movie “Future by Design”. Besides the horrendous music, it is memorizing to see such vision. I can’t wait to see it!

The Society Of Rockets: Our Paths Related

If your into psycho-alternative-garagey-stoney-rock (and come on, who's not?) this albums for you. These guys pull from all over the spectrum. Think - Greenhorns, Radiohead and Wolfmother, mixed with heaping helping of MC5 and a dash of Chicago. This is a solid second album for this 10 piece band, one of my favorites this year. No live shows as of yet, the lead singer just became a new daddy..

Free download here, be sure to buy the full album.

Check out their site

Myspace

What do you think? Comments?

San Francisco, the "teal" city

On my way into our studio this morning I had the sudden realization that our City is being flooded with the color teal, It struck me that it’s everywhere these days. I was aware that a few of the newer buildings intruding on our city’s skyline were teal, but I guess I never really considered how widespread it was. What set me off was seeing our building this morning being defaced with brand new teal awnings, and the realization that when giving directions, from now on I’ll have to say, “look for the building with teal awnings”.

When did it start? When did we first decide teal was aesthetically appealing here in San Francisco? Was it when Apple first released the original iMac? Or maybe when the Asian Art museum opened in the old library filled to the brim with teal colored supports.

Regardless of when it began, the transition to that greenish-blueish hue is definetly in full swing. Look around, you can't miss it. Especially with the One Rincon Hill building staring at us from all corners of the city like a massive teal middle finger. Or the newly built Infinity and 300 Spear Street towers. My favorite though is the InterContinental building, it looks either like a giant Apple G3 computer, or an Art Deco teal tombstone.

San Francisco may be one of the “greenest” Cities in America but we may soon displace Miami as the “tealest”.

Can GM call themselves "Green"?

These days General Motors, Ford and Chrysler, are getting their asses handed to them by Japanese automakers, led by Toyota, who recently displaced GM in domestic auto sales. For the last ten years Detroit has been focusing on large SUVs' instead of more fuel efficient vehicles such as small Hybrids. Now Detroit automakers and GM find themselves playing catchup to the rest of the industry leading to layoffs, plant closings, and suppliers going belly up all while profits continue to drop.

GM is suddenly touting themselves as ”Green“ while their recent and historical records shows otherwise. They have been plastering ads for cars that don’t exist yet, creating campaigns based around existing or so-called “Green” technology. For instance, GM introduced the Chevy Volt at the Detroit International Auto Show this year. It’s basically an electric car with a small gasoline engine that charges the battery when it's running. This is an innovative concept, that if put into mass production and made accessable to most people could be a positive step forward, supposedly it can go up to 40 miles before the gasoline engine even needs to start up. The problem is that the Chevy Volt is just another concept non have been produced as of yet, and when they finally are they could very easily be impracticle. Remember the EV1, GM's electric car for the 90's? The car was crushed before it ever had a chance, thanks to Chevron and GM. As for the Volt, they are estimating a price of 30-40k! and production if it ever happens, will only be around 10,000 units. In comparison, Toyota produced 15,000 Prius models in their first year of production alone.

The simple fact is for the last 100 years or so GM has been one of the worst polluters on the planet and today are still are one of the worst. Their number one selling vehicle is the Chevy Silverado with 526,575 units sold in 2007 and it only gets an average of 19 hwy / 16 city. Just to put things in prospective, the original Ford Model T could get 25 mpg over 100 years ago, so much for advancement.

Let's hope that the general public will see through these ad campaigns, with the beautiful Chevy Volt prototype strategically placed in a corn field, under a dreamy blue sky, with the American flag waiving in the background. Let's also hope that they realize GM is doing this purely for profits and better PR in the attempt to catch Toyota.

Mr. W

You may have seen this already, If not, it's definitely worth a look.