A Hong Kong design student's poignant tribute to Apple founder Steve Jobs became an internet hit Thursday with its minimalist, touching symbolism and brought a job offer and a flood of commemorative merchandise using his design. Nineteen-year-old Jonathan Mak, a student at Hong Kong's Polytechnic University School of Design, came up with the idea of incorporating Steve Jobs' silhouette into the bite of the Apple logo, symbolizing both Jobs' departure and lingering presence at the core of the company. The design spread like wildfire in cyberspace, drawing hundreds of thousands of posts, and even commemorative caps and T-shirts peddled on eBay featuring his design. Credit: Reuters/Bobby Yip
The great divide between designers and developers is well documented. Designers complain when developers would rather backgrounds not have any images. Developers gripe when given a Photoshop document with missing fonts. If those were the only problems we face, we’d be thrilled. Unfortunately, not every studio is a breeding ground for pixel-crafting harmony. Sometimes designers work on one floor, developers on another. If you asked a good number of them, they’d say they were content with that arrangement. No wonder communication breakdowns are so frequent. The only brains we have to pick are those of our fellow designers or fellow developers, with little crossover it seems. Web designers have the unique ability to communicate through layout, shape, typography and, ultimately, simplicity. That same discipline must be exercised internally when sharing their artwork with colleagues — using, coincidentally, those same tools. As challenging as it may be, we can bring sophistication to our interfaces in Photoshop, so that our artwork achieves clarity through order. Just as our client has a target audience, we should also be considerate of the internal audience that uses our work. We’re nibbling at the edges of websites that deliver a happy marriage between remarkable aesthetic and solid function. Seeing some websites already achieving that is exciting. But to fill the Web with more of it, designers and developers will need to combine their skills in even more proficient and efficient ways.
Designer Mark Noad has created an updated London Underground map that tries to "square the circle" between geographical accuracy and visual simplicity -- and add additional usability updates like condensed typography that make the map easier to use on-screen as well as in print. "I’ve always taken the Tube Map for granted," Noad tells Co.Design, "but as a designer, I’ve listened with interest to friends from outside London and overseas saying how confusing they find it especially when trying to relate to London at street level. So I wondered what Beck would do asked to start again with the different parameters we have today." Beck's original map morphed London's unwieldy geography into neat shapes with only two angles: 90 degrees and 45 degrees. Noad's map adds 30- and 60-degree angles to the mix, which lets his map conform better to above-ground features. "I also commissioned a new condensed typeface which makes better use of the space, New Underground Condensed.
Whether you’re a kitchen novice or confident cook, you and two team mates could be cooking your way to our final, and be crowned Big City Chefs! Sign up today: Visit www.thelordmayorsappeal.org.uk/cook We are proud to be working on the Big City Cook campaign for Coram and RedRUK. Visuals coming soon.
During 2011(Nov 2010 to Nov 2011), Coram and RedR were beneficiary charities to The Lord Mayor’s Appeal. The Lord Mayor’s Appeal is a City of London fundraising appeal. An appeal theme was developed, called The Bear Necessities. The aim was to provide the Bear Necessities for a generation of children and young people in the City Fringes, in London and nationwide by supporting children’s charity Coram and across the world by supporting disaster relief charity RedR. Coram instructed Born Creative to create its marketing collateral, including brochure, postcards, event banners and LMA large format event stand. The purpose of the creative was to engage and motivate a city audience to get involved in and support the Bear Necessities appeal. In turn it also had to tell people what the appeal and Bear Necessities is about, what the appeal is raising money for, who the charities are, how and why readers should get involved. The campaign proved to be a success both by raising huge awareness and encouraging a higher rate of donations.