Still waiting for the day we can create digitally with our minds and hands as if conducting a design orchestra. The brilliance at the MIT Media Lab continues to pave the way. Very cool!
The Blog
Kinect + Computer Vision + Javascript = Future
How to Select the Best Imagery for Your Projects
I recently outlined thoughts/direction on how to select stock photography for a project I’m working on. I thought these thoughts could come in handy for others looking for a good foundation for selecting stock photography (or critiquing it).
First off and obviously the most important thing to consider: the context of the image needs to tell the story that you want to tell. Make sure you fully understand the story before you get too far down the visual path. The second most important thing is make sure the image doesn’t look staged. Check the eyes, smile, body language, etc., and try to think about the people in the images. Are they really in the moment? After you’ve figured this out, go on to the following:
What to avoid visually:
- Things that grow out of people’s heads… or chest, a foot, or just about anywhere.
- Distracting clutter.
- Too many points of interest.
- Lines that don’t fit with the rest of the image.
- Bad/weird facial expressions.
- Objects creeping in from the edges.
- Accidental fuzziness.
- Smiling lips combined with eyes without emotion: general fake-ness.
Assessing the image:
Once you think you’ve found what you’re looking for, take a step back and look at the image, then close your eyes and imagine it in a magazine and/or layout. Does it work? How does it feel? Next, look at:
Color/tonal range: make sure the photos feel like they’re from the same family. You may need to break out Photoshop to make this happen.
Last thing: Take your time and try to enjoy image hunting. Slowing down helps a lot too.
Additional Resources
- How to Choose Your Best Photo in a Series – Every Time
- Guide To Critiquing Photographs
- Top 10 Most Annoying Photo Critique Comments
If you have any thoughts or ideas to add on how you find the right image, please leave it in a comment below.
Is Small the New Big? Is the New Big Now the Long?
You decide.
More excellent thinking on the subject can be found on the Creative Social Blog. Thank you @stuartfoster.
How Would You Define a Moment?
Moments: An incredibly moving, inspiring video from Everynone (one of my new favorites on Vimeo) showing both the beauty and simplicity of life. Well worth the 5 or so minutes of your time. Trust me on this one.
Regional Landing Pages: How to Make the Norm Interesting
The landing page of Citroen.com has a nice, unexpected and playful interaction instead of a standard “I don’t really want to design that or I forgot all about it” approach for a select a region/language landing page. Although the idea of images used in a somewhat standard “continents” approach is close to the norm, the use and speed of animation combined with what looks like meaningful *user-generated photos representing various regions of the world is not.
The only thing I’m not a fan of is having to wait through a loader in order to actually use this page. Still, it’s a welcomed approach for a page that at most times can be both boring and bothersome. Kudos to Citroen.
*I am assuming these images are user-generated – I could be wrong.
Be More Creative: Make Each Project Your Best Project
Yuck. So you have to crop, resize, and color correct a ton of images today instead of starting on a new site design, or better yet, coming up with your next big idea? Instead of putting a more mundane task off for the easy out of Facebook, email, or IM, do this instead: jump in, give it your all, take your time, and most importantly embrace it. It’s too easy to get down on yourself.
When I get in a rut, I think about how fortunate I am being a designer. I work in a t-shirt and jeans. I listen to great music… and I get to hang around other creative people. Who else gets paid to do that? That in turn makes me happy, and happiness breeds creativity (at least it does for me). It’s truly a win-win situation.
If you make each project your best project, you will be more creative.
Sometimes it’s as simple as that.
If you liked this post, you can find some additional ideas below:
- Be More Creative: Find the Essence
- Be More Creative: Sketch it Out
- Be More Creative: Work Quickly, Take a Break
- Be More Creative: Help or Hinder?
So what are some things you do that make you more creative? Or get you out of a creative rut? Let me know!
Words by Everynone
An inspiring short film that explores the world of wordplay. Produced by Everynone to promote NY public radio. A perfect way to spend some of your Friday.
The Twitter Mood Story
This video shows the pulse of the Twitter nation in relation to mood (a small percentage of the actual nation), but I thought it was interesting none-the-less. A few random thoughts:
- I’m from Minnesota, and I always thought Minnesotans were considered nice. Are the twitterers showing their true colors via Twitter?
- Are the Twitterers from North Dakota and Iowa alway pissed off?
- How much does weather play into happiness… is that why Twitterers in California always seem happy?
See more interesting nuggets on the U.S. mood throughout the day from Twitter.
Augmented Reality Gaming with Brands, Location and More
Check out the Conspiracy For Good AR game above.
From Augmented Planet:
…players pit their wits against a corrupt company, using their Nokia device players can take on assignments in their city to help bring the company down. Rather than being a simple game where you wonder aimlessly to the end of the road and back, participants need to follow clues on the games website. These clues will require the player to travel to locations and point at objects and images in the real-world using the devices camera to discover the next clue.
The video makes me think about sharing moments with others by surprise. Say someone buys a gift card for a friend at an unnamed store. Upon purchase, the person who you bought the gift card for receives a text message saying that they’ve received a gift card – one that they’d be able to use if they could find the location of the store where the gift card was purchased. Hopefully the gift card would be for a store (or restaurant, etc.) that that particular person frequents. Once your friend entered the store their mobile would send the “brand jingle” then receive the gift card. Call it a 21st century scavenger hunt. You’d have to be nice and probably have the gift card be time sensitive (e.g., okay you haven’t found it so here’s the store), but the thought of adding game-play to a buying experience seems like it could be a lot of fun.
This could branch out to many other interesting (and fun) things. How about a location-based AR trivia game for the Freedom Trail in Boston? Or another form of coupon hide and seek?
AR continues to fascinate me and I’m truly looking forward to what the future of this technology brings.
via Augmented Planet
How to Plan the Ultimate Startup
Work hard, be optimistic, and don’t let failure keep you down.
An interesting and fun info-graphic that shows what it’s like to work with HackFwd (an investment group in Europe). The gist of it: work hard, be optimistic, and don’t let failure get (or keep) you down. Some things I agree with and like:
- The universal answer is indeed 42 (I can’t tell you how many times I’ve set my opacity in Photoshop to 42% and it ended up working)
- A lot of the ideas/thoughts in gray text are the real deal
- Be passionate
- Be optimistic
- Work hard
- Buy a hover board
This will definitely be taped up in my innovation lab (e.g., basement/kid’s playroom).
via FlowingData
