We proved it again at this years edition of Multi Mania, Geeks are fun!

Day I

Monday I whent to Kortrijk to get my first demo of CS5 for designers. So Ton Frederiks from Adobe gave us a nice overview of the most important new features of Illustrator, Indesign, Flash Catalyst and Photoshop.

(photo by marc-thiele)

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Perspective grid

As usual in a new Adobe release a lot of small handy improvements were made but What really got my attention was the perspective grid that you can use in Illustrator. You can see a demo of this new feature here at Adobe TV.

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Content-Aware Fill

Also very impressive is the new Content-Aware Fill tool in Photoshop. In a previous post about the release of CS4 I wrote about an amazing new features called Content-Aware scaling or ’seam carving’. Content-Aware Fill is a quite similar tool because it allows you to remove an image element, and replaces the missing pixels almost magically. This new tool matches lighting, tone, and noise so it looks like the deleted content never existed. The technology is also added to the healing brush. Here is a demo of this new feature at Adobe TV.

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From Indesign to Flash Player

An other remarkable change was made in Indesign.  We all know Indesign as an application that provides precise control over typography and design to create page layouts for print. In Indesign CS5 it is possible  to build interactive documents for playback in the Flash Player using a series of new panels. Here is an introduction to how that should work. Personally I’m a bit sceptic about these additional features. Webdesigners today don’t work with Indesign, so if you ask a print designer to make an interactive document it will not result in amazing top of the bill interactive creations. Adobe probably felt the buzz about online magazines (especially with the coming of the iPad) but forgets that print designers mostly don’t have the education or experience in a digital environment. So in my opinion not the best choice if you want your online magazine to stand out and exploit the opportunities of a digital medium.

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Day II

Yesterday was day II of Multi Mania 2010, hopes were high but the expectations were met!  we started off with a quick overview of Adobe CS5 and a kick-ass talk by Aron Balkan. Here are some memorable quotes of the speakers I went to see. I can only encourage you to check out there blogs and websites because they are all very interesting personality’s.

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Aral Balkan – The art of emotional design

“Worry about the user’s needs not yours, dont drive people crazy!”

(photo by vormplus)

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Geert Coppens – Animated Explanations: Viral educational content

“It’s all about attention!’

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Brendan Ciecko – Sex, Drugs, and Rock & Roll: One Pixel at at time

“Today I’m 22 years old and I founded my company ‘Ten Minutes Media‘ in 2003″

As a true entrepreneur Brendan started designing and developing music websites when he was only 11 years old. In a few years Brendan made sites for a variety of artists in the music industry like Katy Perry, Mick Jagger, Snoop dog, New Kids On The Block, Splash, David Guetta, Lenny Kravitz and many more. His company Ten Minutes Media is a absolute success serving clients like Warner Brothers, Capitol, SonyBMG, Clear Channel, …

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Christophe Rooms – CS5 for developers

Here is a demo of some new features in Flash CS5. It explains the Flash Text Engine, new Text Layout Panels, iPhone App Development, streamlined workflow with FXG support and the ability to import between the Flash tools, Photoshop and Illustrator.

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Branden Hall - HYPE: Combining creativity & code

“Creativity is not a talent it’s a skill!” & “Don’t forget to play, Play is practice.”

Branden is an amazing developer who frequently works with designer-rockstar Joshua Davis and try’s to keep his vision and his work fresh by constantly experimenting with his code. A good example of this philosophy is the HYPE framework a collaborative visual framework developed in FDT and AS3. At Multi Mania he showed us some examples of what the HYPE framework can do. Read more at http://www.hypeframework.org/blog/

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ADNERDS – Kicking ass in advertising land

“Technologie means noting if it doesn’t run on brainjuice”

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Little Miss Robot – Show some f°cking empathy!

“Try to put yourself in the shoes of your customer’s, co-workers, suppliers and community”

After showing us some amazing work like the domotica interface for Nico and opera live: Rigoletto & Gaetano Donizetti, the boys of Little miss Robot and there cute mascot tried to learn us an important lesson. Try to put yourself in the shoes of the client and the people around you, so don’t try to make something that only you like.

And they did than in a quite unusual way. They tried to engage the audience into a roll play in witch a client ‘Wimpy the pooh’ (who tries to sell toilet paper to a younger target group) and 3 volunteers from the audience (the creative studio + one senior jury member of cannes) had to improvise to solve problems the sector runs in to every day. It proved to be a serious challenge to get the timid Belgian people to participate but I’m sure everybody in the session was obligated to consider his or her roll in this very important discussion that is going on in our sector.

Today at Multi Mania 2010 someone told me that I’m nominated in the Cutest Female Geek Contest. I don’t know if this is a good thing but I think I know witch of colleagues enlisted me and I will take it as a compliment. Of course I’m never going to win but please vote for me and have a look at the other participants: http://www.adhese.com/cfgc/

It is so simpel!

(via: you might like this)

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A camel is a horse designed by a committee. — Sir Alec Issigonis

my kind a guy! (via webdesignerdepot.com)

WhereWeDesign is a showcase of your design environment:

http://wherewedesign.com/

hilarious comic of the week on webdesignerdepot.com

This particular table lists 100 of the most popular, influential and notorious typefaces today.

Tnx to Frederic for the tip.

(By Cam from Squidspot via behance)

In opdracht van © Markee & Het Salon

Visite the site

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I whish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! Enjoy 2010!

Back in to time with this hand (free?) kit. A cool gadget From YUBZ you to call in Retro style. Choose from lots of different models and illustrations.

Another nice spoof! This time from Logitech about MTV-Cribs. For all my Dutch or French blog readers, check out how Alex Agnew shows of his Crib in this movie:

Also take a look at the website, you can operate the electronic devices in the room all with the remote controls even the fireplace! Tip: try ‘make atmosphere’ with the harmony 1100. There is also a great game, you can win all the electronic devices you saw in the movie, even signed by Alex himself!

This just really calms me down! Just imagine yourself lying down on the couch and playing this on your big flat screen TV and surround sound system… just beautiful.

I totally dig this Looking glass tablet, an amazing web search concept (Winner of the Red dot design concept award 2009) by Mac Funamizu, web/graphic/industrial designer working in Tokyo, Japan. Of course he’s concept totally ignore all technical boundaries but I just love his contemporary design solution for today’s need to find information on the web. And have you noticed this is a great example of how we can optimally use augmented reality? Not just the little experiments with your webcam we all played with but actually a intelligent way of giving or reality an extra virtual reality layer with useful information. We already see company’s like Amazon pushing the eBook. And the Netbook just saved this year’s computer sales in a time of financial crisis. So there certainly is a right climate to support the R&D for this kind of products.

(image left: Looking glass concept  -  image right: German augmented reality advertisement for MINI)

So I’m pretty shore that the Apple tablet/ebook will look a lot like his looking glass, or at least I hope so! The Apple tablet has made serious Mac-buzz in the blogosphere for the last few months, so everybody is aguishly waiting for the official announcement of this new Mac product. I know I am, certainly if you see al the concept mok-ups that Mac freaks made while guessing about the design and functionality’s of the new Apple tablet. Here is a great post summering the 12 best apple tablet concepts circulating online today: http://www.toxel.com/…

More pictures of the Looking glass concept:

Echt een Toffe peer! Just think wat other kind of forms you could make with fruit!

(via)

We al know the classic porcelain sets, my mother and grandma have them and I was never a big fan of there kitsch flower decorations. But I have to change my mind because a design firm in Portugal Cabracega invited graffiti artists Hium, Mar, Mr, Dheo, Quillorama and Tosco to give the classic teapot a great graffiti motif. These two are my favourites but you can find more examples on there website. The pieces were shown at Experimenta Design Lisboa and will remain on view through October 9th at Espaco Zaum in Lisbon.

Check out these amazing illustrations by Rubens LP, he’s site and blog are definitly worth a visit!

Since 1 may 2009 Sheena Matheiken (New York) wares the same black little dress EVERY DAY! And see will do this one year long! The inspiration for her project was the fact that she went to a school were uniforms where mandate. She found it remarkable how kids always found ways to make their uniforms unique and personal by hiking up their pants or warring all kinds of accessories.

But of course if you want to ware one dress all year it has to be a very nifty design. Her friend and fashion designer Eliza Starbuck was the mastermind behind this multifunctional dress. It is made of breathable cotton that gets Sheena true the warm summers and makes it easy for layering when temperatures go down. The dress doesn’t have a front or backside she can ware it both ways or even as an open tunic.

By combining the dress with all possible accessories found on eBay, Etsy, local vintage boutiques, thrift stores and flea markets of New York she makes a new unique ensemble every day! Be sure to visit her website and check out all of her inspiring creations.

Her project an interesting fashion experiment but it is also a way to raise money for the Akanksha Foundation, this is a grassroots non-profit founded in Mumbai in 1990 through the volunteered efforts of college students devoted to bringing education to children living in the slums. So don’t forget to give a donation to support the good cause but also to encourage this kind of creative initiatives.

This is the basic dress and today’s ensemble:

On her website you can see every day of the past months or get a nice overview of per month:

Did you ever dream about a steamy hot bath with prince William? What ever your taste; Royals, Strippers or Democrats, the German design company Donkey Products spices up your tea party with these very creative tea bag sets.

(via www.ibelieveinadv.com)

Hello everyone,
Xantifee is back from a very wet but amazing trip to Scotland, I’ve explored the mighty highlands and many mysterious castles, counted the sheep on the Isle of Skye, relaxed in the lovely countryside and cheered at the highland games in Edinburgh. So now I just want to say ‘thanks’ to the many friendly Scottish people I’ve met, it was great!

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