Webdesigninformer.com

Cameron Moll Go to the source

Digital Devices Deprive Brain of Needed Downtime : Matt Richtel, The New York Times: Even though people feel entertained, even relaxed, when they multitask while exercising, or pass a moment at the bus stop by catching a quick video clip, they might be taxing their brains, scientists say. ‘People think they’re refreshing themselves, but they’re fatiguing themselves,’ said Marc Berman, a University of Michigan neuroscientist. I hate to beat a dead horse, but for me, creative pausing continues to play an important role in maintaining mental acuity. … Read the rest here

Cameron Moll Go to the source

iPhone 4 GUI PSD (Retina Display) : Not sure how I missed this news (dated August 12). This is the Retina Display-ready update to the original iPhone GUI PSD by Teehan+Lax. The task was no small effort: It wasn’t a simple scale-up from the last file. It was clear as we created it that Apple has spent a lot of time considering how each element should be translated to such a dense resolution. What were single pixel elements are now two or three pixels thick and effects are exaggerated to become visible. For anyone designing for the retina display (640×960) it really is quite a different experience. … Read the rest here

Cameron Moll Go to the source

Is the New Virb for Me? : An excellent write-up by Virb design extraordinaire Ryan Sims. The new Virb , which launched Monday, focuses on building an elegantly simple website for $10/month. I actually appreciate that they’ve launched with no theme previews or sites featured . … Read the rest here

Cameron Moll Go to the source

Kiva High School : A new effort by Kiva that enables high school students to organize themselves in microfinance clubs with the intent of educating others. I’m a big believer in microfinance, and since March 2008, Authentic Jobs has funded 222 loans by donating 1% of its total monthly revenue. … Read the rest here

Cameron Moll Go to the source

Two sizes of dive slates, as displayed in my shower. I’ve written before about showering as an ideal model for creative pause —minimal distraction, mental freedom, and a change of scenery. What I haven’t written about is how to capture what comes of the pause. Inspiration is elusive and fleeting, and if it isn’t captured when it comes, it’s often gone for good. … Read the rest here

Cameron Moll Go to the source

The Cure for Creative Blocks? Leave Your Desk. : Jocelyn K. Glei, writing for The 99 Percent: Though we are more likely than ever to be tethered to others by our iPhones and Blackberries, it’s more important than ever to carve out periods of uninterrupted contemplation. To take our brains out of their scattershot Internet patterns and navigate a new city, take in nature on a long walk, sit quietly and read a book, or have a serendipitous conversation with a stranger. I’d refer to this as creative pause , and I agree with Jocelyn’s remarks about it being a necessary element in the flow of creativity. … Read the rest here

Cameron Moll Go to the source

dConstruct 2010 : Having spoken at this conference before, I can vouch for a quality conference put on by Clearleft each year. And the design of this year’s site? Stunning, fresh, and love the parallax effect as you widen/narrow your browser window. … Read the rest here

Cameron Moll Go to the source

Symphony of Steel : I finally framed this photo by Sara Flemming of the Frank Gehry-designed Walt Disney Concert Hall . “Stunning” doesn’t cut it, but that’s what it is—both photo and building. … Read the rest here

Cameron Moll Go to the source

In October 2009, the hashtag #lessconf began showing up repeatedly in my Twitter stream. The tweets were remarkably positive for something I’d heard nothing about previously. It turns out Steven Bristol and Allan Branch of Less Everything , the bright minds behind LessAccounting , were hosting a conference. Crush It! author Gary Vaynerchuk, Wufoo founder Kevin Hale and others spoke, and nearly 200 of you attended. This year’s LessConf 3010 resumes in Atlanta, Georgia, May 21–22… Read the rest here

Cameron Moll Go to the source

Dribbble , masterfully crafted by Dan Cederholm and Rich Thornett , went live over the weekend. I don’t recall all the details, but probably sometime in 2008, Dan Cederholm and I had a conversation about an app he was considering building. Fundamentally, the idea was to build a community loosely based on the same concept as the “ Screen Grab Confab ” posts on my site. (Remember those?) The concept was simple, embracing the brevity and utility of Twitter and adding to it visuals: Share a snippet of what you’re currently designing, but only a snippet. Let others reply. Dan asked if I had any issues with the idea… Read the rest here

Cameron Moll Go to the source

This year’s HOW Design Conference resumes in Denver, Colorado beginning June 9. Some of the brightest minds in the design industry, including Debbie Millman , Armin Vit , and Von Glitschka , will speak on topics that cover design inspiration, making the leap from print to web, copywriting, business plans, Photoshop tips, and much more. I’ll be giving a reprise of Good vs. Great Design. … Read the rest here

Cameron Moll Go to the source

ColosseoType.com, An All-HTML5 Endeavor : The site for the Colosseo poster is my first production-ready website with HTML5 under the hood. I’ve coded sites semantically with HTML5 class names before (see Jon Tan’s article ), but this is the first with legitimate HTML5 elements such as and in the markup. IE doesn’t yet recognize HTML5, so I’ve added Remy Sharp’s HTML5 shiv script , which forces IE to acknowledge the new elements. Granted, the Colosseo site is a one-pager, but hey, it’s a start. Update: It looks like Firefox 2.x doesn’t play well with HTML5, either. Here’s another article from Remy Sharp on getting Firefox 2 to recognize HTML5… Read the rest here

Hicksdesign Go to the source

Shared notebooks are one of the many selling points of Evernote. Being able to automatically share content easily (no manual upload), with additional benefit of an RSS feed is genius – it almost becomes a blogging platform. As well notebooks shared with individuals (such as moodboards for clients) I have two public notebooks: Design Scrapbook – where I keep any inspiration, be they images, PDF s or type samples. When clippings have come from webpages. the original URL is saved too. … Read the rest here

Hicksdesign Go to the source

Shared notebooks are one of the many selling points of Evernote. Being able to automatically share content easily (no manual upload), with additional benefit of an RSS feed is genius – it almost becomes a blogging platform. As well notebooks shared with individuals (such as moodboards for clients) I have two public notebooks: Design Scrapbook – where I keep any inspiration, be they images, PDF s or type samples. When clippings have come from webpages. the original URL is saved too. Cheese Diaries ) – where I take snaps of cheese labels to remember what I ate… Read the rest here

Snook Go to the source

It’s so easy to wallow in self-pity when things don’t go right. As much as 2009 sucked on all levels, it wasn’t all bad. As much as I want to sulk, the fact remains that I live a charmed life. Through some karmic luck of the draw, I’ve got a lot to be thankful for. Personal Projects This past year was a year of simplication and basically had me letting go of all my personal projects—at least for the time being. … Read the rest here

Snook Go to the source

It’s so easy to wallow in self-pity when things don’t go right. As much as 2009 sucked on all levels, it wasn’t all bad. As much as I want to sulk, the fact remains that I live a charmed life. Through some karmic luck of the draw, I’ve got a lot to be thankful for. Personal Projects This past year was a year of simplication and basically had me letting go of all my personal projects—at least for the time being. I shut down SidebarAds, I never worked on Snitter, and I never finished Haylia, FontSmack or any number of other personal projects that I wanted to work on… Read the rest here

Hicksdesign Go to the source

If you’ve got 4 minutes spare, treat yourself to this video of printmaker Paul Catherall explaining how he produced the beautiful linocut prints that were commissioned by Transport for London under the title “A new view of London”. An exhibition of his work is on display at the.gallery@oxo in London South bank’s until May 18, and the posters are available in the London Transport Museum Shop . Comment on this … Read the rest here

Cameron Moll Go to the source

Yesterday at noon I turned in my employee badge, laptop, and other employer-owned property. Goodbyes and K.I.T.’s were exchanged. A Snickers was indulged, just because. And with that, I concluded a chapter from the last three years of my life. Today I begin full-time employment as founder, principal, whatever of Cameron Moll LLC. This is a decision that has been quietly (and carefully) considered since November 2008… Read the rest here

Hicksdesign Go to the source

Discovery are a new project by members of Vampire Weekend and Ra Ra Riot. Vampire Weekend was my favourite album of 2008 – like a breath of fresh air to my collection – and this looks set to be a contender for 2009. Go see the Discovery site created by David Emery and his team of boffins. … Read the rest here

Cameron Moll Go to the source

Recently I made the switch back to HTML 4 for DOCTYPE s and px for font-size (sound like 1999 again?), and I’ve tweeted about it occasionally. I’m documenting the switch more thoroughly here. HTML 4.01 Strict I’ve chosen to go with HTML 4.01 Strict as the DOCTYPE in my projects moving forward, favoring it above XHTML 1.0 Strict and HTML 5. I’ll briefly explain my reasoning. XHTML 1.0 Strict – This is what many of us in the industry, including myself, have been using for the past few years… Read the rest here