News

Check out this collection of 50 well designed logos from StockLogos.com in various style and themes.

E. chromi is a collaboration between designers and scientists in the new field of synthetic biology. In 2009, seven Cambridge University undergraduates spent the summer genetically engineering bacteria to secrete a variety of coloured pigments, visible to the naked eye. They designed standardised sequences of DNA, known as BioBricks, and inserted them into E. coli bacteria.

Each BioBrick part contains genes selected from existing organisms spanning the living kingdoms, enabling the bacteria to produce a colour: red, yellow, green, blue, brown or violet. By combining these with other BioBricks, bacteria could be programmed to do useful things, such as indicate whether drinking water is safe by turning red if they sense a toxin. E. chromi won the Grand Prize at the 2009 International Genetically Engineered Machine Competition (iGEM).

Designers Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg and James King worked with the team to explore the potential of this new technology, while it was being developed in the lab. They designed a timeline proposing ways that a foundational technology such as E. chromi could develop over the next century. These scenarios include food additives, patenting issues, personalised medicine, terrorism and new types of weather. Not necessarily desirable, they explore the different agendas that could shape the use of E. chromi and in turn, our everyday lives. This collaboration has meant that E. chromi is a technology that has been designed at both the genetic and the human scale, setting a precedent for future collaborations between designers and scientists.

Credits:
Design: Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg & James King
Animation - Cath Elliot (Little Giant Pictures)
Music - Matthew Irvine Brown
Illustration - Alice Hoult

“Why do we need three shawl cardigans?” J. Crew president Mickey Drexler asks a stylish gaggle of his buyers. He doesn’t pause for a response. “We don’t!” Put on your colorblock stripe scoopneck tee and old faithful-wash jeans, UnBeige readers, because America’s favorite hands-on merchant and his latest retail success story are the subject of a documentary that premieres tonight at 10 p.m. on CNBC. Reported by David Faber (get that man a Ludlow suit!), J.Crew and the Man Who Dressed America unbuttons the piped wool hacking jacket to peek inside the retailer, whose revenues rocketed by 170%—to $1.9 billion in 2011—since Drexler took the helm in 2003. Even longtime Drexler followers and die-hard J. Crew fans are likely to learn something in segments that follow the months-long process of conceiving, creating, and marketing a new line of clothing. Did you know, for example, that the production of the J. Crew catalog requires 120 shooting days a year? Or that the Garden City, New York store is something of a laboratory, where window displays and merchandising are perfected—and where new stuff hits racks first? And we like any CNBC program in which a Gerhard Richter book makes a cameo among the cashmere (look sharp toward the end of the first clip below). Meanwhile, we’d love to see Drexler’s motivational mantra on a tissue tee: “Cut back, sell out, and be very happy!”

continued…

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

First produced for hockey players in 1999, Bionic is a line of specialty performance gloves for sports like golf, baseball, fitness (weightlifting), tennis, racquetball, equestrian events and others, as well as a very popular line of gardening gloves. The gloves are the invention of orthopedic hand surgeon James Kleinert for sports equipment manufacturing company Hillerich & Bradsby, which more famously produces the Louisville Slugger bats. In March, Bionic introduced a new logo designed by New York, NY-based CBX. Armin http://www.underconsideration.com

Hedge fun. The logo topiary at the Party in the Garden, hosted by the Museum of Modern Art.

• A new Diane Arbus biography? A new Diane Arbus biography! Journalist Arthur Lubow has inked a deal with Ecco to publish A Secret About a Secret: The Life of Diane Arbus. Word on the street (and by “the street,” we mean the deal report at Publishers Marketplace) is that the book “reveals the extraordinary facts of her life and explores the way she used her gift for intimacy to probe complex ideas about identity in a manner revolutionary to both her art and her time.” Tide yourself over by reading “Arbus Reconsidered,” Lubow’s 2003 piece in The New York Times Magazine, which ignites with the dynamite lead “‘Giving a camera to Diane Arbus is like giving a hand grenade to a baby,’ Norman Mailer said after seeing how she had captured him, leaning back in a velvet armchair with his legs splayed cockily.”

• And speaking of colorful characters (monumental lips! glittering eyes!), the Cyclops Trannies are back. The colorful paint-marker portraits by assume vivid astro focus, exhibited earlier this year at New York gallery the Suzanne Geiss Company, are now available in book form. This evening (6-8 p.m.), Printed Matter hosts a reception and signing with the artists. Stop by the store by May 31 to see two editioned neon works from avaf in the window. Next up, in June, is a window installation by book artist David Sandlin.

• Commencement season is in full swing, and the New York School of Interior Design celebrated its 175 graduates with the help of Amy Lau. The interior designer was the keynote speaker at Friday’s NYSID commencement ceremonies, where she received an honorary doctorate in fine arts along with Martha Stewart, Architectural Digest editor-in-chief Margaret Russell, and interior designer John Saladino.
continued…

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

The one-day event is designed to help attendees leverage the possibilities of curated commerce and consumption....

While the focus of each release of Creative Suite is justifiably on the functionality of its constituent applications, behind the scenes is a significant design initiative. In fact, it takes more than a year to generate such related branding assets as product splash screens and icons for each release. With the growth of the suites over the years, it should come as no surprise that there are an increasingly large number of related assets to create. But it's still something of a shock to learn that the number of these now amounts to more than 5,000. A recent post on the Adobe Brand Experience blog, maintained by the firms's experience design organization, provided some background on what went into such a large design project to meet the requirements of the CS6 release.

From an experience standpoint, there were several goals. First, to return to the more expressive nature of pre-CS Adobe products, while not losing the desirable aspects of recent iterations, such as the work done for CS by Ryan Hicks. It was also a priority to exploit the parameters and limitations of interactions with the operating system. While the curious folded-plane icons of CS5 were apparently a reaction to the splash screens, it was deemed time for CS6 to return to the simplicity of the square. The two-letters-on-a-square icon treatment begun with CS3 was also deemed to be due for a refresh. Finally, the somewhat intangible goal of creating a "more cohesive connection to marketing imagery/packaging" was identified.

Were all these initiatives successful? The jury is still out and, as with previous CS releases, users are feeling free to provide their take on what they like and don't like about the new design direction of CS6. The main question is: does it work for you? Below are a few examples.

A small amount of transparency has been added to the tiles, most notable in the dock and in the app switcher.

An effort has been made to arrange the CS6 icons around a color wheel, in which equal distribution and a shared level of brightness and contrast is evident.

The splash screen for Illustrator CS6 is decidedly "vectorish," with a touch of transparency.

The Illustrator 10 splash screen: the all-time winner or are we just being nostalgic?

The file icons received a "flattening out" treatment.

It's well worth reading the entire post on the Adobe Blogs site.

Time flies when you’re having fun with photos. It was almost four years ago that Hellman & Friedman acquired Getty Images—the world’s largest distributor of stock photos, video, and other digital content—in a take-private deal valued at $2.4 billion. Since the deal closed in July 2008, Getty Images has expanded its photographer grant program, partnered with Flickr on an imagery collection, launched a site devoted to stock photo rights, and tussled in court with a maker of car air fresheners. The company has also paid out a whopping $875 million in dividends, and now its private equity fund owner is fixin’ to cash out. According to a report in the Financial Times, Hellman & Friedman has retained bankers to examine a possible sale or public offering of Getty Images, with multiple sources valuing a sale or IPO at as much as $4 billion. News of a potential Getty sale comes days after KKR ponied up $150 million for a 50% stake in stock photography manager Fotolia, and Shutterstock filed for an IPO that could raise up to $115 million.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Speakers, details, registration, and more is all now live for the 2012 Brand New Conference. A few things: 1) Early-bird pricing will only be available for one month, ending on June 29, 2) this is a small-ish venue, just under 500, and it fills up fast; between speakers and sponsor-reserved tickets there is already 56 seats taken, and 3) you can read all about the crazy "Brand Debris Quilt" identity here. Hope to see many of you there. Armin http://www.underconsideration.com

This week, the New York Post is hiring a feature designer, while Desert Publications is on the hunt for a creative director. Discovery Communications needs an art director, and PopCap Games is seeking a UI lead. Get the scoop on these openings and more below, and find additional just-posted gigs on mediabistro.com.

Feature Designer New York Post (New York, NY) Creative Director Desert Publications (Palm Springs, CA) Art Director Discovery Communications (Silver Spring, MD) UI Lead PopCap Games (San Francisco, CA) Art Director TMG (Washington, DC)

For more job listings, go to the Mediabistro job board, and to post a job, visit our employer page. For real-time openings and employment news, follow @MBJobPost.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Less than a month after Dieter Rams‘ eightieth birthday, Pentagram will hit the big 4-0. (Coincidence? You be the judge.) To celebrate four decades of eye-popping work, Naresh Ramchandani and Tom Edmonds in the London office whipped up “The Forty Story” (below). The film tells the story of a boy born on the day Pentagram opened—June 12, 1972—and how his life has been tracked (and kerned) by four decades of Pentagram design. Here’s to forty more years.

continued…

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

“[As a kid], I wanted to be an architect. I don’t even know where I got that idea from. I think I was told ‘you should be an architect’ somewhere early on, and I just latched onto it. My idea of being an architect was envisioning variations of what my room could be, split-level secret chambers, transportation in and out, that sort of stuff. I guess that’s why I enjoy getting to build these fantasy locations.

My house in New York is pretty spare; it’s sort of organized, but it is very simple. I do have some old telephones, but they are touch-tone. Everything else I use is all Apple. In a movie, if someone is going to listen to music, nine times out of ten I have them put on a record, which I myself never do. It looks so much nicer to me, to see this thing spinning and put a needle on it. It is what I grew up with, but it is also just a more beautiful object and it does something, you know – it spins. At the same time that is a little bit like fetishising this stuff. I met this guy in Italy who wanted to take me to this place where he has his collection of reel-to-reel tape recorders, because he thought I was obsessed with them. Well, I’m not obsessed. I don’t own a reel-to-reel tape recorder, but it does look nice when it spins and you film it.”

-Filmmaker Wes Anderson, in an interview with Tim Noakes for Dazed & Confused. Anderson’s latest film, Moonrise Kingdom, is in theaters Friday. Click below to watch the trailer.
continued…

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Established in 1803, PZU is is one of the largest financial institutions in Poland and Eastern Europe, offering property and casualty insurance, life insurance, and open-end pension funds. It is also one of the most recognized brands in Poland, with more than 500 retail offices. Earlier this month, PZU introduced a new identity, designed by Warsaw-based PZL — although Whitecat Studios also has some work — and a new campaign with the tagline "We are changing for good" featuring a generously eyebrowed character by the name of Moloch, who represents all the old, negative stereotypes of the company. Armin http://www.underconsideration.com

Dueling bathing beauties: Boo George traveled to Oslo to photograph Norway’s “It” couple, Iselin Steiro and Anders Danielson, for the cover of T: The New York Times Style Magazine. At left, George Hoyningen-Huene’s 1930 photograph “The Divers, Paris.”

• Got Polaroids? The Foundation for the Exhibition of Photography, in connection with MIT and London-based publisher Thames & Hudson, is at work on a major project on Polaroid photography. Slated to open at MIT in late 2015 and then travel internationally, the show will cover Polaroid-related art, science, and technology. “This is a call for submissions,” William A. Ewing, who is curating the art aspects of the project with Barbara Hitchcock, told The Art Newspaper recently. “It demands the best of the best material. This is not a community project, we want the stuff that can hold its own against the art of the period—and it was a long period, from 1950 to 1990.” Deborah Douglas and Gary Van Zante are in charge of the project’s science and technology aspects.

• Five finalists have been selected for the Urban Land Institute‘s Urban Open Space Award, a competition that recognizes “an outstanding example of a well-used public open space that has spurred regeneration and the transformation of its surrounding community.” Two NYC projects—the High Line and Pier 25 at Tribeca Section in Hudson River Park—made the final five, along with Railroad Park (Birmingham, Alabama), RiverWalk Urban Waterfront Calgary, Alberta), and Tanner Springs Park (Portland, Oregon). The winner, to be announced in October, will receive a $10,000 cash prize, and if we know this group, they’ll blow it all on bulbs and shrubs.

• Author and graphic novelist Neil Gaiman delivered the commencement address and picked up an honorary doctorate of fine arts at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia. Among his advice for the graduates: make mistakes. “If you’re making mistakes, it means you’re out there doing something,” said Gaiman last Thursday. “And the mistakes in themselves can be useful. I once misspelled Caroline, in a letter, transposing the A and the O, and I thought, ‘Coraline looks like a real name…’” Watch the full speech (his first-ever university commencement address) here.

• Event designer extraordinaire David Stark has taken to the web in his search for a star intern. He has partnered with Apartment Therapy on its “Design is not Taught” contest. In addition to a three-month internship with David Stark Design and Production, the winner will have the opportunity chance to work with Stark one-on-one to edit and curate his or her portfolio. The intern’s final project? To single-handedly design Apartment Therapy’s holiday party. Click here for details.
continued…

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Buy design. Goods for sale at the new online home of the Shop at Cooper-Hewittt.

Whether you’re in the market for a hollowed-out half dollar, a megaphone-shaped iPhone speaker, a “living necklace,” a magazine designed to double as stunning wrapping paper, or a silicone-filled ostrich egg (Father’s Day gift alert!), the new Shop at Cooper-Hewitt has something for you. With its physical home in the throes of a $64 million renovation, the Smithsonian’s Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum is expanding into new realms, from Governor’s Island (where on Saturday, it will open the highly anticipated “Graphic Design—Now in Production” exhibition) to cyberspace. It’s the digital realm where the museum has relaunched its famously well-curated shop, overseen by newly appointed director of retail Robert Nachman. The Cooper-Hewitt tapped Marque Creative to design the new site, which features seamless checkout, integrated member discounting, and enhanced search capabilities. “A true design destination for online consumers, the Shop offers a selection of works by established and emerging designers that will surprise, delight, and inspire,” said associate director Caroline Baumann in a statement announcing the relaunch. Plus, shop purchases are sales-tax exempt and all proceeds go to support the museum’s educational goals and mission—as if you needed more reasons to splurge on a hand-beaded Hella Jongerius bowl.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

Sure, Microsoft's Kinect is pretty cool but Leap Motion seems set to leapfrog its capabilities for remotely controlling computers with the release of the Leap device. The Leap hardware is about the size of a large flash drive. Just plug it into the USB port of a Mac or Windows system, install the device software, wave a few times for calibration and it would seem you are good to go. But go where, exactly?

The idea is that you can use natural finger and hand movements, or a stylus, to make use of an "interaction space" of 8 cubic feet around your computer to perform system commands or control applications. The inspiration behind Leap apparently came from the frustration of the developers with 3D modeling software but it's said to be appropriate for controlling a wide variety of applications. In a clear knock at Kinect, we're told that Leap is "200 times more sensitive than existing touch-free products and technologies" and can track movements as closely as 1/100th of a millimeter. Also noteworthy is the ability to define your own gestures.

And how much will this wonder of the ages set you back? How does $69.95 sound? A limited number of pre-orders are currently being accepted on the Leap Motion site.

The latest version of Lemke Software's graphics utility has been rewritten to take full advantage of current 64-bit Mac systems....

Launched in 1954, Telemundo, a division of NBCUniversal, is a Spanish-language media company revolving around its television network that features "original productions, theatrical motion pictures, news, and sports events, reaching U.S. Hispanic viewers in 210 markets through its 14 owned stations and its broadcast and cable affiliates." At the upfronts this month, among announcements of more new original telenovelas than you can count unbuttoned men shirts, Telemundo introduced a new logo that will be implemented starting in Fall with the launch of the new TV season. No design credit given. Armin http://www.underconsideration.com

“Ladies and gentlemen, design is a popular subject today. No wonder, because in the face of increasing competition, design is often the only product differentiation that is truly discernible to the buyer.” That this sentiment came from Dieter Rams comes as no surprise. What’s striking is the date of his remarks, delivered to an audience at Jack Lenor Larsen‘s New York showroom in December 1976. He ended on a cautionary note: “I imagine our current situation will cause future generations to shudder at the thoughtlessness in the way in which we today fill our homes, our cities, and our landscape with a chaos of assorted junk,” said Rams. “What a fatalistic apathy we have towards the effect of such things. What atrocities we have to tolerate. Yet we are only half aware of them.” The full transcript of this disturbingly prescient speech is now available online thanks to Vitsœ, for whom Rams designed the eminently modular 606 Universal Shelving System in 1960. The big occasion is the legendary designer’s birthday: he was born 80 years ago today in Wiesbaden, Germany. Celebrate by treating yourself to Sophie Lovell‘s masterful monograph Dieter Rams: As Little Design As Possible (published last year by Phaidon) or a gorgeous poster of Rams’ famous “Ten Principles for Good Design,” available exclusively from Fab.com.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

With its Nick at Nite orgins, TV Land has long been associated with classic sitcoms such as Bewitched, Mister Ed, and the infectious, toe-tapping opening credits of My Three Sons. The network’s stylized logo (at left), evoking the technicolor geo-whimsy of the zippy 1950s, was a perfect fit for that programming, but when the TV Land line-up evolved to include more modern syndicated shows (Everybody Loves Raymond, Boston Legal) and orginal programming devoid of nuclear families and happy homemaker-witches in prim dresses (Hot in Cleveland, The Exes), its branding remained tied to the atomic age. Enter Trollbäck + Company, which in its latest branding project for the network has undertaken the first logo reinvention in the 16-year history of TV Land. “Given our familiarity with the brand, we knew that the logo was due for an overhaul to shake off some old perceptions,” says executive creative director Jacob Trollbäck, whose New York-based firm has tweaked the network’s branding in three previous projects. The new look is rolling out this month, with a modern edge, bold colors, and a fresh tagline (“Laugh More”). “The new horizontal logo locks up with type neatly,” notes T+Co creative director Anna Minkkinen, “allowing us to constantly reinforce the brand connection between the network and the shows.” Check out a montage that features the new branding here.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.