Nov 11, 2008 Erik
If only we had this incredible little iPhone app (from Sonoma WireWorks) when we were in our formative garage band years, we would have surely all recorded hit records. It's a full-on 4-track studio, right on your iPhone. The GUI is amazing, and the sound quality (at 16-bit / 44.1k uncompressed) is actually quite passable.
Feeling limited by only having 4-tracks? Yeah, maybe you've never heard of bouncing tracks. Or a little album called Sgt. Peppers? Loser. 
Oct 23, 2008 Justin
Infographics are like the fruit smoothies of complex information easy to consume, packed with stuff that's good for you, and wrapped in pretty packaging. Okay, so that's a terrible analogy, but here at 3dB Creative we love both infographics and smoothies, so there.
As designers, we're always looking for clever and engaging ways of visually distilling large amounts of information. So today we'd like to send a shout-out to 19th-century French civil engineer Charles Joseph Minard. All those colorful and varyingly informative graphics found throughout Time and Newsweek owe a debt of gratitude to Minard, who is widely considered the father of modern infographics and the author of "the best statistical graphic ever drawn."
In his landmark piece Napoleon's March to Moscow Minard attempts to visually convey the almost unimaginable humanitarian disaster that was old Boney's failed 1812 invasion of Russia in which over three-quarters of a million soldiers died over the span of just 6 months. Geographic location and relative size of the army over time, status of the invasion (attack and retreat), temperature, and time scale are all simultaneously presented in one elegant graphic. It was without precedent when Minard drew it in 1869, and it set the standard for journalistic graphics for the next 140 years.
Other infographics we like are here and here.
Sep 12, 2008 Erik
Just look at this picture. A rack full of 1970s-era Marantz hi-fi equipment, with wood side panels, uber-cool blue backlights, big chunky knobs, and smooth tuning dials. For two decades, Marantz stereo gear was considered the "best of the best" hand-built in the USA right up until the mid 1970s.
Today, you can find lots of it for sale on ebay, starting at just over a hundred bucks. Dripping with warm analog sound and cool, timeless cosmetics, what better way to power your home stereo, office stereo or bedroom system? Go get some.
Jul 31, 2008 Erik
We don't know if this really qualifies as a "trend" or not, but we're seeing a growing number of design themes lately which can loosely be called "Space Tigers" or "Cats in Space."
At first, we just assumed this was the work of a single, obsessed, weirdo hippie. But now that we're seeing Space Tigers on hipster boutique t-shirts, a new Nike "Space Tiger" skate shoe, and a general proliferation of Space Tiger-like designs on the Internet, we wanted to make you aware of it.
Be on the lookout for album artwork, ad campaigns, or MySpace profiles with Space Tigers. We're not sure what it all means, but remember, you read it here first.
Jul 16, 2008 Erik
Sounding very close to his classic albums from the '70s (and even better than a few of them), Al Green's new record, "Lay it Down," captures one of our favorite soul artists in top form.
With smooth, retro-style production from The Roots' Questlove, and performances by Anthony Hamilton and John Legend, this record is a must-have for a smolderin' sexytime summer. Or for spinning on downtempo Friday afternoons at the office. Just go buy it here.
|
|
Jul 03, 2008 Erik
Somewhere around the year 2004, we thought every web development agency simultaneously realized that long Flash-based intros (aka "Splash Pages") on websites were just a bad idea.
There's lots of user interface research to support this -- namely, that websites should be all about usability, getting where you want, when you want to get there. Put simply, a long mandatory Flash intro just mucks this up.
However, we're still seeing the Splash Page's thinly disguised younger brother, the Flash "marquee" ad, appear on far too many sites. If this marquee ad is short, it's probably fine. But when it takes forever to load, doesn't say much, or requires you to add a "Skip" button, you should probably reconsider.
This link makes the point pretty clearly.
Jun 16, 2008 Justin
Don't get us wrong, there's nothing inherently evil about stock art, but have you ever seen anyone so happy to be doing business on their cell phone?
"Executives at Work" stock art is really the visual equivalent of elevator music it's intended to offend no one, when in fact it mildly offends everyone. Or at least us.
In any case, we can't think of a better way to dilute your marketing efforts than to drop some of these creepy droids into your next ad.
|
