household name : : : blog

Why Macs Will Always Be Buggy

I'm sure the Mac designers where smiling when they sold this as a screensaver option.

Thanks to my Dad for this observation.

Avedon's Retouching Secrets

Avedon's notes to his printer are a great insight to his meticulous nature.

Photography is like writing: it's all in the editing.

Talent You Should Know : Emma Hack

We've all seen body painting before, but the work of Australian artist Emma Hack has a rare style and sensibility.

Blending into the wallpaper at parties never looked so cool.

Person Emma Hack

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Shoes With Toes

Can't decide where exactly Vibram's waterproof 'foot gloves' fall on the cool/creepy scale, but they'll definitely start a conversation on the beach.

More Is Less : Bill Vs. Arnie

I know which cover I prefer.

London Underground Logo

The creator of this ageless logo is sadly unknown, but one can imagine him or her toiling over a set square and compass to produce  this glorious design.

The roundel––in earlier years known as the 'bulls-eye' or 'target'--was first used in the 19th-century as the symbol of the London General Omnibus Company: a wheel with a bar across the center bearing the word 'General.'

Its usage on the Underground stems from the decision in 1908 to find a more obvious way of highlighting station names on platforms. The red circle with blue name bar was quickly adopted with the word "Underground" across the bar.

Mind the gap!

Why Film Is Dead

 

Witness the 35mm-killer from Red One.

Weighing in at just 10 lbs and matched with a 35mm lens it allows you to take advantage of the world’s finest optics. Modular and upgradeable, the Red is "a future-proof acquisition system you can build upon."

That, and it looks sexy as hell.


Red Cameras

Arpanet Logical Map

If you look closely you'll see how the Pentagon (bottom right) connected to the nation's universities (Stamford middle left).

That browser you're reading this post on began here.

Obama Potshot

Question: Does the BWA Gallery in Wroclaw, Poland, get away with posting this image because they're allowed to call it art?

The Way We Were

You've come a long way baby.

Peg 'O The Day : Tulip Fields

Nature's Mondrian is in, as you probably guessed, the Netherlands.

AIGA Design Archives

The American Institute of Graphic Arts has very kindly collated thousands of classic designs on its archive page.

If you can't find a digital version here, it probably doesn't exist.

Design Archives

 

How Social Networking Happens

Where peacocking and voyeurism meet.

Talent You Should Know : Kent Rogowski

Kent Regowski takes ordinary teddy bears, turns them inside out, and restuffs them.

Each animal's appearance is determined by the necessities of the manufacturing process.

***Gallery-speak alert***

"They are at once hideous yet cuddly, disturbing yet endearing, absurd yet adorable, while offering a metaphor for us all to consider. These bears, which have lived and loved and lost as much as their owners, have suffered and endured through it all. It is by virtue of revealing their inner core might we better understand our own."

More Bears

Peg 'O The Day : Love Bug

An automotive homage to peace. Which windscreen gets the ticket I wonder?

Mac Vs. PC

I'll let you write this post.

Optical Illusion Car Park

So you're driving around a car park trying to find the up ramp when all of a sudden formerly abstract letters appear readable.

The car park in the 92-floor Eureka Tower in Melbourne Australia (the world’s tallest residential building) has signs that convey information to drivers only at key decision-making points.

Covering the full height of the walls the bold primary colors are intended to help engage drivers.

The lettering was created by painting over text projected onto the walls from the driver's perspective.

Now if they could only paint "No Peeing" in the stairwells.

Hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia

The fear of long words.

How etymologists have fun.

And no, I'm not making this up.

Braille Metro Map

Words are redundant.

World's Most Expensive Liquid

That's right. HP #45 ink is $2,703 a gallon. Now that's what you call a business model.