Thinking BIG
Volkswagon has come a long way from the days of Think Small, but the company has proven they are no less innovative. Print ads recently published in popular Norwegian magazines encourage readers to download an app that allows them to “drive” over the small curve of road in the printed spread. The app showcases driving features like Lane Assist technology, Adaptive Lights, and Adaptive Cruise Control. This video shows a great preview of it:
http://referanser.apt.no/Volkswagen/app/
The marketers took a bit of a risk assuming that all of the readers had iphones and would download the app to try it out, but then again, the folks at DDB took a risk 50 years ago, but calling the car a lemon… and look how that worked out.
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SFO online magazine
I currently work doing a lot of design in the financial trading industry and I’ve come to see trends and stand bys for the design in this industry. The biggest impression I get is that it is an industry that is very stuck in tradition and stability. Often times using designs that are simple and easy for people to understand and navigate.
Which is why I was happily surprise when I recieved an email from SFO magazine a few weeks back introducing their new online magazine. This interactive PDF magazine is anything but stodgy and traditional. They have taken the basic PDF flip book to a whole new level. The magazine creates an entirely new reading experience melding the look and layout of a traditional magazine with tons of interactive and flash elements. The ads animate like online banner ads, a feature story page titled “The Future of Cars” shows an animated line of traffic going back and fourth across the spread, and a Q&A style feature incorporates video clips of the interviewee answering questions.
Even if you aren’t in the niche of financial industry design, its still a great innovative piece that you can get new design ideas from.
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- Feature Article Title Spread with animated cars
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- SFO magazine cover
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- video integration in article
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I just helped launch another new homepage redesign or rather update for my company. Not too much changed since the last big homepage redesign I did last year, but I feel like the update makes the page a little more organized and user-friendly.
A few things I improved on this new rendition:
1. Live Content All the Time!
Combined all the social media feeds into one big “What’s New” feed to showcase the latest blog posts, tweets, and podcasts as they happen.
2. Show me the Markets!
Made the market tracker a little less prominent by moving it to bottom, but the idea is that we will be able to incorporate it into the footer and include it on all pages. So no matter where you are in the site, you can still get updates on where your positions are.
3. Ads: bigger, better and more plentiful!
I moved the one ad that was on the bottom of the page up into the middle and through the process of design mitosis I split the one ad into 3 promo boxes that can be easily updated and changed out for upcoming promotions. The middle ad plays a double role acting as a promo box for the events and a calendar reminder of what is coming up next.
4. Stick to the basics and the masses will click.
In the first design I had used blocks of copy to describe four top selling points of the company with links inside the type that changed color on rollover. I thought it looked simple and clean but apparently people weren’t getting they were links. So now it is back to the basics, and I have made the links a standard underlined blue style. I also took out all the superfluous copy and just made the links into a list because hey, proven by fans of David Letterman, everyone loves lists!
So now its time to wait and see if these changes will truly make a difference in sales ,which as much as we hate to admit it in the design world, is really what it’s all for.
homepage2009
homepage2010
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the internets are watching
I recently updated my site and tweaked a few things and have been trying to see if it helps improves my visitor-ship. I track the basics with google analytics: visitors, page views, time on site, etc. Even with the big brother-ness of google analytics there are things that I am still left wondering about my viewers’ experiences. Then I found this article today form sixrevisions.com with a list of even more web stalking tricks and devices. Well if I thought google analytics was leaning towards web stalking, these devices take it to a whole new level of web espionage. My favorite on and probably highest on the creepy scale is a little thing called “click tale” that basically makes an animated movie of the users exact mouse patterns… and you thought your facebook account revealed too much 
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advertising the advertisers
Was browsing some ad agency websites today and I came upon a couple fun and impressive site.
bagbyco.com
It was clean and simple but with some really fun animated touches. The first thing caught my eye were the transitions alone- each time the visitor clicks from one section to the other, they see hands physically moving the space- whether it be folding the page over, cutting it in two or rolling it up to reveal the next layout.
The work is very well displayed in narrated case studies incorporating the story from brainstorm to finished piece in one very impressive reel.
Then there is the “Culture” section which consists of a pile of postcards that upon clicking you discover represent each of the principle members. Each postcard turns into a video where the person tells a funny story or anecdote (kind of a story corps type thing). It makes me not only want to hire them but I want to party with them too, which I guess is what they are going for.
samatamason.com
A very simple site but what I liked with the reel in the beginning. It uses a really simple yet catchy theme in the beginning of stop vs. start- stop analyzing start doing, stop markeing start connecting, ect. This leads into a really cool mantra of their work including brainstorms and comps (which I love to see). The whole thing is done in kind of choppy stop animation style with an elegant and intriguing soundtrack. Very well done, leaves me feeling both excited and inspired, which again I’m guessing is what they are aiming for.
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CSS in emails
As if coding web pages wasn’t hard enough, then you have html email- with so many different clients, and viewers and media types from AOL mail, to gmail, to outlook and then a computer screen vs. an iphone vs. a blackberry… the possibilities are endless. That’s why I was so excited to find this link on campaignmonitor.com a few weeks back mapping out how to use CSS in emails and what works and what doesn’t for specific email clients. Check it out, definitely worth bookmarking if you ever plan on coding your own html emails.
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So my company finally put up the blog redesign I started working on back in June. It can be viewed at letstalkfutures.com
Some of the main objectives of the blog redesign were:
- showcase some of the new promotional endeavors we were working on including webinars, podcasts, and twitter
- merge our blog with our current monthly newsletter by making the blog look a bit more “magazine-like”
- Make the blog look more consistent with the main website, (which I also designed) with similar colors, icons, fonts, etc.
I based the design off of the template Mimbo but after countless revisions, and the help of our awesome developers, that template became more of a unique work of art, kind of like a sculptural garbage heap.
Speaking of revisions, I always find it interesting to look back on all the different versions of a design leading up the the final product. For this project I gathered most of the versions and put them in a slide show below. I would be lying if I said that I think the final product is always the best, but that is the nature of my job. To quote one of my favorite guilty pleasures, Mad Men, ““You’re not an artist, Peggy. You solve problems. Leave some tools in your toolbox.” Tis the life of a designer, but hey at least I get paid for what I do while I’m still alive
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Happy 40th Sesame Street
I have google.com set to my homepage so every morning when I open my browser it is the first thing I see and its always fun when they have a custom logo to celebrate a current event. The last two logos I’ve seen have been so awesome I feel the need to mention them here.
I remember as a kid watching Sesame Street every day. It was a ritual, I would eat lunch, watch the show, and then take a nap. And then later as I got to be a “big girl” I got to skip the nap and watch Mr. Rodgers following. It was such a great show growing up, funny, simple but engaging and above all, educational. I can’t believe it has been on now for 40 years. It was such a big piece of my childhood and I hope that it will be there for my children.
Thanks google for celebrating such an amazing show.
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grunge web design
I just finished up a web design for a folk singer/songwriter that used a lot of grunge textures and then stumbled on this website yesterday with a great list of some beautiful websites using lots of grunge. Great inspiration, just wish I would have seen it a month ago…
http://designtutorials4u.com/20-grunge-style-websites-that-rock/
Also through that site I discovered the portfolio sites of two really awesome design shops.
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Design Coding Rap
A rap about coding websites?!?! …I’m totally geeking out! I recently stumbled on this video on another blog. After doing a little clicking around on youtube, I found that the rapper, known as “the SEO Rapper” has several videos covering everything from putting together a website to conversion to paid search terms. Totally hilarious but completely informative if you listen the lyrics. My only complain is that the visuals are pretty unimaginative (just the guy standing there most of the time). I’m thinking it might be a fun flash project or even PowerPoint presentation…. hmmm
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