31 December 2008

Champagne For All




A few ads from Ads of the World to help you to celebrate the evening with a Champagne Toast. May you enjoy your New Year Eve Celebrations!

30 December 2008

Drinking Like Mad Men




New Year's Eve is coming and that usually means a drink or two. I found an article over at PaperMag.com on the cocktails that are often found to be consumed during the show "Mad Men". Learn how to make an Old Fashioned, a Brandy Alexander or Tom Collins. Enjoy and remember to "drink responsibly" as the ad men say.

29 December 2008

Campaigns from Mad Men






As the year ends, I was thinking about my favorite "newer" show on TV, "Mad Men". I was going through the AMC website and found these images of campaigns that Sterling Cooper used in the two seasons the show has aired. Who could forget the Kodak Carousel or Bethlehem Steel presentations? The props department has done a wonderful job of getting it all right from the zippo lighters down to the presentation boards shown to clients. If you missed any episodes of this wonderful series they are now out on DVD, season 1 and season 2. I had to catch up myself on season 1. So if you are interested in a series that is well written, acted, and takes you back in time to the early 60s, this is it. I know may of us are looking forward to see where season 3 will take us later in 2009. In the meantime, get your fill with tons of content and photos on the "Man Men" website.



28 December 2008

Best and Worst 2008 Logos



The end of the year is fast approaching and "Brand New" has released their Best and Worst Logo list. "Brand New" has been a great resource for everything new in the logo world and should be a site you have in your bookmarks. Check out this best and worst list here.

24 December 2008

Vintage Christmas Ads




The holiday season is a major time of the year for retailers and Santa has been used for years in Christmas ads to sell the goods. He became popular with the Coca-Cola ads in the 1930s illustrated by Haddon Sundblom. These are a few of the ways Christmas ads have been presented over the last 80 years or so. The marketing of Santa with cigarettes ads below reminds me of watching Don Draper on "Mad Men". For all my Gentile friends, have a Merry Christmas.




23 December 2008

Kinetic Typography - Part 2

Last week I talked about Kinetic Typography. This entails Flash and After Effects usually to create the desired effects. Below is a great video of what old fashion drawing and creative energy will produce to "People are Strange" by The Doors.
People are strange from Denis Fongue on Vimeo.

(via The Ministry of Type)

21 December 2008

Happy Hanukkah, Merry Christmas

The El Al plane landed at Ben Gurion airport, and as it taxied to the terminal, the voice of the captain came on:

"Please remain seated with your seat belts fastened until this plane has come to a complete stop at the gate, and the seat belt signs have been turned off. We also wish to remind you that cell phones may not be used until the exit doors have been opened.

"To those who are still seated, we wish you a Merry Christmas, and hope that you enjoy your visit to Israel. To those of you standing in the aisles and talking on your cell phones, we wish you a Happy Hanukkah, and welcome back home."

May everyone have a great and safe holiday this week.

19 December 2008

Reaching for the Sky




Are you a lover of all things tall? Then check out this wonderful site, SkyscraperPage.com. This site is a great reference to gain information on skyscrapers of the past, present and future. A group of individuals that work with this site draw each of the skyscrapers in a vector format. The drawings are beautiful and in great detail. The site allows you to see the tallest in individual cities or how they line up against each other in the quest to create the world's tallest building. There is an amazing 692 drawing of building in New York City alone. This site also allows you see drawings of which skyscrapers are in the works to take the title of world's tallest.

18 December 2008

Listing On Alltop

Featured in Alltop

We are pleased to announce that aNEW designs has been selected to be listed on the Alltop site. We look forward to sharing our passion for all things design and art related with this broader community.

Fall 08 Portfolio Show




Yesterday was the end of the first part in the learning process for many graphic design and advertising students at the Art Institute of California - Orange County at their portfolio show. It has been my pleasure of work with this group of students and be of assistance in helping them prefect their portfolios in class. Now they are ready to take on the world and I wish them all the best in a career as a designer. Good luck with everything and great job!


16 December 2008

Kinetic Typography


Just the other day my students where going crazy about Kinetic Typography on YouTube. So I was watching a little football on Sunday and saw this ad by Ford about it's new F-150 that is an excellent example how it can be used in a commercial world. Kinetic Typography has been with us for a long time, usually seen in film credits, early work was made popular by Saul Bass. More recent film examples include "Catch Me If You Can."With the advent of Flash and After Effects designers are taking Kinetic Typography to the next level. The most popular are taking dialogue from films or songs and animating it to type. A few examples can be seen below but for more hit YouTube.





14 December 2008

12 December 2008

Grid and Bear It


Loving Grids, Grids and more Grids. The Grid System website has more info about grids then you can shake a stick at. This site includes articles, tools, blog links, and much more. TheGridSystem.org should be your first stop and choice when you need to learn more about the mighty grid. TheGridSystem.org - Add this site to your bookmark list!

10 December 2008

Bubble Calendar



It is time to look around for new "09" calendar. I hate to rush and get stuck with a left over. I found this great idea called the Bubble Calendar. It is a huge 48" tall (122 cm for the metric folks) filled with bubbles to pop each day. They say that popping bubble wrap is therapeutic and a stress reliever. The calendar is available in English, German and Japanese, includes all major holidays, is typeset in Helvetica Neue and handmade in the USA (Brooklyn, NYC). To purchase this fun Bubble Calendar go to there website www.bubblecalendar.com

09 December 2008

Free PhotoShop Brushes


It is the time of year for giving to friends. I wanted to pass along a great resource for PhotoShop brushes that are high in quality. Go to Qbrushes.com for hundreds of brushes and links to them all. The collection amassed here ranges from Abstract brushes, Grunge brushes, Floral brushes, to Line Art brushes. Look around Qbrushes.com and I am sure you will find something to brighten up your PhotoShop work this holiday season.

07 December 2008

December 7th


"A date which will live in infamy."

A hurried dispatch from the ranking United States naval officer in Pearl Harbor, Commander in Chief Pacific, to all major navy commands and fleet units provided the first official word of the attack at the ill-prepared Pearl Harbor base. It said simply: AIR RAID ON PEARL HARBOR X THIS IS NOT DRILL.

(via Library of Congress)

06 December 2008

Old Computers





Check out this collection of old computer images. Can we call them older computers since the images I am showing are computer I remember working on? Great collection of what was and what was is always an inspiration for what will be. Review all the images at this link.

05 December 2008

Saving the World

Saving the world or at least a small part of it. That is the goal of these ads found via Ads of the World.

"Every minute we lose 40 acres of our forest.
Will you take him into your home when he no longer has his?"


Advertising Agency: Publicidad Comercial Lowe Honduras
General Creative Director: Juan Jesús Martínez
Creative Director/ Copywriter: David Cruz
Art Director / Illustrator: Franklin Guevara
Published: October 2007



04 December 2008

SEEING DOUBLE




Seeing Double? Yes you are. The ultra right conservative Benjamin (Bibi) Netanyahu in Israel is running for Prime Minister. It seems his web team has stolen, (allegedly stolen) Barack Obama's website. Bibi's site is almost identical to Barack's. Consider this, in Hebrew you read from right to left. Now if you look at it you say, its the same. The New York Times wrote a small article on this last month. In the article it wrote, “Imitation is the greatest form of flattery,” noted Ron Dermer, one of Mr. Netanyahu’s top campaign advisers. Imitation? They could have atleast changed the colors, modified the layout. or the buttons. For me, way too close, so close I would say I am seeing double.

03 December 2008

Designing in Guyana



A friend of us at aNEW designs and former drawing buddy of Jacqueline at Pratt, William Gordon just had an article published on Core77. The article titled, "One Factory, One Forest: Design, Ecology and Micro-Economic Development in Guyana" explains about William's designs and having them produced in Guyana. The article explores the process of a design, materials and production in Guyana. To read the full article go to this link at Core77.

Great article William and it looks like you had a great adventure. We are looking forward to seeing the FAXON chair on our next visit to NYC.