Leather Lumix GF-1 Ever-Ready Case

I told you that whole retro thing would come back, didn't I? Didn't I? Grab the leather case for the Panasonic Lumix GF-1 (my baby) seen above on eBay for $120.

How to Package Pencils

I swear I need to stop reading Lovely Package. Otherwise, I'm going to start designing pen holders for my ever-growing, unnecessarily diverse pen collection.

A Moment to Remember Review

Romance dramas are a dime a dozen, but from my previous experiences, nobody does it like Korea does it when it comes to epic love stories. I found A Moment to Remember on the some international forums a few years back and finally got to seeing it. I gotta hand it to them, A Moment to Remember does it just right. Sweet story. Good characters. And a punch of charm that's definitely lacking in today's Hollywood flicks. If you're a fan of My Sassy Girl, it's hard to go wrong with this one. 8.0/10.

Let's Move Here

Scurry mini-mansions are the best. An aside - Blogger's new publishing system annoys the shit out of me.

Yes, Indeed My Love

Flyarts has some spectular stuff going on in his portfolio. Makes me want to build something very similar. Perhaps a castle... in Caslon!

Mario 2.0

I guess this is what Mario were to look like if he were to grow up Metal Gear style. Even Bowers looks something along the lines of a boss in God of War. Awesome.

Art Worlds and Computers

C.P. Snow presented the myth of "two cultures:" technology and humanistic. But in fact, art and technology have already been together for quite some time.

Take Burning Man for example. Here, you can have an army of computer nerds (programmers and designers) gathering to create art in an all-out social event. Here, there is no right or wrong piece of work. Here, it's shared conventions and ideologies that drives legitimate art.

Liberate art and design itself. Deny politics and embrace pleasure. Pro-consumer. The epicenter for today's technology economy.

#Fred Turner

Finally, Another IT Guy Gets It

Haha, man. This IT guy that works at CrunchGear made my day yesterday as he basically went and flipped out on computers on an epic scale. It was great. My favorite quote thus far:

"I often wonder if plumbers reach a point in their career, after cleaning clogged drain after clogged drain, that they begin to hate plumbing. They hate pipes. They hate plumber’s putty. They hate all the tricks they’ve learned over the years, and they hate the need to have to learn tricks. It’s plumbing, for goodness sake: pipes fitting together and substances flowing through them. How complicated can it be?"

Again, I love the use of rhetoric and metaphors. Of course it boils into an all-out rant a few paragraphs in - about how computers suck ass and how IT guys are only making so much money due to the terrible infrastructure of the Internet, Microsoft, and Adobe PDFs. Reminds me of why I went into Human-Computer Interaction Design in the first place.

For Every Dapper Man, There's a Dashing Gal

This collection of famous females features over 100 iconic hair-dos from women of the past and present. Two color (metallic silver & black). Signed & numbered edition of 50. Best part? Only 15 bucks.

She Likes to Chomp

This is for you, beans. I hope you like. Especially the unicorn meat. I'm getting you 3 lbs. worth.

Conor Harrington, No Graffiti

Pretty incredible stuff by Conor Harrington. Given they're all paintings on public venues make them even more exciting. Conor, come paint my mailbox please!

Edward Tufte Redux

Ah-ha! Even more ideas for me to fill my sketchbook with. Woot, woot!

Bold Banisters

Tired of your standard, boring wooden banisters? Paint it glossy red. Yeah, that'll show 'em.

Crate & Barrel Petrie Couch

Here's a piece of interest. It's C&B's Petrie Couch. It looks pretty good in multiple colors, matches with tons of other mid-century pieces, and reminds me a lot of Macy's Corona collection I wrote about a while back. It's cotton though (vs. Corona's acrylic). Which means no pets. Which means no pug dog. Which means I'll probably go with the Corona.

Infographic of an Infographic

Can't tell if this is art or just more embellishment than what is necessary.

Defendor Review

At first sight, one could easily throw Defendor into the category of a comedy, but I can reassure you that it's much more than that. Woody Harrelson does a fine job in maintaining the comedic overtone, but the heavy themes of child abuse, prostitution, and police corruption are brought forth much more seriously that one would've ever thought. Also, it's not big on special effects or anything either - it relies more on the heart and the empathy to perpetuate the movie's low-budget tale of a faux super hero into a story worth telling. 7.7/10.

Law Abiding Citizen Review

This movie reminds me of the Drake: Uncharted formula. Take a bunch of ideas that have made tense, action movies successful in the past and combine it in a healthy granola mix and hope for a good outcome. And in fact, Law Abiding Citizen does most of it quite well. It captures some of Saw's gruesomeness, a tad of A History of Violence, and maintains a captivating revenge story of the righteous looking for justice. But due to some idiotic writing, the cat is let out the bag 30 minutes too early and pretty much kills any possibility of sustaining suspense for the rest of the movie, thus spoiling all the character development made until that point and wastes the opportunity for a much darker ending with a more satisfying outcome. All that said and done, it was more than enjoyable with a couple of friends. 7.9/10.

Logical Perfection

"Why should we support further the incongruity of living in a outmoded superstitious adaption of some primitive carpenter's art and fitting it with all the evidence of our integrated civilization? Why not be true to our time and effect all the savings possible? Make the most of our abilities. Justify our theories of therapeutic sunlight, septic simplicity, and honest proportion. Erect the logical, orderly, and perfectly functioning machine and find beauty in its fitness."

-Sam Grawe from Dwell May 2010

Chartjunk and Recall

Minimalist graphs were all the rage in 1985. However, these days - where Internet is ubiquitous, our attention spans are tested, and our time is worth more than ever - the idea of infographics with embellishments is an interesting space to explore. That is, charts that challenge the idea of minimalistic information, applying beautiful graphics and design theory in order to prolong retention time of the information.

That said, graphics alone are not enough. Neither are plain Jane charts. Design must be taken in context in the world around us and rules change over time. Value is in the eyes of the beholder, and that beholder of today is subjective as can be.

#CHI2010

Technological Design for Context

Bang & Olufsen have always been one of my favorite companies around. Why? Not only do their tech products perform above and beyond the call of duty, but their empathic approach to design - specifically how they are created with context of their environments in mind - displays an undeniable feeling of care for the user and generates greater value than if one were to simply churn out a design that mimics every other product out there.

Social Capital

The social wealth theory goes a little something like this:

Compared to use of networking site like Facebook, direct communication with your friends is associated with greater bonding social capital and lower loneliness. On the other hand, passive consumption of your friends' news tends to make you feel much lonelier and less connected.

While both have been proven true through research, the reality of the matter is that the passive news feeds equates to a disconnected, unfulfilled experience when news feed algorithms remain mysterious and unseen by the Facebook user. In a sense, all shared news within a user's social circle should not be treated the same; if you know a friend is looking for a job and them to see it, there should be the ability to allow prioritization of such news items to create social capital, even when friend circles remain small.

#CHI2010

Flows Like Wine

They hated IKEA with a passion, yet the details and inspiration continued to fill their whiteboards like a waterfall, endless and forward. What they came up with, they had to call a "sconce" - though realistically, the flowing design never afforded such un-idealized naming conventions.

Emeco Coca-Cola Edition

Good design ain't easy. Neither is recycling all those cans into something useful. Unless you've got the marketing brains of Coca-Cola and Emeco to do a collaboration that'll leave you begging for more. Bless this epic reincarnation!

Office Depot to the Rescue

In a world of $130 iPad stands, it's quite refreshing to see a $0.69 to bring the house down on these shameless, overcharging iPad accessory makers once and for all.

A River of Frames

I want to create my own MOMA someday. Restore a neglected warehouse in a district where I'd probably get shot and display my collection of 20th-century art, photography and furniture, along with a $1200 subwoofer for epic listening sessions.

Yarra, Ho!

Huge posterized image of some random anime chick? Check. Uber comfortable chairs? Check. Brilliant architecture? Double check.

Decisions, Decisions

If you could only have one out of the three pictured above, which would you choose? 1) The hot girl, 2) dream kitchen or 3) iPad with a clever looking stand. Yeah, I know - it took me a few minutes, too.

More Computing Under the Stairs

I think I'm going to make this a reality one day. You know, since I keep talking about it and all. Inspired by Stefan's Split Level Loft.

Grilled Feta Quesadillas Recipe

Although you wouldn't think it would work, the olives, cucumber, and feta merged with Mexican combination is utterly fantastic! Seriously, you gotta try this.

• 3 ounces fat-free cream cheese (optional)
• 1/2 cup shredded reduced-fat Mexican cheese blend
• 1/3 cup crumbled feta cheese
• 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano (or basil or anything Italian)
  
• 4 flour tortillas (6 inches), warmed
• 1/4 cup chopped pitted ripe olives (can be replaced with BBQ pulled pork if you're a carnivore)
  
• 2 tablespoons diced pimientos
• 1 green onion, chopped

In a small bowl, beat cheeses with oregano until blended. Spread 3 tablespoons of cheese mixture over half of each tortilla; top with olives, pimientos and onion. Fold tortillas over.

Coat grill rack with cooking spray before starting the grill. Grill quesadillas, uncovered, over medium heat for 1-2 minutes on each side or until golden brown. Cut each quesadilla into three wedges. Serve warm.

Via Taste of Home

B-Line Fin Shelves

Who doesn't love this awesome little shelving design by B-Line? Let your books zig-zag away...

Back to the Classics

Looks like everything's coming back to the classics again. Must've been that futuristic disco contemporary just couldn't handle it. More greatness by Eric Roth over here.

She & Him - Thieves (MP3)