Bookbinding Cigarette Trade Cards

via letterology
From a set of British cigarette trade cards (circa 1922-1939) on mending old books from the George Arents collection at the New York Public Library.
See others in the series here.

Touchscreen Braille Writer Lets the Blind Type on a Tablet

via wired
“One group of people has traditionally been left out of our modern tablet revolution: the visually impaired. Our slick, button-less touchscreens are essentially useless to those who rely on touch to navigate around a computer interface, unless voice-control features are built in to the device and its OS. But a Stanford team of three has helped change that. Tasked to create a character-recognition program that would turn pages of Braille into readable text on an Android tablet, student Adam Duran, with the help of two mentor-professors, ended up creating something even more useful than his original assignment: a touchscreen-based Braille writer…”
Read the rest here.

Image of the Day: No Dumping

Taken near Baltimore’s Riverside Park

PA Pixelworkers

via United Pixelworkers
Great shirts from Full Stop, a web design shop in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Here’s Pennsylvania’s!

Atomix

via liquid treat
“Atomix is an artful plaything designed in 1966 by Francois Dallegret and recently reintroduced to the market by New York-based Areaware. Sandwiched between five-inch squares of clear acrylic are 6,000 stainless steel balls that form an infinite number of fractal patterns when shaken, tilted or rotated. Originally created to help physics students visualize atomic structures, Atomix is just the thing to smarten up your desk…”
Visit Areaware here.

Confusing (and Frequently Misused) Type Terminology, Part 1

via fonts.com
“In the world of type and design, several typographic terms are either commonly confused with other terms, or are simply misunderstood in their own right. In Part 1 of this two-part series, we will shed light on three pairs of words that are widely misused. The words in each pair are related, but they refer to different things - and they are not interchangeable…”

Font vs. Typeface
Character vs. Glyph
Legibility vs. Readability

Read the rest here.

Richard Nicholson: The Last Of London’s Darkrooms

via npr
“Richard Nicholson recalls that in the ’90s, darkrooms were busy, exciting places for commercial photographers in London: ‘There was a real buzz in these places,’ he writes,‘a sense of competition, but also communality.’

About a decade later, he was struck by how much had changed. ‘I came up with idea for this project when printing in one of these hire darkrooms. The buzz had gone. No one else was there. It seemed like a desolate, abandoned place. I was struck by the bulky, lumpen beauty of the photographic enlargers.’

And so began his project, Last One Out, Please Turn On The Light, a documentation of London’s remaining professional darkrooms. A mere five years after starting the project, more than half of the darkrooms in the series are no longer operational.

‘I wanted to capture the darkroom before it disappeared,’ Nicholson says. ‘I choose to photograph the darkrooms of professional printers as these represent the essence of the craft.’ ”
Visit his site here.

Adobe and the 50" Hi-Def Drafting Table

via nytimes

“When I entered the office of Kevin Lynch, Adobe Systems’s chief technology officer, on Friday in San Francisco, I was immediately caught off guard by a large high-definition television hiding in the corner of the room. It was at least 50-inches wide and propped up at a 45 degree angle on a drafting table.

“What is that!” I asked.

Mr. Lynch paused and looked at me as if I had just seen a Christmas present before it was wrapped and placed under the tree. “Ummm, that’s the future,” he said. “It’s a drafting table running Photoshop Touch where you can essentially draw and create on a screen.”

The future, for Adobe, it turns out, is in the past…”

Read the rest here.

Image of the Day: Sugar Maples

The sugar maples are on Penn State campus are turning brilliant!

Cats and Headbutting

via cat vs human

See the rest of the comic here. It is so true...

My Water’s On Fire Tonight (The Fracking Song)

via propublica.org
“My Water’s On Fire Tonight” is a product of Studio 20 NYU (http://bit.ly/hzGRYP) in collaboration with ProPublica.org (http://bit.ly/5tJN). The song is based on ProPublica’s investigation on hydraulic fractured gas drilling (read the full investigation here: http://bit.ly/15sib6).

Music by David Holmes and Andrew Bean
Vocals and Lyrics by David Holmes and Niel Bekker
Animation by Adam Sakellarides and Lisa Rucker

Image of the Day: Domino Sugar

Taken near Baltimore’s Riverside Park and Inner Harbor

Time Shutter New York

0
via cultofmac
“Time Shutter New York, a new iPhone app, transports you to the streets of Manhattan at the dawn of the 20th century, allowing users to see and experience the city exactly as real New Yorkers did a hundred years ago. Time Shutter New York contains 170 photographs of Manhattan landmarks, skylines and street scenes taken between 1900 and 1925. The app guides users to exact locations where the shots were taken, and with an opacity adjustment slider, allows you to seamlessly overlay what it looked like then with what it looks like now...”
Visit Time Shuttter here.

Hollowed-Out Books

via Green Chair Press
Always inspiring, Green Chair Press’ post creating a hollowed-out book is the latest how-to shared.

Guilloché

via imprint
“A guillocheur is sort of a machine operator, sort of a craftsperson, sort of an artist, who creates the beautiful rosettes we’ve all seen engraved into the backs of antique pocketwatches. (The noun form of the art form is ‘Guilloché,’ and a single engraving is called a ‘Guilloche’ with no accent over the e.) Guilloché, in (rudely) simplified terms, essentially a precursor to the Spirograph. Watching the video, you see how much artistry goes into the programming of the machine to make a pattern, how much care goes into turning the design, with careful and consistent hands, into a piece of repeatable art.
Watch the video here, and read the rest here on digital guilloche and template coding.

When Colors Clash

sent to me by a friend, not sure of the original source


Perfect graphic design humor on a Friday afternoon!

Fine Dining Sign Language

seen on boingboing
“Here’s a guide to the specialized sign language used by the Maitre D’ and staff at NYC’s Eleven Madison Park restaurant; there’s also a set of traffic rules to keep things moving smoothly…”
See more of the signs here.

Earworm of the Day: Queen - Teo Toriatte (Let us cling together)

Let us cling together as the years go by,
Oh my love, my love,
In the quiet of the night
Let our candles always burn,
Let us never lose the lessons we have learned...

25 Years of Apple Technology

This post by Alison Bechdel reminded me of the first Mac I worked with in 1987, a Plus at an agency in State College. Crazy to think back on working on such a small monitor, and working with the OS, which at the time was amazing GUI. 

Today's BoingBoing pays perfect tribute to that here. 


I bought a similar Plus model at Surplus and Salvage a few years ago, just out of nostalgia. The first Mac I owned was a LC II, which I did freelancing work on in between the stint at Graphics II and getting hired Penn State in 1993. Today, we have an iMac, iPods, and an iTouch at home, and I use a Tower at work, and my daughter-in-law has an iPad. Apple’s technology and the way it has become ingrained in our lives is fascinating, and I wonder what things will look like in another 25 years.

Triangular Letters

via a raven
“[T]here was a time when this folding was not considered unusual at all, moreover the mails folded in this way were the most valuable the postman could bring; and, as the story unfolding from the few objects on the picture indicates, for several people they remained more valuable than any other a postman can bring them any more. These are the письма-треугольники, the ‘triangular letters,’ the standard form of soldiers’ correspondence during the Great Patriotic War…”
Read the rest here.

Planned Obsolescence

via fast company
“From lightbulbs to iPhones, tech has a history of being produced with planned obsolescence. And our children will never know the alternative…”
Read the rest here.

Business Cards of the Day: Mix and Match

Top Row: “Feeling Overwhelmed?” — at first I thought this card was for a psychiatric counseling service when I saw it on a bulletin board in Newport, PA. Somehow I hear Bob Wiley saying, “Well, at least I do not have to stress about photographers...” Context is everything for this card, and frankly, it doesn't work in a café. The card next to it is for locally-made wing and marinade sauces. We haven’t tried these, but the graphics tie in nicely to the label designs.

Middle Row: I have a feeling that the cake card is a stock image since the type is seemingly an afterthought. DCNR — pretty typical official government state agency formatting of text. Ranger Onavage is a quite the talker!

Bottom Row: One24 — even looking online, it is hard to tell what this card is about, but it appears to be a get-rich-quick [within 24 months!] scheme. Apparently she is not making enough to get new cards printed and just scratches over the phone number at this point. Maybe in another 24 months she’ll get new cards? The card next to it is for a photographer “of the unusual and extraordinary.” The card reflects the subject matter and tone of the photographs for sale.

Tattly Tuesday

via swissmiss
Every Tuesday, Tattly launches 4 new temporary tattoos and this week’s designs are a homage to print design.
More on these can be found here.

Sesame Street and Food Insecurity

via nytimes
“The familiar address of Sesame Street is about to get a new visitor, one who could surely benefit from the sunny days and friendly neighbors there. For a prime-time special to raise awareness about hunger faced by American families, Sesame Workshop, the nonprofit organization that produces ‘Sesame Street,’ has created a new Muppet character named Lily, a 7-year-old girl representing one of the 17 million American children that the Department of Agriculture estimates are ‘food insecure,’ meaning their access to food is limited or uncertain…”
Read the rest here.

Pantone's Converted to Process

When an electronic file is sent to the iGen [or other digital presses], it is seeing the swatch names. Even if a Pantone swatch has been converted to process, if the swatch still says "PANTONE 285" or "Pantone Red 032", the iGen is picking that information up and using its own color look-up table for that swatch regardless of any mix or alteration you may have made to that swatch.

If you do convert a Pantone spot to process, be sure to rename it, such as "285_4cMix" or the percentages like "89.43.0.0".

Above is a screen shot, showing a file with Pantone 285 and Pantone Red 032 converted to process, altering the color mixes dramatically, but still keeping the original swatch names. In this case, changing Red 032 to a blue mix, and 285 to a red mix. The resulting printout from the iGen is that what is red on my monitor prints PMS 285 Blue, and what is blue on my monitor prints Pantone Red 032.

Business Cards of the Day: Apple

The two on the left are from the early 1980s,
one on the right is from this year.
Clean designs that range from four color-apples and
cool-grey type, to silver foil and black text.

Business Cards of the Day: Vegan & Vegetarian

After a couple of trips to NYC and a vegetarian festival in Washington, D.C, I had some cards piling up to post. Quite the variety of shapes, sizes, and one is even a sticker [Action for Animals]. The two round ones above [purple and golden yellow] are actually the front and back of the same card for gobo. Very often, The Bacon is Not an Herb card [bottom row] has a QR code sticker on the back as well [seen to the right of that card] — kudos for great eye-catching use of technology!

A Simple Book Repair Manual

via green chair press
“Dartmouth College has a web version of their A Simple Book Repair Manual. It goes through the tools you’ll need as well as repairs such as tipping in a page and spine repair…”
Visit Green Chair Press here, Dartmouth College’s Book Repair site here.

Jain Running

The cool October rains have brought earthworms, grubs, and other little creatures out onto roads and trails. As a runner, I feel like I could publish a book / podcast on how to avoid stepping on them. “In chapter 5, you’ll learn simple techniques from pulling your stride up short to using short bursts of speed to lengthen your pace to avoid nature’s smallest crawling life forms; all while keeping under a 10-minute mile. Bonus section includes tips on night and twilight running with a headlamp, and how to avoid tripping over opossums.” Trust me, it is especially mentally exhausting keeping keenly aware and focused on your surroundings and footing for 45 minutes or longer.

Mail-Order Mysteries

via Neato Coolville 
Mail-Order Mysteries: Real Stuff from Old Comic Book Ads! by Kirk Demarais.
Watch the book trailer here, more on the book can be found here. His main site is here, with lots of retro items to explore.

Oct. 1: Doritos inventor to be buried with the snack that made him famous

via cnn
“Arch West, the Frito-Lay marketing executive credited with inventing Doritos, passed away of natural causes last week at the age of 97, and his family plans to honor his legacy in a lovingly cheesy way. The Dallas Morning News reports that at his graveside, service in Dallas, Texas on October 1, the family will be ‘tossing Doritos chips in before they put the dirt over the urn,’ according to his daughter Jane Hacker. ‘He'll love it,’ she continued…”
Read the rest here, and more here.

The Creative Brain On Exercise

via fast company
“For artists, entrepreneurs, and any other driven creators, exercise is a powerful tool in the quest to help transform the persistent uncertainty, fear, and anxiety that accompanies the quest to create from a source of suffering into something less toxic, then potentially even into fuel…”
Read the rest here.

Peter Gabriel: New Blood

via npr
“Peter Gabriel's 12th studio album, New Blood, contains re-imaginings of some of his best-known songs — including ‘Solsbury Hill,’ ‘Red Rain’ and ‘Don't Give Up’ — using orchestral arrangements and ambient sound. The album continues a career reinvention he began on Scratch My Back, a covers album with the attached expectation that the covered artists would reciprocate…”
Read the rest and listen to the interview here. Listen to a sneak preview of Red Rain on Peter Gabriel’s site, here.

Savage Chickens: Ribbons

via savage chickens
This makes me smile!

Vintage Maps Trace the Meandering Mississippi

via a raven
“For anyone obsessed with beautiful maps, these colorful and informative examples tracking the many paths of the lower Mississippi are a dream come true. The monumental collection was produced in 1944 by Harold N. Fisk, who drew in a rainbow of colors the path of past and current flows as the mighty river changed course and flooded over time...”
More can be found here.

He’s Dead Jim: T-Shirt

via ian leino
This t-shirt cracks me up; order it here.

Average Font

via a raven
Moritz Resl writes, “This project shows what a font would look like if it consisted of all typefaces installed on my system. Every character from a to z is drawn using every single font with a low opacity. In total there are over 900 typefaces in my library. I didn’t exclude the ugly ones…”
I just check my font library at work — I have 4,702 fonts; yikes! See his results of the 900 here.

Image of the Day: No Cheese Puffs Were Ejected

Real news story in today’s
Daily Collegian.

Chromolithography Printing Process Trade Cards

via letterology
“The process of Chromolithography was invented in the late 1790s, 40 years before the invention of photography, and it was an alterative to the woodcut or engraving process where you carve into the surface in order to create a relief image. Chromoliths, (sometimes referred to as chromos), are known as planographic prints, meaning the images and text were drawn on a flat, limestone surface with a greasy crayon and when it chemically treated, the drawn areas would attract ink and the stone would repel it. Each color represented a different stone, so the task of producing this method of lithography was not only extremely labor intensive, but an art that few mastered. The subtle texture of each print comes from the irregular grain of the stone. Some of the finest printers were in Germany and France where much of the best quality limestone was mined…”
The set of 6 cards found here illustrate the entire chromolithography printing process in consecutive order. 

Horn Books

This horn book includes
an ampersand

via the fontfeed
“Long before the invention of printing, hand painted letter boards were widespread as teaching material in schools. ABC tablets made of wood were already mentioned in an English manuscript as early as the 14th century. Later a thin, transparent horn plate was used to protect the paper glued on the board against wear and dirt. This is why up to this day letter boards are still called horn books in English-speaking regions, even though they are not books in the conventional sense of the word…”
Read the rest here, and learn a bit more about horn books here and here.

Keming

8via Ironic Sans

The Original Think Pad

via the daily heller
“Computer Revolution Trivia Dept.: IBM introduced the ThinkPad line of laptop computers in 1992. Back in the 1920s Thomas J. Watson, Sr, introduced ‘THINK’ as an IBM slogan. For decades IBM distributed small notepads with the word ‘THINK’ etched onto a brown leatherette cover to customers and employees. The name ThinkPad was suggested by IBM employee Denny Wainwright, who is reported to have had a ‘THINK’ notepad in his pocket…”
Read the rest here.

Progress Report for “Are You My Mother?: A Comic Drama”

via dykes to watch out for
Alison Bechdel writes on her blog, “I’m drawing and drawing, on deadline for the memoir I’ve been working on for the past five years. It kinda freaks me out that the book is already up on Amazon.com, considering that it’s far from finished. But I guess it’s also motivating. The book will have seven chapters, for a total of around 280 pages. So far I’ve got 116 pages done…that’s the first time I’ve allowed myself to tally them up…”
I can hardly wait for this to be released; the subtle details she adds within each frame perfectly captures the era. If you ever get a chance to hear her speak at a public event, take the time to go; you will not be disappointed. On Tuesday October 18, she will be at Barnes and Noble Union Square, NYC, 7p.m.

1493: Chronicling the Ecological Impact of Columbus’ Journey

via wired
“Columbus’ discovery of the New World unleashed centuries of geopolitical turmoil. But humans weren’t the only creatures whose fortunes were forever altered. Entire species of plants and animals either thrived or suffered as well. In the book 1493, author (and Wired contributor) Charles C. Mann traces the far-reaching biological consequences of Columbus’ journey across the ocean blue. “There is a Rube Goldberg aspect to this,” Mann says. “Things are connected in ways that you would never expect.” And just as with human societies, some organisms came out on top, while others were radically subjugated. Here are a few key flora and fauna and how they weathered the storm…”
Read the rest here, more on 1493 here from npr.

Images of the Day: Neon & Enamel

These photos just do not do justice to the rich indigo enamel neon sign, located in Centre Hall, PA.

Image of the Day: “Cat No Allowe”

This handmade sign in Millheim cracked us up on a recent Sunday afternoon. We get this impression that rather than crosshairs, it is supposed to be the international no symbol. Love the fact that the cat has three legs, and that they ran out of room when writing the sign. What is the story behind this rather young person’s request? 

Irony & Sarcasm marks, part 2 of 3

via shady characters
“The irony marks proposed by John Wilkins, Alcanter de Brahm and Hervé Bazin proved stubbornly resistant to putting down roots, and Bazin’s 1966 point d’ironie would be the last to be publicly promoted for some decades. Before the Internet reinvigorated their cause, though, the hunt for a foolproof method of conveying verbal irony took an abrupt detour: if a self-contained irony mark was not enough, perhaps an entire alphabet was the answer. And whereas the concept of an irony mark had exerted a strange pull on a select few French writers, the idea of signalling verbal irony with a different typeface altogether was instead the preserve of English-language journalists…”
Read the rest here; and more on an irony font here.

Legacies & Transformations

via Bacon is NOT an Herb


Back on September 1st, trueindigo posted some writing I had done in conjunction with a previous art project:

“While growing up in the 1960s, I recall my grandmother telling me proudly that her father, Henry, was a one of the best shots in the area. He and other locals would get together and have shooting matches — and that these matches evolved into the annual Labor Day pigeon shoot in Hegins.

There were photos of him and my great-grandmother in the back dining room of my grandmother’s home. To me at the time, they didn’t look like very friendly people. I’m sure part of that was that they had to hold still for a long time for the photographer, as well as the fact that life was hard maintaining a farm in remote Schuylkill County…”

Read the rest on her blog, Bacon is NOT an Herb, just one of the many projects of hers that I am so very proud of.