the aetherworld category
Mac-over your living room with Throwboy pillows
About 8 months ago, I happened across Throwboy. They had come up with the idea of making OS X dock icons as hand sewn soft furnishings! Back then I was in the process of moving into my new flat and the last thing I was worrying about were couch pillows. But the idea sounded so cool it kept nagging at the back of my mind. So, in November, I decided to order two of their dock pillows.
I know, this is why Mac users get the “cultist” label but I still think these Apple icon pillows are adorable. You can choose from Finder, Dashboard, iTunes, iChat, iPhoto and Photo Booth. Each one is hand-made with fleece and filled with polyester fiber. They are $29 each or $149 for the whole set. And even though I missed out on the set price, I’ll still get the rest of the pillows, they are just too cute.
They are shipping internationally and really, really care about their customers. Thank you Roberto and the rest of the Throwboy team.
Throwboy rocks!
Toggle the showing of hidden files in Mac OS X Finder
At work, I often have to deal with hidden files - or dot-files - in the OS X Finder. I usually have a TextMate project for every client website where I can open all files from the convenient project drawer but often I just have to quickly edit a line in a .htaccess or .htpasswd file and don’t feel like opening the whole TextMate project. On the other hand, I dont’t always want to see all hidden files in all folders. My home folder is littered with .ssh, .gpg, .DS_Store, .localized, .bashrc, .Trash etc. files which I don’t need to see most of the time.
Since it’s apparently impossible to modify the Finder so that it only shows hidden files in certain directories or it only shows hidden files matching certain criteria, I looked for another solution. Using defaults write in the Terminal, you can change the Finders settings and persuade it to display the hidden files on the filesystem, but I can also just use ls -al or mate ~/Projects/myproject/.htaccess to fire up TextMate directly with the .htaccess file opened, when I’m in the Terminal.
What I was looking for was a simple button in the Finder’s menu bar, that allowed me to toggle between hiding and showing those files. What I came up with is a small application that does just that. It doesn’t ask you whether you really want to toggle showing the hidden files, it doesn’t give you any options, you just click the button and can see all of your hidden files. And when you don’t need to see them anymore, they’re gone - at another click of the button. Convenient, isn’t it?
Here is how you use it:
- Download FinderToggleHiddenFiles.dmg and mount it
- Copy the ‘Toggle Hidden Files’ application to your Applications folder
- Go to your Applications folder and find the ‘Toggle Hidden Files‘ application
- Drag the ‘Toggle Hidden Files’ application to the free space on your Finder’s menu bar
Note: When dragging, hold it for a while until you see the green + icon next to your cursor.
This works on Tiger (10.4) and Leopard (10.5) on both PPC and Intel.
Typography for Children
For a project I’m currently working on, I needed to pick a good font. Now the target audience of this project is very different from the audience of the projects I was involved with so far: It’s going to a be a website for children.
Children are just in the process of learning to read and how written words relate to sounds and spoken words. The efforts of young readers need to be supported by making sure the texts are not only easy to understand but also are set in inviting, easy-to-read typefaces.
in case you’re interested, I went with Gill Sans Schoolbook (the Open Type version is called Gill Sans Infant).
Innovation in Wine Labels
I just stumbled across a really innovative design idea for wine labels via Noisy Decent Graphics.
If you’re at a friends place for dinner and you have a really, really nice bottle of wine, how often do you remember its name when you’re shopping for wine again? Most of us have better things to remember, anyway. Or maybe you’re a bit tipsy and won’t even remember whether it was a bottle of red or a bottle of white. Anyway, this is one of the ideas that makes you smack your head and ask yourself why you didn’t think of this
Do websites need to look exactly the same in every browser?
Finally, an answer to that almost biblical question.
Alberto Seveso
Alberto Seveso is a freelance graphics designer living in Rome. I knew his old site but somehow forgot about it. Today I stumbled across his new portfolio via agenturblog. Alberto has a few phantastic works on his page, almost all of them surreal photomontages.
In his shop you can buy great prints or even just the digital version as a PDF, where you have to organize the printing yourself. A neat idea.
Photoshop’s New Logo
Since the last rebranding of Adobe’s design suite has been nine months ago (remember the Periodic Table o’ Elements?), apparently it’s time for another new logo, this time for the Photoshop “family” of applications.
Opinions? Well, apparenty it represents a P. At least according to John Nack, who also has more details on the whole rebranding thing. It’s a speech bubble. Yes, another one. Welcome to the bandwagon! And it’s in 3D with glossy finish, practically screaming “photoshop filters!”. Where’s the lens flare?
Anyway, while the logo might not please everybody (judging from a lot of not so nice comments on John’s post), at least it seems Adobe has finally rediscovered Photoshop as a valuable brand.
Speech Bubbles: The Web2.0 Catch All Symbol
I just stumbled over this roundup of web2.0 logos all featuring a speech bubble. I didn’t realize it was that prevalent.
Jealous Computers: Nokia Viral Advertising
The latest viral marketing campaign by Nokia is again beautifully done, consisting of a website complete with videos, victim reports and posters warning of jealous computers attacking their owners when they buy or use a Nokia N95. As a nice twist, users can upload their own videos, pictures or stories of attacks and receive a specially designed T-Shirt.
Mr. Toledano
Have a look at New York-based conceptual photographer Phillip Toledano’s portfolio for some really nice and inspirational photographic work. Some limited edition prints can be purchased online at Gild.
Mr. Toledano (by the way, I just love the entrance page (archive.org link) thinks, that every photograph should be like an unfinished sentence or part of a story and in pursuit of this, he has amassed a dazzling portfolio of original photography. The stories the photographs tell are so thought through and engrossing, it’s definitely worth a look.
Phillip Toledano, a lover of photography since he was eleven, was born in London and currently resides and works in New York.
