145 | July 01, 2008 in Home | comments: 2

I was in a hurry to complete an assignment and was at a complete loss for any good content, hence the following:

144 | June 30, 2008 in Home | comments: 0

Dancing with Matt

Pete posted a link to this video on North Temple a few days back, and I’ve just gotten around to watching it. There’s something about this video that just makes me happy inside.

142 | June 22, 2008 in Home | comments: 2

Someone Stole My Bike (a look back to 1994)

It was 1994, I was about 1 semester from finishing my BFA, and I had just purchased a mountain bike. I was pretty excited. I didn’t purchase anything too extravagant, but I spent about $600 on a used Norco. It was my first bike with a front suspension and I was excited to take it for a ride. I was in the process of moving apartments, and rode my bike home from the university to my new apartment. The apartment complex consisted of individual buildings, with apartments which were accessed from inside a common entry way. I pulled my bike in, placed it by the door, and went into the apartment to make a phone call. When I returned (less than a few minutes later), the bike was gone. Needless to say, I was highly disappointed, and maybe even a bit angry.

141 | June 03, 2008 in Design | comments: 2

Act Well Thy Part

For several months I’ve been working on the following design, and just found some time at home to finish it off (thanks to a stomach flu…). I initially started it as part of a poster contest at work, back in February, but as usual, the clock in my head is moving along much faster than the clock in the real world.

My version is slightly different than the original. I’ve tried to create perfect shapes and added a few different symbols for 2, 5, and 10.

In the Museum of Church History in Salt Lake City there’s a stone on display with a curious assortment of shapes and an inscription which reads “WHAT E’ER THOU ART, ACT WELL THY PART.”

David O’ McKay, while serving a mission in Scotland, saw this stone above the entrance to a building and took the message to heart. The message is simple and profound. We are all unique, with unique abilities and skills, and we each need to act out our part to the best of our abilities along with others to accomplish a greater good.

The inscription on the stone is unique and interesting for its geometric properties which enhance the message at hand. The grid creates a “magic square”. If you take the number of sides on each shape, and add them up horizontally, vertically or diagonally, it will always equal 18. This magic square is also unique because it contains a sequence of numbers 2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10 which together form 1 united whole. The sum of all the parts in proper arrangement is Unity!

The arrangement is also interesting to create, because it requires the construction of 8 unique polygons, as well as the Yin, Yang (my interpretation of 2). Creating each of the 10 geometric constructions all in one composition is a challenge—keeping everything in line and clean can be difficult.

I love the message behind this, and love that the message is enhanced through the geometry and symbolism of the magic square. I’m planning to get large poster-sized prints of this one made up soon.

140 | May 28, 2008 in Home | comments: 0

Cardboard Cars

Today when I came home, I tripped over a cardboard box which had been converted into a futuristic automobile of some sort by my 6 year old daughter. The design was complete with this control panel, which I thought was interesting, and reveals some simplicity, and a little bit of insight into the mind of a 6 year old.

I love the functions that she found most important to her:

Music
Research – “for looking up interesting facts”
Blast-Off
Food
Print
Need Band-Aid – “for when you get hurt”

And, as any keyboard would be incomplete without, she’s made sure to include the “apple” key.

139 | May 13, 2008 in Design | comments: 1

Drawing Circles

You wouldn’t believe how hard this was for me to figure out.

Now that I did figure it out, I’m trying to figure out why I even felt compelled to do so. Was a discussion about circles earlier today taken too far? Perhaps…

Code based circle drawing, colors inspired by 1971 Graphic Design. (click to refresh)

I’ve been trying to solve a circle drawing problem in flash. You’d think it would be a fairly simple thing to do, but getting the code right, flexible enough and having a circle that can be drawing at a specific rate, was not so easy, at least for me.

This functionality will appear in my thesis project in a very, un-ipressive way, and most people viewing it won’t even think twice about it. It’s just another example of lots of hours going into little things that most people won’t even notice.

138 | May 11, 2008 in Design

“A restricted view of the past creates an equally restricted view of the present.”

—Tibor Kalman

137 | May 04, 2008 in Journal | comments: 3

Horse Trailers

A few weeks ago on the bus ride home, we passed a horse trailer. As we moved by, we were at eye level with the horses, and happened to catch the gaze of one the horses. He was obviously peering into our bus. I wonder what his perceptions were?

134 | April 30, 2008 in Design

Graphic Design 1971

I’ve been deep in a historical survey of graphic design. Each week I’ve been gathering several examples of graphic design from different time periods (so far I’ve collected several hundred examples). This week, I was able to dig up some old Graphis design annuals from the library. I grabbed a couple volumes from 1971 (the year I was born).

It seems to have been the year of the “rainbow.”

133 | April 30, 2008 in Design | comments: 4

I just added a new article to northtemple.com, exploring the question: “What is the one skill that can make the most positive impacts in your profession?”

Give it a read and let me know what you think.

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