Little reminder of shrinking economy

Some marketing giants are reacting to the downturn, (that's putting it mildly). I picked this up through an RSS feed I watch. While you read this, envision the storefronts of these mall heavy hitters.

http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/Depression_And_Bipolar_Disorder_Support/message/1603

Mike Clelland's boing marks

I just learned of a friend's site littleboingmarks.blogspot.com. Mike is a talented illustrator/cartoonist and even more talented at backcountry life. He came into my office about 25 years ago and we learned we both knew a particular Chicago expatriate living in New York City. Anyway, long story. Visit his blog and check out his work.

Desperately seeking inclusion

My main purpose here is to encourage people to look beyond design annuals and trendy periodicals and websites and develop their own design inspiration from a larger universe of stimulus. The hope is that good, innovative design follows.

There are a number of design forums, such as http: //www.thegraphicsforum.com/bb/ that provide a chance to enter into a dialog with other designers on a broad range of topics—some relevant and some not so.

Keep it in mind.

What are you listenting to while you work?

Designs, whatever we're working on, have unique rhythms. Much of the time, music, at least what I listen to the most, is a distraction. But other times, something syncs with the text, images, pages and spaces I work on. From time to time, I go on jags, listening to similar or the same pieces over and over. Recently I discovered Japanese rap. The Japanese are good at mimicking American (and probably other) cultural affectations. Often, their music is accented with English words and phrases mixed with their own language. What I like is the music, rhythm and pacing of rap without words I can possibly hope to understand. Additionally, the unusual pronunciation and juxtaposition of syllables wash over me like a subtheme to the bass beat.

Another designer, late twenties, in our office, likes to play Medeski, Martin and Wood on his ipod while building Flash segments on websites.

Whatever works for you, I would like to hear about it.

Why no posts for a while

I haven't dropped off the face of the Earth, at least not yet. My mother was recently diagnosed with cancer and just passed away. I just haven't had the necessary motivation to post. But I just went through some of my design scrapbooks and will be back on the job soon. Thanks for your patience.

Design annuals' limitations

The remark was recently made that looking to design annuals, such as Print or CA, gives you inspiration from last year's ideas. Considering the entry schedule and publication date, the work could have been done nearly two years prior. I find certain things attract my attention and I scrapbook them for later scanning when coming up with a new solution.