Emoji design

EVERYDAY PICTOGRAMS ELEVATED.

OpenMoji was started by Interaction and Communication Design students at the The University of Design Schwäbisch Gmünd in Germany. It’s an open-source emoji library created from a designer’s point of view. A welcome move towards a more unified set of icons.

Here’s a sample of the emojis. Everything on the site is available for download in SVG and PNG formats. http://openmoji.org/index.html

Whether we like using them or not, the fact remains that emojis are the most popular item (in terms of sheer quantity) in the visual communication universe.

A previous post, “Emojis and beyond” by Nigel Holmes: https://wp.me/p7LiLW-OG

And one from World Emoji Day: https://wp.me/p7LiLW-1so

May 14, 2018

X-ray

THE UNDERLYING STRUCTURE REVEALED.

Nick Veasey makes X-rays of various objects in his custom-built studio, which has thick concrete walls and a heavy lead and steel door. Because of the limits of the size of X-ray film, Nick assembles the images of larger objects from separate scans. He also takes the items apart to scan each piece and get a level of internal detail that would otherwise be impossible. For the Boeing 777 shown above, he made approximately 500 scans of individual components. Click on the image for a larger version.
A skeleton that was used for training radiologists, is the source of the human elements. Some Photoshop composition and manipulation is part of the process. http://www.nickveasey.com

Kent Krugh X-rayed cameras for “Speciation,” a photography project. http://www.kentkrugh.com/portfolios/speciation/

May 10, 2018

Extreme architecture

UNUSUAL IDEAS FOR BUILDINGS (SOME OF WHICH WERE BUILT).

OBJECT-DRIVEN
Here in Ohio, we have a giant picnic basket building. It was the headquarters of the Longaberger Company until 2016, and is a surprisingly accurate representation of their Medium Market Basket. Last year it was sold to a developer.
Photograph by Derek Jensen.

The National Fisheries Development Board (India) has an interesting regional office. It’s in Hyderabad.

The Piano House in Huainan, China is built in the shape of a piano and violin. It’s currently a showroom for the district of Shannan.

OVER-SIZED

THE ULTIMATE HOME
This might look like a cathedral, but it’s a very large house. For one person.

William Beckford’s extravagant Fonthill Abbey was also known as “Beckford’s Folly,” and unlike some of the other examples below, it was actually constructed. Work began in 1796, and was completed in 1813. Beckford lived on his own in the house and only used one bedroom. Guests would have been quite impressed entering through the Great Western Hall.

Unfortunately, the 270-foot tower (82 meters) collapsed in 1807 (shown below). A replacement tower of the same height took six years to build, but it also collapsed. So over the following seven years, another tower (much shorter at 145 feet tall, 44 meters) was built. A footnote: after Beckford sold the house, the third tower collapsed too.

RESIDENTIAL SKYSCRAPER
Antilia is a much more recent example of an extravagant private residence. This 27-story, 568-foot tall, house (173 meters) is owned by Mukesh Ambani, and opened in 2010. It’s in Mumbai, which has a lot of poverty, and consequently the house drew considerable criticism. At a cost of around $2 billion, it’s the world’s most expensive residential building. A few items for a real estate listing: Nine elevators. Three helipads. Over 400,000 square feet of space. Parking for 168 cars.

Photograph by A.Savin.

GERMANIA
Adolf Hitler had some big ideas for Berlin. His new capital, Welthaupstadt Germania (World Capital Germania), was designed to celebrate his victory in World War II. Albert Speer was the architect of the grand plan, which was (obviously) never realized. The colossal Volkshalle would have been over 656 feet (200 meters) high with room inside for 180,000 people.

The Arch of Triumph, at around 330 feet (100 meters) tall, would have been large enough for the Arc de Triomphe (Paris) to fit inside it’s opening. The structure would have shown the names of the two million Germans who died in World War I.

NEWTON FANTASY
Étienne-Louis Boullée designed a cenotaph for Isaac Newton in 1784. It was intended to be an impressive 500 feet (150 meters) tall. Holes in the dome would give the illusion of stars in the night sky.

SOVIET SKYSCRAPER
Work on Moscow’s gigantic Palace of the Soviets began in 1937, but was stopped in 1941 because of the German invasion.

It would have surpassed the Empire State Building with a height of 1,624 feet (495 meters).

MEGA-ARCH
The stainless steel Gateway Arch in St.Louis is the world’s tallest arch at 630 feet (192 meters).

Photograph by Daniel Schwen.

May 7, 2018

Line art

INFORMATIONAL VECTOR-BASED ILLUSTRATION BY JOSH MCKIBLE.

MCKIBILLO is the professional name of Josh McKible. It’s a combination of McKible and illo (illustration). I’ve always admired Josh’s stylish, and carefully considered line art style. The use of strong color and simple patterns. It’s the graphic language of information. A modern version of the illustration used in the workshop manuals, and all kinds of how-to instructions, that I grew up with in the last century.

Above, the nuclear cycle, from mining uranium to spent fuel. Below, dealing with an aggressive dog…

…and surviving a shark attack.

Illustrations for an article on emerging technologies.

Josh has made workout graphics for several publications.

How to make pulled pork on a barbecue.

A camper van that has features normally found on a full-sized recreational vehicle.

Future spacesuit.

The process of tapping syrup.

A smart home energy system that connects to the grid.

Cat exerciser. (Yes, this is a real approved patent.)

Website: http://mckibillo.com

Behance: https://www.behance.net/mckibillo

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mckibillo/

May 3, 2018

Chess

DESIGNS FOR A CLASSIC GAME.

New York City
Skyline Chess (architects Ian Flood and Chris Prosser) used a Kickstarter campaign to develop a 3D-printed set of iconic NYC architecture pieces. Available in black, white or metal.

They started with a London version. So now the two cities can be battling each other. https://skyline-chess.co.uk/

Bauhaus
This simple geometric set was designed in 1923–24 by Josef Hartwig. The form of each piece suggests how it can move on the board.

Packaging by Joost Schmidt.

World Chess
David Weil of Pentagram designed the World Championship Chess Set. The pieces are inspired by the friezes on the Parthenon. The set was first used at a tournament in 2013.

The new set is a development of the Staunton set (below) that has been standard since 1849, and referenced neoclassical elements.

Photograph by Bubba73.

It was part of a full redesign of every aspect of the World Chess Championship, including posters and an app to track the matches.

April 30, 2018

Notebooks

JOSÉ NARANJA’S CREATIVE JOURNALS.

Combining drawings with stamps and other ephemera in meticulous arrangements, José creates a unique (and beautiful) record of his thoughts and observations. Above, dragonflies. Below, Bangkok.

Dollar bill.

Inks.

Eyes.

Patterns.

Bermuda Triangle.

José worked for several years as an aeronautical engineer. On these planes.

A travel kit for one of José’s trips.

High density.

Eternal fountain pen.

Queen Elizabeth II.

Ideal studio.

The last page of a notebook is the test page.

Buy a facsimile collection, The Orange Manuscript, here: http://josenaranja.blogspot.com/2015/01/the-orange-manuscript-first-edition-is.html

José’s blog: http://josenaranja.blogspot.com

Follow him on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jose_naranja/

April 26, 2018

Swiss data viz

FROM ATLAS TO INTERACTIVE.

Today is International Chart Day. https://www.internationalchartday.com

So it’s seems appropriate to feature a book that is in Michael Stoll’s collection of historical infographics. Especially as he is a speaker at the inaugural Chart Day event in Washington, D.C.
Michael gave me a copy of the Graphic-Statistical Atlas of Switzerland (1914) a while ago. It’s a data visualization classic, from an age when data was collected in ledgers.

Here are three spreads. Click on the images for larger versions.

Below, the percentage of productive land use (left), and the population density of the states (right), compared to the nation. The Basel-Stadt number is so large that an unusual method was used to get the bar onto the page.

Causes of death, 1901–1910

Cableways by length and altitude. A red line shows a climb of more than five times the initial height. Blue shows less than five times.

To mark the 125th edition of the Statistical Yearbook, the Federal Statistical Office published an atlas that updated the charts from the early editions with modern data. https://goo.gl/7XAVJG
There was a long period when the books did not contain any information graphics, before a revival of that visual approach in the late 1980s.

Population density 1888 compared to 2016.

Fatalities 1890–94 compared to 2010–14.

Exports 1891–94 compared to 2013–16.

The modern book is supported by an online version: the Interactive Statistical Atlas of Switzerland. https://goo.gl/QeLpbt

April 23, 2018

Stop-motion

USING EVERYDAY OBJECTS TO TELL A STORY.

These imaginative films by PES (Adam Pesapane) have been viewed on YouTube millions of times. The first three that I’m featuring here are simple recipes. This kind of approach could be applied to many instructional explanations, perhaps with the addition of labels and other graphic elements. My point is (one more time) that engagement of our audience is so important. We have to look for new forms to get our message across.

“Western Spaghetti” (above) is from 2008: https://goo.gl/HRraHM

“Fresh Guacamole” was nominated for the Oscar for Best Animated Short Film in 2013. In fact, at 1 minute 41 seconds, it’s the shortest film ever to get a nomination. https://goo.gl/Ghh575

“Submarine Sandwich” was funded by a Kickstarter campaign. PES himself appears at the beginning: https://goo.gl/qf1Lvo

This commercial for Honda was nominated for an Emmy in 2016. https://goo.gl/M4b1XK

Website: https://pesfilm.com

April 19, 2018

Tallest

THE HIGHEST BUILDINGS COMPARED.

In 1850, the Great Pyramid of Giza was the tallest structure, as it had been for over three thousand years. By James Reynolds and John Emslie.

Below, by 1884, the Washington Monument (555 feet, 169 meters) had taken over. From Cram’s Unrivaled Family Atlas of the World.

The Eiffel Tower (1,063 feet, 324 meters) had arrived on the scene by 1896, and being nearly twice the height of the Washington Monument, it presented a scale problem. Solved here by cropping off a large piece of it. From Rand, McNally & Co.’s Universal Atlas of The World.

After a number of buildings held the title, the Empire State Building (1,250 feet, 381 meters) became the leader in 1931. This elevation is in the Art Deco lobby, which according to the building’s website, took 18 months to restore in 2009. The whole building took just 13 months to build.

Photograph: Ken Thomas

The World Trade Center (1,368 feet, 417 meters) took the record away from the Empire State Building in 1972. The Tobu World Square theme park in Japan has scale models of 102 buildings from around the world. Their World Trade Center is 65.5 feet (20 meters) tall.

Photograph: Fredhsu

A 2008 gatefold for Condé Nast Traveler that includes the soon-to-be number one, the Burj Khalifa (2,717 feet, 828 meters), a number of previous record holders, some landmark towers in terms of design, and some other towers that were planned back then.
Click on the image for a larger version of the illustration.

Illustration by Bryan Christie Design: http://www.bryanchristiedesign.com

April 16, 2018

Retro tech

REMEMBERING THE GEAR WE USED TO LOVE.

Everyone had a tape recorder, and presentations were on slides, in a carousel. Jim Golden made these GIFs.
See more of his bygone technology images here: https://goo.gl/JX1pzT

Early cellphones were bulky.

It was the beginning of the end for the conventional telephone.

William Shatner presents the latest in computers in an early 1980s advertisement.
The Commodore VIC 20 was the best selling model of it’s time.

I was lent a Commodore 64 to illustrate it for a magazine. I even tried to use it. End of story. Below, the airbrushed illustration. The overlay which carries the labels is rolled back.

Email was new and mysterious in 1981.

The Macintosh Portable (1989 to 1991) had a fabulous two megabytes of RAM, and a black and white screen. Weighing in at 16 pounds (7.2 kilograms), it was not exactly lightweight. The cost: $7,300 (more than $14,000 in today’s dollars).