Black & White Clock Concept...

I stumbled across this beautiful concept clock by Russian designer Vadim Kibardin while looking for an eye catching piece for my studio.

It takes the form of a digital clock, but only the figures themselves. Each figure has self-contained power supply and independent control, it can be fixed to any surface autonomously. A light sensor will switch the clock to an invert mode: the figures are white in the dark time of day and black at daytime. Currently the clock is only a concept, which is unfortunate because I’ve already picked a spot for it!

Vadim Kibardin was born 1974 in Omsk, Russia. Graduated from Ural State Academy’s of Architecture and Art Industrial Design Department, Yekaterinburg. Since 2005 Vadim Kibardin has lived in Prague where his Kibardindesign studio started production of his own trade mark goods which have being sold in Russia, Europe and USA. He won over ten awards, including Reddot design award, iF Award, Promosedia International Design Competition, DIA, Charman design competition.

Amazing Snow Globes...

This week I was asked by one of our clients at Hill Langdell to design a corporate snow globe; a strange request in May but after I received the brief it was clear there were no festive connotations.

For a little inspiration I trawled around the internet for examples of snow globes and stumbled across the captivating works of Martin and Paloma Munoz. They are best known for their sculptures and photographs of sculptures contrasting pristine settings with foreboding or grisly scenes. Their most recent work are the Travellers and Islands series pictured below.

Slightly out of season perhaps, but enjoy!

Deb Site Demolition...

Historic Belper firm Deb Ltd, famous for making skincare products including Swarfega, has recently moved to a new £18.5million premises at Denby Hall. The old site on Spencer Road in Belper, which had been the firm’s home since 1941, is currently undergoing demolition.

The opportunity to try a little post-apocalyptic style photography was overwhelming! Luckily I work with Wheeldon, the company currently redeveloping the old industrial site. Once kitted out with hard hat and boots, I was given permission to spend a morning wandering around the derelict factory buildings with a camera.

The demolition was already underway, revealing pipe-work, tanks, wiring and exposing the dilapidated interior of the factory buildings. The whole area had a grimy, dark, grunge feel to it with so much detail to capture.

I’ve attached a few of the early results below...

Subbuteo..

Following on from my Food Landscapes blog entry last year featuring the photography work of Pierre Javelle and Akiko Ida, I recently had an opportunity to undertake some micro-photography of my own for one of our Clients at Hill Langdell.

Mainline Communications is the leading UK Orange mobile phone distributor; in my role as Creative Director I have worked with the Mainline team for some time on various projects from their branding through to websites and promo design. Recently Mainline submitted an entry to the 2010 Mobile News Awards; biggest event in the UK mobile channel calendar. Hill Langdell were asked to come up with a concept and design for the entry to ensure it wasn’t merely overlooked.

As this is a World Cup year we came up with the idea of styling the entry with a football theme, but with a twist. Using macro lenses, old table football sets dug out from friends’ attics, blue tack, sticky-back-plastic and a little imagination, football’s greatest tournament was re-enacted with Subbuteo.

The entry folder was made as a Subbuteo branded game box, with players included (shirts in my client’s branded colours of course) and with the award submission document, compiled by our friends at Quiet Storm Consultants, fitting neatly inside. The document itself included sports action photography, all recreated in miniature.

The end result was fairly striking. Fingers crossed Mainline pick up first place, watch this space...

Steampunk Chic; Halcyon Goggles

This morning I received a package from British Manufacture Halcyon containing a brand new pair of Vintage-style classic Goggles. I’m so impressed with the quality, aesthetics, functionality and even the retro-styled packaging I thought I’d put up a post about them!

Manufactured in the UK and based on the original RAF flying goggles of the 1940's, Halcyon Goggles are a popular choice for use with all styles of open face motorcycle helmets.

The goggles were packaged in a box that looked as if it’d been plucked from a museum cabinet or the depths of your granddad’s attic; I love the old-world feel of the three-colour graphic design, which although isn’t sophisticated, completely suited the identity of the product within.

After unwrapping the goggles from their tissue protection, the quality and craftsmanship was immediately apparent. The facemask is manufactured from soft brown leather and the frames are produced in Brass then painted. The lenses themselves feature unique twin-glazing and can be specified tinted, in laminated glass or even to your prescription! I went for the standard lenses for now, but new examples can be purchased clipped in at a later date.

There is a knurled adjuster across the nose bridge which results in a perfect fit once I put them on in conjunction with my Vespa Helmet; a quick trip out at lunchtime confirmed a very snug and comfortable fit.

The perfect accessory for a classic scooter or burbling hog. Just need a wax jacket or parka now...

Retro Philco PC...

The Philco PC by Dave Schultze is pretty much a re-imagined Philco Predicta—a short-lived but ridiculously iconic television from 1954. Then there are other fantastic touches as well, like a typewriter keyboard and a mouse that looks like some sort of repurposed handheld sander from an era when men in gray flannel suits didn't shave, but straight-up ground stubble into submission.

It runs on the latest Windows 7 operating system though, but seeing that this is but a concept at point of publishing, to heck with specifications as those are only limited by your imagination. How would you like to see future computers and desktops come in such a form factor, or do you prefer those boring and old dark-coloured designs instead?

Measuring Type...

Matt Robinson in collaboration with Tom Wrigglesworth compared a selection of the most commonly used typefaces for how economical they are with the amount of ink which they use at the same point size. Large scale renditions of the typefaces were drawn out with ballpoint pens, allowing the remaining ink levels to display the ink efficiency of each typeface.