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Great Website Design, Illustrations and Music

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Gigawatt - The Illuminated Mixtapes. I came across this website last week and I’ve been streaming the “Mixtapes” ever since. Really nice work!

This is the Best Font Tool Ever

The Best Font Tool Ever - Wordmark.it

At the outset of a logo design project about 99% of the time I start with type. I can spend hour upon hour, even days exploring typography. This is where Wordmark.it comes in. It is a free, online service that allows users to get a quick snap-shot of fonts installed on a computer. Users can simply type a word or phrase into a text box on the Wordmark.it website. Wordmark.it will then display that word or phase via the fonts that are installed on your computer. Complete awesomeness!

Whether Fine Artist, Photographer, Web Designer or Print Design, the Vignelli Cannon is a Must-Read for all Creative Types

The Vignelli Canon
Italian Designer Massimo Vignelli gives us a snap shot of his understanding of what makes good design, it’s basic principles and rules. He gives us various examples of practice in product, graphic and information design.

“We design things which we think are semantically correct and syntactically consistent but if, at the point of fruition, no one understands the result, or the meaning of all that effort, the entire work is useless.” - Massimo Vignelli

This may be old news to some of you but I thought it well worth the a post. Grab this fantastic 96 page read. The PDF version is free and it’s a quick, easy read.

ROI Tools that Actually Look Good—A Challenging Website Design

ROI Tool Website Design - Korrio's Cost Savings Calculator
A few months ago our friends at Korrio (and a great client), commissioned us to create an ROI tool that demonstrates the cost-benefits of using their product. It had to speak to a no-techie audience, be simple yet effective and give the user multiple options for sharing the resulting information.

I don’t know about you but when I think about “Return on Investment” tools I think about dry, left-brained analytics tools – no fun for us right-brianers right? As I started doing research I came a across a beautiful ROI project by Google, appropriately called, “Gone Google”. Inspired by what they had created, as well as a few others, we dove right into design.

Yes this project was a bit of a challenge but fortunately the client let us get creative with it and we like that! In terms of coding, fortunately those genius Korrio developers were able to connect the final dots and launch what I think is a really well-rounded web design project. The resulting PDF might be the most impressive part so be sure to take a look.

Baroque, Neo-Classical, Contemporary and Even a Little Graphic Design – Check Out Google’s Latest Website Project

Art Project Powred by Google
Prepare to be get sucked in. “Art Project, powered by Google” launched this morning. It appears to be Google’s equivalent to “Street View” for some of the more popular museums across the globe. The best part, all of the pieces are hi-res and one can zoom in to explore the intricate details of a Monet, Picasso or even photographs from the Spanish Civil War. Take a Look!

The W3C Gave HTML5 a New Logo but What’s That Mean?

The New HTML5 Logo
In a recent article via WebMonkey, Scott Gilbertson states that “HTML5 already enjoys more buzz that a web developer left alone in the back of a Mountain Dew truck (it even has it’s own posse), the only problem is that the buzz makers conflate just about every emerging web technology under the HTML5 umbrella. Purists have long decried headlines proclaiming the glory of HTML5 above an article about JavaScript and CSS 3, but now the one group that ought to know best appears to throwing in the towel and embracing the HTML5 hype.

While the new HTML5 logo looks good, the FAQ that accompanies it is troubling. According to the W3C, the logo is “a general-purpose visual identity for a broad set of open web technologies, including HTML5, CSS, SVG, WOFF, and others.”

The logo’s not spectacular but I think it’s a good and sound design. I have a feeling however that, it may fade into the abyss. Wouldn’t you strip the logo/brand off of your site/collateral once your audience realized it doesn’t actually mean anything? Gilbertson elaborates, “Lumping everything together is as silly as a carpenter referring to every tool in their toolkit as “a hammer.” I totally agree. Read the full article here…

Xtranormal is Gaining Momentum - Design Your Video!

I heard about Xtranormal via NPR on the way to work this morning. Initially I thought it was the first I’d heard of them but as the story progressed I realized I’d actually seen an Xtranormal video before I knew who Xranormal was. You’ve probably seen one as well – does Geico (the insurance company) ring a bell? If you happen to remember that really odd, animated, commercial with the robotic voices that’s purposely made to look cheap, then yes, you too have seen an Xtranormal video.

Xtranormal just recently hit the 2 million monthly user mark. The company’s slogan is ”If you can type, you can make movies,” and the do-it-yourself computer-generated animations it makes possible.

Enough said, I decided to give it a shot and create my own Pixelube commercial. I’m impressed; the UI is designed nicely, it was super simple to create and the deadpan voices make it kind of funny. You should give it a shot!

New Seattle Website Design: Hardy Boys, Treasure on the Tracks


Local business, Her Interactive, a gaming development company located in Bellevue, Wa. commissioned us to create a “micro” promotional web site for it’s new Nintendo DS game, Hardy Boys, Treasure on the Tracks. The web site was created to reinforce the basic concept of the game where users are prompted to travel the rails from Paris to St. Petersburg in search of the “Royal Treasure.

Pixelube worked closely with the Her Interactive marketing team to create a flash site that is fun, immersive and promotes the game in a creative way.

Senior Designer: Tyler Hill
Creative Director: Vincent Dean

40+ Useful & Handy Web Designer’s Web Services & Tools

noupe - 40 useful web site tools

If you’re a web site designer, you’ll want to hang onto this list of useful links that our friends over at noupe.com have provided. From tools for site status, to screen shots to em charts, there is much to be had here! Take a look…

Freshly Launched Website: Seattle Construction Company BNBuilders

BNBuilders New Web Site
BNBulders (BNB) is a full-service general contractor. They have worked on a variety of local projects such as the Seattle Children’s Research Institute, the King County Library System, various projects for the University of Washington and multiple biotech projects in the Lake Union area of Seattle.

Pixelube worked closely with the BNBuilders team to build the new website that would showcase their latest projects and allow the BNB staff to easily post job openings, and announcements to the site via a custom content management system.

Senior Designer: Don Flora
Development: Devin Swecker
Creative Director: Vincent Dean

About

Pixelube is a design studio based in Seattle Washington. We specialize in logo, identity, web and print design—design that sparks interest, builds equity and generates revenue.

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