Best of May 2009

Some interesting designs worth looking over.

I Can Read Your Language

Digital translators may not be new to the scene, but what makes ViewTrans different is that it “translates what you see.”

What is design?

What is design? Is it something you sketch? Is it a bright idea in your mind? Is it something that makes you ponder? There are endless questions and answers about what design is. It is hard to just give one precise answer because design lives in so many areas of our lives.

What is the creative process?

The creative process is not just iterative; it’s also recursive. It plays out “in the large” and “in the small”—in defining the broadest goals and concepts and refining the smallest details.

25 examples of great architecture

Some human-scaled cool houses.

Cutting Off the Power: New Green Product Invention

It takes the chore out of conserving energy. Simply assign your electronic devices to the ‘always on’ or ‘can be powered down’ ports of this surge protector. Then, the next time you leave home, all you have to do is use the wireless switch that you mount next to your light switch to save on your electric bill. Simply brilliant!

Giant Eco-Egg Skyscraper: A Conceptual Luxury Hotel

From the unseen, unsung files of design competitions past comes the Envision Green Hotel proposed by Miami-based Michael Rosenthal Associates for Hospitality Design’s Radical Innovation design competition. Part wind tower, part urban eco-resort, and all egg, this “lobular” structure is touted as one of the most recognizable landmarks for the city in which it would ultimately be…laid. Read the article here.

TED talk: behind the design of DIY charcoal

MIT senior lecturer Amy Smith’s TED talk begins with the best thing a design presentation can share: failures along the path to successful solutions. Smith wanted to design a locally producible fuel that would eliminate Haitian preference for wood-based fires.

Hippo Roller announces $25 x 200 campaign

With the Hippo Water Roller, an individual can transport 24 gallons (200 pounds) of water as if pushing a 22-pound weight.

40 Fantastic Sand Sculptures

It's amazing what people can do out of sand and also how big and detailed they can be.

Transport TW: Magnet-powered vehicle promises green commuting

Designed by Harsha Vardhan, the “Transport TW” is a futuristic car that generates power from magnetic field generated by on-board electricity powered systems. The Transporter TW (Twin Wheel) is based around an electric engine which produces a magnetic field to drive the large wheels.

Mobility

Mobile experiences are changing the rules of behavior by enabling persistent access to information, creation of media, sense of discovery, and emotional connections.

100 Most Creative People in Business

There are no rules about creativity. Which made constructing our list of the 100 Most Creative People in Business a tricky task.

The REFRACT House

An interdisciplinary team from CCA (California College of Arts) and the University of Santa Clara have been working on a project for the 2009 Solar Decathlon. The video tells a very nice story of a group of smart students dealing with the challenges of a complex piece of design thinking. A link to the project on the CCA site is here. The movie was made by one of the project team members, Alexander Winter.

Ideas Project

People talking about ideas around communications technology.

In Italy, futuristic bus stops to blend practical, chic

High-tech bus stops so cool they might actually entice you to take a ride will be installed next year in Florence, Italy.

The urban fixtures have been designed by a group of researchers led by Carlo Ratti, head of the Senseable City Lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

SunRun PPA

The cool tool here is creative solar financing. Solar-electric panels are pretty much a commodity, but still high priced. What's new is an innovative way for a homeowner to afford an expensive solar set up.

Google Wonder Wheel: Exploring Related Keyword Search Queries

Somehow feeling guilty this has not surfaced on infosthetics before, but here it is anyway. Google recently introduced its so-called Wonder Wheel [google.com] as an addition to its normal results page. Read the rest of the article here...don't miss the YouTube video about Wonder Wheel.

Variable Frame Bike

The bike is up, then the bike is down. You sit on the bike upright in the city, then set it down to cruise in the suburbs. It’s intuitive.

Designing An End to Poverty

The philosophy of Jeffrey Sachs revolves around a simple tenet: the world’s problems are man-made, therefore they can be solved by man. Of course, immediately following that simple idea is an avalanche of complexity: how to decide which issues get priority, how to navigate through governments, how to raise funds for foreign aid, how to distribute those funds.

Designing the Future

“Designers have been failing to humanize their work for years,” explains Brian Collins, president of the New York-based design firm COLLINS:. “The problem is that they apply a top down approach, where they impose their design onto something or someone. Yet what they should be doing is thinking of word ‘design’ as being synonymous with ‘empathy’ and working from the bottom up.

Logos, Flags, and Escutcheons

Paul Rand's thoughts on logo design.

Designing presentations in the TED style

TED has earned a lot of attention over the years for many reasons, including the nature and quality of its short-form conference presentations. All presenters lucky enough to be asked to speak at TED are given 18-minute slots maximum (some are for even less time such as 3- and 6-minute slots).

Ignite: a great implementation of the short-form presentation

The point of an Ignite talk is not to rush through the topic or to dumb it down, but rather to work within the constraints to illuminate and illustrate the essence of your idea and of your story.

Beyond the fold

Beyond the Fold is a speculative approach to the electronic newspaper of the future. It explores gesture as a means to interface with the device and bridge the digital and physical worlds. The design process employs cultural metaphors, human experience and rituals to create meaningful interactions.

The 99% Conference: Scott Thomas On Designing the Obama Campaign

At the recent, The 99% Conference, Scott Thomas took the stage to talk about what it was like to design Obama's digital campaign on the fly. This video culls the highlights from his presentation and catches up with him afterward to find out more about his theories on simplicity and his plans for working in politics in the future.

CCC Car

The renderings from ZEEP Design display a concept car named “CCC Car” that transforms into a helicopter.

Creating a Post-Crisis Economy: How to Design a Participatory System

The best examples of current participatory systems included a significant amount of "user" participation in the design process itself. Whether it is Facebook or Apple, the richness and variety of their offerings are created by untold developers, not employed by the host brand, who have created solutions never imagined by the original architects of the platform.

Kindle DX: Why Size Matters

People have a lot of expectations for the new, larger-sized Kindle DX. Interesting how a shift in size / form factor can hold the fate of an entire industry (newspapers in this case) in its hand.

How to feed the whole world (the case for white bread)

Louise Fresco argues that a smart approach to large-scale, industrial farming and food production will feed our planet's incoming population of nine billion. Only foods like (the scorned) supermarket white bread, she says, will nourish on a global scale. (Recorded at TED2009, February 2009, in Long Beach, California. Duration: 18:00.)

13 Super Cool Computer Keyboards

Keyboards are an essential part of out computers. We use computer keyboards mostly to type. However in recent times we have seen a diversification in the use and design of keyboards.

Redesign Your Street

America’s streets leave a lot to be desired. As Carly Clark and Aaron Naparstek write in the latest issue of GOOD, “For the most part, [traffic engineers] viewed the city from behind a windshield and saw the street as a problem to be solved for automobiles. The result is the America city that most of us know today: sprawling, traffic-choked, hostile to pedestrians and cyclists, dependent on a vast, never-ending flow of cheap oil, and deeply unsustainable.” Check out these ideas!

The Unusual Architecture of Dubai

Dubai is the most populated city in the United Arab Emirates with more than 1.5 million inhabitants. However, in 1975 this number was much smaller, something around 183,200. Seen by the whole world as a futuristic and modern city, it's in constantly change, Dubai has invested heavily in architecture, hiring some of the most famous architects to project its skyline.

100 Amazing Futuristic Design Concepts We Wish Were Real

Concept designers are also referred to as “visual futurists”.

These concept designs may not be on the market yet, but they can still inspire you to create something just as futuristic and exciting online.