iPad Letterpress App!
Remember when I posted about Hatch Show Print and their amazing old-fashioned letterpress art? Very soon, you’ll be able to create your very own cool art prints using traditional letterpress techniques . . . on your iPad. (This might be a reason for me to BUY an iPad.) Check out LetterMPress and consider backing this project:
How long do animals live?
From a post at Information is Beautiful about the history of information graphics:
Then there’s ISOTYPE — the International System Of TYpographic Picture Education. It was an early infographical form, originated in the 1930s by Austrian philosopher and curator Otto Neurath “as a symbolic way of representing quantitative information via easily interpretable icons.” Again, it’s eye-popping how modern these images look. Despite being fashioned from woodcuts and hand-printing methods. Gorgeous.
(via @GKellyDesigns, via Erstwhile & dear)
I see Jesus
It seems like if Jesus was going to show up, it wouldn’t be in ice cream.
(via mythic flame)
The Rock’n'roll Metro Map.
Not quite an image out of context.
What you’re looking at is the compressed image of every frame of Requiem For a Dream.
USAwesome
Illinois ranks as Most Average. I concur.
(Thanks, Susan.)
C A R S O N
Fans of the icon of 90s graphic design will be pleased to know David Carson has a new magazine coming out.
David Byrne said of Carson’s work: “It communicates. But on a level beyond words. Just like music does – slipping in there before anyone has a chance to stop it at the border and ask for papers.”
A six issue subscription is $20.
(via kottke)
Mark Your Calendar
Other notable highlights:
Mr. T’s birthday, Montenegro’s independence or the Red Sox-White Sox game.
See you assholes on the 22nd.
Rosie the Riveter, dead at 86
Geraldine Doyle, the woman who came to be known as Rosie the Riveter, died December 26th at a hospice in Lansing, Michigan.
Rosie’s rolled-up sleeves and flexed right arm came to represent the newfound strength of the 18 million women who worked during the war and later made her a figure of the feminist movement.
But the woman in the patriotic poster was never named Rosie, nor was she a riveter. All along it was Mrs. Doyle, who after graduating from high school in Ann Arbor, Mich., took a job at a metal factory, her family said.
One day, a photographer representing United Press International came to her factory and captured Mrs. Doyle leaning over a piece of machinery and wearing a red and white polka-dot bandanna over her hair.
In early 1942, the Westinghouse Corp. commissioned artist J. Howard Miller to produce several morale-boosting posters to be displayed inside its buildings. The project was funded by the government as a way to motivate workers and perhaps recruit new ones for the war effort.
Smitten with the UPI photo, Miller reportedly was said to have decided to base one of his posters on the anonymous, slender metal worker – Mrs. Doyle.
For four decades, this fact escaped Mrs. Doyle, who shortly after the photo was taken left her job at the factory.
Analogue hyperlinks for a book on dreams.
Maria Fischer. “Traumgedanken.” Final year project at University of Applied Sciences Augsburg. 20 × 28 cm. 76 pages. Japanese binding.
The book “Traumgedanken” (“Thoughts about dreams”) contains a collection of literary, philosophical, psychological and scientifical texts which provide an insight into different dream theories.
To ease the access to the elusive topic, the book is designed as a model of a dream about dreaming. Analogue to a dream, where pieces of reality are assembled to build a story, it brings different text excerpts together. They are connected by threads which tie in with certain key words. The threads visualise the confusion and fragileness of dreams.
(via @pruned)
Indianizing the Facebook “Like” button
Or, like, it’s all like, so, like, UScentric.
When Your Logo Design Speaks Well of You
Impact Logos of Australia are asshats. Also, they are experts in gerbilling. Contact them if you are interested in that.
EVIL PEOPLE IN MODERNIST HOMES IN POPULAR FILMS
Alexander Trevi (he of my longtime favorite Pruned) twittered about Ben Critton’s Evil People in Modernist Homes in Popular Films, then followed up by linking to these snaps of said publication.
Fair Notice
October 5, 2010
TO: Lester Albatross, President & CEO
FROM: Cindy Scroggins, Senior Graphic Design Specialist
RE: Michael Smith
This serves as a formal complaint against my supervisor, Mr. Michael Smith. I walked into Mr. Smith’s office on Monday, October 4 to find Mr. Smith in a compromising position with his bicycle. While I acknowledge that Mr. Smith was in his own office, his door was unlocked and, this being a place of business, I assumed that I could enter the office of my own supervisor without having to witness the kind of unnatural display of affection that was taking place at 2:00 in the afternoon.
Clearly, Mr. Smith’s actions create a hostile work environment. I have three requests:
1. A new supervisor
2. Reassignment of Mr. Smith to another city
3. Mandatory counseling for Mr. Smith and his bicycle
Thank you for your consideration.
from the comments
Sheila, I was going to extend her deadline to Friday, end of day (EOD). But I don’t plan to look at her submission until sometime on Wednesday, probably around 4:00 or 4:15. At which time I will give her a list of things to change (I’m thinking around 15 items) and letting her know that the entire project is due to be reviewed by Senior Leadership at 10:00 AM Thursday morning and I’d need it on my desk by the time I arrive at work the next morning. I would tell her all of this as I gathered my things and headed out the door for the day.
Amy’s Gift
Europe According to the USA
Other maps of stereotypes include Europe According to France and Europe According to Gay Men.
clusterflock investigates: costume etiquette at Anime conventions
Deron, do you have a sense of whether the majority of costumes are off-the-rack? DIY? Is it possible to say?
The Show Starts in [?] Minutes
Hatch Show Print: the art of American letterpress
I have a love that borders on unhealthy obsession for the look of Hatch Show Print letterpress art. Though you may not be familiar with the name Hatch Show Print, their advertising poster style has a look that’s so familiar it’s iconic. Affiliated with the Country Music Hall of Fame and the official poster shop for the Ryman Auditorium, they’ve been operating continuously in Nashville since 1879. And the letters and forms they used back then are still being used today — what owner Jim Sherradan refers to as “preservation through production.” In fact, everything they do here is done by hand — absolutely no computers in evidence. They even call their customers on a rotary phone.
This 8-minute video is a fascinating glimpse into the daily operation and the unique art of the original American letterpress shop.
I was lucky enough to snag a signed copy of the Robert Plant / Alison Krauss poster shown in the video. And one of these days I’m going to find an appropriate excuse to have them design something for me. Business card, maybe . . . ?
Early Suasion: A Comic Review
I found this recently at my favorite used books place, and it brought back memories of being trapped in church with little to do but gaze at Sunday school propaganda and the few inked illustrations in the Bible. I remember seeing many reproductions of parts of this book, and have noted since that credit is seldom given to the editions done by M. C. Gaines, in the early 1940s–illustrations done by Don Cameron, with scripts done by Montgomery Mulford. Even this edition shows the odd understanding of “fair use” in religious publishing: the ISBN on this edition takes one to an entirely different edition. I don’t know what kind of deal Jimmy Swaggart worked out with Scarf Press, but I can’t seem to find any news of how this book with this cover came to be presented.
35mm from Felix Meyer on Vimeo.
Sweet Georgia Brown
Amy and I were driving home from the Trinity River Audubon Center a few months ago and noticed a line out the door, post church, of people in full Sunday attire, on a hot, pre-summer afternoon.
The name of the restaurant was Sweet Georgia Brown.
If you see this combination, you know, instantly, the food will be good. It took too long to return to find out, but when Kelsey was here last weekend, we finally went. There was a line inside, from the door to the serving area, at 3:30 in the afternoon.
Again, when this happens, you know it will be good.
After we decided on our entrees, we spent a good deal of time figuring out what our “vegetables” would be. I knew one of mine would be Macaroni & Cheese, the other BBQ Beans, but for the third? After scanning the large, yellow menu (it spanned the entire wall above the serving area; every possible item spelled out in 148 pt. type) I decided on fried okra.
When finally, we made our way to where the food was served, I saw stewed okra in the steam tray. I asked for my other items, then finally: “I’ll have the fried okra.”
“We don’t have fried okra,” the man said. Then, “But some people like it though.”
I got the stewed okra and couldn’t have been happier.
“A Tattooing ‘Artist’.”
The craze for tattooing grew worse, and each morning saw new additions to the ranks of the disfigured. One morning the climax was reached when a dozen little boys and several little girls appeared with beetles, shrimps, lobsters and butterflies crawling over their faces.
New York Tribune. Illustrated Supplement. Sunday, October 26, 1902.
Pernice to Me
I designed this book and book jacket (with help from my friend Sarah at Third Half Studios, who designed the actual tattoo). It’s called Pernice to Me, and it’s an amusing compendium of conversational snippets between music industry veteran Joyce Linehan (@ashmont) and the artist she manages, the incomparable (and apparently irascible) singer/songwriter Joe Pernice. I am a longtime fan of Joe’s work, despite the fact that he comes from my hometown. Their banter, while tinged with occasional mock racism, sexism and homophobia — and a canny misanthropy borne of long years toiling in the trenches of the music biz, with which I have a passing familiarity — is strangely enjoyable. Think of it as a “Shit My Dad Says” for working musicians and the people who work for them.
My favorite tweet was actually a voice mail: “Hi Joyce. This is Joe. Please return my call so that we may resume our little dance.”
You can enjoy their little dance for $10. On sale here.
