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design

Congrats to Live Labs' Jeff Weir

Posted By: Larry Larsen | Mar 11th @ 10:29 PM
Jeff Weir is a UX Designer in Microsoft's Live Labs. Between free alcohol, parties, more alcohol, more parties, and a general lack of sleep, Jeff managed to win the South by Southwest (SXSW) Web Award in the Art category. Jeff's application, Viscosity, is a modern art generator.

Viscosity kind of reminds me of some of Shirley Shor's work that was featured on Celebrity Apprentice last week. While I looked at Shirley's vastly expensive framed LCD panel playing through moving artwork, I thought to myself "Hey, I could make that with an old Tablet PC... well, except for the moving art part."  Well, now I think I'll just frame a spare Tablet PC and direct it to Jeff's Viscosity watch page. Very cool. Congrats Jeff.
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Want see who designed the XBOX?

Posted By: Laura Foy | Oct 29th, 2007 @ 2:31 AM
I stopped by Teague, a Seattle based design firm, to discuss the latest in consumer electronics. What better people to chat with than the ones who brought you the first Xbox and Racing Wheel.

 
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Apophysis - Freeware Fractal Editor for Windows

Posted By: Larry Larsen | Jun 5th, 2007 @ 1:07 PM
Back in the day, I was a huge fan of Kai Krause. In the squared arena of 90's interfaces, Kai showed us that round corners and shaded depth in interfaces just felt good, and the world followed. The fact that Kai bought a 1000 year-old castle, filled it with developers and then promptly disappeared made him the Willy Wonka of our time.

What got me thinking of Kai, who is a fractals genius, is a new freeware fractal editor called Apophysis. I've been playing with Apophysis for a week now and it's a fun little app. You can get started by downloading it here. Getting your first fractal is as easy as hitting F9. For more complicated designs, you can see the Apophysis wiki here and check out some tutorials here.

And if you run into Kai, tell him to drop us a note sometime.
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Greenprint for the future: Dongtan, China

Posted By: JD Lewin | May 1st, 2007 @ 2:49 PM

In the current issue, Douglas McGray’s “Pop-Up Cities” for Wired Magazine could be the most interesting read on the newsstands. The story follows the progress of creating an environmentally friendly city for 500,000 people on a small island across from Shanghai. Designing a complete city from scratch is usually the sort of academic exercise that civic engineers and architects go through without any hope of implementing their ideas. However because China has both the space and the demand for such developments, the Eco-city of Dongtan will be one of the most watched projects of the next couple decades. More important than it’s built-from-scratch status though is how the lead architect Alejandro Gutierrez and his team from Arup are able to leverage what is now known from centuries of civic development. The article talks about the trends and insight about building density, energy usage, flood control, and environmental symbiosis. A truly educational read.

Photo credit: Arup / Wired Magazine
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Grass-covered buildings and other bad jokes

Posted By: JD Lewin | Apr 4th, 2007 @ 2:55 PM
The best part of April Fools is that everyone channels more of their imagination into ideas that seem ludicrous yet plausible. This is also the worst part of April Fools, and the building we have here is a perfect example. The kids at the design blog Inhabitat thought it would be hilarious to trick everyone into believing that London’s Gherkin Tower is testing vegetated façade panels. They were sure to fill the post with detail about the potential benefits; insulation, energy generation, and the air cleaning effects. Of course my question though, is why anyone wouldn’t attempt something like this? A grass-covered skyscraper isn’t nearly as humorous as a grass-covered skyscraper is an idea worth exploring.
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Expression Studio added to the MIX07 goodie bag

Posted By: JD Lewin | Mar 20th, 2007 @ 6:25 PM
The countdown to MIX07 continues and the anticipation for this year's 72-hour conversation about the web gets closer all the time. The MIX News blog has been a great way to keep up on the announcements, and yesterday's post was no exception. Every MIX07 attendee will receive a commemorative copy of Microsoft Expression Studio, the suite of tools for developing killer a killer user experience. Our favorite Netflix and Flickr clients were built with these tools by thirteen23. Add this on top of the copy of Vista Ultimate each MIX attendee will receive, and the loot to be had in Vegas is getting quite appetizing.
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Vista desktop backgrounds from Flickr users and MS employees

Posted By: JD Lewin | Jan 30th, 2007 @ 2:01 PM
One of the most entertaining parts of setting up your new Vista install is walking through the new desktop backgrounds that are included. The Microsoft Design team has done something truly excellent, by including photographs from Microsoft employees and Flickr users such as Hamad Darwish. Read more about the process from Long Zhen's Finding vistas, and also check out Scoble's interview with Jenny Lam from this past July.

(via Kottke)
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Peugeot Design Contest brings your car to the Xbox 360

Posted By: JD Lewin | Jan 17th, 2007 @ 3:51 PM
For the petrolhead gamer, walking through the virtual garage of your favorite racing sim is one of the more pleasant experiences. Staring at the endless amounts of detail that gets lavished onto each car model is truely awesome, but what if you could see your own designs in-game?

This year's Peugeot Design Contest is being sponsered by Xbox 360, and they've decided to give us all a shot at just that sort of glory. The grand prize winner, in addition to having their fully-constructed concept vehicle shown in Frankfurt, will see their creation take digital life inside an Xbox game.
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Level Designing with Gears of War

Posted By: Tina Wood | Jun 23rd, 2006 @ 12:00 AM
I pack my things and head to North Carolina and Epic Games, home of the unreal series, the unreal engine, and gears of war. As a gaming enthusiast and completel fan girl I wanted to find out how a level designer actually creates an interactive video game. And we do this with Gears of War. I hope you learn something, I did! :)
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Louis Castle and the Battle for Middle Earth 2

Posted By: Duncan Mackenzie | Jun 21st, 2006 @ 8:10 PM
Louis Castle, co-founder of Westwood Studios and now Vice President of Creative Development at EA LA, was here in Redmond for a community site leader conference and Laura managed to sneak past the velvet ropes and corner him for this interview. Lord of the Rings: Battle for Middle Earth 2 (doesn't that just roll off your tongue?) could be the RTS for all you RTS haters.
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