Today the much publicised website 99designs.com announced the launch of their, wait for it, ‘Ready-Made’ logo store. Now, while I was never a massive fan of their successful design contest idea I must admit to entering a view in my early days as a designer. Strapped for cash and eyes wide open at the prospect of some ‘easy money’ I entered about 10 or so contests, of which I won 3. The design contests idea is never going to produce a magnificent or innovative design for the client but at the end of the day, neither the designer or clearly the client cares. Both are in it for financial reasons; the designer looking to make a quick pound (or in the site’s case – a dollar) and the client not willing to fork out on a designer to conduct a proper design process. The idea has many flaws in that people’s ideas are often ripped off, and cases of unpaid prizes are common to say the least.

However, this latest venture by 99designs just goes to show how little they understand about the world of design. They claim to be doing this for the millions of companies who are without an identity – fair enough. But what good is a logo to these company if it’s not unique? What’s to say that 2 shops next door to eachother couldn’t end up with the same logo, bought for $99 on the website? It’s scary to think the amount of people who will actually opt for this idea and think they’ve got a great deal. They might as well have opened Microsoft Word, chosen some clip art and put their business name below it.

Frankly, any business who uses this service is clearly putting no thought in to it. What scares me most though is how much this could potentially devalue the world of design. People already think that designers are over-paid. If they think that a logo is only worth $99 then they’ll expect near the same for a logo for any designer.

Unlike most of the other iPhone parodies, this is done to a brilliant standard. It takes everything about the iPhone and makes it relevant to the newspaper.

I’m trying to find out who was the brain behind this advert, if anyone knows please let me know by leaving a comment below.

EDIT: The advert was created by Glue London. Thanks to James Merrick for this.

I found this image on Gizmodo and thought it was a great visual description of how the world of storage has evolved.

I’ve recently begun a D&AD design project in University. For this project I need to design a new poster campaign to promote the Metro newspaper. At the moment I am compiling research about people’s opinions of the paper and commuting in general. In order to fully understand the audience I am undertaking various methods of research. Firstly I have compiled a short survey to gain some initial knowledge about commuters.

I would greatly appreciate if ANY commuters (travelling to work/college etc.) reading this could fill in the survey below. You don’t need to be a Metro reader, I’m purely trying to gather research on commuters at this stage. The survey will take less than 2 minutes but will be a huge help to me:

Your help would be greatly appreciated and if you could share this blog link in any way then that would only help me further.

Thanks in advance for any answers I receive.

This idea stuck in my head and eventually led me to 3rd level education where I began studying a degree in Computer Applications and Support. At first I enjoyed the new experience, however the novelty wore off and soon I found myself feeling bored and in a way limited on this course. I was, and still am fascinated by how computers work. I am totally in awe of people who can fix the most complex of computer related problems. Problems that would boggle the mind 99.99999(you get the point!)% of the people on the planet. My decision was purely based on what I wanted to to as a profession. So, despite (eventually!) passing my 2nd year of the course I opted to leave for a change of direction, that being Graphic Design.

Something that you need to bare in mind is; I have categorically no artistic talent in terms of drawing, painting or anything traditionally relating to the world of ‘art’. In fact, Art was the first subject I chose to drop in secondary school. However at my then age of 19 I had found that one thing I really loved doing was creating digital imagery on screen. Yes they were just basic forum signatures and desktop wallpapers but I loved doing it and I wanted to do it more, so in what was the most hectic and stressful month of my life I left Ireland to study Graphic Design in Chester.

Doing this resulted in confirming my love for design. Although at times my course annoys me and stresses me out, I never feel bored by it. I love learning new methods and techniques, and find that I can engage much more with my lecturers than I ever could on my previous course because I can relate to them and vice versa.

I know most people reading this will wonder why I’m saying all this, but I’m in the final year of not only this course but also my time in education, and its only now that its dawning on me how much I’ve changed. To sum it all up, as of last month I no longer actually own a Windows computer, instead I now use an Apple MacBook Pro. It felt very strange switching from Windows to OSX based computers but in the end it’s not that I dislike either, Macs are just more ‘me’ at this stage in my budding career. Ten years ago if I heard “apple” I thought fruit, now I think computer.

My point is, make sure to do what you want to do in life. Do what you enjoy and if you find its not right then at least you’ve tried it. I’ve been lucky enough to have 2 attempts at things I wanted to do and although my career as a PC technician didn’t come to pass, I am glad I chose to do it as it thought me a lot!

I’ve met some amazing people in the process of getting to where I am, many of which are now very close friends, and of course my girlfriend.

“It is hard to fail, but it is worse never to have tried to succeed” Theodore Roosevelt

I am actually writing this blog while sat on a train and it’s this novelty that makes this app so appealing to me. I love blogging but find that when I’m at home I’m often too distracted to sit and write a new post. This app allows me to write whenever I feel like it and gives much more freedom, which I like.

If you’re a blogger and a Blackberry user then I can’t recommend this app enough. You can download it at http://blackberry.wordpress.org.

Enjoy.

Stumbled across this amazing piece of design and thought I would share it on here. I think it’s a very creative idea and adds something different that makes the album stand out from the crowd. It will also more than likely have a positive effect on sales.

Anyway, have a look at the video and let me know what you think.

Since I’ve last blogged I’ve been involved in a number of projects with various clients, some existing, some new. I’ve managed to secure a couple of good new projects which I will add to my site when they are complete. Personally I am finding one of the jobs very exciting as the clients have given me a lot of creative freedom, something which I absolutely love!

Some of the projects I can share with you include work I’ve done for the University of Chester’s tennis team. I was asked to create a new logo for the team and the result is something I am very happy with. You can view this project on my website.

I’ve also been working on some work for a Dublin based politician. The work included producing over 20 different flyers and leaflets leading up to the local elections, and since the candidate was successful in the elections I will be producing further designs for this client in the future.

I will be updating my blog more often in the coming weeks as I have a lot on at the minute which I feel is worth blogging about. Watch this space.

Stumbled across this brilliant piece of packaging design for Elk & Wolf Chardonnay wine. The bottles, designed by London based branding agency SocialUK stand out as they are coated externally in aluminium. This design is a bold statement in a sector that is more used to seeing bottles designed in a more classical manner with subtle features.

Despite the harsh, almost industrial appearance of the bottle it manages to keep a high level of sophistication. The silhouettes for example are a nice touch and help to break up what might otherwise be an overpowering element.

Reading through other people’s opinions of this design it is certainly not one that appeals to the masses but from a personal point of view this is right up my street. A fresh, bold design that stands out from the crowd, Beautiful.

Personally I’ve never looked at the UK plug and thought “Urgh, that could use a redesign”. It’s sturdy, never falls out of the wall (unlike many flimsy US/Euro plugs I’ve used), but when you see such things as this being made it begs the question, why not redesign it? Sure, it would be a pain for electrical companies to switch their products to this new design but it’s not a huge barrier to overcome. After all, if a better design for the plug exists then why not use it?

(via BoingBoing.net)