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Category: Links
Your logo is the work of Satan
I’m just completely at a loss for words. Well, actually… one word comes to mind. HORSESHIT!
Even if the makers of Monster Energy Drinks were satanic devil worshiping heathens, I doubt they would spend the time and money trying to hide that much devilishness in their logo/package design. Corporate greed would take over.
Fellow designers, this is the type of thing we’re constantly up against. So the next time your client asks you to make the logo “pop,” you can tell them that you’re afraid that details are the devils work. Or some such horseshit.
Font management best practices for macOS
Extensis has released their annual Font Management Best Practices guide for macOS. I grab the PDF every year, if for no other reason than they always provide a list of required fonts for the current Mac OS version. This allows me to remove so many fonts I don’t use and aren’t necessary to run the system.
Best & worst logo redesigns of 2016
Free OS X Security Tools
Grab a number of security apps for Mac OS X (will probably work with macOS Sierra as well), absolutely free. Some are useful to the average user, others may require you to know a bit about what you’re doing.
Superhero visual alphabet
Australia-based illustrator and designer Simon Koay’s “Superbet.” Check out the details in the larger individual letters. Very cool!
The Science of color: Why is Facebook blue
Companies use color to trigger an emotion from us. Here’s a great little article about why designers choose the colors they do.
Interview with the Apple logo designer
While working in their garage in 1977, Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak asked Rob Janoff, who had studied design, to create a logo for their first Apple products. When Janoff went to Jobs with final sketches, everything went very smoothly, and the bitten apple has been the symbol of the brand ever since.
The bite of the apple was a “fix.” Genius.
Free cloud-based font sharing webinar
If you read my review of Extensis Suitcase Fusion 7 recently, you may recall I mentioned their new service called TeamSync, allowing you to share your fonts with a team of users, even if they aren’t Suitcase Fusion users (though they will be). If you discounted it because it sounded complicated, I urge you to take a look at this recently recorded webinar that sheds some light on TeamSync.
You’ll find out:
• The advantages of cloud-based font sharing;
• The differences between Suitcase Fusion and Suitcase TeamSync;
• How Suitcase Fusion and Suitcase TeamSync work together;
• How to quickly get your users connected;
• How to stay in sync by sharing your font library with multiple users.
The Suitcase TeamSync webinar is only an hour long, and does a fantastic job of showing you exactly how it all works.
Full-size wireless Apple keyboard… except it’s not from Apple
The standard full-sized Apple keyboard is probably the best keyboard I’ve ever used. I just wish it was wireless. Unfortunately Apple’s wireless keyboard, like almost every other wireless keyboard, jettisons the numeric keypad, navigation keys and extra F-Keys.
This is where the Matias Wireless Aluminum Keyboard (MWAK) comes in to save the day. The MWAK looks and acts just like the Apple Full Sized Keyboard, including the handy function keys to control your Mac. But there are three more things that make this thing a real gem.
First off, you can choose the MWAK color to match your device. It comes in Silver, Space Gray, Gold and Rose Gold. FINALLY, a full sized wireless keyboard for the Mac that offers black keys instead of white! What is it that makes manufacturers think that just because we’re Mac users we want want everything to be white? And it’s aluminum instead of the cheap plastic virtually all other keyboards are made of.
Next, you can sync the keyboard with up to four Bluetooth devices, including Android and Windows devices, and easily switch between them with the press of a button.
And finally, the 1,600 man battery is huge in comparison to other wireless keyboards. After a full charge (which can take up to 5 hours from empty), you can safely put the included USB charging cable in a drawer somewhere—because you won’t need it for another year. That’s right, a single charge will last you an entire year, according to Matias. And that’s with having the keyboard on and connected at all times (no delay in connecting to the host computer like most keyboards do).
The Matias Wireless Aluminum Keyboard sells for $99, and can be purchased directly or from numerous retailers.
I don’t own one of these Matias keyboards, so I can’t vouch for them in any way. What is the build quality? Do the colors match Apple devices accurately (or even close)? How does the keyboard feel compared to the Apple keyboards? I don’t know the answers to any of those questions because…
I would have run out to the Fry’s Electronics store down the street, but the website doesn’t list any products from Matias—despite the fact that the Matias website claims to sell the keyboard there. Same goes for BestBuy.