Yes, this blogpost is longer than normal but I wanted to create one holistic view. If you are not a big reader just scan the nice bits or go to the end The Lift The past week I was in Geneva, the city where HTTP/HTML or in other words the internet was invented. I visited [...]
This week I was a member of a jury of an international contest named Frisian Design about innovation and sustainability. It was a contest organized by the Cartesius Institute and had entries from Portugal, Latvia, UK, Australia, Turkey, Italy, the Netherlands etc. The quality of the entries struck me. I saw a complete sustainable Island [...]
Lately I’m involved in many projects in which I touch many sides of society around me. By talking with many people I am learning about the common problems but also difference in thinking and kind of people that are working in that branch. It is nice to seek for connections and while talking it is [...]
I often present on various subjects but often the subjects contain abstract concepts that you can’t convey with a simple photo. I hate bullet points because they don’t visualize the subject and make the story more abstract. So through my different presentations I developed a style of graphics that could be build with the basic [...]
The oldest form of creating an experience is storytelling. Stories can be small or create whole worlds. They work directly on the consciousness. They transcend you to an experience that is more than just words. I always tend to lose myself in a good movie or story. In my mind I become the protagonist/main character [...]
Yesterday I was with some friends listening to some of the great music one of them made recently. But suddenly he opened a song that was ‘great’, I and the other friend looked at each other but didn’t hear the greatness. But I understood why he liked it and how it influenced his music. But [...]
Above are some small ideas I penned down in one of my sketch books. Maybe you can make them useful in some of your future interface designs. They are all about including extra information in common interface elements. 1. Range slider with distribution curve Price ranges or other type of ranges like for example the [...]
2 slides from yesterdays presentation: Related: Leadership 2.0 Work 2.0 – The empty cubicle Big changes ahead for us
With some fresh insights I wanted to write an evolved sequel to my popular Designing in pictures post. What are the factors in building a good designed product? You have to look at different perspectives to create something holistic that works. 1. Emotion This perspective adds character and identity to a product. Something that sets [...]
Well in the previous article we came to the conclusion that we are striving for perfection. Combining functions and properties into one holistic design. Let’s get into a real world evolution that most of us experienced in our lifetime: the evolution of the mobile phone. One of the most important inventions of the 20th century [...]
Renewal is necessary. To invent new things, to see new perspectives you have to renew. You have to dare to drop the old systems and experiment to get something better. Otherwise we would still be monkeys. (Insert monkey sound here) Renewal has some phases in which it takes place: Exploration – Some small experiments to [...]
The End Well at the moment this post comes online I will be in the middle of my graduation project presentation which marks the end as student of Communication & Multimedia Design (CMD). It was a journey that searched for the essentials behind media, design and information. It began as a search for ultimate serious [...]
The first design. What was the first thing we designed as the human race? Well we together designed ourselves. We as people select with who we mate so the best combination of genes will live on. Random mutations create unattractive new forms that do not lead anywhere but also new attractive variants we love to [...]
Sometimes you just know you are on the right path but you can’t explain it. It is just a feeling. It is a feeling you get after absorbing lot’s of information on a certain area. You begin to feel the pattern before you actually see it. Good designers/humorists/artists/writers/scientists/anything that are good work just on the [...]
Once this post would be written. My big unification post. What am I searching for… Well I was searching for the ultimate goal of design. Design has only one goal. To improve, to construct, to unify, to become one and simple. Design works with improving what already is. So it communicates better, so it works [...]
All mediums have their own design movements. Think art with minimalism, dadaism, surrealism, futurism etc. Think Architecture with Bauhaus, rennaissance, avant-garde, modernism, postmodernism etc. They all look with a different perspective to the design. For example from an emotional, functional, technical point of view. But could also be centered around a philosophy, vision or religion. [...]
My computer of choice is Apple. It needed some convincing with me but in January I switched and now I will not return to Windows. I have become a real fan. I discovered that Apple is a religion. You either believe it or don’t. (Or you are not aware it exists and what it is) [...]
I was in the mood for a big change for my site. My old domain name Arquelis.com was not feeling alright anymore. It was a relic from the past and I associated it with my scifi internet time and the days when nicknames were cool. The first step on this road was naming my weblog [...]
Ted released a real cool video today on the multitouch displays I talked about in the earlier days of this blog. For those who don’t know, TED is an event that brings together thoughtleaders, movers and shakers to share their ideas. I recommend you to check out some of their videos. These multitouch screens are [...]
Emotions… The base of our life. Not the rational facts but what you feel and believe matter most in the end… Memories What do we remember best? Well, the moments that had the most impact for us. The moments that ment something to ourselves. You can only remember two ways: by repetition (on what most [...]
This post is about design. But think broader than graphical design! Think music, buildings, toilet seats, airplanes, movies, money, phones, clothing, text, pencils: everything by people for people. The goal of designing Every object has to be designed to bring something accross: a message or a feeling. A message can also be something on how [...]
I love to dance. I love to lose myself in the music. It just happens with a good rythm. A good DJ can guide you through an experience where you forget about the world and reality. Where you are in the flow and where your personal tastes and problems don’t matter anymore. It is just [...]
Well math is the universal language of the universe. So even a religion should be translatable to numbers: The holistic principle of us: 1+1=3 Works only with variation in inviduals, thats why variation and different ideas are important. People together find things they would never have found alone. Well the maths are not entirely right. [...]
As humans who grow up, discover things and die we must share our knowledge to let it survive. Every human has to go through education to learn all the basics of being in a civilisation and enhancing our existing knowledge. Knowledge is passed on to evolve the human race. Through time we as a human [...]
What happens when you move the now point? Does the people curve change a lot with other forms of design? (For example new and dying forms) How are new dominant movements born within design? Where is the most passion with users and creators? Who decides which is the most dominant movement? Where does retro belong [...]
Rules are everywhere. They are there to avoid chaos and define a common understanding. In civilisations rules are the main principle of it existence. They are defined so we can live together, move around savely and solve differences between each other. There are rules for almost everything, some written and some unwritten common knowledge. We [...]
Creating something on the web, for print, a movie, a game, a text, a song, a car, a meal or a house has one thing in common: you create it for people. The process is all about designing something so it can be consumed or used in the best way possible by the users/consumers. The [...]
Why getting it? Multimedia, the stuff that I have learned to create, is all about getting the message/fun/information etc. accross. Getting it is the state you want your user to reach. Understanding getting it is needed to understand other users. So as a designer you have to get it first. Growing knowledge cloud. Some raw [...]
You get it or don’t. Somebody has laid out an experience and people get what is meant or not. It can be about getting the fun or getting the passion, but can also be about more serious goals like getting the knowledge that is teached. It is very difficult to get somebody else to get [...]
Well I think the winner of the next gen battle is here. The output of graphics and sound has evolved greatly in the past generations and Sony and Microsoft tried another leap there. But that leap is costly in research, which has to be paid back in the costs of the console. (599 euros for [...]
Last friday was a big day. We delivered the official release of the Virtual Reality Engine Room to the Maritime Institute of Terschelling. I was asked to do a small presentation on the building process and the future. I decided it was time again for a supporting ‘powerpoint’ presentation. This time I decided to try [...]
Andreas notified me of a great blog on the topic of experience design: Creating Passionate Users He also gave me a link to a great post by Kathy Sierra that I wanted to share. She translates the Rules of Play book rules into general rules for all kinds of applications: Typology of Cognitive Pleasures (in [...]
David Seah had some interesting posts in his blog. He talks about storytelling as a method for designing. What I gather from the posts is that he is really searching to get the feeling/emotion/message accross. It seems he want to use the story as the main tool for setting up the experience he wants to [...]
The secret ingredient that makes anything excel above it’s normal function. A term made famous by idols (Pop-idol/American idol) is the most important factor for the WOW experience. Something that has the X-factor has something mysterious inexplainable that makes it bigger than the sum of its parts. So the X-factor works holistically. But what do [...]
I have one passion: To experience the WOW! It is something uncontrollable. It is something unpredictable. It is best described as a mental orgasm. A state of mind that takes you over. I seek it and try to understand it. Try to control it. Try to find what triggers it. There are several things that [...]