Archive for December, 2010

Design Coffins, Not Such a Bad Way to Go…

Sunday, December 12th, 2010

Believe it or not this friendly colorful sculpture is a coffin! This particular work of art was made by the design shop of the Ghanaian master carpenter Paa Joe (seen right). Paa Joe was an apprentice to Seth Kane Kwei, who is thought to be the inventor of African design/fantasy coffins back in the 50’s. This tradition seems to have grown from a delightful story of a loving son who want his mother to have the world. Kane Kwei’s mother had always dreamed of flying in a plane. Living as a poor woman in Teshie, in the suburbs of Accra in Ghana, she of course would never be able to afford such an expense. Here loving son however created for her a beautiful wooden airplane in which would carry her in her final journey. When she did pass, she was buried in the plane coffin Kane Kwei made for her. It is no surprise that the community fell in love with symbolic gesture and thus the tradition was born.

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Minivans Never Seemed so Cool

Saturday, December 11th, 2010

Swagger Wagon, is an ingeniously adverting campaign centered around the two gangsta-parents seen is this catchy hip hop video above. Aiming to make the least sexy and most “parent-esque” vehicle on the road (the minivan) seem more hip and fun, Toyota employed Saatchi & Saatchi LA to “get behind the wheel”. Marketing Toyota’s Sienna though the use of humor, these ads hit the spot and miraculously seem to make that mommy/daddy-wagon seem like a sexy gangsta beast, love it! Check out the Swagger Wagon YouTube Channel for more of the humorous videos and marketing.

Choose Your Own Adventure Advertisment?!?

Friday, December 10th, 2010

So this is not today’s news, but I just stumbled onto it and it is AWESOME! Just like those good old Choose Your Own Adventure books that we all loved ever so much from our youth, this sweet advertisement for Tipp-Ex is genius. Sure it took me watching it several times to get past the novelty and actually recognize that it was even an ad for Tipp-Ex, but it blows my mind none the less. You have to take a few minutes to play around with it. Enjoy!

Lorem Ipsum For Images!

Thursday, December 9th, 2010

As a web designer and/or developer, we have run into the need for placeholder images on more then on occasion. A client may be developing the content, or perhaps a photo shoot is on the calendar. Maybe your client or the photographer are waiting on you to define that space where the image needs to go. In any of these cases, we usually end up turning to Photoshop (or your preferred image creating software) and create a dummy image. This takes time and is a pain in the butt. Well dummy image no more! Mr. Speaker has come out with a solution to this problem, that they call “lowersrc: Loren Ipsum for images“. (more…)

The Art of Physics

Wednesday, December 8th, 2010

These awe-inspiring photos are not doctored! They were taken with a high speed camera by master photographer Edward Horsford. These incredibly beautiful and gravity defying photos illustrate the beauty of cohesion, as seen between water molecules and between rubber molecules of the balloon in direct contrast to the lesser adhesive forces between the water and rubber molecules, resulting in these delightfully brilliant yet fleeting moments. Horsford’s collection is truly a poetic and beautiful suite and of course is very well executed. To see more works by Horsford, visit his site: EdwardHorsford.com.