Flashy Illustration

I like the tree. I like the lines that wander--a little bit unexpectedly--up and down the trunk and the branches. I like the illustration's feeling of design agency, Motto's web site.

That said, this web site is not the easiest to navigate... but I still love the feeling of simplicity. I like the bird that hops about on the branch. I am not sure about those Union Jacks that sit on the tips of each branch... what do they mean? Sometimes they hide the text that appears next to it. They are part of the nav, of course. Maybe not the most user-friendly, but certainly nice to look at. It reminds me of a book I read, when I was a kid in French school: Le Petit Prince.

Tequila!

Who would create a big hoax and then flaunt it, in the face of adversity? Well, this Madison Avenue design shop, for one. Tequila, also located in 35 countries, boasts a glossy, A-list client roster with such big names as Adidas, Canon, Nissan, and Visa, among others.

Their latest campaign for Sony PlayStation, draws users into their interactive advertising "game" by making reference to the devastating 2004 tsunami that took place in SouthEast Asia, killing more than 225,000 people and destroying the lives of many of those left behind. My initial reaction was to balk at such a tactic. Is this the only way in which to grab peoples' attention, in a world that seeks to trump each adrenaline rush with the next, in order to grab the market's attention, if only for a fleeting moment? Perhaps it is. Or perhaps they've gone over the acceptable edge of shock value? You be the judge.

I have to compliment them on their web site's great interface design... I love the way they've made it so you zoom in and out of outter space/their offices. That is very fun.

Flash Cheat Sheet... Coult it Be So?

If you're like me, you love to see fluid creativity in motion, but you may not be so adept at the programming side of things... enter, Sprout, "the quick and easy way to create sophisticated multi-media content". A user-friendly, pre-built WYSIWYG Flash programming claims to make Flash programming easy and breezy. Here's the Youtube video.

The Sprout web site proudly boasts a launch date of January 28, 2008... Well, we know that date is past. Akin to most software companies, I suppose they have run into unforseen delays before their product launch. I thought I'd try clicking on their "Get Started" page, but received a message saying that they're in the closed beta stage (code for: they're testing their software, and they have enough testers already, thank you very much).

From a programming-challenged designer's perspective, it looks like a promising solution, so I've signed up to be notified of their launch... I'll keep you posted!

FEB. 19 UPDATE... Get your Sprout here: www.sproutbuilder.com/friendsofsprout