I am looking forward to working with students over the next few weeks to produce and promote their work for the Special Olympics and should be a wonderful experience for everyone involved. We are also using a variety of social media such as foursquare, twitter, and flickr to both promote the content being produced as well as connect all the people involved. Stay up-to-date through the site that was developed by students during the Spring semester and is being populated by students this summer.

I have been a member of the National Association of Photoshop Professionals for a number of years now so when the offer came out that members could apply to beta test the Photoshop CS5 I jumped all over it. The first version I used in depth was Photoshop 5.0, so I was very excited to get the opportunity to try out the new version before it was release. I submitted my information to NAPP/Adobe and received an email with instructions to participate in the beta testing. For the last month I have been playing around with the exciting new features and have enjoyed the added functionality. You might wonder what these are, but you’ll have to wait until tomorrow when Adobe releases Creative Suite 5. I am looking forward to integrating the workflow and new tools into my day-to-day work with CS5.

One of my freelance projects is designing the Impressions newsletter that is published three times a year for alumni and friends of the UNMC College of Dentistry. We recently worked to re-design the newsletter to fit into the new UNMC branding guidelines. Read more from the UNMC Branding Initiative.

Anyway, recently I have been reading this great book by Rebecca Lieb called “The Truth About Search Engine Optimization.” Nice quick read but jam packed with practical information about SEO. I teach a New Media Design class at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and will definitely be referencing this book and recommending it to students. It is easy to understand but also clears ups some gray areas I had about the topic. It is broken down into short sections making it a great reference book that is a great addition to any advertiser, marketer, web designer/developer, graphic design or anyone else involved with working online.

More info here, they also offer it as a PDF download which I am always excited about for classes I teach.

Through various contacts and research on other things I ran into Nxtbook Media’s website where they “find ways to leverage traditional print material for optimized use online.” It is an interesting concept and goes into the whole debate on whether print is dead. I will speak on that at a later date, but they make arguments ranging from easy online integration to environmentally friendly.

I see where they are going with this and seems like a glorified PDF or Google Book. The interface is nice and it is neat how the pages actually flip, but I think it seems like an older crowd application who are hanging onto how they read printed pieces. It is nice to have the printed layout available but there are multiple benefits to provide a web-based layout to include related materials, links, video, interactive charts, and commenting options. In other words take advantage of all the “Web 2.0″ there is some included but it is very clunky.

On the other hand, the way the technology is being used in this video provides an amazing mood which compliments the song perfectly. Radiohead has a way of combining current technology into their music and videos that push the boundaries in a variety of fields which leads to an entire multimedia experience. The attack on all the senses makes the band brilliant. Check out the video as well as an article and behind the scenes video from Creativity Online…

Link to Article and a behind the scenes video ~ via CREATIVITY

DDB advertising agency in Sydney, Australia and the New South Wales Police Force have released a road safety print campaign to raise awareness of the fact that teenagers are dying from crossing the road while listening to their iPods. (iPhone Savior)

Visually, think the ads are beautifully done. The play off of a chalk outline with the earbuds snaking around the victim. It reminds me a lot of Melanie Pullen’s “High Fashion Crime Scenes“, which is some amazing photography emitting a sober feeling will viewed similar to these ads. Here are some of the ads from DDB.

We talked a bit after the movie and had some good conversations, assuming your into design and have a nerdy interest in typefaces. Function vs. Ascetics, which is always a fun topic. Should it be readable or a piece of art. Some of the designers in the movie feel type should have no more meaning then the words themselves, while others feel you can use fonts to enhance your message. It’s great they talk about modernism through grunge backlash to get to where we are today. We discussed how people outside the design world like what is comfortable, which Helvetica fits this niche. So what to do as a designer when approached by a client who does not want to break down design barriers and only wants an appropriate look for their business?

For me, this is the challenge of being an effective designer is to know your audience. Finding the appropriate balance between form and function is the fun part. I have an assignment in one of the advertising classes I teach, communication graphics, where they are required to use the university branding guidelines. Most of the reactions are frustration and feelings of restriction when they don’t have free reign. To me this is a fun obstacle, but when given the opportunity to create, go all out. In short, the movie is fun and raises many interesting topics regarding typography and design.