Coffee machine

Coffee machine, originally uploaded by julian marshall sykes findings.

We have a lovely new coffee machine in the studio. A bit late but nice cappucinos.

Another David Thorne email

Carwyn came across David Thorne a while ago now about spider. More recently I happened upon this from a twitter. Once again a great piece of work. Love it.

see it here.

Branding Obama book launch

Over the last year or so I have been really interested in the president elections in America. For me it was the first election I have been aware of where design/branding of a campaign was used to such a degree that people could have been swayed to vote by the power of media design and in essence branding of a person. See some more related articles here.

Designing Obama from mas / menos on Vimeo.

Chapter subsidence

Had a great weekend which included a quick drink at Chapter Arts Centre. In the new Cwtch area I came across this small object. Not being a builder or surveyor I can only assume it has been setup to check that the walls are not moving too much. For me though it leads on from a talk I was involved in a few weeks ago at the unConference. The talk was about the possibility of building 'talking' or reacting to the user. While a very basic interpretation of this I loved the idea of what information the building is giving us as to how this particular wall is reacting to the world. I am sure sensors in buildings are not new but I wonder if they can be used in fun and interesting ways to aid understanding could be very interesting. It also reminds me of some similar work Andrew is working on with the development of the nakedwales site.

Chapter subsidence, originally uploaded by julian marshall sykes findings.

Chipped X-BOXES does that mean they can find stolen ones?

With the recent launch of Call of Duty and also the bigger story of Microsoft blocking chipped X-Boxes it led me to think about how much information Microsoft have on the owners of the consoles. As a occasional user I am in no way qualified to know any of these questions but I wanted to theorise if they can track the consoles which have been chipped does that mean they can track the actual physical x-box? if that is the case would it mean that they could track the serial codes of the x-box and if yours is stolen then they could track that and turn it off?

Only a thought...

Independents at their own game?

I cam across this post via Moving Brands blog and thought after the recent launches of independent bars and clubs in Cardiff it seems appropriate to highlight the huge corporations and how they are starting to look small. To me it seems similar to innocent in a way of seeming small and bespoke but actually being huge. I wonder what everyone else thinks?

Future of branding

I came across this article via marketing week's website and think that the examples of the way branding and communication are potentially changing is very interesting and exciting new direction for this type of design. As the article suggests the future logo's do seem like they will have to be so much more than just a stationary 'mark'. It seems like it is almost mirrored in history by painting, to photography, to animation, to film and now virtual reality and even 3D which seems to be having a bit of a revival recently.

As technology allows this the brand and the ability to move and alter and perhaps personalise is fantastically interesting for us at Hoffi and something we would be really interested in investigating further. There is also a strong sense that with this type of branding then there is a much greater need for a strong strategy and story behind it and it is something I have been looking at in terms of ARK's recent development and how through story telling it is possible to include people from various sectors in complex issues through simple language.

Did Walt have it right all those years ago?

As you have probably guessed. This year I have been moving into responsive community projects both through public involvement right the way through to encouraging a different way of viewing business and branding. Bringing it back to basics. Which for me is to concentrate on people rather than profit. While I am not sure Walt Disney was purely about this the organisation chart seems to have a refreshing feel of community.

Cardiff Arts Institute Launch

Visited the new Arts Institute in Cardiff Last night. Interesting place. It used to be a Brains pub called Incognito which I very rarely went to but the space now has really been changed will be interested to see how it works after the initial launches.

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