Archive for February, 2009
You gave no idea how much I wish I had an extra $349 right now.
Not to harp too much on the bacon theme, but This Is Why You’re Fat will be my favorite new blog for the next 15 minutes.
Posting has been a little more sparse than usual lately. I’ve been in big project land getting the NewSpring Web Campus (live on Sundays at 11:15am and 6:00pm EST) up and running.
For the tech specs crowd, we’re using our current video-on-demand vendor Lightcast Media for the streaming video and live countdown, a hodgepodge of AJAX stuff for the chatroom (I’m exploring other, more scalable options right now), and the site is built on our existing ExpressionEngine install, which makes updating things a lot easier on me. We’re currently using an AOL Wimzi widget for limited live prayer until PHPLive! can sort out their issues and let us give them our money for their extremely flexible multi-operator system.
I started wireframing this in late October, took a few weeks break, buttoned up the first round of .PSDs in mid-November and then started talking to a few web developers to find a good fit to help me with the heavy-lifting. By late November the layout was finalized (ish) and we began development in early-December aiming for an ambitious January 4th launch.
Too ambitious. We had one development snag over the Christmas break, and then we contracted with the lovely and talented Paul Armstrong to help finish out the site for a February 1 public launch. Oddly enough, in order to hit our (still yet ambitious) deadline, I ended up doing way more front-end code than I ever planned to (because anything more than “absolutely none” is actually more). I’m sure at some point someone who knows what they’re doing will be brought in to tidy up my hackery, which will likely coincide with a phase 2 (online user map/count, better live prayer UI/platform, and some other prayer-related features) and a phase 3 (packaging up a simple CSS/HTML free install of a web campus that other churches can easily set-up and use with the streaming vendor of their choice.)
Big props to our Web Pastor Nick Charalambous who’s running the show and the volunteers and Will Rodes, who’s responsible for the video components being what they are and where they need to be. I just build stuff, they make it happen.
Update: if you’re after the technical aspects of the video capture process, Will has a great write-up full of acronyms and schematics.
A man should look as if he bought his clothes with intelligence, put them on with care, and then forgotten all about them.
— Sir Hardy Amies
1. Consistency in the little details begets consistency in the overall impact.
2. Wayfinding arrows should never point to the text.
3. Sweat the kerning on your type, or it’ll eventually drive you crazy when it’s physical.
4. Scale matters, especially with signage, so do your homework.
5. Design is more about thought process than implementation. Think before you computer.
If you like my blog, but always find yourself saying “I just wish Joshua’s blog had more bacon” then friend, I have a sizzling treat for you.
On one end of the product design spectrum we have idiots making USB-powered sandwich warmers, i.e. useless junk that no one asked for and that hopefully does not turn a profit. On the other end we have Vestergaard-Frandsen [making] the LifeStraw, a plastic cylinder fitted with a filter that those in less developed countries can use to drink water…safely.
— A look at Vestergaard-Frandsen, the company behind the LifeStraw on Core77
It’s always nice to see people using their design skills for good.
Typographically delicious motion graphic intro for TED 2009 from the folks at Trollbäck + Company. I love the sound design, too.
Making the simple complicated is commonplace; making the complicated simple, awesomely simple, that’s creativity.
— Charles Mingus
Quote, “Nine times out of ten, the first impression someone gives you is exactly who they are.” Derek Powazek has great advice on why you shouldn’t work for assholes.
I cannot begin to tell you how strange it is to see something that started as a notebook sketch and then moved onto my computer screen and then got printed out and then tweaked and etc. etc. etc. eventually become a 30′ physical object.
Semi-related: How Twitter was Born and The Technical Story of Muxtape.
If you use NetNewsWire as your Mac feed reader of choice and you enjoy a good spot of simple typography, you should download LegiStyle’s Serif Black & White theme.
Sean Sperte has a handy Super Bowl commercial scorecard so you can play along at home scoring commercials in four different categories or the dreaded ‘flag as inappropriate’ checkbox “for those distasteful GoDaddy ads.”
We don’t have a huge marketing budget. But there’s always money to be found, so long as every dollar we spend brings back something more valuable in return.
We’re don’t have the ability to hire tons of people. But there are always vacancies for talent. Talent pays for itself, or it isn’t talent. Period.
We don’t have time to invest in HR. But the time invested in team building and picking the right people to be in the trenches with will come back tenfold in execution and productivity.
There is always margin for amazing.
The details are not the details. They make the design.
— Charles Eames
I, Too
I, too, sing America.
I am the darker brother.
They send me to eat in the kitchen
When company comes,
But I laugh,
And eat well,
And grow strong.
Tomorrow,
I’ll be at the table
When company comes.
Nobody’ll dare
Say to me,
“Eat in the kitchen,”
Then.
Besides,
They’ll see how beautiful I am
And be ashamed—
I too am America
