You Oughta Know // Week 1

You oughta know will be a weekly segment devoted to links I come across that I just feel like sharing and other interesting finds I just happen to stumble upon. Enjoy!

1. You'll never think of screws the same way again.
2. Would you expect any less of a professional model's wedding video? Stunning cinematography.
3. Simple solution to a common problem. So glad I came across this photo.

The Swiss Legacy

Lately I've been doing a lot of research on Swiss design because I admire its simplistic yet effective and aesthetically pleasing quality which I have yet to master. Minimalist design definitely isn't one of my strengths and it is a style that I'd like to be more comfortable working in. I've found that though I've dabbled in graphic design since I was 12, I still have a lot to learn especially when it comes to knowing when to taking my hand off the mouse and just let the design be.

“Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing left to add, but when there is nothing left to remove.”

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

This article does an excellent job of overviewing Swiss design as it relates not only to graphic design but also web design:

Lessons From Swiss Style Graphic Design - Smashing Magazine

TYPOGRAPHY Tuesday

Typography is one of the many facets of graphic design that interests me. Lately I've really enjoyed scouring the net in search of unique designs and trying to recreate them on my own time. Doing so has been an amazing learning tool for me and I'm sure any artist, rather a seasoned pro or a humble beginner, would benefit from doing the same. Here are some examples that caught my eye this week:

(All images via Designinspiration)

Tilt/Shift

(photo by Ryan Jay?)

Being a member of the Flickr community has opened my eyes to a whole world of previously unknown photographic effects and techniques. I've come to admire the whimsical nature of tilt-shift photography with its minuscule figures and overly saturated color palettes. Two flickrites in particular come to mind when I think of well-executed tilt-shift effects: Ryan Jay and Noah Sahady.

After seeing their works, I was inspired to try my hand at this effect using some very helpful tutorials I found online.

Wanna try out this effects for yourself? Check out this tutorial.

- A.

P.S. You gotta see awesomeness too.

Coachelletta from Sam O'Hare on Vimeo.