Small and Powerful Phones are the New Black.

Small and Powerful Phones are the New Black.

With a timeless design and the most powerful performance of any phone currently available, the iPhone SE sets the new bar for the market to chase after–the mini or less-than 4.5 inch, flagship smartphone. Stealthy and incognito, it appears you are using an old, antiquated phone. (This is only because, in the phone world, we currently live in a bigger equals newer/better mindset.) But hiding within is a secret, super-fast flagship level device with great battery life, true one-handed use for all, and functional ergonomics. Like Gruber says, it just feels right. I…Read more …
iOS App Icons Designed With The Grid

iOS App Icons Designed With The Grid

When iOS 7 (and now, iOS 8) made its debut, along with a complete UI overhaul using a flat visual design style, a new app icon grid was revealed. This framework, called by some the "Jony Ive Icon Grid," made up of both a central circular element set and parallel and diagonal straight line elements, works to provide a supportive set of, literally, guidelines for icon designers. The goal of these guidelines was to create a more harmonious appearing homescreen for iOS devices. The images in this blog show some recent icon designs…Read more …
Tough and Slim—the Pelican ProGear Protector Case for the iPhone 6.

Tough and Slim—the Pelican ProGear Protector Case for the iPhone 6.

This case is the perfect blend of protection/durability with a non-bulky, streamlined design—a simple, yet durable one-piece case. While the Pelican Voyager seems to be, currently, a more popular option, the Protector is the true hidden gem for the iPhone 6, and 6 Plus. It is less bulky than the Voyager. It is one-piece and the Voyager is many pieces that snap together. The large "lip" on the outer edge of the front-side of the case is nice and allows for ample room to place your iPhone 6 face down if you desire.…Read more …
For UI & UX Design, Complex Drawing is a Waste of Time

For UI & UX Design, Complex Drawing is a Waste of Time

I am taking about this shit above (and and below), and only in the context of app development.   Whatever your sentiments to the craft of drawing may be, in terms of UI development, in the here-and-now, this stuff is almost pompous. Like most all the crap seen here except for a few. Most people under the age of 35, and many over that age, who are not illustrators themselves cannot even relate to drawings or sketches. There is a distinction to be made. Very quick brainstorming notes like this example have their…Read more …
iPhone 6 Plus Keyboard Needs to Move Up.

iPhone 6 Plus Keyboard Needs to Move Up.

With the 5.5 inch screen of the iPhone 6 Plus, typing is quite difficult with the current, and nonadjustable location of the keyboard at the bottom of the screen. Apple should add the ability to slide the keyboard up the screen just a bit to make typing much more functional, whether typing with one hand or two. Build the functionality and UI exactly like it currently exists on the iPad, when using the undock function usually utilized with the split keyboard, or, more relevant here, on its own. When in landscape, the ability…Read more …
Apple Inc. Should Relocate to the Denver-Boulder Area.

Apple Inc. Should Relocate to the Denver-Boulder Area.

Author note: Reviving this unpublished old blog in light of the events in Napa Valley that occurred on Sunday, August 24th. Apple does not need to be in Silicon Valley. Microsoft's headquarters are not in the bay-area of California, neither is IBM. Apple, build should have built the mothership in the Denver-Boulder area.Read more …
iPhone 6 and the Future of Mobile From Apple, in 20 Seconds.

iPhone 6 and the Future of Mobile From Apple, in 20 Seconds.

Visually, somewhat like the current 5th generation iPod Touch, but bigger (and smaller). From an industrial design point of view, it can easily be argued that the 5th gen iPod Touch is a better hardware design than both the iPhone 5s and 5c. The French blog Nowhereelse.fr and designer Martin Hajek have put this idea to pictures. The design essentially looks like an iPad mini or iPad Air scaled down to iPhone size, which happens to look almost exactly like a current generation iPod Touch. This hypothetical new design would work with multiple…Read more …

iPad Mini is my iPhone Phablet. Only $20 a month.

Simple, yet a bit too convoluted for most people. iPad Mini (Verizon LTE) + Google Voice + VOIP phoning app (Talkatone). Double bonus because I have bad eyesight and iPhone screen is too small for me. Sans all the jokes about carrying it around...I leave it in the car often. Or, Bluetooth/WiFi the free personal hotspot to my old iphone 4. Mini is wrapped in an Otterbox Defender and sometimes just carry it around like a small book. Fits in the pocket of most of my cargo shorts/pants... Not doing much conventional phoning,…Read more …
Gold iPhones and Automobiles

Gold iPhones and Automobiles

Driving in my car, I see gold-colored newer model automobiles everywhere. I never saw all of these gold cars, trucks and SUV's until I mentioned this in a previous "Gold iPhone" thread at a popular Apple rumors website. Look at all the gold cars. This is especially true if looking for various versions of the color gold, and not just one preconceived color of gold. I think only hipsters claim to not like the color gold. I am a hipster myself, I do not like the color of gold, most all versions of…Read more …

Hover Effects / Mouseover will come to mobile devices in the near future.

Enabled with the use of advanced, wide-angle camera (s) or the screen itself will be able to detect hand &  finger locations. This will work with websites using ancient code. You will not need to touch the screen, unless you want to. People who have used a Wacom or other modern digital drawing tablets with a pen device know this effect already. The pen tip does not need to touch the tablet surface. We are talking fingers and thumbs here, not stylus pen device. This is the next killer app.Read more …
I could have designed all the iOS 7 stock app icons in 5 days

I could have designed all the iOS 7 stock app icons in 5 days

The title is meant to be alluring—sensationalist, maybe—but not altogether untrue. I am not a team. I am one person. Many other single persons out there could also have designed better app icons in less than one week. Many already have in the last week, as if in defiance of the less-than-stellar visual design of the app icons. I am not a huge "skeuomorphic" design fan, I do not even like saying that word or typing it, and I never know if I spelled it correctly. Neither am I a huge "flat" design…Read more …

iPhone Iterations and Their Analogous Relationship to Led Zeppelin Albums

Original iPhone to Led Zeppelin I Led Zeppelin I is the band’s rawest and most blues-based of their studio recordings. It is also, obviously, their first album. The first iPhone is the most low-technology (old, slow CPU, low resolution screen, limited functionality in the software) yet high hardware craftsmanship / durability / build quality to the point of being over-built. Led Zeppelin I became the template for all future hard rock, even some punk rock—listen to Communication Breakdown. iPhone became the template for all future mobile phones/devices. Apple did not invent multi-touch with…Read more …

Facebook, Why is the Cover Image an Undersized Width of 851 Pixels?

The current size of a "Cover" image, the optional large photo or other image that runs across almost the entire width of a Facebook page open in a browser window, is 851 X 315 pixels. Besides the fact that this is an odd size in and of itself, it is vastly too low resolution for a wide variety of current devices displaying Facebook by either a browser window or the Facebook stand-alone app. We are not talking about only the very new hiDPI, high-resolution or hi PPI devices hitting the market. Using the…Read more …
Interactive Started with Pong.

Interactive Started with Pong.

It is one thing to be born into an electronic interactive world, it has always been there for you; and it is one thing to have already been an adult, lacking the extreme learning abilities and child-like amazement of a new mind; and it is an entirely other experience to have been a young child EXACTLY when electronic interactive interface was let loose upon the world, and it was not with the personal computer and later the internet. 717Read more …

Apple’s iTunes Store using lower quality images?

It appears that some of the main graphic images used in Apple's iTunes Store are of a lower visual quality than in the recent past. Look for some of the classic representations of image compression—noise, loss of edge clarity and tone roughness. Compression artifacts are especially recognizable in small and medium sized text. Image quality changes appeared sometime around August 24-27, but this date range is unconfirmed. The alteration in image quality is consistent across multiple configurations including OS X, Windows and iOS on the iPad (iPhone images seem to still be very…Read more …

Using a Wacom Tablet and Pen, in Mouse-Mode.

I like to dabble in the visual design arts, and one of the input devices for my computer is a Wacom tablet. Specifically, a Bamboo Pen & Touch, allowing both an Apple-Trackpad-like experience, including all the gestures as well as the typical Pen-Mode input method. The touch interface works satisfactory, but not great or even well. The cursor movement is not smooth as it is with both the Apple Trackpad and with the same Wacom tablet while using the supplied pen. This may be a driver/software issue or it could be hardware. However,…Read more …
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