Posts Tagged ‘visual design’

I love a good reel. Some day I’ll do one of my own. Some day.

2009 REEL from // Videodrome on Vimeo.

Here’s another great piece of stop motion goodness. This time it’s from the students and faculty at Brigham Young University who created the opening titles for the Typophile Film Festival 5. More information at Bit Rebels.

Late last week we rolled out a significant update to Citysearch.com.au. The first thing you’ll notice is the revised header which now sports a much cleaner, lighter design with a prominent search box. Once you start a search you’ll really begin to notice the changes. The search results page has been completely redesigned for better scanability. You can also clearly see what other users are voting for and commenting on.

When you click on a result for more information you’ll find the details page has also been redesigned. The new, cleaner, lighter design makes it easy to find the information you need. You can read what other users are saying and leave your own comments. We’ve hooked up Citysearch with Facebook Connect so you can now sign in to Citysearch using your Facebook account. This makes leaving comments on Citysearch much easier and it also gives you the option of publishing the stuff you’ve found on Citysearch to your Facebook wall for your friends to see.

We hope you’ll enjoy using the new features as much as we do.

I’m currently working on a redesign of my portfolio, so I’ve been doing a bit of research into current trends, techniques and basically looking for some great inspiration. The following is a collection of great resources and some stunning examples from both studios and individuals. While I believe the star of the show should be the work itself, the portfolio needs to tie it all together and take the user on a journey.

To be honest I’m a little daunted as the benchmark is pretty high. The old version of my portfolio is here. Hopefully it’s not long before the new one is ready.

Resources
12 Tips for Creating a Great Portfolio Site
Portfolio Design Study – Another great deconstruction by Smashing Magazine.
10 Cool Photo Portfolio and Gallery WordPress Themes
60+ Helpful Resources for Portfolio Design
Design a Textured Portfolio Site Layout Using Photoshop
Five Popular Design Portfolio Website Styles
Top 10 Portfolio Faux Pas
How to Design a One-Page Portfolio in Photoshop
Stacey, Simplified portfolios

Examples
6 Absolutely Stunning Design Portfolios
50 Beautiful and Creative Portfolios
50 Fresh Portfolio Websites for Your Inspiration
Elliot Jay Stocks – I’ve always been a fan of Elliot’s work. His new website is awesome.
Purple Rock Scissors
Five Popular Design Portfolio Website Styles
Marius Roosendaal – I love the way the theme changes depending upon the time of day.
STUDIO7DESIGNS
Travis Isaacs | My Life In Pixels
45royale Inc.

UPDATE: Elliot Jay Stocks also has a 2 part screencast on how to design a portfolio site.
UPDATE: Smashing Magazine’s  Showcase of Case Studies in Design Portfolios
UPDATE: Ready-made portfolios Hosted Portfolio Roundup on Heavy Backpack

A couple of weeks ago I referred to Alex Campbell’s post on the possible drivers behind behavioural changes in the way people use Google search. Personally, my greatest frustration with Google is trying to find up to date information and being presented with articles that are years old. Maybe that’s more of a failing with the user than the algorithm. Whatever the case, I seldom find relevant and up-to-date results the first time.

Since that article Google has rolled out the mother of all updates: A larger search box. Of course it’s not just a larger search box. There’s also larger, blocky, bespoke buttons and a new typeface. There was almost enough discussion about the typeface alone on Twitter to rival the Ikea uproar. Ok I’m exaggerating, but there was significant chatter for something I thought was, well, pretty trivial.

I’m a little dubious about Marissa’s claim that the larger search box is for added fun. Although it probably makes sense in terms of allowing for a wider drop down for the predictive keywords. Also with monitor resolutions getting higher the once sparse and clean Google homepage is really starting to get a little pokey and dated. So how do you keep up while maintaining the status quo? Easy, just upscale the search box and the buttons.

The recent addition of some visual-bling to the once barren text-based domain of search doesn’t just stop there. Google now have Fast Flip which despite the claim it emulates a news stand, it is really just a gimmick. Then there’s bling, er sorry, Bing. I actually admire Microsoft (wow, did I just say that?) for taking such an approach with Bing. The fresh image every day is really just a cheeky alternative to changing your logo every day (don’t get me started on the Google logo). I also like the way Microsoft have built in a discovery component to the images.

Microsoft have taken Bing a step further with the announcement today of Visual Search. This is not a new idea and while it has some merit I think it’s uses are pretty limited. Even in the demonstration most of the focus while using visual search was on the refinement tools on the left. The images really just served to show the number of potential matches or help provide some recognition that you were on the right path. It’s also interesting to note that in some cases selecting an image just dropped the appropriate keywords into the search bar to begin a new search. Groundhog Day anyone?

Finally, I love the way Microsoft are edging into Google’s space, quite literally. While both parties claim that Microsoft has not purchased any questionable keywords as was initially reported, it seems as though the word “search” has been. Try it and you’ll see what I mean.

So with all prettying-up of search and tinkering with SEO and keywords, I can’t help but think that traditional search has really run out of genuinely new ideas. Is this as good as it gets? Have we jumped the shark?

UPDATE: Google This: 5 Reasons to Switch to Bing