Join Dirk+Weiss and AIGA Boston at Pecha Kucha Night. July 22, 1009 @ 6:30pm. The goal of these events is to talk about ‘our’ design work, in a setting that is comfortable and not pretentious. Come support all the speakers and Dirk+Weiss at this open forum type event. Each speaker is given 6min and 40seconds to talk about what they do as a creative professional.
Our topic will include designing for now and the power of interconnecting design concepts with smart technology. For more information: http://www.pecha-kucha.org/cities/boston
What is Pecha Kutcha?
“Pecha Kucha (which is Japanese for the sound of conversation) has tapped into a demand for a forum in which creative work can be easily and informally shown, without having to rent a gallery or chat up a magazine editor. This is a† demand that seems to be global – as Pecha Kucha Night, without any pushing, has spread virally to over 100 cities across the world. Find a location and join the conversation.”
With mobile applications, your business is online, viral and now.
Mobile applications have not only become cash cows for those who choose to sell them, but they have also proven to be extremely beneficial for building brand recognition and reinforcement.
iPhone users make up more than 50% of all smart phone users and represent over 15% of all cell phones purchased. A pretty large chunk in the grand scope of total US cell phone usage.
From books to card games to promotions, the iPhone can be a platform to help your business. With a combination of an integrated advertising model and a developed markeing strategy, an iPhone app can not only create revenue from app sales alone, but enable you to sell your other products and services.
If you have not already seen our smash hit site AnyoneCanSwiss, please do check it out. In the first 48 hours, 11 thousand unique-visitor, poster submissions, we’re collected and shared on Flickr. And now, AnyoneCanSwiss, is going mobile.
Here at Dirk+Weiss, we have created a new iPhone app that takes the concept of AnyoneCanSwiss, and makes it mobile. In the next few weeks, you will be able to download your own Swissmaker 2.0 App to your iPhone from the App Store on iTunes. And did we mention, its totally free!
The app will not only make instant Helvetica posters, but will allow you to save the posters to you photo library on your phone. From there, the possibilities are endless! Email a poster to friends, or set one as your phone wallpaper. If any other app on your phone can access your photo library, it can also access your posters.
Also included with the launch of the Swissmaker 2.0 iPhone App, is an advertising model that can connect interested brands to a niche viral market. This process of co-branded advertising is a no-risk model in you only pay for the views you receive. If you our your company is interested in co-branding with AnyoneCanSwiss, send us a message.
Apparently, long time software developers are finally making bank by creating one of those $1.99 iPhone apps. I have now read countless articles about struggling software companies who are giving up their pc/mac box development, for the iPhone platform.
So what’s in an iPhone app? Well, from what we can see, besides some code and graphics, there is an underlying philosophy that has put up the white flag to proprietary software piracy. Software companies have, and are beginning to understand that there is no bringing down piracy. The old mentality and business model of “big box, big software, big price” has been eradicated by open, collaborative development, and the iPhone has brought the same software development strategy to a mobile and light weight, if not viral stage.
Lets do a quick calculation for an example iPhone app’s annual revenue:
200 downloads/day x 1.99/download x 365 Days = $145,270!
Now that’s the way to make a six figure salary.
Stay tuned for the Anyone Can Swiss iPhone app!!
Above: Microsoft’s Surface Interface. Proprietary madness. Lets go open-source and make it available to everyone!
In typical Dirk+Weiss fashion, we are building an interface for this years 2009 AIGA BoNE Show. This kiosk combines projection and a touch input device, powered by a custom software interface.
The purpose of this kiosk is to showcase the website winners of this years Best of New England design competition. Our goal is to create an interface that is not only well designed, but extremely intuitive.
The next generation of software interface is well, interface-less. Menu’s are going away and being replaced by hand gestures and organic content design. Thanks to a generous donation from TechSuperpowers in Boston, we have access to a MacMini and other various components for hardware. Come by the show in June, to check it out!
AIGA BoNE Show 2009 Info >>
Go ahead, click around. This is our “Transparent Relaunch” of the Dirk+Weiss Brand. Countless times we have been asked, “what is it you do exactly?” The typical response you may hear is “we are a design and technology firm”.
And we still are, but different.
After some great brainstorming and critically mapping of our original business model, it became instantly clear that what we were doing for our clients was more than just design and programming, and was more in the Marketing arena. We were always trying to find what field exactly uses graphic design and technology combined. Our solution was to re-structure our business model and brand as a fully capable, creative marketing agency.
If you follow our blog, you know that we know, transparency is king. Just like our advice we give to our clients, we applied to Dirk+Weiss. The cases are real, the videos are real, results are quantifiable and we can help make you money. Enjoy.
This past Saturday, I attended the annual AIGA Student Portfolio Review at MassArt, Boston.
The event started with all the reviewers, corralled, anticipating and chit-chatting amongst each other about what they do and what they expect to see. As the doors opened, the sight of all the students, looking nice and nervous at the same time, was quite exhilarating. It reminded me of a time not to long ago, when I was on their side of the table.
As I went from person to person, looking at posters, books, and corporate stationery, I quickly realized that the most needed advice to the students, was that of the so-called “Big-Picture”. There were obvious signs that the students have diligently practiced their craft; typography was tight and craft was clean. So after seeing this, I began to tell the students to relax, and that I was not there to nit-pick about un-kerned 12 point type.
I was very interested in hearing what the plans were for these students post-graduation. Where would they take their design skills? A job? Graduate Program? Freelance?
Because of the economy, most students had no idea what was in store next. They did understand however, how important it is to create valuable connections not only to other designers, but companies as well.
I felt I was able to provide some insight to the value of creating connections, and some of the methods that connections can be made. The first buzz word to arise is “Facebook”, then “Twitter”, then the common phrase “I need a website, but don’t want to learn Dreamweaver.” When I here this, I smile politely, and recommend a more realistic approach that is content management based. I explain that HTML websites are OK at best, and then go on to explain the power and simplicity of systems like Wordpress and Indexhibit. Their eyes go wide.
One student in particular, I found was looking for the Big Picture talk. Michael Deal is a design student who loves information graphics and the Beatles.
He found in his design class, while working on an information graphics project, that lots of connections can be made withing a particular subject. He told me quite a few times, that he wished he had an entire class about this subject (information design).
We talked for quite some time about how he could apply his skills in design to not just posters of information, but to business models, products, and events. Probably the best conversation about design happening in the room.
These students at the MassArt Review seemed like fast paced, social network savvy individuals who seem satisfied with their schooling. I could see the wanting though, to take on not just design projects, but larger goals. Overall, a feeling I got from many of the students: “I can do graphic design…now what? How do I make an impact?”
I guess my last bit of advice here would be: Branch out, make connections to what ever can help you move forward. Remember, regular people are your clients, continually get to know the world they live in, and you will be fine.
Michael Deal - "Beatles Citing Beatles"
Last night’s Hugh Dubberly lecuter @ MassArt was fascintating, inspirational, and a bit exhausting.
Entitled: “Design in the Age of Biology”, Hugh covers his thesis that explains how the ideas and principles of design have moved from mechanical to organic, and object to system. Many points (and charts) show how the trends of technology movements influence designers and the products they make.
In terms of technology, the Open Source software movement is one example of his theory. The old dev model was to have software be proprietary, with big conglomerates holding all the cards. The new dev model, that is proven to work, is to allow software to be developed by an unlimited community of developers. This creates faster more efficient development, as it uses the “from the ground-up” model instead of “from the top-down”. In short, let the users design the software, for free.
The second point that seemed to stick out in my mind was the “then and now” of the designers role. There is a transition going on now for designers. Graphic designers especially, seem to be in the thick of it. Before graphic designers, there were printers who set type. Then graphic design became what it is/was in the 20th century, a slew of “Lone-Gunman” designers, who (are expected to) hold all the cards for the client. Now, a transition is happening again. The days of the “Lone-Gunman” are over. Designers can produce a stronger, more efficient product for their client if collaboration is encouraged and implemented.
Clients expect the designer to be at maximum efficiency. The internet, social media, and the speed of information access set the standards for designers to operate in.
“In the first part of the 20th century, there were great circus posters in Poland. Go to Poland, and see. But now, designing the poster is just not enough. Designers are expected to design an entire circus. Oh yea, and a poster to advertise the show.”
-Nathan Felde, Chair of the AIB Design Department, Boston.
From www.dubberly.com
A 21st century design lecture in Boston tonight!
Free Hugh Dubberly Lecture: Design in The Age of Biology: Shifting from mechanical to organic; from object to system.
@ MassArt / Wednesday / 04.08.09 / 6:30pm / FREE
Pozen Center for Interelated Media
Massachusetts College of Art and Design
621 Huntington Avenue
Boston, MA 02115
We love the TED talks. They showcase various theroies and realizations of innovation. Many of these talks talk about the future of content, media, interface and the impact it all can have.
This TED talk “Jacek Utko: Can design save the newspaper?” is quite interesting indeed. Can design save the bleeding newspaper industry? Every day, newspaper and magazines are laying off employess, going digital, or folding completely. Jacek is an art director who re-designed a European newspaper, and the effect was grand. But as he points out, designing the look is not enough anymore.
Here is an idea for a possible solution to the newspaper crisis.
Imagine a broad-sheet size, E-paper display with wifi access. The Amazon Kindle is the new famous device to use such E-Paper displays, rendering text and images in gray scale with great clarity. There is also flexible LCD technology being developed by leading Japanese and Korean electronics companies. The content of the new “Digital Newspaper” is updated as frequently as the parent website it pulls from, rendering content directly on the E-Paper screen.
Example: The New York Times stops printing completely. Paper and ink becomes to costly because distribution has become null, and advertisers wont pay to be with yesterdays news. But wait! Now you can buy a device from NYTimes.com that is the size of a standard newspaper, yet is all digital! The content is changing when you refresh, streaming to your device from NYTimes.com. Video replaces photography. A table of contents can be pulled up to pick a section. The last news paper you will ever buy! Go ahead, take it with you. Download (subscribe) to your favorite newspaper. A real device to replace newspapers, because we all know that iPhone screen is just too damn small!
It could happen. The fact of the matter is Newspapers are dying because other sources prove more efficient and practical. Advertisers are pulling ads from print, and content is as fresh as day-old-bread.
21st century design is indeed a process from beginning to end. Graphic design is just one part, but the theories, practice and strategy of design principles can be applied to all aspects of business.
