Psycho Buildings At The Hayward

All summer I've been trying to find enough time to get my arse down to the Southbank to have a look the Psycho buildings exhibition at the Hayward gallery. Despite my best efforts, my rowing technique was rubbish (I maintain that Wilf is 'the' rower of the team but as he could not make the trip, I was left stranded on the boating lake for several minutes.)

I really liked the idea of the boats on the roof, it made it feel less like a wanky exhibit and much more about the visuals. Some of the other pieces were interesting for the sheer thought and the simple yet effective ideas. These pieces of work, similar to the best adverts, were simple, well produced and keep you captivated. The most uplifting feeling was that, it seemed that all concerned understood the power of architecture and its power to tell a story and make a difference. A nice thing to do when stuck for inspiration.

A Simple Thought

It's been a while since I traveled with an airline of any good reputation, due to student finances, but I'm pretty sure that this is something that could be done. I think most airlines have in-flight magazines, which they use to plug a few things and I'm sure earn money from advertising, my issue is that these are printed on paper.

I've been on a few planes that have interactive screens in the headrest in front of you and remotes in the armrest. These are normally used for watching films on, or playing games but I'm sure that you could read things from them as well. Therefore, why can't airlines publish their magazines in a format that can be shown on the screen and selected with the remote or by touching the screen.

It seems like something that would be seamless and easy to use, not to mention that it means wasting less paper and allowing for links to other parts of the system. For example, if a film review was written in the magazine, you could have a link to the featured film, that is, if the airline was showing the film. I'm sure this would not only benefit the quality of the service but it would also be doing something to help out our nice planet, even if they refuse to do much else.

Trip Into The Past (MOB)

Hello,

It's been a while, today whilst Wilf was working I took a trip to the museum of brands, as I've been trying to crack some copy which was causing me issues, I think it's better now and I rather enjoyed myself. It was extremely interesting to see how some things hardly change, even if they way we perceive them does.

I sat watching some really memorable TV spots for a while, at least an hour, some classic Hamlet ones.

Some of the copy on the posters was unreal, the way communication took place decades ago seems more to the point. It may just be the fact that we are bombarded with lots of useless messages on top of the good stuff, but I cant help thinking that we now consider many more factors when thinking of ad's.

Check it out.




Also, thanks to everyone for the comments on the last post, if you have actually decided to keep reading, then this is for you. Plans are underway to get the idea from the blog wall to a physical one.

An Idea On Ideas

As part of a project myself and Wilf are looking into, we would like your help. I'm not sure about how many people will read this post, but it is a hope that those of you who do read this, will want to help us.

Our University has recently re-branded to call itself the UCA, after obtaining full status, combine this with the influx of new students that will join our ranks in September and we have the potential for exciting change and some exciting work.

Myself and Wilf have decided that we would like to attempt a project to inspire our fellow students to share their thoughts and build a buzz around the campus. We would therefore like you to tell us your answer on the following question:


"What does it feel like when inspiration strikes?"

Maybe it was when you solved your first brief, when you got the last word on the crossword. The moment you invented a groundbreaking theory that will be shown on TED for years to come or when you decided on a name for your child, no matter what it was, we are sure at one moment in your life, you had a special inspired moment, so please share that feeling with us.

We hope that we will then use your answers to start the project rolling, putting them up on a wall on campus and encouraging students to add to the collection. We hope to add a bit of insight and analysis into fags breaks throughout the campus.

Thanks

'Say hello to my little friend'

The world changed once man made light was introduced - it allowed us to work half a day extra of course! But now that it costs so much, both financially and environmentally, we are beginning to see the introduction of LEDs as a low cost, high impact resource and we couldn't be happier. These little beacons have been very kind to Luke and myself, letting us know that the Playstation is working, and that the TV is still wasting 85% of its power on standby and of course, using them for our own creative purposes. We only hope that more people begin to see the benefit in these genius, tiny gems, just take a look at this article from the NY Times, and the picture of the Marcus Centre in Milwaukee to see just how much of an impact they can have.

Film In Data Form

We are both very big film fans, many a time have I sat in the corner whilst Wilf shoots down my critical viewpoint, ashamed of the fact I thought Matt Damon was good. Then I noticed this Data Visualisation graph, it tracks box office takings in the US of past and current films, its neat. After seeing the Radiohead House Of cards video, that was created through only data visualisation, I 've become addicted to the topic. You should check out the guys site, he has many other graphs and lots of other interesting sections. I must also say, Contagious Magazine brought it to my attention. http://xach.com/

Firefly On The Blog

So after a day on the blog, both myself and Wilf have been thinking of how to get conversation going, after having a quick brainstorm we decided to get visitors to talk on the page, not just through comments, but whilst reading the blog overall. Therefore Wilf has enabled Firef.ly for all you guys and gals that want to have a conversation with us or any visitors, its at the bottom right of the screen, or the little switch below our posts(Makes the screen go a nice orange tint.)

The hope is that it will enable feedback on the blog to become easier, as well as giving us a chance to have a chat with you all. I must say, thanks to Rubbishcorp for the original post on his blog that brought it to our attention. Lets hope that this catches on, as we like to have a talk every so often, plus it beats Facebook chat. The best thing about this, is that if you are on an enabled site, you can send a twitter update from the site, possibly recommending what you've just read.

Innocent Village Fete Fun

Yesterday I (Luke) went to the Innocent Village Fete and lots of fun was had whilst running from tree to tree. Sadly it is not the habit of this team to take umbrellas out with them (Hoods being the choice of the youth) and therefore I spent most of my time under a tree watching the folks dancing at the alfresco ballroom. The whole feeling of the day was great and the team at Innocent even entertain you in the queue for the toilets.

I think that these kind of events can sometimes be done rather badly, but congrats to Innocent for pulling of a great weekend. It was nice to see a whole range of causes about the fete and I've even made a pledge to walk more. It must be said, when a brand not only promotes itself in such an easy going manner but also manages to help out many good causes, you are sure to go down a storm.