Core77

We know it's freezing outside (at least where we are) and the last thing you're thinking about is A/C, but here's a nifty interface design (by Tokyo-based Mac Funamizu) that could just as easily be applied to a heater.

The project description on Mr. Funamizu's portfolio page is light, but it seems to be a hologram containing graphic elements manipulated by the user to set temperature, humidity, and a timer.

Karl Lagerfeld likes custom cases. Remember this Fendi iPod briefcase, from way back in '04? It was meant to hold a dozen of the music players.

Lagerfeld also designed a single iPod holder, again by/for Fendi, for those of us who don't own more than 40 iPods.

Then there was his six-bottle champagne case, which had nothing to do with iPods and everything to do with Dom Perignon.

But back to the 'Pods. Lagerfeld's now upgraded to a bespoke Louis Vuitton trunk system, each one loaded up with speakers and a subwoofer by Monster and containing a briefcase loaded up with 20 you-know-whats.

We find this last one kind of comical, because the whole point of the iPod is portability. Somewhere along the line, "1,000 songs in your pocket" turned into "Lower back pain for Lagerfeld's lackeys."

Talk about object convergence: Back in the day you'd need an SLR to shoot still pictures and a separate Panaflex to shoot movies--but look at the gorgeous first-look HD video shot with Canon's new 5D Mark II, using only ambient light in Tokyo:

The 5D ships in December, but is reportedly back-ordered until February.

via akihabara news

New York Times art director Steven Heller interviews Sol Sender, whose firm designed the ubiquitous Obama "O."

via Design Observer

Senior Footwear Designer, Lifestyle
PUMA North America Inc.
Boston, Massachusetts

The candidate will design footwear by combining influences of sport, fashion and lifestyle to bring unique products to market. Duties include designing seasonal fashion/performance driven footwear and address fast paced design requests for footwear design detailing: color and material selection, presentation preparation, market research, and logistical support.

» view

The best design jobs and portfolios hang out at Coroflot.

Jason Morris, a professor at Western Washington University's ID program, has just posted up the findings of a year-and-a-half long survey of software requirements for ID jobs, summarized above. Taken from an admittedly small and arbitrary sample--200 or so job postings in IDSA Perspectives--the results point out a few trends worth considering.

1. 2D visual exploration is still the most important, and Adobe is still at the top of that heap. No surprise there.

2. Illustrator edges out Photoshop for the first time. Apparently rapid iteration and adjustment is winning over s3xy hawtness.

3. SolidWorks muscles its way into first place among 3D CAD. A little surprising considering it was originally engineering software, but it's hard to argue with something so easy to learn (and backed up by all that marketing).

4. Alias is still the most requested surface modeler, creaming Rhino by nearly 2 to 1. Again, it's a limited sample, but we thought it'd be a lot closer than that.

5. Pro/E: it ain't dead yet. In fact it's doing pretty well. In fact it's kind of kicking ass. The latest WildFire doesn't look half bad.

6. AutoCAD and 3DSMax are losing favor, which is only fair--they're mostly for architecture and construction after all.

7. Not a single explicit modeler on there...yet.

Does this jive with your own experiences? Let us know.

There's at least two ways to design a new category of product:

1) Invent a new technology and incorporate it into your design (the Dyson Vacuum), or

2) Design something around a novel use of an existing technology (the iPod).

Both types can be exciting, but what we like about 2) is that you don't have to spend a dime on R&D vis-a-vis the technology.

Let's take vacuum technology, for instance. Not the Dyson cyclonic stuff, we're talking regular, run-of-the-mill suckage from an air pump. In 1901 a Brit named Hubert Cecil Booth patented the first powered vacuum cleaner. Check out his "research" (courtesy of Wikipedia):

[Booth] noticed a device used in trains that blew dust off the chairs, and thought it would be much more useful to have one that sucked dust. He tested the idea by laying a handkerchief on the seat of a dinner chair, putting his mouth to the handkerchief, and then trying to suck up as much dust as he could onto the handkerchief. Upon seeing the dust and dirt collected on the underside of the handkerchief he realized the idea could work.

Although Booth lost the consumer market to Hoover--Booth was apparently the HD DVD to Hoover's Blu-Ray back then--he built a good business producing industrial-sized vacuums, and his company (renamed Quirepace) still exists to this day--and now they make Pneumatic Tube Transport systems, another cool use for vacuum technology.

But back to regular household vacuums. They evolved through various form factors throughout the 20th century--standing up, lying down, shrinking to fit your hand--before detouring into Dyson's cyclonic separation and even into semi-autonomous robot form with the Roomba.

But the purpose was always the same: To clean dust off of floors (at least until the 1970s, when it was used to suck spilled cocaine out of the shag).

Then someone (we don't know who, but judging from the photo below, it was someone from the early 1980s) got clever and saw another use for vacuuming technology: Clothes storage.

The leap from cleaning floors to making sweaters smaller is not at all intuitive, but the concept was sound and now the market is rife with vacuuming storage systems for clothes.

The latest iteration of this idea is aimed at, of all people, hunters and campers. The idea is that after slaughtering fish or little furry animals or what have you, you seal them up in a Zip Vac bag, keeping the kill fresh for the ride back home.

And there you have it. So, take a look at some of the technology we've got lying around, and ask yourself: What else might that be good for?

The Anemona lamp, by Ukrainian designer Igor Pinigin, is like a Weeble that can commit to its leanings; heavy glass balls hidden inside the base provide stability, no matter which way you tilt it. Working prototypes were exhibited at Moscow's SaloneSatellite 2008, though there's no word on if it will go into actual production.

via design in central and eastern europe

A bite-sized list of what's happenin' now:

wwd lifestyle
Ron Arad Fetes Solo Exhibition in Paris

forbes
Nokia Designs The Future: chief designer discusses his inspirations and what's next

unbeige
The "New Temple of Industrial Design": Inside Autodesk's $10 Million Showcase Lobby/Museum

mac news world
Essay: Apple's got a lot right, here's what they got wrong

al bawaba
Red Dot founder to inspire Mid East product designers at Index

e media wire
Millenia Retaining Walls Voted Best Green Exterior Product

ten links
Current rendering software: CCS incorporates Bunkspeed's HyperShot and HyperDrive software into curriculum

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