John Rainsford.com

My home office, devilishly charming?

Tue, 22 May 2012 19:16:00

Much to my bemusement, whilst I was reading my RSS feeds this morning in Google Reader, I came across a post on Apartment Therapy called 'John's Devilishly Charming Desk'. As I am quite fond of looking at other people's workspaces, I eagerly clicked and noticed some familiar photos. It seems that the John they were referring to, was me.

My desk photos seem to do the rounds quite a bit. They were featured before, on Unplgged, (who are the same company as Apartment Therapy, I think), but I was unaware that AT were publishing them, again. (I wrote about the initial publishing on Unplgged here.)

The motivation for the supposed republication was probably because my photos recently featured on the DESK site here- they contacted me and requested permission to feature them and I happily agreed. Apart from needing Flash to view, the DESK site is really nicely designed and has some great desks featured on it- I highly recommend it. If you're interested, I have the original high res photos on Flickr, here and here.

I don't get to use my home office as much as I used to when I worked there almost full time, so it has become a little neglected. I have to buy a new desk and some other bits and pieces soon, so maybe I'll do another 'photoshoot' when that's done.

Moving Images: Predators

Thu, 10 May 2012 23:45:00

I like movies for many different reasons, the story, the script, the characters, the visuals, the actors or just a combination of the aforementioned. I thought the 2010 film Predators had many flaws, but I liked the characters, the premise of the story and most especially the visuals. It really had some great scenes, which I have screen-grabbed and included below.

My favourite scene? The Yakuza versus the Predator scene. Everything about it just came together to be a really nice visual. The lighting is moonlight, the location is a wild grass pasture, the characters are a heavily tattooed Japanese gentleman and a big hulking Predator. The juxtaposition is really great.

Worth watching the movie for the visuals alone or just enjoy the images below.

Brilliant Branding: St. Barts

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 22:42:00

Not all new branding needs to follow the latest trends and use so-called 'modern' typefaces. Case in point- the branding solution for Saint Bartholomew's Church, which won the Best of Show in the 2011 Brand New Awards.

There are many things I like about this identity. The typography is a nice blend of old carved type, lifted directly from the Church walls, and Carter Sans by Matthew Carter. Carter Sans is a very legible and clean sans-serif, with loads of character (no pun intended) without being too ostentatious. The sub-branding is nicely consistent- a circular motif is maintained through the branding, with a selection of iconography and text-within-circles, to denote the different aspects of the church. I love the fact that not only is the branding incredibly comprehensive, there is also so much room for expansion.

The branding is designed by the Original Champions of Design- you should check out their case study page as well as the rest of their work. They do some great work, kudos.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Mon, 23 Apr 2012 23:10:00

Just after Christmas last year, I saw the David Fincher remake of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. I thought it was a better interpretation of the original novel than the Swedish film. I thought they had a great cast of actors, and I felt that both Daniel Craig and Rooney Mara portrayed their respective characters better than their Swedish counterparts. I thought the film was shot, edited and paced a lot better too-it's a long movie, two hours and forty minutes, but it doesn't seem like a long journey. More like a tough journey.

As with all David Fincher movies, the attention to detail is brilliant. Every little element on screen has been thought about and is there for a reason. I think this is probably why this movie appeals to me a lot- as a designer, it's those tiny little details that 99% of people do not see, but are there, that excite and interest me. They are the threads of a fine woven garment.

The Art of the Title Sequence, a website celebrating movie title sequences, posted an article about TGWTDT when it was released in the cinema, and I'm sure I posted it to Twitter. Having watched the movie again on Blu-Ray, I thought the article deserved a mention on a blog post because it is really good.

It consists of interviews with David Fincher, Tim Miller from Blur Studios- the company which created the title sequence and, Neil Kellerhouse, the designer who handled all the graphic elements for the movie.

Amazing and inspiring work.

All images were taken from the Art of the Title Sequence without permission and I do not claim ownership for any of the images in this blog post.

Brilliant Branding: Budnitz Bicycles

Thu, 19 Apr 2012 21:22:00

I happened across Budnitz Bicycles on 37signals' blog and I was really impressed with the branding that Budnitz Bicycles have. It was designed by a two-man design studio in Colorado, Berger & Fohr (check out their work on their website, it's all great).

The branding has been designed to go across several mediums, even bicycle frames, and it works so well. The three elements that I think form the guts of the branding are the logotype (Paul Budnitz Bicycles), the logo mark and the stretched hexagon crest (which reminds me of the vintage bike companies, especially when on the frames) enclosing the logo mark.

The real genius is how the logo mark, the 'b' from the logotype, looks completely natural in the stretched hexagon and in the text-based logotype. I have tried this before and it is near impossible to achieve. A single letter taken from a logotype can look unbalanced on its own, or a single letter logo mark can look forced when it's shoe-horned into a logotype.

A really nice piece of work, kudos to Berger & Fohr.

(Image taken from bergerfohr.com. I, of course, lay no claim to ownership)

Adobe Illustrator issue: Keyboard controls not working

Wed, 18 Apr 2012 09:42:00

As a public service, I'm recording this issue and solution here, rather than a throwaway tweet.

I've noticed in the past couple of months that the shift, alt (or opton if you're an old school Mac user) and spacebar functionality within Adobe Illustrator had stopped working. Examples would include when I use the alt key to duplicate selected content whilst moving it, or when I hold the shift button down to move content at 90 or 45 degree angles to its original position. Or even the old 'move the artboard' trick by holding down the spacebar.

The behaviour was sporadic and when they weren't working, holding the keys down had no effect- even holding down the spacebar did not change the cursor to the grab-hand.

After much forum searching, and going through many suggested solutions, I spotted that people were claiming that quitting Firefox solved the problem. I wasn't using Firefox but I had started to use Chrome a whole lot more.

The solution was to quit both Chrome and Illustrator, but restart Illustrator first. There seems to be a conflict with key commands between the two and I think whichever app opens first gets precedence.

I hope this helps someone with similar issues, as it is so frustrating. It makes it very difficult to be productive with one metaphorical-hand, tied behind your back.

Play Well

Mon, 19 Mar 2012 22:16:00

An example of brilliant design- the Lego brick. The patents below are dated 1961, but the design was finalised in 1958 (also on patent)- since then, all Lego pieces conform to these dimensions. Lego pieces from 1958 can be used with Lego produced today. The genius of the design can be seen both in the success of the product and the fact that the fundamental details of the design are still used today.

Tangentially, I'm aware that people from the US tend to say 'Legos' as in 'I have ten Legos', 'can I play with your Legos' etcetera. This is wrong, very wrong. You can have 'Lego sets', 'Lego bricks', 'Lego pieces' and 'Lego Minifigures' but not Legos. Sort it out.

As seen on Swiss-Miss.com

Pencils to Pixels

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 16:13:00

When I was in my teens, I was an avid comic book reader, specifically the British 2000ad. It always seemed darker than it's American cousins. Around the mid-to-late-1990s, there was a surge in computer-aided comic art. Artists were not just using computers to colour their art, they were using Photoshop, Poser, Bryce and Color It (remember those latter apps?) to apply textures and arrange artwork. One such artist, Mark Harrison, was a sort of pioneer in the movement, he created the artwork for Durham Red and co-created Glimmer Rats and used a Macintosh heavily, to create his art.

MacFormat, my Mac magazine of choice at the time, ran a series about comic art and Macs, and part of this was two tutorial movies created by Mark Harrison.

I found these movies so inspiring that I felt I simply must become a comic book artist, using these techniques. So taken by these movies that I have kept them safe since about 1999, moving them from computer to computer (about eight different machines and at least five different storage mediums, I reckon) and it was only today, when I was trying to explain to my nephew how to create realistic gore using Photoshop (long story) that I decided to post them to YouTube.

I did a search and they don't seem to be online already. I also did a search for contact details for Mark Harrison, to ask permission to upload them. I didn't find any, so he'll have to accept my apologies for going ahead anyway. I've embedded the two parts below.

Sadly, shortly after trying, I realised that this wasn't the path for me- I just didn't have the artistic ability. What was becoming a stronger influence on me though, was the design in 2000ad- especially the typefaces, which were created by a guy called Rian Hughes, who was a big influence on me and is still one of my favourite designers today.

Auto-updating Dates with Timezones and PHP

Tue, 03 Jan 2012 11:23:00

Happy New Year! The last few days I've seen a number of articles written, regarding the PHP date() function, which can be used to ensure the copyright date on the footer of your website (assuming you have a website written in PHP) is always the current year. I'm sure you'll agree that there is nothing worse than seeing 'Copyright © 2009 SomeCompany.com' when it's the sparkly year of 2012.

Currently

If you are unaware of the date() function, it basically allows you to output the current date on your PHP website. For example, if you wanted to display todays date, you could use this:

<?php echo date('l, jS F Y'); ?>

This will output Tuesday, 3rd January 2012. Due to my CMS, I can't inject PHP into this content, so please take my word for it. The l, j, S, F, Y all refer to different date aspects- in this case, l is the day of the month, j is the date, S is the ordinal suffix, F is the full name of the month and Y is the four digit year. You're not limited to just these elements, you can mix it up. I've included some links at the bottom for more information.

Anyway, in relation to updating your copyright date, to produce the current year you could simply stick in <?php echo date('Y'); ?> in the appropriate place. Depending on how long the site is up, you could do something like:

The Issue

Sometimes, the servers that host your website do not have a timezone set. If this is the case, PHP throws an error which can either stop the website from loading correctly, or just not display the date- depending on the server settings. I do not have this problem with my preferred hosting company, Blacknight, as they have their timezones set at the php.ini document on the server.

I do, however, have this problem on my local hosting environment- I haven't set the timezone on my local development machine. It's a subtle reminder to always declare the timezone on the websites I'm working on- I like my sites to be self contained, able to be moved from hosting company to hosting company, with minimum hassle, should the need arise.

Declaring timezones

Aside from avoiding potential errors popping up, declaring a timezone is essential if you are doing delicate date/time related work. For instance, I have on the Pixelcode contact page a script that displays the current local time and shows whether I am open or closed for business. This would be useless if the timezone was set to New York or California. As it happens, my host is in the same timezone as me, but why take the risk when the solution is so simple?

The solution

I use the following, before any date function is used:

ini_set('date.timezone', 'Europe/Dublin');

So, in full, to output the current year (or any day and date):

<?php ini_set('date.timezone', 'Europe/Dublin'); echo date('Y'); ?>

I have linked to the full timezone list below. I personally use the above method in the footers of websites I make, or else I include it in the bootstrap files of the site, declaring it once to save a bit of time.

Resources and Links

PHP Solutions - David Power. I would be lost and useless without this book, now in it's second edition. Highly recommended.

php.net Full date() function format characters

php.net Timezones

Copybooks renamed as Sktchbks

Tue, 20 Dec 2011 21:42:00

A few weeks ago, I had to rename the sketchbooks that I’ve been producing and selling for the last year. They were called ‘Copybooks’ but that doesn’t translate well overseas (ie copybooks in Ireland are blank/lined/graph books, similar to my sketchbooks- this is not necessarily the case elsewhere).

After much going back and forward with lots of different ideas, I just couldn’t come up with something that worked. I wanted something that described what it was, a sketchbook, and something that I could use as a name, ie register a domain with it.

Finally, as I was getting close to reverting back to ‘copybooks’, as I was doodling different names and variations, I noticed that if I removed the ‘e’ in sketch, it still read as ‘sketch’.
I started emailing around the name ‘sktchbooks’ and full credit to @burkie for suggesting I removed the double-o in ‘books’. As soon as I saw that, I knew that this was what I was looking for: Sktchbks.

My attitude towards the sketchbooks was always simplicity, strip them back to the bare essentials. Stripping vowels out of the name tied in nicely with this. I registered the domain and stuck up a holding page until I could do a major branding and design exercise in the new year.

Sidenote- I registered a .com but what made me really laugh, was the possibility of registering a .cm, completely stripping vowels out of the name, so sktchbks.cm. I checked out my local domain and hosting peeps, Blacknight, and unfortunately a .cm domain is eighty euros per year, too expensive for a confusing joke, purely for my amusement. Maybe some other time.

Support Web Standards 2011

Tue, 06 Dec 2011 11:11:00

Last Wednesday, November 30th (aka Blue Beanie Day) myself and Jeffrey Zeldman launched a new incarnation of Support Web Standards, a website that houses both a growing list of web standards resources and a shop to buy some products 'to show your love and support for web standards'.

I have lots to say on the matter, but due to the approaching Christmas shipping deadlines, I am spending all my time packing and shipping envelopes of products around the world. It's hard work, but I actually enjoy doing it.

I'll go into more detail with the new product design as soon as I get a free minute, but I'd like to share with you our new promo video. It has been something I wanted to do since last year's launch and I finally got around to doing it. Check it out below.

I filmed the footage on my iPhone 4S, but it still came out at a decent quality. There are lots of little things I'd love to change but I just filmed and cut it really fast, ignoring all spots and quirks with the footage (I'll share my 'unique' iPhone/Tripod setup at some other time).

The soundtrack is courtesy of my younger brother, the inimitable, YouTube drumming sensation, Jimmy Rainsford. I filmed the footage Sunday night, cut it together Sunday and Monday, sent the rough cut to Jimmy after lunch on Monday and he had drums, guitar and bass back to me by late Monday night. I only asked for a drum track! That kid has mad skillz and I'm so appreciative of his work.

I have another post, lined up for when I get a moment to finish and publish it. Thanks again to Jimmy, and also to Jeffrey and finally, thanks to Blacknight who have sponsored the hosting for the site again.

Build Recap: Erik Spiekermann

Fri, 25 Nov 2011 22:05:00

I've finally gotten some free time (on a Friday evening, no less) to blog some bits and pieces before too much time passes and then, what I want to write about, loses relevance.

I visited Belfast, for the first time, at the beginning of November, to attend the Build Conference. I had contemplated arriving the Wednesday before the main conference, which was on the Thursday, but then I would've missed Erik Spiekermann's talk on Tuesday evening, so I arrived on the Tuesday.

I have been a big fan of Spiekermann for a long time, probably from the 1990's when I was a FontFont fanboy- I even submitted typefaces to FontFont for approval. Sadly, I never heard back from them. Anyway, Spiekermann is a prolific designer, both in graphic design and in typographic design. I enjoy his work and his attitude to work, so I was really looking forward to his talk.

Spiekermann is a brilliant presenter, incredibly passionate about his work. I loved the fact that his talk was about both his creative work but also about the business side to his work- running a company, staff, premises, clients, budgets.

He made a few points that really resonated with me-

Projects should be costed on the basis of what the project is worth, not on a per-hour basis.
Never work with bad clients, it'll end up costing you, rather than making you money.
An espresso machine is always a good present if you're opening a new office.

His talk was videoed for later publishing by the Build crew (or so I hope), and I really can't wait to see it again. In the meantime, check out this interview with Erik Spiekermann, by Elliot Jay Stocks:

24theweb

Fri, 28 Oct 2011 14:50:00

I'm taking part in the annual charity-web design-marathon 24theweb and I couldn't be more excited. I do enjoy working on group projects and cramming 3 months into 24 hours should be a challenge.

I've resigned myself to the fact that I probably won't get much work done this afternoon, so I might as well start getting stuff ready. I'm following the excellent pro tips of Stephanie Francis and stockpiling all my gear together. I have made a list.

If you'd like to follow along, I guess you could look at:

I have to get a train at 7.22am tomorrow morning, it'll be like old times commuting at unholy hours. I'm hoping my honed skill of sleeping at every opportunity, under any circumstances, will keep me functioning.

I'll try post here as well tomorrow, depending on workload. I'll hopefully take some photos with my trusty Samsung- my lovely iPhone 4s isn't arriving until Tuesday (boo!).

Fine Gael profiling, the follow-up

Tue, 25 Oct 2011 12:05:00

I posted on Friday about my suspicions that Fine Gael tried profiling the electors, when sending out their Presidential Election material. If you didn't read it, you can read the blog post here, and you'll understand what I mean, going forward.

I got an email Friday evening from someone who very kindly let me know what pamphlets were received in his household and by whom, which made it highly improbable that the pamphlets were targeted via profiling.

Alternative theory

However, he also pointed out that the pamphlets were distributed in order (check out the serial numbers above the name and address of each elector) green, yellow and blue. My emailer postulated that it was done to ensure that there was a number of different Gay Mitchell pamphlets entering each household.

At first I thought this was a risky approach to take- aside from the possibility that someone (like me) assumes something more sinister is happening (like profiling), what if one person in a household received a version that didn't agree with them, surely this would have a negative impact on their perception of Mr. Mitchell?

I was stuck on this line of thinking until David Norris's election material popped through our letterbox this morning and, aside from cynically appraising his boast of 'a track record of always doing the right thing', I realised that it didn't matter who's name was on the pamphlet, it would be read anyway.

I think that this was the strategy of Fine Gael; to ensure several different 'versions' of the pamphlet entered each household, each with the aim of appealing to different members of a household.

Not that much of a stretch

You could say it was a bit of a stretch to say Fine Gael were trying to target specific stereotypes within a household. But, what I learned over the weekend was that they actually did produce two different election posters- one for the city and one for the 'rural' countryside. Targeting specific stereotypes within a household isn't that much of a stretch from there.

Fine Gael's methods of targeted messages is not good, not in our society, not in our small communities. Personally I don't want to be treated differently to anyone else. I may not live in one of the larger cities, but that doesn't mean that Rural Gay is going to appeal more to me than City Gay, and I hate the thought that someone decided that it would. Just give me the same information that everyone else is given and let me make up my own mind.

I don't think Mr. Mitchell is a realistic runner in the race and I'd love to know if his dodgy election practices had a part to play. I'm sure though, if that was quantifiable, it would be kept like a state secret.

Are Fine Gael profiling the electors?

Fri, 21 Oct 2011 16:09:00

The Irish presidential election is coming up soon, and as per usual, there are many candidates vying for the all important position of President. I can't really say that I particularly like any of them enough to sway my voting decision, but I'll worry about that closer to election day.

Fine Gael, an Irish political party, have a candidate for election, Mr. Gay Mitchell, and one thing that has been apparent since the party's successful 2011 election campaign, is the effort and extent to which they go in their election campaigns (seems to dwarf their actual work when elected). From a design perspective, there are a lot of similarities in their campaign with the Obama '08 campaign (not just Enda Kenny's aping of a certain speech).

During election campaigns, there are large posters erected all over the country for each candidate. My interest in Fine Gael's election campaign was piqued when I heard rumours that there were two varieties of the Fine Gael election poster: in the cities and large towns, Mr. Mitchell was sharply dressed in a suit and tie and in the rural areas, he was dressed in more casual clothing, stereotypical of members of the farming/rural community. I haven't seen this, so I didn't pay much heed to the rumours.

However, I was visiting my homeplace and I saw a slew of election pamplets, sent through the mail, for a few members of my family. The information, names and addresses, is obtained from the nationwide Register of Electors. I do not know what other information is available on it. Looking at the pamphlets, I noticed a variation and I saw an apparent correlation with the variations and the people who received them.

Mixed Messages

Shown below are the fronts of three pamphlets, the content on the other side changes per pamphlet, which I've noted below the images- I've only reproduced the piece that changes- the rest is the usual fluff.

Serious Gay

Text on the back-

KNOWING WHO WE ARE - Gay Mitchell was born in Dublin, in 1951, the second youngest of 10 children. His father died when he was just five, leaving his 47 year old mother Eileen, a widow. Despite the hardship, Gay recalls a happy childhood. "We were taught that everything was possible, with hard work. Education is a priority. As a young man, I volunteered with the St. Vincent de Paul, and took great pride in helping my local community and my country. As president, I will work to reinvigorate the spirit of volunteerism that we have lost during the economic crisis and help to develop a deeper sense of community across the country."

This was sent to my father, a business owner and in his 50s. See how Mitchell is dressed in a nice suit of muted colours, cocky grin on his face. The background is a blurry street scene, think 'Brunch in Wall Street'. This man means business. The text on the back reinforces Mr. Mitchell's age and background, a tough one, but as he says, with hard work he will prevail. Some of the values that could be appreciated by the apparent profile, that my father fits in, are hard work, education and volunteerism.

Friendly Gay

Text on the back-

WHY GAY? - The next president will play a very important role in influencing the mood of the nation - restoring Ireland's economy as well as building a new foundation for our society.
"I have the experience, energy and a real plan for a new Presidency. There is more to a just society than simply economic stability, although that is very important. We need to rediscover the joy of being part of a community of people, where every citizen is valued and cherished. The President of Ireland must lead that change."

This was sent to my mother, the matriarchal figure of a household. See how he's now looking directly at the camera, his eyebrows saying 'vote for me, you can trust me'. He's wearing a nice red tie and blue shirt (Fine Gael love blue shirts). They bring out his rosy cheeks. Check out the background, he's in someone's garden, maybe yours. He's the guy staring at you through the kitchen window, while you're preparing the dinner at the sink.

The text is all about community, it does briefly mention the economy, but the focus of this pamphlet is not on money, it's reinforcing the fact that 'every citizen is valued and cherished'. I wonder what they are implying about the self-worth of the person they are targeting.

Man-of-the-people Gay

Text on the back-

A RECORD OF HARD WORK - Ireland needs someone with experience to communicate our economic recovery abroad and expand our reputation. As a TD for 26 years and a member of the European Parliament for the past 7, Gay has experience making connections and being an ambassador for our country.
"As president, I will use my experience to help the Government bring foreign investment, especially from America and Asia, to get us out of the financial crisis and create more jobs. I will also do everything I can to foster and encourage the entrepreneurial spirit of our people at home."

This was sent to my two sisters, ladies in their thirties. The clothing is more casual- he has kept the tie- the President is a serious job. He's wearing his raincoat because he doesn't mind braving the harsh times we face in the economy. The background is busy with people and a tractor. We live in a rural area, we obviously identify with tractors. This man will get down and rub shoulders with the people, especially 'you people'.

The text tells a similar story- all about hard work, not just in Ireland, but also abroad. I take that this pamphlet is targeted at a group of people prone to emigrate, people who are in their working prime of their twenties and thirties and maybe forties.

DISCLAIMER

I do not have any inside knowledge of the Fine Gael campaign. I could, very easily, be speculating on a coincidental situation. However, it's an unusual coincidence, if it is one.

I must also state that I am more fascinated, than anything else, with the idea that Fine Gael would try this. If they did, I'd love to know how they profiled people to send a specific version of their pamphlet. After a quick search, I found this Irish Times article, which notices the three variations (unique to Fine Gael in this campaign) and says
It is not clear if the leaflets are being targeted at different types of voters or if they are being sent at random. A campaign spokesman said a variation in literature was “common”.

I'm going to go a little bit deeper and see what information is available from the Register of Electors. I think a simple profiling system would only need age, gender and maybe occupation, to work.

If Fine Gael did attempt a targeted, profiling approach to campaigning, I do feel, in my humble opinion, that they have crossed the line. I hate the thought of being profiled, it does not inspire trust and I'd feel patronised- give me the same message as everyone else, I'm capable of making up my own mind.

If you have any knowledge of whether there was profiling done or noticed a similar situation in your household regarding the material you received, please let me know and I'll post some follow-up.