Pingmag is back after a 5 year hiatus! We are truly happy having had the chance to be involved in the redesign of this legendary design & culture blog from Tokyo. See more project details here »

From the original Ping 2013 launch posting:

Yes, dear and loyal PingMag readers, it’s true. After five long years of rest, PingMag is back, and raring to go!

Five years. A lot has happened over that time, and much has changed around the world. For Japan, of course, the 2011 tsunami has had an enormous impact on the lives of so many people, and also altered the way many people here think about their country, too.

We hope to be able to bring you updates about some of the exciting things happening in northeast Japan, as rebuilding and regeneration continues.

And we have all sorts of other exciting plans too to look forward to in the coming months. As one of them, we are planning a series of in-depth interviews with influential and interesting Japanese people, starting tomorrow with a two-part discussion with ex-prime minister-turned-potter and artist, Morihiro Hosokawa. So look forward to that!

But our first job is to clean the rusty old cogs, and get PingMag up and running smoothly again. We will be updating the site regularly from next week, but in the meantime you can click through all the links on the right of this page, and browse through around 1,000 old articles from the archives.

Go to the re-launched PingMag here »

Our brief included to refresh the design without loosing too much of the original DNA. Additionally the new Pingmag is now a responsive website which is enjoyable on smartphones, tablets and up to large desktop monitors.

The English/Japanese bilingual site setup largely mirrors the previous site in order to keep all previous article links and images intact. Though we extended the layout with an immersive header image (or video), reorganised the navigation and site categories, added crisp typography styles in English and Japanese and easier commenting and sharing functionality. Additionally we implemented the functionality to post sponsored banners, either for whole channels (like PingArt) or individual posts.

Tablet & iPad Layouts

Smartphone & iPhone Layouts

We hope you enjoy the new PING!

The Japan Times: New state-of-the-art responsive website with custom layouts for smartphones, tablets and desktops.

For a live preview of the responsive website see this demo page.

The leader in English-language news on Japan takes a step into the future of new media.

The Japan Times, the nation’s oldest and most widely read English-language newspaper, achieved another milestone today with a new radically redesigned website built for mobility and the future.

Utilizing the cutting-edge technology of HTML5 and responsive design, the new website displays pages automatically sized on the fly that can fit the specifications of a multitude of devices, from widescreen TVs to tablet PCs to compact smartphones. No installation of an application is necessary; it all happens by merely accessing www.japantimes.co.jp with a device’s web browser.

Founded in 1897, The Japan Times has long been the premier source of English-language news in Japan and has, over the decades, evolved to meet the needs of its readers.

Similar to steps made last year by sites such as the Boston Globe and the Houston Chronicle, the redesign of The Japan Times’ site not only opens the media company’s content up to a larger number of readers but also showcases its high-quality news and features in an easy-to-read format featuring crisp typography and high-resolution photos. Among major newspaper websites in Japan, it is the first of its kind.

Whether it be via a PC mouse or the flick of a finger, readers browsing on different devices and platforms can enjoy the same user experience. Because it all happens in a browser, readers can seamlessly move between the site and their mail and other social media applications.

Over the coming months, The Japan Times will add more content catering to the needs of its readers and continue to showcase the possibilities of new media.

JT Online: Into the future of new media

– The Japan Times

Smartphone & iPhone Layout with Offcanvas Menu

Tablet & iPad Layout

After the design phase we started (responsive) web development with the best practise “mobile first” approach. This means to build a fast and lightweight mobile site first and then extend the layout to larger screen sizes such as tablets and desktop. This approach provides the best user experience for mobile users and prevents burdens on the small devices. Tablet and Desktop PC users are served the wider layout with all the same rich features as mobile e.g. custom galleries, lightbox photo viewer/slidshow, today’s stories archive, article history information, sharing features, video embedding and many others.

The main focus of the new site is the best possible reading experience for users, coupled with intuitive navigation and content parity. Content parity also means to give the mobile users all the same features and content as desktop users, instead of a dumbed down mobile site.

On mobile and tablets the  main navigation is hidden as an “off-canvas” menu which slides into view when needed. This goes along with one of the “mobile first” principles which dictates “content first”. Mobile and tablet layouts support some touch gestures such as swipe.  The tablet layout unfolds into two columns on landing pages and serves larger custom typography styles which considers the position of the device (which is usually further away from the eye than a smartphone).

Desktop Layout

The desktop layout unfolds into three columns on landing pages and expands nicely on large monitor screens. See some of the sample features and layouts of different pages below:

Flyout Menu

Section Modules

Market Page

Weather Page

Today’s Stories Page

Large Lightbox Slideshow

Article Page

Site Footer

For some further information and reactions from accross the www also see this launch announcement.

More technical geek facts:

• Large scale news website with millions of users each month, based on Wordpress CMS.
• Custom backend integration with Woodwing publishing system via XML-RPC.
• Fully responsive layout to be easily viewed on smartphones, tablets and large desktops.
• Responsive ad loading of differently sized banners based on screen width via Javascript.
• Fully taking advantage of Custom Post Types to structure the site and query featured contents for landing pages.
• Using custom fields (via ACF plugin) to the maximum possible advantage e.g. custom galleries, video embedding, SEO keywords, control article position on page etc.
• LESS was used a CSS preprocessor
• Memecached via W3 Total Cache and hosted on several load-balanced Amazon (AWS) instances and redundant database servers.

We greatly enjoyed creating the new The Japan Times website and were humbled with the spirit of collaboration and openness for creativity at JT.

The Japan Times new website was launched on Wednesday, 23th January 2013 at 22:20 (JST). We are in touch with JT for more than 1 year about this project, actual design and development work took more than 7 month to complete. This is also a new milestone for Bento Graphics Inc.

This is just a quick notice and more information on the site features will follow soon, in the meantime see the official FAQ.

Note, the new responsive JT website is still in Beta stage while we fix bugs or add requested & new features. We are thankful for your bug reports and general site feedback.

For the official launch announcement see this post:
JTO 2.0: Into the future of new media.

Enjoy the site!

Reactions in the WWWild:

The newly redesigned (and responsive) site for The Japan Times is just, well, fantastic work: japantimes.co.jp /via @bentographics

— Responsive Design (@RWD) January 30, 2013

@rwd @bentographics that’s beautiful – really well done.

— Jason Pamental (@jpamental) January 30, 2013

@rwd @bentographics beautiful & clean site. Good inspiration.

— Vytenis Krukonis (@vyteniskrukonis) January 30, 2013

The Japan Times, full renewal!The first major newspaper in Japan (or even in Asia maybe?) to go with a full … tmblr.co/ZltqYydNz-cf

— Tom Vincent (@Tom_Vincent) February 4, 2013

japantimes.co.jp is a beautiful responsive site and using WP, got a lovely menu for mobile devices

— my username is (@burkie) February 2, 2013

So @japantimes at last upgraded their website. Yay.

— Jacob Carscadden (@jakcadden) January 29, 2013

I quite like the new layout of @japantimeswebsite. Nonintrusive and legible, increasing readibility. japantimes.co.jp Leave beta soon!

— clajoh (@clajoh) January 29, 2013

Just checking out the Japan Times responsive Site: japantimes.co.jp nice! #rwd

— Ellen Bauer (@ellenbauer) February 5, 2013

Excellent example of a responsive website. The Japan Times buff.ly/Td3Izr (drag the bottom right corner of your browser to the left)

— Next Big Leap (@nextbigleap) January 31, 2013

The Japan Times (japantimes.co.jp) is a responsive site done right. Very well executed.

— Ben Groulx (@bengroulx) January 30, 2013

@aexmo I bet you love the japan times website the responsive mob are citing as best in class then. It’s scrolltastic on the iPhone.

— Ian Fenn (@ifenn) January 31, 2013

The Japan Times has redesigned their Web site and the new look is really nice. It’s really a major improvement. japantimes.co.jp

— Scott Reynolds (@scottinhiroo) February 2, 2013

Loving the new look of the @japantimes_life website. Cleaner, lighter, and reader-friendly.japantimes.co.jp/life/food/

— Yukari Sakamoto坂本ゆかり (@YukariSakamoto) January 31, 2013

Check out The Japan Times’ new responsive design site — on whatever device you’re on. – ow.ly/hdDw4

— The Japan Times(@japantimes) January 29, 2013

英文ニュースサイト「The Japan Times ONLINE」をリニューアル

Manekineko-Daruma is wishing a belated Happy New Year!

Dentsu PR Digital is a division of Dentsu Inc. (株式会社電通) “the world’s largest single-brand agency for almost 40 years”.

The site development included all site architecture, interface design, web development with responsive design and bilingual CMS integration in English and Japanese. The site also has a mobile preview feature to simulate the site on smartphones and tablets. The site displays random posts of a specific section in the sitebar which helps for discovery of new content across the site. The site is designed as responsive website to work smoothly across most screen sizes such as desktop, tablet and smartphone.

i.lab was founded by the members of i.school, a cross disciplinary, human-centered innovation education program established in the University of Tokyo. We provide a consulting service to help clients come up with new breakthrough products, services, ideas and business.

In i.lab’s idea-creating process, we make full use of tools, experience, expertise and insights of the world’s various innovation education programs and consulting firms, which i.school has studied over the past years.

Consultants at i.lab are experts in science, mechanics, design and management and have deep cross- disciplinary insights. Our diverse problem-solvers help clients keep competitive advantage, through the idea-creating process based on the best academic knowledge there is.

The bilingual English/Japanese website makes use of parallax scrolling with a combined page flip effect. The site can be navigated via the menu or the up/down keys.

This project is a collaboration between Bento Graphics x Nosigner.

3 days holiday weekend!! we had to do something special at SUNDAY ROOF TOP CINEMA! .. starting bit earlier 18:00 enjoying the roof top breeze to the tunes of our good friend dj megagigagenki, our now famous sangria, pop corn and some special food!

The movie selected this time will be equally entertaining! the feature debut of the very talented Guy Ritchie: Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels!

Join us!

* with japanese subtitles! *

Movie FREE ~ !
Music FREE ~ !
Pop Corn: 500 yen (* support your local cinema *)
Food and drinks: 500 yen each

Date:
16th September 2012

Location:
目黒区青葉台3-3-11

Tuesday, June 19–Sunday, July 22:

FOUR WEEKS TO ENJOY NEW YORK WITH YOUR FIVE SENSES

Fumiaki Yamazaki Photo Exhibition at Martiniburger

A collaboration with Martiniburger ＋ Absolut Vodka ＋ Brooklyn Brewery. A month-long event featuring the sights, sounds and tastes of New York.

ABOUT FUMIAKI YAMAZAKI Following a 25-year career in advertising working for major multinational agencies and a beverage corporation, Fumiaki Yamazaki is now concentrating on fine art photography. The experience of having lived both in Japan and the United States informs Yamazaki’s work, and provides an experiential quality neither strictly Japanese nor Western. His time living and working in New York City inspired the current exhibition, which focuses on downtown Manhattan.

Print this card, bring it along and enjoy a special Absolut cocktail or Brooklyn Beer on us!

Bento Graphics has been re-launched!

Quite a few juicy technologies and development approaches have been put into practise:

• Responsive Web Design, website adapts to screen size of device i.e. desktop, tablet and mobile.
• Mobile First Development, optimised for speed with minimum page loads and HTTP requests.
• Therefore Future Friendly, upcoming mobile devices are mostly supported.
• Highly accessible HTML5/CSS2/3 development. Accessible even without Javascript.
• Fine-tuned typography presets for best reading experience.
• Custom icon font sub-setting, minimised loading and crisp on high-density screens i.e. Retina™
• Customised mobile navigation for best experience on touch screen devices.

It’s the first site update in roughly 5 years and the accumulation of a lot of research and learning over the last year.

To see all mobile version resize your browser window or use this handy tool: http://responsive.is/bentographics.com

Malin Baumann / The Baustudio exhibition

“deCONSTRUCT”

In a few months I am leaving Japan after six years of living and working here. This exhibition is an opportunity for me to showcase projects I have been working on and also to make use of some of the materials and ideas I have accumulated during this time. ※ Since I came to Japan I have been developing an idea/concept that I call “Constructionisms” . Constructionisms can mean many things, but at the core is that a structure should be true to its materials, purpose and the individual needs of the people using it, with a nostalgic preference to houses/workshops, where the professional and private lives of people are still visibly connected. I also use it as a projection of imagination and dreams, for myself and for society in general. Wherever I go, I photograph houses and buildings. All these photos have accumulated into quite a big collection from different parts of Japan. As I am about to leave and move to a new place, of course the architecture around me will also change. Therefore, it feels right to take this opportunity to show a selection and series of works built from the material gathered in this country. Earlier outcomes of the concept of “Constructionisms” have been drawings of houses and a 3D model of one drawing, which together with the new works show the different angles and development of the concept.

SHOW: “Constructionisms” : drawings, 3D House, photo collage, house portraits. “Tanjogaoka” : renovation photos of our house, video/animation STUDIO: I will set up a studio space and work on a new pattern collection during the whole week of the exhibition, I will make samples and print fabrics and paper. SHOP: “Scriptions” and “Classics” brooches, ear pendants, bow-ties and panels will be available for purchase.

※”constructionisms” is an ongoing project in form of drawings, graphic artworks but also installations and actual constructions. it is like a knot connecting two major threads in my imaginary; the obsession with all sorts of buildings and architectural structures and the dream of and the constant search for the perfect place, a combination between the nostalgia of the past and the hope of the future.

Site: E&Y SHOWROOM 1-32-17 UNS Bldg, Komaba, Meguro-ku, Tokyo, 153-0041 Japan Tel : +81 (0)3 3481 5518 E-mail : info@eandy.com Fax : +81 (0)3 3481 6255

Exhibition: Thursday 17th – Friday 25th of May 2012 OPEN:11:00 – 19:00

※Malin will be present working in the studio space during the whole exhibition.

Reception party: 17th May 18:00 – 21:00

大友克洋GENGA展

The Manga Artist Otomo Katsuhiro The Complete Picture Finally Comes to Light.

Otomo Katsuhiro made his debut 39 years ago. His work made such an impact upon the world of manga that a demarcation of “pre-Otomo and post-Otomo” came to designate a turning point in manga history. The power of his work was not only felt within Japan but starting with Europe and America his work has had a strong influence over creatives across the world and has brought many new followers to the world of manga. The live action remake of “AKIRA” still gains much attention in Hollywood, even 20 years after its conclusion in manga series, pointedly revealing the breadth of impact of Otomo’s work and its universality. In this exhibition work is brought together from Otomo’s debut period up to the current day in the first comprehensive exhibition of his original drawings.

Website: http://otomo-gengaten.jp More info: @Tokyo Art Beat

Period: April 9 (Mon), 2012 – May 30 (Wed), 2012 Opening Times: 11:30-20:00, 10:30-20:00 Closed: Third Tusesday（17th Apr, 15th May） Etc.: Advance sale @Lawson Ticket Hours: [Weekday] 11:30-20:00 / [Weekends & holidays] 10:30-20:00 Admission: adult 1,500yen, Student 800yen, Junior high school 500yen Venue: 3331 Arts Chiyoda, 1F Main Gallery, 104 (shop)

Important Notice: All tickets must be reserved and bought in advance.

Well-known abroad for his critically acclaimed photo diary series “My Little Dead Dick” and “Talking Barnacles“, photographer Patrick Tsai has finally broken into the insulated Japanese art-scene within the past year. To coincide with the release of his upcoming photo book released by Nanarokusha, Logos Gallery proudly presents “Modern Times”, an exhibition about the wonders of China by one of the most upcoming photographers in Japan today.

Exhibition: “Modern Times” by Patrick Tsai Location: Shibuya Parco Part 1, B1F, Logos Gallery, Tokyo, Japan Date: 4/06/12 – 4/18/12 Time: 10:00 am – 9:00 pm (*The gallery will close early at 5:00 pm on 4/18/12)

Opening Party: 4/06/12 (Fri), 7:00-9:00 pm

Artist Talk Event/Death Match: “Yamaguchi Yosuke (Painter) vs. Patrick Tsai (Photographer)”, 4/15(Sun), 3:00 pm – 4:00 pm

* Pre-sales of the book will be available at Logos Gallery and Utrecht Bookstore from 4/06. Official Release will be on 4/14.

http://www.parco-art.com/web/logos/exhibition.php?id=475

LOGOS GALLERY： 東京都渋谷区宇田川町15-1 渋谷パルコ　パート1 / B1F http://www.parco-art.com/web/access/

We help organisations become social enterprises

Our company’s philosophy is based on the concept of collaborative intelligence. Whether internally or with the world at large, we use the power of social media technologies the way we believe our clients should: to do better work – together.

And we believe we walk the talk: our consultants work collaboratively using web-based applications, across geographies, time zones and areas of expertise to deliver the highest quality consulting and research within social media enterprise solutions.

We are also the founders of the Social Media Leadership Forum, a business network where executives collaborate, learn, share ideas and agree best practice strategies for successfully engaging with social media to improve the performance of their organisations.

Since It’s Open is the parent company of the Social Media Leadership Forum, the new corporate site was created using a slightly similar style. For instance the use of depth with gradients and same corporate font.

Corporate design development in progress:

Collaboration and working together across time-zone or remotely were other keywords for this company made up of freelance consultants. The About page reflects this approach with easy to add & edit staff profiles and links to their SNS profiles or personal websites.

The site was created as fluid-responsive website and adapts well to most screens between desktop and smartphone size. On touch-screen devices such as smartphones and tablets (incl. iPhone/iPad) a few gestures such a swipe can be used. The smartphone size features an enhanced mobile navigation.

Responsive Web Layout

The site was further enhanced to accommodate embed codes of some popular sharing websites for medias such as Videos or Slideshows. Also the embedded media adapts to screen-size with correct media-ratio applied.

Home Page

News Landing Page

Services Page

Case Studies Page

Case Studies Detail Page

About Page & Staff Profiles

Photography portfolio website for Tokyo based travel photographer Yoko Évé.

Initially an identity design concept was developed using pins as the main element, drawing from the nostalgic usage of pins to mark places on maps. Each continent received it`s own pin colour to mark projects by individual country. The linked pins icons can also be used to browse projects by country or load individual posts. A splatter textured background was added which remotely hints island shapes on a map or mud splatter from trekking off-road.

The site was developed as bilingual English/Japanese CMS website with fluid-responsive web layout. Further for the site coding a CSS post-processor (LESS CSS) was used to simplify and speed up development. Some of the benefits and other enhancements are listed below:

• Website layout adapts to most screen sizes of desktop PC, tablets and smartphones (incl. iPad/iPhone)
• Touch-screen friendly navigation on tablets/smartphones
• Photo galleries support swipe gestures on touch-screen devices
• HTML5 Audio player supports replay on smartphones/tablets
• A tabbed content navigation can be inserted as desired (example)

Home Page – English

Home Page – Japanese

Category Landing Pages

Documentary Project – Detail Page with Slideshow

Documentary Project – Slideshow and HTML5 Audio Player

About Page – Japanese

Contact Page

Bento Graphics was featured in the recent APC Asian-Pacific Design – No.7.

As a top representative of graphic design in Asia-Pacific region, APD collects excellent graphic designs from Asian countries or regions and those along Pacific Ocean. APD aims at promoting design in Asia-Pacific Region and providing good opportunities for excellent designers to stand out. It is the seventh volume this year in 2011. APD No. 7 continuously follows the publishing concept of original design and collects more excellent graphic designs. Putting outstanding designs on display, APD forges an interactive platform for exchanges and communication within the circles. It covers seven categories, respectively, visual identity, orientation system, type, poster, packaging, print, logo and graphics & extended product, including Base, Pentagram, Sagmeister (America), BrandCulture, Emery Studio, THERE (Australia), Seven 25. Design & Typography Inc (Canada), Koiso Yuji, Yuji Kimura (Japan), AGI Society (Korea), Anagrama (Mexico), 3nity (Malaysia), &Larry, Bravo, the bureau (Singapore), Thinking Room (Indonesia), Prompt Design (Thailand), ect.

Author: Sandu Publishing Co., Limited Basic Information: 248*290mm, hardcover, 464 pages, English/Chinese List Price: $72

More details here: http://www.sandu360.com/design360en/publicationshow_en.php?id=72

Fiery Wishes* from Bento Graphics! *2012 - Year of the Dragon

Update: Due to popular demand we created more variatons, see below:

You can download the variations here (580 × 380px PNG files):

2012-Newyearcard_Bento-Graphics.zip

Use for free where ever you like, we are only asking for the credit (logo) to stay on the cards.

Redesigned responsive website for Tokyo based bar-restaurant Martiniburger.

Requirements for the website were the following:

1. CMS based site for easy updates by the client.
2. Support for bilingual English/Japanese content.
3. Mobile friendly web design.

The support of mobile devices was identified as key to provide customers on the go to easily find access information, opening times and menu information or news about the restaurant.

After several design variations based on the existing brand colours and font selection the site was coded in HTML5 using a fluid-responsive web design approach. The site now flexibly adapts to desktop screens and iPhone /iPad (portrait and landscape mode). It also supports all upcoming in-between screen sizes though fluid layout and the navigation menu was enhanced for touch screens of mobile devices.

Furthermore the site makes use of embedded custom fonts in line with the styleguide specs. Additional support was provided with claiming of an already publicly created Google places map and the consolidation of duplicated Facebook pages.

A little more about Martiniburger:

This casual neighborhood spot serves up gourmet burgers, upscale diner fare and assorted vodka cocktails. They bill themselves a New York-style bar-restaurant, and accordingly the menu features tasty Brooklyn Lager on tap, the ubiquitous NY cheesecake, and a credible rendition of a chocolate egg cream – a soda-fountain favorite at New York diners.

Screenshots

On display are photos by 6 photographers that depict the performances of the underground club collective Tokyo Cabunny. Marting Holtkamp our friend and terribly talented photographer will be present.

Schedule From 2011-11-04 To 2011-11-13

Open everyday Opening Reception on 2011-11-06 from 17:00

Artist(s) Junji Ishiguro, Yasuyuki Emori, Minoru Suwa, Ken Hayafune, Martin Holtkamp, Maki Miyashita

Website http://hgrnews.exblog.jp/16984329/ (Japanese)

English Info: http://www.tokyoartbeat.com/event/2011/1996

Fee Free

Venue Hours From 12:00 To 20:00 Closed on Mondays

Access Address: 3-17-15 Nishinippori, Arakawa-ku, Tokyo 116-0013 Phone: 03-3823-6216 Fax: 03-3823-6217 6 minutes walk from West Exit of Nishinippori Station on JR Yamanote and Tokyo Metro Chiyoda line, 6 minutes walk from North Exit of JR Nippori Station

“Wir Kinder von UENO ZOO” was initiated to promote cultural exchanges between Germany and Japan, by German-born, Tokyo based photographer Sebastian Mayer and Japanese-born artist Hanayo who divides her time between Berlin and Tokyo.”

More info: uenozoo.de

What: Grand Opening, free German beer, kartoffelsalat und live show of henkfishbein aka woodenveil!

When: 4th NOV 18:00~20:30

What else: “please come and join our kick off party! let’s connect nippon–deutschland new connection like sausage!“ ドイツ日本文化交流スタート！ソーセージの ように繋がろう！

Where: @amu 渋谷区恵比寿西1-17-2 | 1-17-2 ebisu-nishi, shibuya-ku, tokyo

http://www.a-m-u.jp/access.html http://www.a-m-u.jp/event/2011/11/y-a-h-bt.html

… our first game for iPhone.

We have a release date, and a name for our next game, that we can now share with you.

The name of our new game is Tilterpillar. The release date is 1st of September.

Currently in the final rounds of beta testings and preparing a new PR video, it’s a fun time at Dadako Studios, we’ve done apps before but we are sweaty in anticipation of what is our first game on iOS.

For more information check out: http://tilterpillar.com

Studio Sklim commissioned us with corporate identity design brush-up, development of a playful-experimental website design and bilingual English/Japanese CMS implementation.

Studio SKLIM is an emerging design practice establishing its roots in the fields of furniture design, interiors, landscape, architecture and urbanism. Tokyo / Singapore

The identity design consists of the main logo and 5 icons representing the various fields of work of Studio Sklim: Architecture, Urban Planing, Interior, Furniture and Landscape. The logo icons of the website are in fact linked buttons to each category. On individual project pages they are highlighted according to work involved for this project i.e. the 360° Kiosks involved Architecture, Furniture and Landscape.

The visual project timeline on the front page of the site is one of the most unique design features. It displays in a playful way the duration of each project, thumbnail images are linked to actual projects. The timeline can be mouse-dragged to left or right to scroll to past or present (possibly future for upcoming projects).

The project listing page was nick-named “sushi plate” due to the similarity, it also reminds of a conveyor belt sushi restaurant (回転寿司, kaiten-zushi). The round shape of the icons is referenced in the design in various places such as this page or in the featured project on the home page.

Project detail pages allow navigation of the slideshow image gallery via hoover arrows or the thumbnail menu below. The goal was to keep images as large as possible, but still support minimum monitor/screen sizes without compromising on navigation of the slideshow. Image captions or tags may be added to each project.

The site is using a colour desaturation script for images on listing pages such as the press listing or top page featured images to preserve low-key colours. Mouse-roll over changes them back to colour. News images are covered by random pattern which reshuffle on reload. The patterns are derived from textures and shadings of actual 3D CAD renderings of Studio Sklim.

The website is setup as bilingual English/Japanese CMS installation, however the Japanese section is still hidden. It will be unlocked once all content has been translated to Japanese.

Corporate Identity Design – Brush Up

Home Page with Timeline Feature

About Page

Project Listing Page (“Sushi Plate”)

Project Detail Pages

Press Listing Page

Press Detail Page

News Listing Page

News Detail Page

Contact Page

Date: 02 July · 19:00 - 22:00 Place: Gallery Restaurant ESCRIBA, Tokyo Information: www.yokoeve.com Facebook:  http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=125912654157420

Join us to meet the photographer and enjoy a mini concert by Cuba’s prominent artists – Alexander L.P. (guitarist & singer) and Ludwig Nuñez (percussionist). Entrance fee of ¥4,800 includes buffet, drinks and music charges. Open to the public. Please book from www.yokoeve.com

Yoko Évé’s photo exhibition “Havana – Music and Life” will be held in Tokyo from July 4 to September 2, 2011. A part of the sales during this exhibit will be donated toward the Japanese Red Cross Society for the recovery of the disaster area.

> June 4th (Sat.) @ M Event Space & Bar: Fashion Workshop

15:00-19:00: Workshop “live creation of a Hors Pistes Tokyo collection” Ft. Andrea Crews (Maroussia & Anji) & Yoruko Banzai in collaboration with: American Apparel & Tomodachi Calling*

*the best pieces of the collection will be sold via Tomodachi Calling‘s webshop for Japan Earthquake relief

Entrance: FREE WANTED: Everyone, come and participate to the workshop!

> June 5th (Sun) @ M Event Space & Bar: Fashion Workshop and Lounge

17:00-20:00: Workshop “Extreme Styling” Andrea Crews Casting with American Apparel, Photo Shoots & Lounge Party with: Andrea Crews (Maroussia & Anji) in collaboration with: American Apparel & Tomodachi Calling Entrance: FREE

WANTED: Cast! Everyone, come and mix your own “Andrea Crews style” with Andrea Crews and American Apparel clothes!

20:00-: Lounge party at M Event Space & Bar

Andrea Crews presents Hors Pistes workshops in Tokyo! June 4 & 5, 2011 at M Event Space & Bar (Daikanyama)

Based in Belleville (Paris, France), Andrea Crews is a collective led by Maroussia Rebecq who works in art as well as in fashion federating women stylists, designers, musicians, video directors and performers. Combining many aspects of contemporary creation, she presents and stages her collections as performances, happenings and video clips. Contrary to the prevailing uniformity, Andrea Crews emphasizes personal creativity, experimentation and independence. In this way Andrea Crews asserts its own position as a conceptual and alternative fashion designer.

Guest of Hors Pistes 2010 in Paris, Andrea Crews proposes, for Hors Pistes Tokyo 2011, to set up a live creation workshop during which American Apparel dead stock of clothes will be transformed into delightful and original Hors Pistes Tokyo Collection with the complicity of Tomodachi Calling and Yoruko Banzai (June 4th) as well as an Andrea Crews Casting – Extreme styling! workshop, inviting the audience to dress up and mix some pieces of her collection with American Apparel basics (June 5th). The audience is invited to participate to the creating process with Maroussia, Anji and Yoruko Banzai by customizing American Apparel clothes with painting, felt-tip pens, etc…(4th), and to be a one afternoon model by trying on their favorite clothes (5th).

Maroussia, being sensitive to the recent tragedy up North, asked that the best of this original collection be auctioned on Tomodachi Calling’s website as a contribution to their initiative to support the Tohoku recovery.

http://www.andreacrews.com/ http://yorukobanzai.com/ http://store.americanapparel.co.jp/ http://www.tomodachicalling.blogspot.com/ http://tomodachicalling.org/

Bento Graphics was commissioned to redesign the Social Media Leadership Forum website by IT`S OPEN, a social media strategy consultancy based in the UK.

The extensive corporate identity development was followed by a website redesign and full CMS implementation with membership functionality. The CMS website offers the customisation of nearly every aspect of the site from the admin area, such as posting of additional downloads in the password secured membership category, automated upcoming and past events posting option (an expired upcoming event automatically moves to the past events section), members logo posting and resorting, iPad/iPhone compatible video posting, fully editable membership profile pages (also password resetting) and others. The home page also features a editable Javascript slideshow and updatable sidebar widgets for introduction test and icon links for social networking services such as Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin. The design of the Facebook and Twitter pages were also adapted to any extent possible.

About SMLF

The Social Media Leadership Forum has been established to help organisations collaborate together; share ideas and agree best practice strategies for successfully engaging with social media.

A Place to Learn

The Social Media Leadership Forum is bringing together leading organisations that have an interest in engaging with their stakeholders through social media – from pioneering early adopters of social media to those just beginning to develop their social media strategies.

Our objective is to provide a stimulating open environment for members to share their knowledge and experience, learn from other leading industry players, and network to help each other successfully customise social media strategies and policies for the long term success of the organisations they serve.

The Social Media Leadership Forum is managed by ItsOpen.

Fundamental Change

Social Media is fundamentally changing the way that organisations communicate. Social media presents different ways to engage with stakeholders, and requires a different culture of communication to be effective. Social Media is having a direct impact on the way businesses operate. But we are still in the early days of understanding the challenges and best strategies to successfully manage the risks and harness the opportunities it presents.

Members

Some of the world’s leading companies have already joined the Social Media Leadership Forum (including those shown at the top of this page).

Business leaders in all industries are finding that engaging with communities through social media requires new ways of working and communicating, and that the transition to this brave new world isn’t easy. The Social Media Leadership Forum provides a unique, open environment for people to exchange ideas about social media strategies, and to learn from each other about the realities of translating strategy into business practice – the opportunities, the challenges, the hazards to avoid.

Some members of the Forum have well-developed social media strategies that are already delivering measurable results, while other members are at an early stage of engaging with social media. What they all have in common is a recognition of the increasingly important role of social media for enterprise and a willingness to share their experiences with their peers.

Project Group Asia is a Tokyo based company with four business areas: Capital, Sustain, Creative and P-2-M.

Project Group Asia work across multiple disciplines to facilitate full cycle delivery and management of route-to-market solutions; and best-in-class independent consultancy services tailored to meet our clients’ specific requirements.

We achieve this through the complimentary skills and services within the three company divisions: Capital, Sustain, Creative [and P-2-M].

Key to the success of all Project Group Asia endeavours is the capacity to leverage the symbiotic skills, services and established external networks offered within our group structure to implement optimal strategies and solutions that create differentiation, quality and fulfilment of stakeholder objectives.

making better places…and making places better^©

Bento Graphics created a new website for PGA which is run on a CMS for easy updates. The websites also features a password secured client area to provide additional downloads to clients. The website is also setup as a multilingual installation in English and Japanese (Japanese language will be activated once all content has been translated). Banner images can be set and changed from the website administration. We also created the key visuals for each sections which were collaged in Photoshop and some of the diagrams and charts. The website was created in HTML5/CSS3 with SEO (Search Engine Optimization) friendly template structure and complies with best practise web standards.

EVERYTHING MUST BE FREE!

DJ: Shu Okuyama / Tatsuya / Ivan Kuzbass / Ya’man / Kenji VJ: Spielfilm / Daito Manabe

Date: April 28, 2011 Location: Soft (Shibuya) Entrance: FREE

www.minimaltokyo.com www.tomodachicalling.org

“Tomodachi Calling” is a charity web-shop with T-shirts and other cool stuff organized by a couple of international friends who’ve met in Tokyo, either because we were born there, living there by choice or because we were visiting.

Most of us were in Tokyo at the time of the big Sendai quake on Friday 11th of March 2011. The unfolding events in the days following the quake left us in shock and terror, it made us feel helpless, that’s why we’ve combined and decided to ask friends, artists whose works we admire and people we like, to contribute a design for a charity-webshop. 100% of the profits will go to the Japanese Red Cross- we will not keep any of the profits and all profits will be spent helping the victims of the Sendai quake.

Shop: http://www.tomodachicalling.org

Blog: http://tomodachicalling.blogspot.com

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/tomodachicalling

Bento Graphics would like to focus your attention to the below donation sites benefiting those affected by the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake in Japan:

Red Cross Japan: http://www.jrc.or.jp/english/relief/l4/Vcms4_00002070.html

American Red Cross [donate through iTunes]: https://buy.itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZFinance.woa/wa/buyCharityGiftWizard

Save the Children: www.savethechildren.org/japanquake

Doctors without Borders: https://donate.doctorswithoutborders.org/SSLPage.aspx?pid=240

The estimates of the Tōhoku earthquake‘s magnitude make it the strongest known earthquake to hit Japan, and one of the five strongest earthquakes in the world overall since modern record-keeping began in 1900. [Wikipedia]

Pétro Services Ltd. commissioned the integrated design of Balise. Balise is a PDF review magazine concerned with insights into the North African energy market and politics (more detailed information below). The project included the corporate identity development, website design and magazine layout in English and French language. The website was created in valid HTML5, makes use of font-face embedded web fonts and features a slideshow and time-switcher and a few other Javascript enhancements.

Algeria is what we like to call a sphinx market. A workframe difficult to read for investors and yet promising on many levels, resource-laden and with a youth bulge on its population pyramid. The BALISE (Bulletin in Algeria for Lobbying on Security and Energy) offers a review that caters exclusive analyses and specialist intelligence, to forecast commercially relevant political risks in Algeria. Our area of expertise is strategy. Our business lines are KPO (Knowledge Processoutsourcing), exclusive analyses, go-to-market as well as lobbying. Unlike other intelligence agencies, we do not gossip or value irrelevant data. Methodology used to draw both the review and the lobbying is applied rigorously, with tight editorial control, ethos and precision. Our global network and includes experts from the security and energy sectors, politicians, lawyers, economists, as well as promising Algerian graduates from top universities.

1. balise.info

The newsfeed on the homepage displays level 1 unlocked articles on current affairs in Algeria and the arab region. They promote the BALISE review and offer a glimpse and a grasp on latest news as well as exclusive reports illustrated by talented painters.

2. BALISE review

Our main product is the biweekly review BALISE. It is confidential and exclusively catered online to companies willing to take the temperature in Algeria, on many aspects (Political strategy, biddings, tax reforms,…). It can be printed as well, and translated into french and japanese.

3. The consulting office

Operated by our office, BALISE offers a hotline and valuable advice for companies willing to enter the algerian market on the long term, with a stress on EPC contracts in the energy and construction sectors.

Website

PDF Review Magazine

Please come and join me at the reception party of the forthcoming Exhibition OVERSEAS 2011. The reception will be from 18:00 – 20:00 on Saturday 19th February 2011.

I will be showing some work together with 2 other artists, Gen Kay and Lucille Reyboz.

The reception will be held Saturday, February 19 at Ringcube Gallery [Google Map]

I should point out that currently PART I is showing at the same place. Great work by Takeshi Kamei, Satomi Shirai and Takeshi Miyamoto, well worth checking out.

http://www.ricoh.com/r_dc/ringcube/

写真展のお知らせです

オープニングレセプションは２月19日（土）18:00より20:00までです！

「OVERSEAS 2011 – 世界を選んだ写真家たち」

Part II 2011年2月19日(土)〜2011年3月6日(日)

11:00〜20:00 ※最終日（2月17日、3月6日）は17:00まで 火曜日休館

開催期間： Part　I 　　は今やってます　　〜2011年2月17日(木)

開催場所： 東京都中央区銀座5-7-2 三愛ドリームセンター（受付9階） RING CUBE　ギャラリーゾーン

参加写真家 〈PartI〉亀井 隆司　白井 里美　宮本 武 〈PartII〉Gen Kay　Martin Holtkamp　Lucille Reyboz

http://apcpress.jugem.jp/?eid=319 http://www.ricoh.co.jp/dc/ringcube/event/overseas2011.html

A shiny new corporate identity design for Augustus Corporation, an international Tokyo, Japan based management and law consultancy.

Augustus is an international management consultancy dedicated to providing consultancy services to law firms, in-house legal departments and the legal media operating in the Asia-Pacific Region.

Sharp minimal graphic design & typography, combined with large black & white photography. The website was created in best practise SEO optimised HTML5. The transition effects between pages are achieved with Jquery/Javascript and ‘gracefully degrade’ to a fully accessible page for Javascript disabled browsers. The website was also designed as ‘responsive design’ with one additional smartphone layout. If a smartphone visits the site i.e. iPhone, Android etc. a narrow version of the site will be displayed.

Additionally business cards in English and Japanese were designed.

Smartphone Optimised

Business Card Design

A new corporate identity design, multilingual website  (English, Japanese and Chinese) and a great number of print designs and software templates have been completed for Promar Consulting, an international agribusiness consulting firm based in Tokyo, Japan. The project also included the design of many information graphics such as diagrams, charts and maps and a thorough corporate identity styleguide. The company also underwent a name change from Promar Japan to Promar Consulting in order to reflect their expansion into Asia. Promar has offices in Tokyo and Beijing as well as a large network of independent international offices or affiliates all over the world.

Promar Consulting is Asia’s preeminent business development and research consulting firm specializing exclusively in assisting food, drink, agricultural and fishery organizations to capitalize on market opportunities and resolve ongoing business issues.

Founded in Tokyo in 2000 with a branch office opened in Beijing, China in 2008, Promar Consulting approaches every assignment with strategic perspective combined with both international and local expertise. We serve our clients with our own talented team, backed by the resources of the worldwide Promar network.

Our client base represents the entire food supply chain, from farmer cooperatives to exporters, importers, processors and retailers, as well as trade associations, government agencies, international organizations and multi-national corporation. Our experience ranges from agricultural inputs all the way to branded food products.

There is no industry more deeply connected to lifestyle, culture and tradition than food and agriculture. Analyzing and developing strategy to meet the needs of global markets requires in-depth knowledge of diverse geographic regions and how they are linked through international food and agriculture trade, as well as a clear understanding of the business cultures, trade policies, market dynamics and consumer demand that drive trade relationships.

Corporate Identity Design & Style Guide Template

Multilingual Website Design

Brochure, Letterhead, Business Card and Envelope

Powerpoint Template

Promar Consulting is Asia’s preeminent research consulting firm, specializing exclusively in international food, drink, fisheries and agribusiness markets. Our experienced, multilingual and multinational staff in our main offices in Tokyo and Beijing work closely with affiliates throughout the world to assist major companies, organizations and governments resolve problems, access markets, improve strategies and explore opportunities.

The website had a long difficult birth, but finally it`s (a)live and kicking! Check it out here: www.promarconsulting.com

Corporate identity design brush-up and a new website design for Land Rush Group, a Tokyo/Japan based online marketing firm. The client brief requested a more playful social-media influenced interface design for the new website.

Founded in 2008, Land Rush Group is a online marketing company. Our team cooks up innovative marketing and analytics tools that our brand partners use to monetize their content or improve e-commerce sales.

Three things we do well: /ONE/ Execute content monetization strategies /TWO/ Marketing and branding new products /THREE/ Development of cool social media marketing tools

Also logo mark and overall identity design underwent a design brush-up to better reflect the focus on current and emerging online marketing and monetizing technologies of the company.

The website is based on a English/Japanese bilingual CMS installation which provides all content mirrored in both languages.

The About/company page makes use of playful staff avatars (generated with FaceMakr) to introduce the inidvidual members. Also their individual Twitter account details are provided and a short description. The same avatar images are used for the “Random Staff Member” section in the left sidebar.

The counter in the main menu indicateds the currently available positions in the recruitment section.

Both the Technology and Brands pages feature tags to intuitively sort or search for company projects (these section will grow over time).

News/Blog listing page.

Contact page.

Business Cards

Graphic Designer/Web Designer

Specialised in web design and corporate identity development, strong experience in:

• Conceptualising design ideas
• Minimalist design sense with a wink ;)
• Corporate identity design development
• Information architecture and wireframing
• Grid-based, modular interface design for websites
• Illustration skills, especially for icon designs

Bonus: Good knowledge in standards compliant SEO friendly XHTML/CSS coding, WordPress CMS template integration, Jquery/Javascript and PHP and print design

Developer/Web Designer

• Standards compliant SEO friendly XHTML/CSS coding
• PHP custom coding
• Javascript/Jquery custom scripting
• WordPress theme implementation and custom plugin development
• Knowledge of other CMS` i.e. Drupal, ExpressionEngine etc.
• E-commerce site development (either of Drupal/Ubercart, Magento, OSCommerce, Zen Cart, Joomla etc.)
• Social-Media service integration (Twitter, Facebook)
• Custom web application development (can be based on a PHP framework like Codeigniter or similar)
• Mobile site development

Super-Duper Bonus: Japanese language skills (but not a requirement to apply).

Please apply with web/PDF portfolio, only email, no calls please:
jobs@bentographics.com

Thank you!

A new iPhone app release by my friends at Tokyo based Dadako Studios.

Make gruesome victims of your Friends and Co-Workers this Halloween with Monstermakr for iPhone!

Featuring: Yours Truly!

The video production was handled by Ice Block Films.

Full Credits:

• Director: William Greenawalt & Jesse Koester
• Producer: Dadako
• Editing: Jesse Koester
• Music: Justin Decenzo
• Starring: Hawken King, Ai Onodera, Benjamin Thomas (Bento), Mark McFarlane, Kimie Gotoh, and Andrew Lee
• Photos: William Greenawalt, Jesse Koester, Andrew Lee, and Mark McFarlane

Full tongue-in-cheek corporate identity, print and e-commerce package for this new UK based seller of men’s designer underwear.

Pants People® with the fitting tagline »Nuts about Underwear« commissioned Bento Graphics with the identity design development. Further the design of print collateral such as business cards, letterhead, stickers, postcards, packaging labels and a surprise greetings card. The project also included the actual e-commerce site design and project management during the whole site development process.

Letterhead

Corporate Identity Design

Surprise Greetings Card

Business Card

Stickers

Postcard

Postage Labels

E-Commerce Website

Bento Graphics designed a new mini site for De’Longhi. This project included website design – using heartwarming colours & a sheep mascot! – as well as the coding of standards-compliant XHTML/CSS templates. The extremely snappy website uses a Javascript tabbing function for the page loading and a playful resorting menu in the user voices area.

Below a few words on De’Longhi`s history:

De’ Longhi Group, or De’ Longhi S.p.A, is a major European small appliance manufacturer based in Treviso, Italy.

The company was founded by the De’ Longhi family in 1902 as a small industrial parts manufacturing workshop. The company incorporated in 1950. Historically a major producer of portable heaters and air conditioners, the company has expanded to include nearly every category of small domestic appliances in the food preparation and cooking, as well as household cleaning and ironing, segments. De’ Longhi is especially well known for the Artista Series espresso machines and Pinguino portable air conditioner.

De’ Longhi is renown for their design, which they describe as drawing from the rich heritage of Italian design. Their Esclusivo line of kitchen appliances won the prestigious Red Dot design award in 2007. Additionally, Home Furnishing News recognized De’ Longhi Design Director Giocomo Borin as one of the 50 most influential designers in the world in 2006.

De’ Longhi’s 2001 acquisition of the struggling British appliance maker Kenwood Limited gave De’ Longhi access to Kenwood’s Chinese factory. As a result, many of De’ Longhi’s products are now made in China, while design and engineering remains in Italy.

In all, De’ Longhi operates thirteen production facilities and thirty international subsidiaries supporting sales to seventy five countries worldwide. International sales account for nearly 75 percent of the group’s total revenues, which topped EUR 1.25 billion ($1.5 billion) in 2003.

Traded in Milan’s stock exchange (BIT: DLG), the company has over 5,870 employees worldwide.

Tokyo Proofreading is a proofreading, translation, writing & consulting service founded in Tokyo in August 2010 by Antony Peyton.

Our team consists not only of Japanese and British staff with experience of a wide range of documentation, but they also come from an international background and have worked in other professions.

This project included the corporate identity design development, brochure, business card and the bilingual (English/Japanese) CMS website with customisable free quote form. Bento Graphics collaborated with Hawken King for the corporate identity design and website coding.

As a sponsoring partner Bento Graphics provided the bilingual (English/Japanese) website CMS implementation for the You Are Here – Berlin Tokyo Festival.

Part of the project was the coding of standards compliant & SEO friendly XHTML/CSS templates, implementation of AJAX driven slideshow and newsletter signup form integration. The slideshow in the background of the website can be fed with a live stream of images and will be used to display photos from the festival venues in 2011.

For some of the facts please read on:

YouAreHere festival: Berlin Tokyo

A 30-day art festival of Berlin in Tokyo.

You Are Here: Berlin Tokyo, in collaboration with the Museum of Contemporary Art Tokyo (MOT), the Goethe Institute in Tokyo and the Japanisch Deutsches Zentrum Berlin (JDZB).

YOU ARE HERE: BERLIN-TOKYO is an art event taking place in October 2011 over the course of 30 days and nights, across multiple venues throughout Tokyo, bringing a diverse cast of Berlin-based creative practitioners to Tokyo, in order to stimulate existing connections.

By bringing selected artists and art practitioners from the Berlin art scene to Tokyo, and exhibiting their work as well as staging platforms for exchange (workshops, discussion panels, publications and interactive programs), we aim to highlight the mutual reciprocities of these two dynamic cities while encouraging a durable exchange of creative processes and various modes of art production.

In celebration of the 150th anniversary of Japanese-German diplomatic relationships, and within collaboration with Goethe Institute, YOU ARE HERE: BERLIN-TOKYO takes part in the celebration program, initiates a dialogue and aims to be a platform for cultural exchange between the two cities. YOU ARE HERE will strengthen the preexisting creative bond between Berlin and Tokyo.

September 3rd 2010 at 8pm at Vacant, Harajuku (Tokyo)

〒150-0001 東京都渋谷区神宮前3-20-13 3-20-13 Jingumae, Shibuya-ku, Tokyo 150-0001 www.n0idea.com

Sound performance “Loop Tower” by Jacob Kirkegaard, event presentation by You Are Here team, sound pieces and video clips from the heart of the Berlin art scene straight to Harajuku!

Bento Graphics will be sponsoring the festival with web design support.

The Graduate Program in Global Studies was founded in 2006 at Sophia University, one of Japan’s private universities. Its English-taught curriculum offers M.A. degrees in Global Studies, International Business and Development Studies, and Japanese Studies, as well as a Ph.D in Global Studies. The program’s location in central Tokyo enhances classroom and research activities, and internship and employment for students.

As design concept we focused on global cities as part of global culture. The unique skylines of global cities i.e. Tokyo, New York, London, Shanghai and many more are used as header graphics for the website. The overlapping skylines are meant to express the „interconnectedness of global cities (including Tokyo) and culture“ (our starting phrase for the design concept). The header graphic consists of a static Tokyo skyline with always two other semi-transparent skylines graphics overlapping. The other two skyline graphics are chosen by a random script which will create a great variety of visual combinations.

The menu uses Javascript for the hover-effect, exposing the sub-menu items on mouse-rollover and always highlights the correctly selected parent category. The project also included the coding of standards compliant validated XHTML/CSS templates and the project management of the implementation into the Drupal CMS framework.

THIS+THAT (Worldwide) – a new music industry start-up in Japan - contracted Bento Graphics with the development of their corporate identity.

http://www.onzaline.com

Custom build high quality face illustrations with Facemakr!

Facemakr is a custom avatar builder for the iPhone & iPod Touch. It outputs images ideal for use on social networking sites, instant messaging, twitter and blogs.

My Tokyo colleagues from Dadako™ Studios are releasing their first iPhone app called Facemakr. For more information about this amazing piece of software check out their site: www.Facemakr.com

AlienStart

Alexander Bühler

Faculty of Liberal Arts – Sophia University Tokyo

360 Risk Management Group

360 Risk Management Group is a newly Hong Kong founded company, with branches in Tokyo, London and Los Angeles.

360RMG will offer services such as:

Business Continuity, Crisis and Emergency Management, Kidnap & Ransom, Protective Service/Executive Protection, Security Consulting, Travel Security, Business Intelligence, Anti-Money Laundering, Compliance, Corporate Intelligence & Due Diligence, Corporate Investigation & Litigation, Corporate Security & Business Controls, Corporate Investigations, Due Diligence, Financial Advisory & Intelligence, Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, Forensic Accounting, Fraud & Embezzlement Investigations, Fraud Detection & Prevention, Hostile Takeovers/Proxy Contests, Industry & Competitor Insights, Market Entry/Political Risk etc.

Bento Graphics was comissioned with the development of the coroprate identity design and website design, additionally MS Word & PowerPoint Templates and a business card kit.

Corporate Identity Design

Business Continuity, Crisis and Emergency Management, Kidnap & Ransom, Protective Service/Executive Protection, Security Consulting, Travel Security, Business Intelligence, Anti-Money Laundering, Compliance, Corporate Intelligence & Due Diligence, Corporate Investigation & Litigation, Corporate Security & Business Controls, Corporate Investigations, Due Diligence, Financial Advisory & Intelligence, Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, Forensic Accounting, Fraud & Embezzlement Investigations, Fraud Detection & Prevention, Hostile Takeovers/Proxy Contests, Industry & Competitor Insights, Market Entry/Political Risk etc.

Alien-Eye is a marketing strategy boutique based in Tokyo. We work with a small number of long-term client partners, and pride ourselves on our analytical strategy and inventive planning that creates new value for their businesses.

Experienced in web and offline marketing and strategic promotion, our work is often consultative, innovating our clients’ business models and in some cases client relationships extend to business partnerships and profit share contracts.

Alien-Eye Inc. commissioned Bento Graphics to implement their new English/Japanese bilingual CMS based website. The site design was provided by Alien-Eye Inc.

Start Page – Japanese

Creative Case Studies Page – English

Creative Case Studies Page – Japanese

Creative Case Studies Detail Page – Castrol/Magnatec – English

Strategy Case Studies Page – English

Creative Case Studies Detail Page – Smart.fm Iphone App – English

Alien-Eye Inc – About/Client/Access Pages

…a Tokyo based boutique marketing agency specializing in strategy, social media planning & brand building.

This project has to remain as a protoype for a pitch of the new website for the Faculty of Liberal Arts at Sophia University Tokyo. Initially a corporate identity make-over was planned as well but later not realised.

The draft coropate identity design uses architectural elements and patterns from buildings of the Sophia University campus in Tokyo as a starting point.

On this page are drafts for the new corporate identity, website, print collateral and PowerPoint slides.

Website Drafts

Corporate Identity Design Drafts

PowerPoint Drafts

Bringing Local Japan to the World Buy directly from small manufacturers, designers and merchants across Japan – only on Loopto.

Feed your excess tweeters to the tiger & tame Twitter in 2010!

Have fun unfollowing your way to a slimmer timeline by taking a quick information diet. Connect with your Twitter account to get started here: Tigertweet.me!

What’s it all about?

2010 is the year of the tiger, and what better way to start it than with a good clean out of your Twitter timeline? TigerTweet.Me is a fun service that encourages you to do just that. We believe that in this age of information overload, keeping control of the signal to noise ratio is vital in enjoying, and getting the most out of the 24/7 stream of information.

Our hungry tiger loves nothing more than chomping through tweets, whether they’re endless lunch updates, pet statuses or just plain old spam. So feed all those noisy tweeters to him and enjoy a slimmed-down, info-rich, noise-free 2010.

So get feeding, and have a Happy New Year!

Alexander Bühler is a Swiss artist based in Japan. He mainly works with the media of painting and cut-up art, but also creates an occasional video installation.

Bento Graphics was asked to overhaul the existing website design using CSS and Javascript. The Javascript font replacement gives the site a paper-like feel to it which goes along well with the artists business cards using the same font.

Date: Friday, 8th January 2010 Time: 18:00 – 20:00 Place: Gallery Speak For in Daikanyama Address: Sarugakucho 28-2 Speak For B1F

Join us for the opening of HANAMI, an Outsider’s View of Japanese Icons. For about 2 weeks starting on the 8th January photographs I have taken between 2007 and 2009 will be on display in Gallery Speak For (located near Daikanyama Station, see map below). HANAMI is a collection of images based on what I consider to be essentially Japanese, but I have taken the liberty to include images that do not fit this brief in the strictest sense.

For those of you who speak Japanese, you can find a bit of writing below as posted on the Gallery’s blog.

We will have a reception party from 6-8pm on Friday (8th) evening. There will be a few bottles of wine, but supply will be limited.

In case you cannot make it to the opening (or like to come again), please note that Gallery Speak For is open every day from 11am-8pm except Thursdays (so on the 14th the Gallery will be closed).

I am looking forward to welcoming you at my show and hope you will enjoy the works and of course each others company on the 8th.

AlienStart.com is an Internet upstart-company based in Tokyo. AlienStarts concept is to unify the most used web activities under one umbrella. The web application allows access to Email, RSS, social-networking and such from one administration interface.

An important feature is the “temporal” feeding of RSS-subscribed news content to it`s users. In a nutshell, this feature is a reversed StumbleUpon, where the user will be presented with news from sources of his liking in a sequential way, thus avoiding to overwhelm the user with all news content at once. This feature was coined “temporal portal”.

A second feature of AlienStart is a new standard plugin architecture which will allow developers to write sand-boxed custom widgets to add new services.

A third feature “Accessibility” will allow users to access the application from most mobile devices and others – still unsupported – browsers.

Bento Graphics was commissioned to provide the corporate identity design, lots of playful information graphics & illustrations to better explain this new type of service and also to overhaul the existing site design (without the actual site implementation). Part of the illustrations was the character development of an friendly alien-monster which serves as a mascot to the site. The various application features are explained as a narrative showing the mascot on his travel through the universe.

Note: AlienStart.com is still under heavy development (interface design implementation and actual functionality) and is not in the launch phase yet.

Illustrations

Mascot Character Developement

Administration Interface

Misc. Pages

ON ZA LINE The 5th Collection The Garden as Science Fiction Vol.2

with Photography by Sebastian Mayer　SM/AEIOU

Venue: ROCKET – www.rocket-jp.com Date: 11th (Fri) -15th (Tue) ?December 2009 /12:00-19:30

★Opening Party: 11th (Fri) December 2009 /18:00-20:00

“The Garden as Science Fiction” is a series of works which represent the life of those who yearn for nature and their immediate future to be one of “Science Fiction.” In this exhibition, we have added new works to the collection we announced last fall under the same title. We feel we can never complete this series, however this will be our very first collection.

This time, the work of ON ZA LINE is linked and exhibited with the work of German photographer Sebastian Mayer SM/AEIOU. We hope you will enjoy the world of “The Garden as Science Fiction” ever more.

This is a completely new exhibition which takes place only once a year. Please don’t miss this exhibition as it runs only for five days.

Sebastian Mayer SM/AEIOU

Sebastian Mayer is a photographer and creative artist from Berlin. His works has been published in magazines and newspapers such as The New York Times, The Wire, Spex, Dazed & Confused as well as Leica Fotografie International. Mayer is known for his stylistically reduced, simplified photographs and works with a basic theme of portraiture. His favorite motif is one of artists, musicians and other bizarre people encountered on his travels through Europe, South and North America and Japan. Currently, Mayer resides in Tokyo and is working on a book for publication.

The TiWiKi Design website was launched just on time for the Design Tide 2009, which is a large annual design fair based in Tokyo.  The design studio attended with the code:TiWiKi project in collaboration with Kollektiv Tokio.

TiWiKi DESIGN is a creative agency cherishing ideas to develop original and cheerful products. The creative process is focused on experimentations, modeling and prototyping,  to carefully mature ideas…

The design concept for the website emerged while watching the busy TiWiKi folks pursuing their work. There is always an incredible amount of tools, glues, paints and such, involved. The tools to be seen on the website are all actual tools which are used frequently at TiWiKi Design.

The website is based on the WordPress CMS which allows for RSS feed generation, commenting, a sliding gallery function with thumbnail generation and easy updates amongst other things. The website also features an e-commerce online shop were you can find cheerful handmade design products.

My office colleagues of the product design studio TiWiKi Design and Kollektiv Tokio are attending this years Design Tide with a very interesting project called code: TiWiKi. A “TiWiKi” is the funny little figure on the flyer above. Read below for more information:

There are three hundred TiWiKis in Shibuya, Tokyo. They are ready to explore the world but they can’t do this without your help! Thanks to a map showing each TiWiKi’s original location you can meet one of them. Stuck to its back TiWiKi has a personal I.D. code that you can scan to find out who they are. Take these little chubby creatures on a journey with you and take their picture in different places. By uploading those images onto codetiwiki.com, TiWiKi’s adventures can be followed.

渋谷に３００体TiWiKiいて、いろんな世界を見てみたいの。でも、あなたの助けが必要なの！各TiWiKiのロケーションが地図上で見れるため、その１つに会えます。背中には、TiWiKiのパーソナルIDコードが付いているので、彼らが何者かスキャンして知ることができます。このぽってりした生き物を一緒に連れて行って、いろんな場所で写真を撮ってください。その画像をcodetiwiki.comにアップロードすることで、TiWiKiのアドベンチャーを追うことができるのです。

Also, I just relaunched the new TiWiKi Design website. Take a look here (some content still missing): www.tiwiki-design.com.

This project involved the development of a new corporate identity, a CMS-based website and print items i.e. business cards.

Hospitality Associates Asia Limited is an Asia based group specializing in hospitality asset management and project development, from concept to completion.

Corporate Identity Design

For the identity design a typographic style logo was designed, colours indicate the various fields of work of Hospitality Associates Asia Limited.

Website

The website has a fully trilingual setup (English/Japanese/Chinese-Mandarin). Another advantage is that the user can browse the site in only one language, without ever changing back to the default language. On initial page load the site automatically detects the default language setting of the user-browser. It will display the corresponding language, if it`s either English/Japanese/Chinese-Mandarin. Below are sample pages in either English, Japanese or Chinese-Manadarin.

Sample Prints – Custom Print CSS

The refined print style sheet allows the output of high-quality prints or PDFs. All unneeded items i.e. menus etc. are hidden on the prints and the logo is linked to a b/w high-resolution file.

Business Cards

In addition business cards were designed using the new corporate identity. More print items are likely to follow soon.

Hospitality Associates Asia Limited is a China based group specializing in hospitality asset management and project development, from concept to completion.

The redesign will include a logo brush-up, new CMS based website and a few print items like business cards and letterhead.

Kuriya (くり屋) is a new product line for Nanyouken (南陽軒) which I designed in collaboration with Tonoloop Networks Inc. Nanyouken is a confectioner specialised on chestnuts sweets with over 100 years of tradition from Nakatsugawa, Gifu prefecture in Japan. The name “Kuriya” is derived from the Japanese word for chestnut “Kuri” (栗 or くり) and “Ya” (屋), which means shop or store.

This project involved:

• Corporate identity design development, including logo
• Design of print collateral and various packagings
• Web design, (X)HTML/CSS template coding and setup of an online shop

The design process started with the development of a new logo and deciding on colours and fonts. The logo obviously takes reference from the spiny outside of a fresh chestnut. For the further packaging design the illustrations of chestnut and persimmon flower were used, the main ingredients of the first two products added to the Kuriya line. The corporate design and illustration were then applied to print collateral and various packagings i.e. sweet wrapper papers, printed paper bags, leaflets, obis (a paper belt for the packaging), stamp design, gift wrapping paper etc.

In between an extensive photo shoot was carried out in Gifu forest, capturing the initial Kuriya sweet products in a natural setting in front of a stunning waterfall. Photos by Sebastian Mayer.  These images, plus extra packaging shots were used for the website imagery. After the completion of the print design a new shop website was designed and set up on the Japanese Color-Me Shop! pro e-commerce platform.

An opening exhibition will be held at The Cover Nippon at Tokyo Midtown Galleria F3 on 9th – 11th September 2009. Please be warmly invited to the opening reception on 9th August 2009 from 19:00 – 21:00 to taste delicious chestnut sweets and marvel at our newly designed packaging. This event is a collaboration with MIJP (Made in Japan Project).

»Flutterscape – Live the Hunt!« an internet upstart sponsored by one of the largest Japanese e-commerce enterprises NetPrice (ネットプライス). Flutterscape is about creating a new market platform to sell rare - or not usually available – items on the Japanese market to overseas customers. To sell on this site one simply need to upload images of items available in Japan. Once an item gets sold the seller goes back to the shop where he took the photo, buys the item and ships it to Flutterscape. Flutterscape deals with all transfer actions, payments and shipping.

The basic concept was that Flutterscape.com will become a sort nest, where all the users (birds) will deposit their unique and interesting items for sale. Therefore the design of this site revolves around birds, nests and eggs. Also the mascot “Flutter-kun” originated from this idea.

I was involved with the development of corporate identity design, illustration, information architecture, graphic design & layout, web design, (X)HTML/CSS template coding, Javascript (Jquery framework) amongst other things.

However large parts the initial design have been changed after handover. Below are samples of the initial designs.

I will perform live visuals for the final Minimal Tokyo event!

VENUE Liquid Loft in Ebisu.

DATE AND TIME July 31, 2009 23:30 – 6:00AM.

COVER CHARGE ¥2500, ¥2000 with flyer.

E-mail us for discount. ディスカウントをご希望の方はこちらまで E-mail ください。

“MADE IN TOKYO” is the final regular event produced by Minimal Tokyo collective. With this event we invite you to celebrate creative energy of Tokyo, featuring some of the top music and visual talents from this exciting city, including DJ Sodeyama (Archipel), Sackrai (Archipel, Minimood, Telegraph), Minimal Tokyo Crew and art/design collective Delaware.

『MADE IN TOKYO』はMinimal Tokyoの最後のレギュラーイベントとなります。今回は最後を飾るに相応しい日本人アーティストによる世界トップレベルの音楽と?映像を提供します。この「Tokyo」という素晴らしい街のクリエイティブなエネ ルギー をみんなで共有できたら幸いです。

MINIMAL TOKYO is a Tokyo-based event format that brings together an international selection of DJs, producers, designers and media artists. Since 2007 it has been running one of Tokyo’s top events for electronic dance music with a minimal flavor: minimal techno, click house and tech house.

MINIMAL TOKYO は、国際的に活躍するDJ／プロデューサー／デザイナー／メディア・アーティストを集め、東京を基点としてイベントを開催しています。２００７年より、ミニマル・テクノ／クリック・ハウス／テック・ハウスなど東京でもトップクラスのエレクトロニック・ダンスミュージックのイベントを行っています。

I was asked by a small Tokyo based Yoga school to design their visual identity. A logo based on a Yantra symbol turned out to be best match. This project involved the design of business cards (which also functions as a point card), PowerPoint templates and a few rough drafts for an upcoming website.

Business Card Designs

PowerPoint Template Design

Website Launch Page Imagery

Unfortunately parts of my original design have been altered quite a lot since my handover to their inhouse designer. Below is a screenshots from the original design.

If you would like to find out more about this project or get involved, please follow this link: www.flutterscape.com

• ISBN: 9781592535156
• June 2009
• $40.00 | $43.95 Canadian | £25.00
• Hardcover
• 300 photos/illustrations
• 240 Pages
• Size (in): 9 x 11
• Size (mm): 229 x 279

Buy it from Amazon »

Visual Language for Designers

Principles for Creating Graphics that People Understand

Connie Malamed

Within every picture is a hidden language that conveys a message, whether it is intended or not. This language is based on the ways people perceive and process visual information. By understanding visual language as the interface between a graphic and a viewer, designers and illustrators can learn to inform with accuracy and power.

In a time of unprecedented competition for audience attention and with an increasing demand for complex graphics, Visual Language for Designers explains how to achieve quick and effective communications. It presents ways to design for the strengths of our innate mental capacities and to compensate for our cognitive limitations.

Includes:

• • How to organize graphics for quick perception
• • How to direct the eyes to essential information
• • How to use visual shorthand for efficient communication
• • How to make abstract ideas concrete
• • How to best express visual complexity
• • How to charge a graphic with energy and emotion

Connie Malamed has a background in art and cognitive psychology, with a B.S. in Art Education and an M.A. in Instructional Design and Technology. She is a consultant in the fields of e-learning, visual communication, media design, and information design.

I will – again – perform live visuals at the next Laptop Battle Tokyo event.

Date: 19. June 2009 | 6月19日(金) Open 7pm Start 8pm Entrance Fee: ¥1500 / Door: ¥2000 | 前売り1500yen ドアー2000yen Place: Super Deluxe

Below is a video where you can see some of my visuals from the last event:

Bridge Online is an interactive online Bridge game website. The company is based in New Zealand and Japan with users all around the globe.

The project brief was to redesign Bridge Online starting with information architecture & wireframing, then fine-tuning the user interaction flow throughout the site. Additionally a new look was created with fresh illustrations and meaningful pictograms/icons. The client is planning to gradually shift this platform from purely Flash based to a more open standards platform with new versions planned for desktop browser and smart phones, possibly applications for iPhone/Android as well. Hopefully the new designs will be fully implemented with the new versions of the site.

I just found an interesting website which let`s you represent your RSS feed as a tag cloud. Find out more here: www.wordle.net

“Alltagsfantasien” (roughly: Everyday-Fantasies) is a German-language blogging project of up & coming writer Sonning Strauß.

The quite extensive identity development process followed the web design for this WordPress CMS based blog site. It turned out that an every-day-doodle as a logo was the best choice for his purpose and earned the most sympathy amongst his colleagues. Also the fact that one easily starts doodling while absorbed by a daydream (or fantasy) has a nice touch to it.

The design idea of the blog is – obviously – centred around the writers pad. The category menu is made up of post-it notes which allow re-sorting to view articles of only one particular category. When using the next/previous article links the post-it navigation will indicate the category of the displayed article.

This “digital writer pad” is also meant to records the progress of his upcoming book release called “Digitale Verwahrlosung” (roughly: State of Digital Negligence). But he will also share “every-day-poetry” as he calls it. The commenting function of a blog platform, as well as RSS feed and email subscription allows him to gather a following as a 21th century writer.

My client Dr. Parissa Haghirian is about to release a new book called “J-Management – Fresh Perspectives on the Japanese Firm in the 21st Century.” Dr. Parissa Haghirian is an Austrian associate professor of international management at Sophia University in Tokyo in Tokyo.

I also updated her website. The site became a lot leaner and more intuitive. It will also feature a new podcast section. Take a look here: www.parissahaghirian.com

RecruiterDB

“The Directory of Asia`s Top Recruiters” – quite an ambitious and large project:

Zap Associates

A group of entrepreneurs, based in Tokyo:

Von Fall zu Fall

Engl. “from case to case”, 3d animation from my better days:

Bruder Lustig

Engl. “Brother Merry”, a journey into information graphics. My graduation project which had gone missing along the way:

Shanghai-Berlin

Website for the Berlin based advertising agency:

Bresse Bleu Japan – Bongrain

Production of a Japanese language pamphlet for this high-end cheese brand from France:

This website is the personal playground of Carlos E. Gibbs, a Tokyo based DJ, music and event producer and recently owner of a fashion shop. The website is mainly focused on photography and provides a visual journey into Carlos` world and his collaborators.

The website enables the user to view the photos as slideshow, picture wall or large fullscreen images. The sliding header menu contains other hidden menu items and a flashed based MP3 player with chart listing. All imagery and music files can be set with ease from the admin area of this CMS based site.

Carlos Gibbs is the founder of both the Deep House Project (DHP) and the RedBox Project. Carlos began DHP in 2001 to express his own passion for the culture that is house music. It was designed to embrace all facets of mixed media: using the fashion, music, art and style that thrives in the vibrant underground house music scene.

Considered a vinyl technician, Carlos consistently proves his ability to move a dance floor with his programming finesse. His DJing seems to be an extension of his passion for music and his inspiration to create. Part deep groove, part ghetto funk, he moves seamlessly across the ever-changing landscape of house music. He has played with such seminal house DJs as Land Shark, Ron Carroll, Mark Farina, Miguel Migs, Claude VonStroke, Justin Martin, Iz & Diz, T-Rek and many others. The list only gets longer as he is continually asked to play at scene-making parties and clubs the world over.

Always looking to expand, Carlos has now moved into the studio, working with some of the West Coast’s top production talent to begin a new label under the DHP moniker. Look forward to the new future of house music as Carlos Gibbs continues to unleash the funk worldwide.

Sliding Header Menu

Slideshow View

Kika Style – Vol. 2 feat DJ D’Julz @ La Boheme, May 2

Date: Saturday – May 2nd 2009 日付: 2009/05/02 土曜

Place/場所: La Boheme, Shibuya

ラ・ボエムクアリタ渋谷 150-0042 東京都 渋谷区 宇田川町20-11 渋谷三葉ビルB1,B2 http://www.qualita.boheme.jp/jp/casual/home/index

Time: 23:00 – morning 時間: 23:00から朝まで

Door/料金: ¥3000 / ¥2500 (flyer/フラヤー)

iFLYER discount link (¥2000): www.iflyer.jp/event/37638

Main Room: DJs - D’JULZ – Ovum / Pokerflat / Circus Company / 2020 Vision / audioFAMILIES - Tim Boffa (Sydney Australia) vs Skinni Pants (REDBOX) - Shotaro Meada (EDEN) - Christian Mora (Bang the Box San Francisco)

VJs - Chroma Fresh - Ben Sheppee (Light Rhythm Visuals)

Level one DEEP LOUNGE: DJs - SATOSHI OTSUKI (Tres Vibes) - Aosawa (KSR HOUSE) - Kikiorix (Redbox / Ladies and Gentlemen) - DJ Aki (Sound&Space / Lime light / KIKAstyle) - Raha (Ooooze)

VJs - Remo Camerota ( White Wall Studio) - Bento (Minimal Tokyo/BentoGraphics.com)

KIKA STYLE PHOTO EXHIBITION by - Yu Hokazono (KIKAstyle/ Redbox) - Jeaq (KIKAstyle)

Live Art - Pinkman

Book Release: Japanese-English Guide to “Sex, Kink and Naughtiness” Signing Party

Author and collaborator Nate Jensen will be present to sign his new book “A Japanese-English Guide to Sex, Kink and Naughtiness”. Jensen, a long time resident of Japan and language enthusiast has amassed and documented over 600 words in areas often overlooked by most Japanese language and cultural guides. This new guide is certain to complete a missing space on everybody’s bookshelf.

Books will be available at the party for a promotional price of 1,000 JPY.

www.tokyodusk.com

GELMANNICA 2009

First International Festival for Electronic Music and Media Arts

Friday, April 10, 2009

Unit Main Floor: Apparat+Transforma LIVE

Saloon: Gelmannica party of parties

Open: 23:00

Admission: 3500 YEN (3000 W/FLYER)

http://gelmannica.com

—

I will perform live visuals from 11pm – 2am at Saloon area of Unit at the above event. Drop me a mail for discounts, 2000y instead of 3500y.

I am currently working on a German-language blog site for soon-to-be writer Sonning Strauß from Hamburg.

Watch this space: www.alltagsfantasien.de

Carlos Gibbs is the founder of both the Deep House Project (DHP) and the RedBox Project. Carlos began DHP in 2001 to express his own passion for the culture that is house music. It was designed to embrace all facets of mixed media: using the fashion, music, art and style that thrives in the vibrant underground house music scene.

Considered a vinyl technician, Carlos consistently proves his ability to move a dance floor with his programming finesse. His DJing seems to be an extension of his passion for music and his inspiration to create. Part deep groove, part ghetto funk, he moves seamlessly across the ever-changing landscape of house music. He has played with such seminal house DJs as Land Shark, Ron Carroll, Mark Farina, Miguel Migs, Claude VonStroke, Justin Martin, Iz & Diz, T-Rek and many others. The list only gets longer as he is continually asked to play at scene-making parties and clubs the world over.

Always looking to expand, Carlos has now moved into the studio, working with some of the West Coast’s top production talent to begin a new label under the DHP moniker. Look forward to the new future of house music as Carlos Gibbs continues to unleash the funk worldwide.

WITH Co. Ltd. (株式会社ウイズ) is a Japanese interior construction company with offices in Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya.

We were responsible for concept, design and coding of their re-designed website. The very minimalist design is enhanced by smooth Javascript slide effects (i.e. on the porfolio section, achieved with the Javascript framework Jquery). The webite is rendered in standards compliant valid XHTML/CSS.

Discounted tickets for ¥2000 including one drink can be ordered from here:  guests@madeinglitch.com (please send full names). Tickets at the door are ¥3500, advance tickets are ¥2500.

After the epic first party at Legato,the Made in Glitch crew is back for another unmissable event. The crew that created the 1st and only glitch hop party in Tokyo, offering something music-wise truly different,is pushing the boundaries even further this time. Made In Glitch is very proud to announce, for the 1st time in Japan, Speakerbruiser Rob from Meagasoid (Turbo Crunk / Ninja Tune) from Montreal and Mochipet (Daly City Records) from San francisco. Its gonna be the usual made in glitch music trademark: a mix of glitch and hip-hop empowered with laser basses. ]]> http://bentographics.com/blog/made-in-glitch-feat-bento-graphics-live-visuals/feed/ 0 http://bentographics.com/blog/made-in-glitch-feat-bento-graphics-live-visuals/ http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/bentographics/~3/1BkCmr5iFXw/ http://bentographics.com/blog/minimal-tokyo-11-featuring-bento-graphics-live-visuals/#comments Mon, 26 Jan 2009 11:22:31 +0000 Benjamin Thomas http://66.147.242.84/~bentogr1/site/?p=137

Please be warmly invited to MINIMAL TOKYO 11 – “Connaisseur Recordings Label Night” at Unit on Friday 30th, January 2009. I will perform live visuals in the main hall during the DJ set by Tatsuya starting from 23:30.

entrance: 3,500yen, 3,000/W flyer

【UNIT】

DJs: Patrick Chardronnet (Connaisseur Recordings/Poker Flat) Alex Flitsch (Connaisseur Recordings) Tatsuya Ivan Kuzbass

☆LIVE☆ Shu Okuyama Feat. Kazuma Ishii

【UNIT】

GUEST Vj: DELAWARE

Vjs: Spielfilm Bento Moa Teru (curl)

【Saloon】

yoshiki (op.disc) PERNOD (Virgin) ya’man (Mancheez/Technique) Valentino De Bronff (minimood) Kenji

Connaisseur Recordingsは2005年発足以来、一貫して良質なディープハウスとミニマルテクノをリリースし続け、その独特なコスモポリタンな特徴を合わせ持つ洗練されたエレクトロニック・サウンドには定評がある。今やドイツを代表するディ―プハウス／ミニマルテクノレーベルへと急成長したConnaisseur Recordingsには現在、Patrick Chardronnet、Daso、Ripperton、Simon Baker、Afriloungeなどの優秀なアーティストが所属。さらに、来年の2009年にはAudioflyとTimoMaasの参入も決定！

今回、日本初のConnaisseur Recordingsのレーベルナイトを開催するにあたり、レーベルオーナーのALEX FLITSCHと所属アーティストのPATRICK CHARDRONNET(Raum Musik, Connaisseur Recordings, Poker Flat)が来日。東京を拠点に活躍中のビジュアルアーティストのDELAWAREのスペシャルVJ-setと共に、Patrick ChardronnetとAlex Flitschのプレイに乞うご期待！

LINKS:

* Minimal Tokyo: http://minimaltokyo.com

* Connaisseur Recordings: http://www.connaisseur-recordings.com/

* Patrick Chardronnet http://www.myspace.com/patrickchardronnet

* Alex Flitsch http://www.myspace.com/alex_connaisseur_rec

* Delaware http://www.delaware.gr.jp/

* Shu Okuyama http://www.myspace.com/shuokuyama

The re-designed website for WITH (www.with-web.com) will launch soon. WITH is a Japanese interior design company with offices in Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya.

p.s. I promise to savely relocate the above dogs from the world wide web.

The Tokyo based publishing house White Rabbit Press asked me to re-design their website and incorporate a blog. A support area and the online shop were linked to the new site as well. To keep things in line with their old style we decided to keep the pink signal colour, but give the site a fresh, more contemporary look.

The site is based on a WordPress CMS and can easily be updated by the client. The home page contains a Javascript based slideshow of their latest products and bold buttons to drive traffic to the various areas of their online shop. The news area features sorting capability for certain categories or tags and archives by month. The support area, based on a the Help Desk sofware, received a new header menu in order to tie them together with the main site. The linked WRP online shop will be re-designed in the near future as well.

Logo design for Japan Journal, a German language news website run by Martin Fritz, who is a long time Japan journalist for the German news channel ARD. He will supply the interested public with new insights into Japanese politics, economy and society.

www.japanjournal.de (German only)

SKM (株式会社エスケイエム) provides various facility services mainly to the Toyota Corp. and is also a 100% subsidiary of Toyota. Services provided by SKM include: building maintenance, car park management, cleaning services, construction work, security services, recruitment, real estate/rental services and others.

Their website was re-designed from the ground in standards compliant valid XHTML/CSS and runs on a WordPress CMS, with an added custom CMS for the parking, rental and recruitment pages. The menu includes an open/close effect and highlight states of the menu items are indicated with arrows. Headline colours and header pictures change throughout the site, depending on which page is being displayed.

Their old domain www.skm-t.co.jp will be re-pointed to the new site shortly.