What does design mean to you? For me design is both the process and the final product of an endeavor to fulfill a personal or professional brief. Whether you’re creating a piece of graphic work, a website, or a design for a new product, the underlying principal is the same – and the creative process is everything. So how do we make ourselves better designers?
When things in your life seem almost too much to handle, when 24 hours in a day are not enough, remember the mayonnaise jar and the two pints of beer.
A professor stood before his philosophy class and had some items in front of him. When the class began, wordlessly, he picked up a very large and empty mayonnaise jar and proceeded to fill it with golf balls.
He then asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was.
The professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured them into the jar. He shook the jar lightly, and the pebbles rolled into the open areas between the golf balls. He then asked the students again if the jar was full. They agreed again that it was.
I need to open this post by apologising for the sporadic level of posts recently… Everything’s managed to catch up with me the last few weeks, leaving me with little time to blog or comment on all my usual daily reads. 
I’m off on my holidays tomorrow though – and I’m hoping to return to a more relaxed schedule!
Aaron Russell tagged me with this almost three weeks ago (has it really been that long?!?), and he was originally tagged by Marc Rapp – the creator of this fantastic meme. Aaron managed to weasel out of giving anybody any real advice though (only kidding mate), so I felt I should at least try to impart some pearls of wisdom! 
Several client projects this month have required me to do some GUI design – so I thought it might be appropriate to share some of the rules that I try to stick to when creating an interface. I think that these guidelines (learnt originally from a book by a guy called Shneider I believe) could be applied to both desktop and online applications – including websites!
I hate giving business presentations, and I do anything I can to avoid them! It’s not that I’m bad at them (many years of practice has made me quite good), it has nothing to do with me not liking to talk (anyone who’s met me will tell you that I can talk the hind legs off a donkey), and it’s certainly not anything to do with nerves (being a DJ means that I regularly find myself on stage in front of large audiences). I just don’t like them – simple as that!
I’ve had many labels stuck on me in the past; including Techie, Geek, Designer and Coder – but recently I’ve been called an Entrepreneur, which is a new one for me! The label stems from my development of Britster – a niche social networking site focused on Britain – and carries with it the threat of presenting the project to potential venture capitalists and the like.
One of the most important aspects of a presentation is the materials you use to reinforce your sales pitch. They can make the difference between a successful presentation and one that flops – so from slides and brochures to props and snacks, here are the essentials that entrepreneurs should bring to their first meeting.
When I see a post titled video, time, sound and tangible interface pop up on one of my daily reads, I can’t help but be intrigued! As it happens, this is an awesome short film called SPIN by Double Edge Films.
The clip – in which a mysterious DJ is sent to a busy city block to mend a series of tragic events that occur in our everyday lives – is the winner of 35 film festival awards worldwide, and it’s not hard to see why. Clever, well-shot, touching, the list goes on… Enjoy! 
This one’s worth watching twice – and let me know your thoughts!
