Pop Art Blog

When the first iPhone was announced, I publicly stated that I would wait for version 2 before purchasing. It took about 30 seconds of playing with version 1 before changing my mind. Holding the slim, elegant device in my hands, I felt like I was experiencing radio for the first time. I didn't want to be the person who waited for FM. I wanted it now, and I marched down to the Apple store at lunch, plunking down my $600 with a smile. Yesterday, Apple announced a new, faster iPhone yesterday at... Read More...

WebVisions is a Portland-based web conference that I’ve attended twice before . Sadly, due to a crisis at the office, I was only able to attend the first day of sessions this year, which means I missed Andy Baio’s presentation on internet memes and Jeffrey Veen’s keynote . What I did see was good, but not great. In a nutshell, I think that WebVisions is a B-grade conference that’s trying desperately to become an A-grade one. It has moments of greatness, and manages to attract... Read More...

On May 12, 2007, Warner Brothers released the first web teaser for the upcoming Batman Begins movie sequel, The Dark Knight. The teaser was an image of the Batman bat symbol exploding into many pieces. It was mysterious but it was only the first clue into an almost year long interactive marketing campaign that bridged the offline world and the web, and fiction with reality. The following is the chronology of “The Dark Knight” interactive marketing campaign. May 13th-ish: Fictitious campaign posters... Read More...

This magazine cover is a perfect example of why you should always have someone else review any art decisions you make. There are several things in this illustration that don’t make any sense… The kid on the left, I assume, is supposed to represent current, cutting-edge technology — hence, the Web 2.0 shirt — so why is he playing Pong? I guess that old is represented by wearing a tie, being unshaven, and working, while youth is represented by spiking your hair, getting a facial... Read More...

Last year, I attended An Event Apart 2006 in Seattle . It was a great event, although I remember it being really rushed, because they seven sessions packed into one day. So when I heard that they were coming back to Seattle, and had changed the format to two days, I signed up right away. I’m happy to tell you that the new format is a huge improvement. The event no longer feels rushed, and even though there are six sessions every day, there’s a 15 minute break between each one, and a 1½... Read More...

Pop Art has launched two sites that we’re really excited about, Visit Cascadia and Drive Cascadia to promote the launch of a groundbreaking new truck, the Freightliner Cascadia™. Visit Cascadia Visit Cascadia is a tourism site for a fictional town called Cascadia. Imagine the perfect trucktopia that inspired by the features and benefits of their official truck, the Freightliner Cascadia™. In Cascadia, you can drive on North America’s smoothest pavement, go swimming in the world’s largest cupholder... Read More...

Have you ever had this experience. You rent a DVD, maybe one you’ve been waiting for. You are so excited to view the movie and you throw it in the DVD player. After the player adjusts itself, recognizes the disc, you wait through a series of warnings and previews. You fast forward or skip past all this content only to end up on the DVD menu. You wait as various scenes of the movie fade in and out, lines from the movie are played, maybe some snippet from a theme song is played, and you wait… and wait... Read More...

Every once in a while, I see a movie that excites me as a designer. The opening titles for Panic Room, combined with that film’s amazing camera work. Fight Club, with it’s “IKEA catalog” sequences and David Carson-like typography. Last night, I saw another such film, Stranger Than Fiction . The great typography and motion graphics first started my design pulse racing, with a great opening sequence. Harold Crick (Will Farrell) is an IRS agent with a boring life. He has an amazing gift for numbers... Read More...

David Allen, the “personal productivity guru” featured on the cover, brings us his guide to “the art of stress-free productivity.” It’s a quick read, and after thinking it over for a few days, I’ve come to the conclusion that people reading this book will fall into one of two camps. First, there will be the people who find it revolutionary, and then there will be the people who read the book and say “Well, duh.” If you’re the kind of person whose... Read More...

1. “Real World” Interfaces. Yeah, the menu should totally be on a banner pulled behind an airplane. Get it? It’s a “fly out.” Leave the real world to the real world. To borrow from Clement Greenburg, “screen is screen, pixels are pixels.” You’ve got a million colors and several million pixels to play with, unlimited fonts, and the only thing you can think of is a coffee table? But the telephone links to “contact us.” Get it? Apple pioneered this interface in 1995, and your idea is neither new nor... Read More...