Talent

design is what i love to do and think

...but i think "music" is the brain food that allow me to go through each day, mentally and emotionally.

recently, i have been addicted to watching videos of singing contest shows (kinda of like american idol) on youtube. something just always gets me when i see talented people. one of the show is called 超級星光大道 [super red carpet]. let's just say it's the taiwanese version of american idol. james lin[林宥嘉], is one of the final 7 contestants of the show..and i'm always amazed by the singing talent of this guy..

now..a little joke[or more like a funny thought] posted by james on his blog because i had to share it =P [probably funnier if you can read chinese]:

"我想來想去 [ so the more i thinkg about it...}

烤土司機還是只能用來烤土司 [you can only use the toaster to toast a bread...] Right?

烤土司機是為了吐司而生 [the toaster was born for the bread]

烤先生總是在等吐小姐 [mr. toaster is always waiting for miss bread]

天啊![gosh!]

真浪漫! [too romantic!]

以後我會多吃ㄧ點 [from now on, i shall eat more toasts!]

看你們約會快樂 [seeing the two of you having a great date]

我也很開心呀 [i feel happy too!] " - james lin [林宥嘉] wretch

i like talented people..hehe ^______^

gift idea: graduation for architects

so last weekend my friends, who I had classes with and saw everyday during my college life, graduated from the school of architecture here at UT austin. since I knew all of them and so many of them are good friends of mine, I knew I had to prepare early to select a gift that is unique to individuals but will suit all of them. the resultant are these linkable notebooks by E and tina at littlefury.com called "start here" notebooks.these notebooks are absolutely wonderful: not only it uses recycled paper, it comes in three different formats (blank, lined and grid), it's even got a waterproof cover! for architects or anyone who can get clumsy and spill their coffee over their sketchbooks, this is a great feature! And most importantly, it's linkable! just tuck the back cover of the first notebook behind the second one's front cover, vola~ you got one new "thinker" notebook! and you can just image the possibility goes on with that! now, i'm hoping all my happy graduates of the classes of 2007 are happy with their little presents from me...and hoping some of you out there will head over to starthereny.com and check out their awesome invention!

gocco

mizna wada

"for over 25 years, the print gocco screen-printing system has been used in japan. the small plastic device was marketed at families for making greeting cards and sold in toy and hobby stores. since it’s peak during the 1980’s, gocco’s sales have declined in the japanese market with the advent of home computers and printers. outside japan, however, appreciation for the gocco system has only just begun. for artists who cannot afford to own or don’t have the space for a traditional screen-printing set-up, gocco has offered a way to mass produce everything from postcards to wedding invitations to mini-comics to limited edition art prints as you see here. each print in this show is limited to 50 numbered pieces. in december 2005, gocco’s parent company, riso, announced they are discontinuing manufacturing the print gocco system due to low sales in japan. savegocco.com was created in december with hopes that it may not be late too work together to find a new home for gocco outside of japan. for more information on the history of gocco and to find out how you can help, please visit savegocco.com"-- Save Gocco i personally just got a gocco PG-5 set this week (from ebay) and did my first set of prints tonight. it worked like magic!!!! it was so easy to operate and the image came out crispy clear and still got the unique look similar to that of silk-screen prints! it's a little pricey but everything so well invented that i bet it will last for a looong loooong time! it would be great for one would need to mass produce print work! those who are looking for cheap/easy/nice & personal looking invitations (wedding, graduation, party, or anything you can think of), i am open for challenge!!! ^____^

Links to some websites that showcase gocco art!:

"flicker link" "wurst gallery"

random interesting videos for your entertainment!

walk of 2nd street

austin children's museum

here's a series of photos i took for work. just to show the character of austin's new hip area- 2nd street district, where the city hall is located and our infamous "block 21" project will be located. to read more about "block 21", here's an article from the austin360.

to see each image at larger size click the image above

Abigail Percy

Sweet Horse Chestnut Hoops

"Sweet chestnut leaves translated into beautiful outlines for these elegant hoop style earrings. Completely handmade, Abigail Percy's craftsmanship is unbelievable."- rare device (click to buy the earring shown above) I saw this artist, Abigail Percy, on Etsy.com today and completely fell in love with her work. She has a wonderful mixture of sophistication, free-form and softness in these vintage jewelery. I think I have seen too many jewelery made with very simplistic and geometric forms. Everything becomes very clean cut, edge defined. Therefore, Abigail's floral curves brings a whole new feel of freeness to these femieant accessories. You can find her work on flickr (click the image above) or at her blog.

table top

so last weekend, i set up a little workshop right outside of my apartment and painted a table top. we have had this mdf board as our table top for almost a year. it have been very well used (with all kinds of stains, gooey stuff on it) and i was getting very disgusted by it. so i decided it was time to repaint this board and make it pretty. after working on this for the whole weekend (my back really hurt afterwards), this is the product. i'm still waiting for the weather to get better so I can take a better photo of it.

mdf board painted with behr semi-gloss paint (bear rug and mermaid treasure) with a polyurethane-clear waterproof coat

interesting deisgn ideas

recently i have been on a streak of just coming up with ideas in my head but not taking real actions...it's really a bad habit : ( too many little projects, ideas, words to be recorded...but quickly forgotten because they only stayed in my head. I have accumulated so many images of things that I want to share with everybody...I promise starting today I will get them out of my "random" folder on the desktop and show them to you. And since I have been just saving the images, I did a really poor job remember the exact names and sources of them. So here I apologize to the designers that should be credited for the great work.

Let's start with a few design ideas/products that have caught my attention and really fasinated me:

This is a design that an industrial design student had proposed. He's using a bunch of giant umbrellas normally used in professional photo-shoot. These umbrella were made to help reflect light evenly and therefor interestingly it is a great material to create a diffused light fixture.

this is a ash tray designed by a japanese designer. maybe because my love for architecture...anything that show some kind of architectural relevance fascinates me. hehe : P

i visited the school of architecture at UT a few weeks ago just to see some old friends and saw this in the 3rd year sound-building studio. i supposed i have graduated too early (?) i don't think there was a laser cutter in the school two years ago?! so this a modular wall the 3rd year students have design and created by using the laster cutter. it was a material experiment with professor billie faircloth. module, is truely a wonderful design technique. you would be amazed how possibility can expand just by multiplying a single module.

hello im a mac/pc

apple ads one of the things i would periodically check is apple's ads. i think they are just simply clever and humorous. this one that i just saw today was titled "security". i couldn't stop laughing when I was watching it. it was one of the most annoying things about pc when I used to have a pc laptop...

mac. much smarter. life. much easier =P