Illustration

Noma Bar Goes 3-D for Wallpaper* Magazine

With London-based Israeli illustrator Noma Bar, viewers have to look at his work at least twice — once to see the image in the positive space and again to see how the shape of the negative space creates a whole other picture. That’s the way Bar likes it. “Most of my images are not immediately obvious to readers. Most of them require a second reading or take a minute to interpret.” Irresistibly drawn to making viewers do double-takes, Bar extended this approach in another direction on the cover of Wallpaper* magazine, painting in 3-D and incorporating real objects.

Bar was commissioned by Wallpaper* , an international authority on cutting-edge design and style, to create eight newsstand covers for its Global Design issue, one for each of the world’s top design territories –Germany, the U.S., France, Italy, Spain, Japan, Belgium and Scandinavia (Norway, Sweden and Denmark). Tony Chambers, Wallpaper* editor-in-chief, says, “Bar entered a new dimension just for us. His cover designs are, in fact, room sets, painted in a three-dimensional studio space and integrating actual products from each of the territories.”

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Publishing

Is Publishing Dead?

Turn up the sound and pay attention to the words all the way through. This video titled “The End of Publishing” was presented by Penguin CEO John Makinson at an internal sales meeting. It was so well-received that Penguin decided to share it with a wider online audience.

Prepared by the marketing arm of Dorling Kindersley in the UK, the video was done by Khaki Films in Kent. Khaki says that the approach was inspired by the Argentine film, “The Truth,” by Savaglio/TBWA Buenos Aires, which won a Silver Lion at Cannes in 2006.

For “The End of Publishing,” Khaki’s writer Jason LaMotte took four days to piece together a script that made the exact opposite point when read forwards and backwards. From there, arriving at the right voice inflexions and pacing for the film was an amazing feat in itself. Very clever. Let’s hope that the backwards reading is true.

Animation

Lacoste : The Man, the Brand,
the Online Pop-Up Book

Lacoste has borrowed a page from real printed books, and gone one better, with this engaging online pop-up book dedicated to its founder Rene Lacoste. The six-chapter story is set to a lively ragtime tune and sound effects. Clicking on a chapter prompts visuals to pop up, and following the finger-pointing tab reveals a “gatefold” sidebar with explanatory text, old photos and vintage flim clips. A hybrid of different communications media, the online pop-up book tells the corporate story in a fresh way.

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Publishing

Books That Make You Feel

Tamaki Covers

Aside from the fact that these are charming images embroidered by New York-based illustrator Jillian Tamaki, the covers of Penguin Threads Classics signal yet another move to define non-electronic publishing as more than a vehicle for communications. Traditional publishers can no longer assume that readers will stay loyal to print because e-books are harder to read due to screen glare, not offered in full-color, crippled by short battery life, limited in availability of subjects and titles, etc. Over the past year, the iPad, Kindle, Nook and other e-readers have proved otherwise, and are getting better with each iteration.

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Publishing

Little White Lies – About How a Magazine Is Made

This is a video about the making of a magazine that is about the making of films. Little White Lies (LWLies) is an independent British film magazine produced by The Church of London creative agency. In 2001, while at university studying graphic design, Danny Miller co-founded Little White Lies as a final degree project. His 17-year-old friend Matthew Bochenski wrote the content. Miller then moved to London to work on a skate and snowboard magazine called Adrenalin, but kept thinking about making Little White Lies for real. Finally in 2005, he produced the first issue and since then LWLies has become a bi-monthly magazine with a print run of about 2,500 copies, distributed in Borders stores in the UK. The design and editorial content of each issue is inspired by a single film – in this case “Black Swan” – and features an illustration of the lead actor on the cover. In 2008, LWLies won “Best Designed Consumer Magazine of the Year” at the Magazine Design & Journalism Awards. What’s great about this “making of” LWLies video is that it covers the focus, teamwork, deadline pressure and ultimate satisfaction of starting from rough sketches to holding the finished product in your hands. Ah joy! Although online has its advantages, there is nothing quite as wonderful as seeing your work reproduced with ink on paper.