Educate, Liberate, Celebrate with Vancouver Pride Society
On Friday March 20, Definium Design was proud to be a part of Vancouver Pride Society’s (VPS) Spring into Pride media launch at Vancouver’s Edgewater Casino. The event was to announce Pride’s new three year theme: Educate, Celebrate and Liberate, and to publish their new theme logo which our studio has helped them develop.
As the VPS push into their 30’s, Educate, Liberate and Celebrate is a concept created by the Vancouver Pride Society as a homage to the past, present and future. The VPS and many Pride’s alike did not get to where we are today easily. The GLBT movement has spawned many years. By mobilizing events, talking to individuals and inspiring communities, the VPS is an organization whom at its core is a community educator. Liberating is the GLBT community’s perpetual challenge. Liberating themselves, individuals, communities and the wolrd from discrimination and unequal treatment to all. Celebrate is what the VPS is known for. Parties, loud music, dancing and smiles that memorializes the past while paying tribute to the future and current milestones.
Working with the VPS is always a treat. We hope to personify the things that had long standing value while being a point of remembrance. With a text that resembles a flag standing proud and a mark that has nostalgic point of three decades of reference, we hope newer GLBT generations and current ones can find a point of reference for Pride while they continue the fight from the past, be active in their present and never loosing hope for days ahead.
Educate, Liberate, Celebrate
Related Links:
View our interview on Extra West
http://www.xtra.ca/public/Vancouver/Vancouver_Pride_Society_unveils_new_theme-6480.aspx
http://definium.wordpress.com/2009/03/23/chris-and-kevins-interview-on-extrawest/
Definium Celebrates Chau Kitchen & Bar Grand Opening
Last week Definium Design was pleased to celebrate with one of our clients, Chau Kitchen and Bar as they celebrate their long awaited grand opening.
Media, critics, restaurateurs, and friends were there to help kick off this one of a kind Vietnamese cuisine restaurant. Within the murmur of elbows rubbing and spring roll sampling, the topic of all the buzz was how amazing the food tasted and how people can’t get enough!
Amidst the popular Asian-fusion restaurants springing up on Vancouver’s Robson Street, Chau offers something different. A taste that is truly unique, combining Vietnamese cooking with French inspired fusion — an amazing combination!
You can thank the enterprising and classically trained Maria Huynh, for opening and spear heading the restaurant. To honour her roots and never forgetting what her family has gone through as landed immigrants, she fittingly named the restaurant after mother Chau, who ran a congee cafe in an Indonesian refugee camp.
On your next stroll on Robson Street and you feel like some Asian food, drop by Chau Kitchen and Bar.
Chau Kitchen and Bar
1500 Robson Street, Vancouver, BC
tel. 604.682.8020
Chau Reviewed at Vancouver Sun
http://www.vancouversun.com/life/food/Chau+Kitchen+Gneration+Next+Vietnamese+food/1203292/story.html
Chau Reviewed at Georgia Straigh
http://www.straight.com/article-175347/chau-shakes-flavours-vietnam
Chau Reviewed at Martiniboys
http://www.martiniboys.com/Vancouver/Chau-review.html
A Tribute to Paul Rand
Paul Rand (1914-1996) is a graphic design legend in my book and I don’t think many studios or agencies will be here today if not for him.
He studied at the Pratt Institute and Arts League and was one of the originators of the Swiss Style of graphic design. In my opinion he took the best features of what was coming out of the Bauhus and other places in Europe and called it his – making it very “American”, fun and Rand-like.
He started off his early career designing stock images and quickly building a portfolio of work he art directed Direction Magazine. As a well versed designer, advertiser, illustrator, artist and industrial designer, Rand is mostly noted are his corporate identity work, IBM, Ford, ABC and UPS were some of his largest clients. Practically working as a freelancer, Rand single handedly raised the value of designers with his identity work, giving graphic value to these companies who’s logos has been relatively untouched- some for over 25 years – paving the way for other great designers, studios and students to go out in the world and make a living doing what we love to do.
Thank you Paul Rand for all you’ve done.
Too Many Cars and Nowhere to Put Them
Photograph: Nigel Roddis/Reuters
If you haven’t slept the last 6 months away, you would know that the recent downturn in the economy is affecting us all. People are waiting to make large purchases and investments – a large economic pause is in effect. One of the biggest hit areas is the auto industry. A combination of thousands of layoffs world-wide from all of the large manufacturers and consumers keeping their cash in the bank, the question is where are the unsold automobiles going? Well they aren’t going anywhere. Stocks of unsold cars all over the world where lots, bays and docks are reaching near capacity. Soon these manufacturers will be looking for new inventory solutions or ways to get these cars into people’s garages. Maybe its time to offer a different transportation solutions if people are no longer buying automobiles and are driving less.
Thanks Guardian for the news source.
To read more about this article and see more images click here.
Franz Ferdinand's Tonight: Franz Ferdinand Reviewed
The Glasgowian greats have done it again with their new album rightfully entitled Tonight: Franz Ferdinand, their 3rd album which follows their 2004 debut self-entitled, Franz Ferdinand, and their 2005 album, You Could Have It So Much Better.
Tonight:Franz Ferdinand, which releases on January 26, 2009, is considered to be ones of those albums to watch out for this year and I must say that Valentine’s came early – thank you cupid! For any Franz fans out there, including myself, this is an album hard not to love.
Tonight… can be described as a well infused departure combining rock, pop and 80’s electronica but still never forgetting their trademark Franz Ferdinand post-punk elements of sexiness, up tempo-ness, charm and perfectly timed pauses and slow-downs. Their last two albums has left the world with a solid Franz Ferdinand impression – an image of stylish, funky rockers who really know how to lay down a fist pounding rock beat while keeping the dance floor alive. They’ve taken some slack for, You Could Have It So Much Better, for sounding like a first album continuation, but after listening to Tonight…, this one proves that they can be creative producers, capable of expanding beyond their comfort zone – not afraid of trying out something different (probably realizing that they will take some criticism for it) and making it work!
The most noticeable inclusion to Tonight… is their creative exploration of the synthesizer and electronica-sounding elements. The 12 track ensemble follows suite to previous albums in terms of tempo, creating the right flow to carry listeners through a great “night-out” listening experience. Alex Kapranos, lead vocals and guitar, has stated that this album is more of a dance album than a rock album, drawing Jamaican and African influences.
Most notable songs that stand out is Ulysses, a great introduction to the album with a taste of their new techno-synth which I’m sure will go down in history as a song worth singing under the category: Songs That Includes The Words “.. let’s get high”. Bite Hard, found halfway through the album begins as a Kaprano ballad and quickly turning into a fun-hopin’ bumpin’ beat reminiscent of classic indie-Franz. (It’s also a song I heard them open with when they played in Vancouver… magnificent!). Lucid Dreams, probably the most pleasantly surprising track, a near eight minute song that breaks into an over three minute electronic homage that simply blew me away – showing a wide talent range. (This would make a great live finale song – watching them escape from their conventional guitars to an electric jam!). After listening to Lucid Dreams I developed a whole new level of respect for this band as musicians, leaving me in hopes that their next album will include this electronica rhythm as their over-arching theme. Reminding me of their well known, Eleanor, the album ends of withKatherine Kiss Me, a soft “lul-alling” tune , featuring Kapranos and an acoustic, which to me, is reminiscent of their Scottish roots, most noticeable by its tongue-loosening lyrics.
The rest of the album sounds perfectly smooth creating good pace from one track to another, proving that they can work within their familiar roots and dabble and experiment with new sounds, the blues, Jamaican and African influences, and 80’s techno. Enlightened by the cover art’s likeness to a crime scene photograph, the album’s sound lives up to the title, Tonight: Franz Ferdinand, easily convincing you and the fans that its time to go out and party tonight with Franz Ferdinand – creating a night of exploratory debauchery.
Franz Ferdinand, formed in Glasgow, Scotland in 2002 is comprised of Alex Kapranos (lead vocals and guitar), Bob Hardy (bass guitar), Nick McCarthy (rhythm guitar, keyboards and backing vocals), and Paul Thomson (drums, percussion and backing vocals).
Track Listing
“Ulysses” – 3:13
“Turn It On” – 2:23
“No You Girls” – 3:44
“Send Him Away” – 3:01
“Twilight Omens” – 2:32
“Bite Hard” – 3:31
“What She Came For” – 3:28
“Live Alone” – 3:36
“Can’t Stop Feeling” – 3:05
“Lucid Dreams” – 7:57
“Dream Again” – 3:20
“Katherine Kiss Me” – 2:56
This is Definium’s own Kevin Mak’s first review.
Gung Hay Fat Chow 2009
Definium Design would like to wish everyone a message of fortune, happiness and good health this new year seaon.
Happy Chinese New Year
“Gung Hay Fat Choy”
Book Cover Archive
A new online source just launched recently that is a source and archive for book covers. It’s in Beta mode right now but it seems like its sole intent and purpose is to archive, organize and categorize for alll “appreciators” to gaze, look and appreciate. There are some great designs here by Chip Kidd, Pentagram Studios, Frank Miller and Wolfgang Weingart.
This has all the promises of a great resource so stand by all for future updates.
Remembering Shigeo Fukuda (1932 – 2009)
I ran into Shigeo Fukuda’s work as a student in design school. At first glance I just thought “oh just another old-school designer”. But after looking closer at his work and spending a few more moments in a book I found in the library I developed a deep appreciation for him. As a sculptor, artist and designer his work challenges the norm visual norm. Coined a master of deception and compared to the likes of Escher and Dali, Fukuda is extrmely well known in Japan and his impossible objects, ambiguous sculptures, distorted projections and anamorphic art can be seen all over the world.
“Shigeo Fukuda passed away on January 11th, 2009 at the age of 76. He was a master of creating optical illusions, simplistic logos, and designing bold and engaging posters. In 1987 Fukuda was the first Japanese designer to be inducted in the Art Directors Club (ADC) Hall of Fame.”
Source
On Nightmares… Freud I Challenge You
According to Freud, nightmares were the result of masochistic wish-fulfillment. The basis of this curious notion was Freud’s unshakable conviction that every dream represented the fulfillment of a wish. “I do not know why the dream should not be as varied as thought during the waking state…” wrote Freud, tongue-in-cheek. For his own part, he continued, “I should have nothing against it…There is only a trifling obstacle in the way of this more convenient conception of the dream; it does not happen to reflect reality.” If for Freud, every dream was nothing but the fulfillment of a wish, the same thing must be true for nightmares: the victims of nightmares must secretly wish to be humiliated, tortured or persecuted.
http://www.lucidity.com/EWLD10.html
According to me, nightmares scare the shi*t out of me leaving me in a cold sweat and going ‘what the heck was that?’. Freud was a psychologist and had a psychoanalytical mind like no other but I do have to disagree that nightmares are a wish fulfilment – no matter how basic or complex this fulfilment is. Last night I had a bad dream, which I won’t go into detail about but it was scary, and I don’t ever want to see any part of that being fulfilled. Who wants to see their nightmares realized, no matter how scary, odd or crazy the are, whether you are being chased by monsters, eaten alive by a giant zebra or swallowed whole into a lake of red Thai curry.
Freud, you might be wrong on this one.
How much energy does Googling burn?
Until now, it was a rarely pondered question: Between the virtual bookends of someone searching for revealing pictures of Lindsay Lohan online and a search engine producing said pictures, how much energy is consumed?
Thanks to an Internet mini-controversy this week, inquisitive minds now have a pretty good approximation: 0.0003 kilowatt hours.
A recent story in The Sunday Times of London focused on the research of Harvard University physicist Alex Wissner-Gross, who studies the energy use associated with Internet search engines. Apparently taking some liberties with the scientist’s work, the story claimed that two Google searches produce roughly the same amount of carbon dioxide as boiling a kettle for a cup of tea.
Dr. Wissner-Gross quickly shot back this week, telling a technology website that his work has nothing to do with the ubiquitous search engine and that his findings instead showed it takes an average of 20 milligrams of carbon dioxide a second to visit a website – no mention of Google; no mention of kettles. By then, however, the blog mill had already caught on to the story, and the Web was abuzz with musings about the link between dead trees and search results.
However, the most interesting response to the story came from Google itself, which went about analyzing exactly how much energy a single search uses.
Urs Hölzle, Google’s senior vice-president of operations, countered on the company’s official blog that the average search time is about 0.2 seconds, meaning the servers that do the heavy lifting work on a query for only thousandths of a second. Mr. Hölzle said that in the time it takes to run a Google search, the user’s personal computer consumes more energy than the company does to answer the query.
In addition to the work performed before the search request, Mr. Hölzle produced an estimate of 0.0003 kilowatt hours of energy for each search, equivalent to about one kilojoule.
“For comparison, the average adult needs about 8,000 kJ a day of energy from food, so a Google search uses just about the same amount of energy that your body burns in 10 seconds,” Mr. Hölzle wrote.
While the numbers make for interesting hypothetical arithmetic, it is the speed with which Google produced them that is perhaps more telling. Google’s energy consumption aside, the company’s co-founders, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, are known for their support of myriad environmental initiatives, and Google wasted little time responding to The Sunday Times’s article.
The company also provided an estimate of how much carbon dioxide a single search is equivalent to: 200 milligrams. Using tailpipe emission standards, Mr. Hölzle estimated that an average car driven one kilometre generates as many greenhouse gasses as 1,000 Google searches.
Mr. Hölzle did not mention that Google’s websites receive hundreds of millions of search requests a day. However, even those numbers don’t bring the company anywhere near the energy consumption of firms in other industries, such as automotive or manufacturing. And Mr. Hölzle does point out that, before the Internet age, recovering information would have involved travelling to the local library and looking it up.
www.globemail.com
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20090117.wGoogle17/BNStory/International/
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