Design Briefs
Have a news item you’d like to share? Have you read a good book or blog lately? Would you like to see your work featured in Designer? How about an office or department profile? Your contributions and feedback are welcome. Let us know what you think. designer@ucda.com
Apple warns not to close MacBooks with a camera cover installed
On the one hand, you’re protecting your laptop camera from getting hijacked. On the other, you’re damaging it. Love hurts.
Apple has advised, via a new support document published this month, against closing your MacBook if your laptop has a cover applied over its camera, as doing so can damage the screen.
The tech giant reasoned that the “clearance between the display and keyboard is designed to very tight tolerances,” and forcing a camera cover between both ends can impair features like automatic brightness, True Tone, and the ambient light sensor.
The note might have been issued following multiple experiences from MacBook Pro users who have complained of their displays cracking after adding covers to the cameras. The problem seems to especially plague owners of the new 16-inch MacBook Pros, which sport slimmer bezels.
Free coloring pages for adults from Faber-Castell
Faber-Castell’s lovely printable coloring sheets for adults will implore you to get in touch with your inner child. The world’s oldest producer of office supplies has a generous collection of intricate coloring papers featuring beautiful elements of nature, mandala motifs, and styles like Art Nouveau and Art Deco.
Take a minute and get coloring with the free-to-download papers here: tinyurl.com/ucda-coloring
Animated GIFs reveal differences between subway maps and their actual geography
Have you ever wondered just how true-to-life the world’s many metro maps actually are? If so, you’re in luck! Recently, Reddit users have started to create animations that compare stylized subway maps with accurate geographical representations. Now, this transit-inspired trend has taken off, with several cities starring as its subjects.tinyurl.com/ucda-subway-maps
CNN asked Black artists from Mississippi to design a new state flag
“What should Mississippi's new state flag look like? [CNN] reached out to five Black emerging artists who grew up in Mississippi with the prompt to reimagine the Mississippi state flag."
Here's what they came back with.
Life Stripe uses color to turn everyday experiences into works of art
The idea behind Life Stripe is to find patterns in our everyday existence by using bands of color. Life Stripe lets you see your daily, weekly, or monthly routines in an exciting way, and helps you discover something about yourself.
A Life Stripe work is a “pattern of life” made by replacing one’s everyday actions such as sleeping, dining, relaxing, and working, with 21 colors selected based on research, and recording them along a 24-hour axis.
They have collected over 150,000 life records of both well-known and ordinary people of various careers, circumstances, genders, age, as well as animals, and made Life Stripe works based on them.
PRINT partners with Wix to unveil new site design for printmag.com
PRINT partners with Wix to unveil new site design for printmag.com
PRINT (founded 1940) is where creative people gather to inspire and build design dialogue. Perpetually curious about everything design, we report on, curate and celebrate visual culture, the makers of that culture and the expression of graphic design in all its forms and mediums.
In late 2019, the PRINT brand and Printmag.com were acquired by PRINT Holdings LLC, comprised of industry veterans Debbie Millman (Design Matters), Steven Heller (The Daily Heller), Andrew Gibbs (Dieline), Jessica Deseo (Dieline), Deb Aldrich (D’NA Company) and Laura Des Enfants (D’NA Company).
Together, this team is committed to carrying the brand forward in innovative new ways while honoring its deep legacy.
Elevating Black Design Voices: a panel discussion
Join UCDA for open and honest conversations with Black designers in education. We will be hosting these free events that are open to everyone. Questions from the audience will be answered as time permits. Discussions in part one (held on July 8) included what it means to be a Black designer and why there are so few. Among other topics, the panel addressed what racism exists in higher education and how institutions can be more authentic when recruiting diverse students.
Additional discussions are being planned throughout 2020.
ucda.com/elevating-black-design-voices
Eight students honored
This year, the Vote 2020 Student Poster Design Initiative helps promote civil engagement by enabling students to design an original, nonpartisan poster for print or social media use. We welcomed entries as part of a class assignment or done independently by students outside of class.
Posters were reviewed by a panel of design educators. UCDA honors eight students with two first place winners and six honorable mention winners, and can be seen on the UCDA website at ucda.com/vote-2020-winners.