May 31, 2011

Portfolio: Illustration for ASN Bank

Everybody was asked to supply an illustration for the biggest (green) sustainable bank of the Netherlands, the ASN Bank to be used in their internal communication materials. This illustration mentions, in Dutch, that you are an “eikel” (which has the double meaning of dickhead and acorn) if you don’t bank in a sustainable way. Since the ASN Bank logo is a squirrel is was just a matter of putting the two together to complete the image.

May 17, 2011

Snakes on a… erm, Photograph.

As lovers of image, this is quite simply breathtaking. We were told about a website belonging to Parisian artist, Guido Mocafico, who produces some literally stunning images. When we visited the site it was one of the rare ones which makes us stop, gather around a screen and click each image. Every one of them.

The ones which we felt compelled to show you first are the Serpent series, which are, as we mentioned at the start of this post, breathtaking. Scientists argue that our brains are hardwired to be scared of snakes (amongst other things) but when they are presented in this manner, you can’t help be see them as stunning examples of how nature can make colours and beauty that man could never make up.

The image shown above is of Dendroaspis jamesoni jamesoni, or Jameson’s Green Mamba – or so I am informed, a snake which comes originally from Burundi, living mainly in trees.

After we discussed it a little, we realised it was the context in which the snakes are all photographed which makes this series of shots so special. Think about it, you usually see snakes in their natural habitat (or a mock up of it’s natural habitat at least) but these are all photographed against a black background, which is obviously containing them and forcing the shapes they are making, usually long, curved and lithe, square and angular. This forces them to become a real abstraction of themselves and results in some amazing images.

This is a website which we would really recommend a visit to for this series alone, but the rest of the photos are as good, so have a look and see what you think. (Clicking the image above will take you to the site of the artist.)

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May 16, 2011

Light tables by ARBONATA

As is the usual, I stumbled on this whilst looking for something else this morning.

It was so nice that I even forgot what I was actually looking for in the first place. (Not strictly true but it side-tracked me for a while!)

As you can see in the picture above, it’s a quite nicely made table which has rows of little LEDs recessed in the surface in a halftone screen image. In this case you can see it’s a tree. Which is quite an amazing effect. It’s made by a company called NKcharms, hailing from Hong Kong. It’s a really nice addition to the table which would pretty much be suitable in my home. Just sayin’. As is usual, if you click on the image you can get more details for yourself, and see more images.

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