Danielle Noah » Design

Oh why thank you!

Danielle — Mon, 03 May 2010 07:18:59 +0000

I recently went through interviews with a company in Portland and wanted to send thank yous that were different from the generic email. After spending an hour in Nob Hill’s Paper Source I came up with the idea of present tags and mustaches. Not your typical combination but one that I am quite satisfied with!

My main points of interest were rub on mustaches, polaroids of me being silly, and hints of blue to contrast the cardboard brown.

At first, I wanted to hand draw each card but after #1 (of 16 total) was completed my night was almost over with! Instead I redid my hand drawing in photoshop for a much easier and efficient card! I still wanted some personal touch and drew my signature doodles on the “thank you” portion of the card to help add texture.

Next process was to take all of my polaroids. I am not foolish to think I was the only candidate being talked to so I knew I had to get my mug back in their memory and paired with my name. This had me enlisting my mom for a mock photoshoot where I took fabric I bought two years ago to add touches to my old apartment and made it into a back drop. Then with my handy mustache necklace and 16 awkwardly goofy poses I was all set! The mock ups for this card seemed like a great idea and until I had 16 pictures smiling back at me on the kitchen counter. I promise I love myself only a respectable amount!

Finally, I glued and taped it all together. Wrote a unique note to each individual, stuffed it in an envelope and sealed it with a kiss. Ok, I didn’t really seal it with a kiss… that would be creepy! But I did hand deliver it to the company with wishful thoughts.

To top it all off, I decided I liked my final outcome so much that I redesigned my twitter account to match!

Awesomely Awesome Book Cover

Danielle — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 18:00:21 +0000

I. Want. This!

A laptop cover that looks like an old book. Man, everyone at the coffee shop is going to think I am so smart!

Shake things up a bit with TwelveSouth’s ‘The BookBook,’ a vintage Macbook cover like none seen before. The one-of-a-kind hardback leather case is available in red and black versions that are made for Macbook and Macbook Pro exclusively. Not only does this ingenious creation look incredible, it could also act as a deterrence to potential thieves or elevate your status in the oldboys club.



Images and blog courtesy of Definitive Touch

Awesomely Awesome Mugs

Danielle — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 18:00:40 +0000

Mugs and blog courtesy of Francesco Mugnai

Weekend of Design

Danielle — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 02:12:12 +0000

Usually I save my smaller design finds for my tumblr account but recently I came across few products that warrants it’s own blog. This weekend is all about design and Danidot. You might think these next few blogs are ridiculous but I find them to be perfect.

Stay tuned!

Create Fun

Danielle — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 18:00:53 +0000

Before this past weekend, I have never had a panic attack before. In fact, the closes I came was my freshman year of college when my neighbor was hanging out on my bed and he all of a sudden went catatonic. My roommate and I called the paramedics and he was rushed to the hospital where after a night of hanging out in the emergency room we took him home to find he had a severe panic attack.

With closing out my final weeks in San Jose I am feeling the weight of leaving my home, my friends, and my job. Coupled with a busy day at work, poor sleep, friend issues, and rush hour traffic… I found myself unable to breathe and my body completely tense. I called my mom a bit freaked and our discussion quickly moved to packing and moving my apartment. Let’s just say that didn’t help. Luckily, I was soon home and went into my bedroom, closed the door, laid down on my bed and did the one thing that calms all of my nerves…

I edited photos.

I love tinkering on photoshop and seeing what I can create in half an hour. The editing that I did to calm my nerves was take a picture of my sister and her boyfriend and edit myself into them. See, not all photo editing has to be serious. In fact, the more fun the better.

Original Image
Original Danielle Creation

To top it off I sent a very non chalent email to my sister saying I cleaned up the image a bit and fixed the color… something she often has me do for her images. Then waited and waited and waited.

But that’s ACTUALLY not why I wrote this post… it was just my long winded introduction!

My dad recently returned to Ethiopia and took his usual team of miscreants. One of them took some wonderful pictures and I took one of them and edited it, printed it, and gifted it to my father. I think it turned out quite nice. There are many many many layers and I only want to brag about one, you can see it best on the far left but I layered an image I took on my visit to Ethiopia of the material they use to make their mud huts. (Straw and mud basically) Also, “Tesfa” means “Hope” in Amharic (one of the native languages of Ethiopia).

Original Image

Original Danielle Creation

RB: Lego House

Danielle — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 15:00:41 +0000

James May, a fan of the Lego brand since childhood used nearly 816 million pieces of LEGO pieces to build this two-story house in the countryside.

— more pics —

Blog by Penguin Creative at http://blog.penguincreative.com/

Five Finger Challenge

Danielle — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 18:00:52 +0000

The other day I was in the gym getting ripped, ya you heard me, and I saw this couple walking around barefoot. In the weights area of all places! It took me a second to notice they were wearing the freakiest looking socks/shoes I have ever seen. A couple weeks later one of the trainers in the gym showed up wearing the same contraptions. After a google search I learned that these “shoes” are called Vibram Five Fingers and are designed for all types of fitness and comfort.

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The typical human foot is an anatomical marvel of evolution with 26 bones, 33 joints, 20 muscles, and hundreds of sensory receptors, tendons and ligaments. Like the rest of the body, to keep our feet healthy, they need to be stimulated and exercised.

Many experts believe the shoes we wear not only cast the foot in a protective form, but also weaken our foot and leg muscles, leaving them underdeveloped and more prone to injury. And while there are many occasions where traditional footwear is essential for protection, safety, and security, it is equally important to stimulate and exercise the foot in a more natural state on a regular basis.

That’s why we recommend wearing FiveFingers for exercise, for play, and for fun. Stimulating muscles in your feet and lower legs will not only make you stronger and healthier, it improves your balance, agility and proprioception.

After looking through all of the pages I am still a little skeptical but as I am a lover of all things weird I definitely want to check it out. They look comfortable but I have a feeling I would feel like I was breaking the rules and walking barefoot around the gym. Although I do love breaking rules, what happens when I drop the weight on my foot or trip like I often do?

To see if you are up to the five finger challenge and would like to purchase a pair or find more information their website is: http://www.vibramfivefingers.com

RB: Dropped Food. Should You Eat it?

Danielle — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 18:00:21 +0000

Since you’ll be trying every single drink recipe in the engineer’s guide this weekend, you’re most likely going to drop some food on the ground. Consult this flowchart to decide whether to eat it. Results may vary by individual.

Food on the ground, food on the ground. Looking like a fool with your food on the ground.

ReBlogged courtesy of: http://flowingdata.com

For Web Designers

Danielle — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 17:00:35 +0000

Are you building a website and not sure what to do? Is the stress of design wearing you down?

No need to worry, Internet Online Website has the template just for you! A cutting edge cookie cutter website that will scream, “I ROCK!”.

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No seriously, this website is awesomely bad and SO true. Check it out! http://www.internetonlinewebsite.com/

Holy Blogosphere – Bill Gates

Danielle — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 17:00:00 +0000

My twitter stream blew up yesterday with tweet after tweet about Bill Gates, his new website and twitter status. People are excited for a new twitterer, love the blog, hate the blog, think it looks like apple, think it looks like microsoft, too small, too big…. a whole lot of opinions. In the end, check it out for yourself. I have attached some screen shots below as well as my opinion after the jump!

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In case you can’t read that, his welcome note says:

Welcome to the Gates Notes

Since leaving my fulltime job at Microsoft to dedicate more time to our foundation, a lot of people have asked me what I’m working on. It often feels like I’m back in school, as I spend a lot of my time learning about issues I’m passionate about.

I’m fortunate because the people I’m working with and learning from are true experts in their fields. I take a lot of notes, and often share them and my own thoughts on the subject with others through email, so I can learn from them and expand the conversation.

I thought it would be interesting to share these conversations more widely with a website, in the hope of getting more people thinking and learning about the issues I think are interesting and important. So, welcome to the Gates Notes.

My opinion: I love the literal white space and effective use of color. It has a very fresh, clean and modern look. Best part, it doesn’t look like he is trying to hard. I do agree that the type is a little too small. I can read it fine enough but I am in my 20′s and with a large screen, his target demo might have a rougher time than I do. I have also heard that the coding is a bit sloppy, but as I am no expert who am I to say! Overall, I really enjoy the first impression and look forward to seeing how he continues to report and update it. As for twitter, I don’t plan on following but you go Bill!

http://www.gatesnotes.com