Super-Bastard Box Art Characters

Super-Bastard Box Art Characters are a set of paper toys created by Malaysian designer Undoboy. Extremely creative and well illustrated with well known characters amongst the set.
Consists of 16 unique toys in one set, with 4 unique characters on each face of the box. Collectors have an opportunity to collect all 16 toys/64 characters in the series. Each toy is individually placed in a sealed box (blind assortment).

They are produced in a limited edition with only 1000 copies of each toy on the market.

Each toy is made with heavy card stock plus matt lamination and stands 4” in height.

Characters include Uncle Sam, George W. Bush, Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, Queen Elizabeth II, Mother Teresa, a mummy, a Japanese wrestler, a cave man, dominatrix and so on.

The head and pants are detachable, so you can mix and match the characters to create some hilarious outcomes!

Sprint: Plug into Now

This widget based website for 'Sprint' is well worth a look, featured in this years D&AD, brilliantly designed.

Françoise Nielly

Françoise Nielly’s gigantic and immensely colourful portraits are mesmerizing. She paints on canvases with dimensions as large as 78 x 25 inches (195 x 62 cm) from black and white photos/images which only adds to the emphasis of her ability to decipher light, shadow, hue and tone by applying vibrant bold strokes with a palette knife to her blank canvases.

The following excerpt is taken from her personal website which I really hope you visit as there's a huge array of artwork available for viewing as well as a video demonstrating her methods as an artist.

"Françoise Nielly's painting is expressive, exhibiting a brute force, a fascinating vital energy. Oil and knife combined sculpt her images from a material that is, at the same time, biting and incisive, charnel and sensual. Whether she paints the human body or portraits, the artist takes a risk : her painting is sexual, her colors free, exuberant, surprising, even explosive, the cut of her knife incisive, her color palette dazzling."

eins: eins

When I think 'office job' I imagine brown painted cubicles arranged in drone lines, minimal space, suspended ceilings, much like the setup in Ricky Gervais' 'The Office'.

Hamburg's Syzygy have shown that with a fair budget, new jazzy desks, excellent architectural and interior skills, the overall ambience of office space can be transformed in to a far more enjoyable environment.

This isn't the box standard office job however, this is creative space and to reflect the creative nature of the work and staff, the space in which Syzygy work to design adverts and interactive campaigns for clients such as Chanel, Mercedes-Benz, Mazda and Fujitsu.

The office of Syzygy Hamburg was created by Christoph Roselius and Julian Hillenkamp, the two founders of eins:eins architecten in Hamburg who also have offices in London and Frankfurt.

The sleek, white cubicles may appear rigid and inflexible but in actual fact the various configurations and flexibility of the space is endless. The desks always join together and form a whole unit which strengthens the essence of teamwork and close cooperation.

White allows for light to bounce around the space which in turn will affect the working conditions for the work force by positive means and the space is extremely economical, utilizing the space in to this positive working environment.

James Jarvis

Possibly one of my all time most inspiring illustrative animations. Credit where credit due!

Weapons of Mass Communication

The first responsibility of any leader during times of conflict is to win the minds, body and imagination of the people - see President Obamas' branding campaign. Since World War 1, 1914, the weapon of choice has been the poster.

Investigating the power of the poster was exhibited at The Imperial War Museum which ran from 04 October 2007 - 30 March 2008, a fantastic demonstration of propaganda that I felt was worth noting.

Weapons of Mass Communication: War Posters featured hundreds of iconic posters exhibited across the walls in their bulk. The designers and advertisers of the day were employed to influence the wills of civilians and soldiers, the most successful were memorable, direct and strikingly beautiful, disguised to carry the government message.

The iconic images of Alfred Leete’s Kitchener recruitment poster, the pioneering designs of Julius Gipkins and Abram Games were on show as well as the influential graphics of Peter Kennard and David Gentleman.

Truly a fantastic exhibition and one I'd recommend to anyone, artist or otherwise if they display the posters again.

The principle of propaganda I find fascinating and ultimately terrifying, but above all this is history and evidence of the socio-political times as well as a reflection of people as a whole; ...how our minds were easily influenced, how culture dictated, how far through freedom of speech, woman's rights etc we've developed and grown as a race.
These posters are what made us who we are today and without a doubt should be appreciated.