Lee Munroe » inspiration

5 Mac Apps You Should Try

Lee — Wed, 18 Aug 2010 08:01:10 +0000

Nearly two years ago I published a post on 15 mac apps web designers should have in their dock.

I thought it was about time I updated this list with any new apps I’ve started using but turns out I’ve been using pretty much the same lot since then.

Here are 5 new apps I’ve been introduced to during that time and now use daily.

1. Google Chrome

Firefox was once my choice but for some reason it started running very slow for me. I’d especially find YouTube videos very jumpy. So one day I tried out Chrome and absolutely loved it. It’s light weight, fast and trim.

After I sourced a few extensions I use often (namely Delicious and EyeDropper) I fully switched over my default browser.

Chrome also renders with the WebKit engine so you get all the nice CSS3 and HTML5 goodies (that also come with Safari).

I still tend to keep Firefox open though. It’s hard to beat that Developer Toolbar and Firebug. I also prefer the autocomplete that comes with the Firefox web address bar.

If you’re asking “What about Safari?” I never really got using it – an earlier version used to crash on me quite a lot which put me off it.

2. Mailplane

Only started using this recently for managing emails. I have 4 different GMail accounts for different domains that I was continually checking and had tabs open in the browser for (I wanted to keep them separate).

Mailplane is a desktop app but with the same look and feel and interaction as GMail has in the browser. It has some niceties like a top toolbar and ‘neater’ switching between accounts.

3. TweetDeck

This is my Twitter client of choice. Some people really dislike it, and to be honest it doesn’t scream of the typical nice UI you get with Mac apps, but I find it really handy for keeping track of multiple accounts and groups of people.

Also nice integration with other social networks like Facebook, LinkedIn, even FourSquare.

4. MacJournal

MacJournal actually came part of a MacHeist bundle and I find it really useful for taking daily notes. I now use it to keep track of:

Meetings (what was discussed)
Events (what was talked about)
Books (overviews and key notes)
Workshops (what I learned)

Great for referring back to. In the past I would have recorded these things in a notebook, which would eventually be lost, forgot about or binned.

5. LittleSnapper

LittleSnapper was also part of a MacHeist bundle. Useful for taking screenshots of web pages and nice graphics then keeping them to hand for inspiration.

I wish I could say I had a really neat and nicely configured LittleSnapper for all areas of inspiration but I never get around to organising it (except once when I did it on a plane).

What would you recommend?

I’m sure there are tonnes of apps out there that I haven’t tried and should be using.

If you were to recommend one really good app that I haven’t mentioned, what would it be?

Web Design Trends: iPhones

Lee — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 10:30:27 +0000

Arguably the coolest gadget at the minute (and for the last couple of years) is the iPhone. Not only do they look good in your hand, they look good on websites too. It also gets the immediate attention of any iPhone owners out there as they’ll want to know more about what your site does for the iPhone.

iPhone GUI PSD

First lets get you started with the iPhone GUI PSD file from Teehan + Lax. This contains the iPhone and all the iPhone elements you need when creating your iPhone interface. Very handy, in PSD format for Photoshop.

Showcase of websites with iPhones

Now for some inspiration.

Tea Round App

First & 20

Classics

June Cloud

Zumobi

Graphik

dBelement

Firetask

Tweetie

Bottle Rocket Apps

Snow Reports

WordPress

Paraply

Voxtopia

Mock Draft

Cellar

Satisfaction Remote

Bird Feed

Tapbots

Pokeseo

Has anyone developed an iPhone app or have you designed a website for an app?

Inspiration from Packaging

Lee — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 09:00:16 +0000

I often browse a handful of CSS galleries for continuous inspiration but it’s good to draw inspiration from a host of other sources, one of those being packaging.

Creative packaging shows a good reflection on the brand it represents. My first real appreciation of packaging was opening my first Apple product, which was an iPod Touch. The perfectly crafted box and minimalism is reflected throughout the Apple brand, including their website. Some even go as far as to film themselves unboxing Apple products as it is such an enjoyable experience.

Drawing inspiration from packaging design can inspire new ideas and different approaches for your next project. Check out these great examples.

Route 29

Boxed Water

ITO EN Loose Leaf Tea

Skin

Coca Cola

Clover Farmstead Butter

Good Little Sausages

Tasty Bone

Incase

Monopoly

100% Chocoloate Cafe

Pot Of

Doo

Coop Norden

Other sources of packaging inspiration

Web Design Trends: Green & Renewable Websites

Lee — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 09:00:50 +0000

These days the words renewable, fresh, organic, green etc. are used quite a bit and more and more brands and businesses are jumping on the ‘green’ band wagon (which is a good thing of course).

These are all words that I would also associate with the following websites. With the right colour scheme, using elements of nature e.g. grass and trees, adding some subtle paper backgrounds and using hand drawn graphics/text you can design a fresh ‘green’ website too.

1. Jiri Tvrdek

2. Organic Supermarket

3. Sprout Box

4. Recycle Now

5. Ecoki

6. Green Globe Ideas

7. Green Web Awards

8. Edenbee

9. Silverback

10. Carbonica

11. Red Brick Health

12. Mint

13. Osvaldas Valutis

14. Opera Mage

15. Glocal Ventures

16. enviRenew

17. Plant With Purpose

18. Bikevasion

19. 53 Mondays

20. Envira Media

25 Hot Female Web Designers Part 2

Lee — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 01:12:44 +0000

Last year I published ‘25 hot female web designers‘, showcasing a collection of female designers who are hot at web design and had great websites.

With the recent publication of the A List Apart Survey 2008, I thought it was a good opportunity to follow this up with another 25 great designers.

This year’s survey found that 16.2% of those surveyed (29,567 of A List Apart readers) were female. That’s a rise of 0.1%. So there’s not much improvement in regards to the amount of females in the industry, but I have came across 25 more great designs.

1. Irene Demetri

2. Joanna Klima

@thedarlingtree

3. Ilona Filipenkova

10. Denise Wilton

11. Adelle Charles

@adellecharles

12. Kris Colvin

@KrisColvin

13. Kimberly Coles

@imwithsully

14. Stephanie Sullivan

@stefsull

15. Winnie Lim

16. Jen Gordon

17. Joanna

18. Wiehanne

19. Madeline D’Amato

20. Renee Rist

RibbonsofRed

21. Anna Pawełczyk

22. Allison Mills

@allimills

23. Manuela Hoffman

24. Mindy Wagner

@graphicsgirl

25. Drew Europeo

Web Design Trends: Cityscapes, Landscapes and Seascapes

Lee — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 07:00:22 +0000

A popular trend over the past year or two is using landscapes, cityscapes and seascapes in a design. Often placed in a website’s footer, they’re a great way to show off your creativity and as a web designer gives you a chance to test out your Illustrator skills.

A few tips for designing your ‘scape’

1. Get some stock photography

You can get lots of downloadable vector graphics and photos from iStockphoto.

2. Check out Flickr

Flickr has loads of Creative Commons photos available for use.

3. Take your own photos

Get out around your town/city and take a few photos of noticeable buildings.

4. Sketch your own ideas

Jot down your own hills and buildings on paper.

5. Finally, get tracing and cutting in Illustrator and Photoshop

Now you have your inspiration you can start tracing in illustrator and trying different Photoshop effects on your buildings to come up with the perfect amazing scape.

Check out the showcase below for inspiration from the best.

Showcase of cityscapes

1. Andy Sowards

2. Disability Heroes

3. Flayks

4. Gotta Get To FOWA

5. Carrot Creative

6. Sawyer Hollenshead

7. TJ Mapes

8. Bainbridge Studios

9. NY Moon

10. DrupalCon

Showcase of landscapes

11. The Mattinator

12. Kulturbanause

13. Hicks Design

14. Viget Inspire

15. Rissington Podcast

16. Adit Shukla

17. Vimeo

18. Koller Media

19. TwitterFone

20. Project Vino

Showcase of seascapes

21. Dizzain

22. Tomas Pojeta

23. We Are Not Freelancers

24. Frisk Design

25. David Torondel

26. Design Disease

27. Volll

28. Get Me Fast

29. Stylized Web

30. DivVoted

Why it’s good to work on your own side projects

Lee — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 15:06:43 +0000

Whether you’re freelance, employed or a business owner, we each have our own daily routine, which usually involves doing work to please someone else, whether that someone else be a client, end user, reader etc. But every once and a while I think it’s important to work on your own projects.

As I work on my major Masters project (due December), and while doing the odd freelance job, I take inspiration from the likes of Carsonified and Contrast who have been known for their ‘drop everything else for a week’ approach to work on other projects, and I work on my own side projects.

Their approach to taking a week to focus on 1 new project (from start to finish) is great but working 1 or 2 hours a day on a side project is also beneficial.

Why bother with side projects?

Luck favors the people who try stuff - Guy Kawasaki

1. Take a break

Take a break from your normal routine and refresh your head. Exploring different ideas can get you out of a creative block and bring inspiration.

2. Expand your skill-set

Try out new frameworks, see what you can do with different APIs, test your design skills. The creative community never stops moving so you need to make sure you stay up-to-date.

3. Brand awareness – raise your profile

Whether you’re a freelance designer or a large corporation, side projects can help raise your profile simply by having your name associated with it.

4. Contribute to the community

It’s always good to contribute something to the community. It’ll be appreciated.

5. Have fun

You can have a lot of fun working on your own stuff because you’re in control of the brief and there’s no one to tell you what to do.

6. Passive income

It’s hard to beat an application that makes money while you sleep or get on with the rest of your life. You might not make a fortune, but a few extra bucks a week to fund your Saturday night on the rip is a welcome addition :)

7. Try stuff

If you want to be successful in life I believe you have to try stuff. If it works, happy days! If it doesn’t, learn from it and move on. “Luck favors the people who try stuff”, says entrepreneur Guy Kawasaki.

Where to start

a. Take notes

Take notes when you think of projects and put them on your to-do list. I carry around a small notebook in my laptop bag and constantly add ideas to my ‘Someday’ list in Things.

b. Talk to other creatives

Talking to others will spark new ideas.

c. Read

Read a book from an inspiring designer or look at a book of visuals to get ideas.

d. Mashups

APIs make it very easy to launch small apps. Look at all the Twitter mashups now available. Think of different uses for Google Maps, Flickr, YouTube.

e. What would you find useful?

Chances are that if there was a website or tool that you would find useful, then there are 100s or 1000s of people who would also find it useful.

What side projects are you working on?

A successful side project I co-founded was The Big Word Project and I’ve just launched an Irish web design gallery (Web Designire) which only took a couple of hours a day for 5 days to develop (read more about it here).

Please feel free to share the side projects you’re currently working on or have produced in the past. It would be great to have your input.

30 Creative Twitter Theme Backgrounds

Lee — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 14:31:44 +0000

One thing I love about Twitter is it’s simplicity. The concept is simple, the usage is simple and even the design is simple. As far as your theme is concerned you are restricted to changing a few colours and adding a background, keeping things nice and clean and ensuring the app doesn’t become a mess like MySpace did :)

These restrictions limit our creativity boundaries so if you want to make an impression with your Twitter profile it all comes down to the background.

I’ve compiled a list of Twitter profiles who have impressive creative backgrounds, which I feel stand out above the rest. Feel free to share any you’ve come across and you can also follow me on Twitter.

Textures

1. @builtbybuffalo

2. @gabediaz

3. @designbyfront

4. @elliotjaystocks

Logos

5. @bittbox

6. @benek

7. @3drockz

8. @studio3k

9. @zohoinvoice

Photographs

10. @bookchiq

11. @ceidotorg

12. @chorrell

13. @nonlinear

Twitter Bird

14. @justtweetit

15. @darkmotion

Illustrations

16. @elitistsnob

17. @imajes

18. @flarup

19. @simplebits

20. @pixellent

Sky

21. @mayhemstudios

22. @divvoted

23. @collis

24. @rogieking

Colourful

25. @rsg

26. @abduzeedo

27. @bartelme

Patterns

28. @jophillips

29. @randaclay

30. @leelowe

Any more?

Suggest any Twitter profiles I haven’t mentioned below and feel free to follow me if you like.

25 Hot Female Web Designers

Lee — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 12:13:18 +0000

When it comes to the web industry (or computer industry for that matter) men generally rule the roost. In 2007 A List Apart published their web design survey results and found that out of nearly 33,000 professionals who participated, 82.8% were male while only 16.1% were female (1.1% gave no answer).

However, as I browse the web today I’m finding more and more inspirational and creative websites from females across the globe. Just because there are more men involved in the web community doesn’t mean that the best stuff comes from us. There’s a certain elegance, beauty and tone that the female touch can add to a design.

I’ve compiled a list of 25 26 female web designers who I believe are hot at web design and whose designs are an inspiration to the whole of the web design community.

1. Larissa Meek

@larissameek

2. Veerle Pieters

@vpieters

3. Lea Alcantara

@lealea

4. Jackie Ellse

@designspace

5. Jan Cavan

@mj12982

6. Bel Koo

7. Shirley Ann

8. Mourylise Heymer Marreiros

9. Rina(Honey Design)

10. Sarah Parmenter

@sarahparmenter

11. Emma Taylor

@emtaylor

12. Cindy Li

@cindyli

13. Gisele Jaquenod

@giselejaquenod

14. Grace Smith

@gracesmith

15. Melissa Hie

16. Caty Ng

17. Natalie Jost

18. Inayaili de Leon

@yaili

19. Kassy

@kassy4

20. Eva-Lotta Lamm

@evalottchen

21. Estibaliz Landa

22. Sabrina Dent

@sabrinadent

23. Ali Felski

@felskia

24. Tanya Merone

25. Jen Germann

@germanny

26. Meagan Fisher

@meaganfisher

Who have I missed?

I’ve only shortlisted 25 26 designers above so obviously there are a lot more out there. Feel free to mention yourself or someone else below in the comments.

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