360° Panoramic Views

A log of some 360° panoramic projects I’ve seen.

Google is providing a service that allows businesses to opt in and allow potential customers to have a peek around through a series of online 360° panoramas- it’s called Google Places. The first business to get the Places treatment is Comics Toons N Toys; a comic book store in California.

View Larger Map

The wonders of Google have allowed me to paste this onto my blog! Cool huh? Walk right through the door and explore around.

 

360° Langstrasse Zürich is one cool site! According to Google Translate it’s ‘A Web documentation, which takes us through the craziest quarters of Switzerland. We follow a police patrol, observe the ”oldest” business and lookinto the lives of families, entrepreneurs, colorful birds.’

You can tour the city by scrolling up and down, and even see it in night view (click on the crescent on the right hand corner)! You can also see nearby tweets.

Throwable Panoramic Ball

PanoPlaza is a panoramic view with a twist. This doesn’t use Google Street View but combines panoramic virtual tours with virtual shopping. In this example, you can shop all kinds of sweets and desserts from the  basement floor of a large Japanese department store.

It sure makes you drool!

Souvenir from Milan

FWA TV

I found an awesome site a few months ago- the FWA TV website.

It’s currently undergoing an upgrade to version 2 but the version 1 series were great – it invited agencies all over the world that had won FWAs to book time slots over several weeks to broadcast themselves over the internet for an hour a week. Some agencies started by showing the typical studio working environment and then decided to do something different for the next week – unit9 for example decided to take viewers on a tour on London’s streets on a motorcycle to Buckingham palace on one week.

I loved having a peek at the different agencies and see what their studio look like or how they work- and see who the people behind these agencies are. It’s a rare opportunity! It meant that I could have a peek at what a friend of mine was up to at her workplace in Japan at 4am in the morning! Or what Mexico’s creative studio looked like at 4pm.

Bring on version 2!

RCA exhibition

All student work displayed at the RCA exhibition this summer was labeled with a QR code- perhaps that’s unsurprising. One of the works that caught my attention on my visit there is this piece – QR U? created by Thorunn Arnadottir.

The Swarovski crystal QR-beaded dress was designed for pop star Kali of Icelandic group Steel Lord. When QR codes from the various garments made by Thorunn were scanned, it linked the audience to the group’s various promotional material – such as an animation e.g. the face on the QR code would humorously mouth the words to the music. Please visit Thorunn’s website to see more images.

From Thorunn’s website:

‘In only a few years the combination of the Internet’s social networks and digital cameras on mobile phones have changed the way we express our identities. Individual expression has been made significantly easier and the route to fame more accessible. It has also turned all of us into our own “paparazzis”.

Reading through some articles and texts about the effect of technology on our society I found the word “tribal” to be a reoccurring term used to describe it.

To use a very analogue culture as a reference to describe the effect of high tech on our society I find very interesting and this led me to how beads have been used as a communication tool and to express individual identity in African culture and how we also use “beads” (pixels) in the digital culture as a communication tool and to express our identities online.

QR U? explores the juxtaposition of self promotion and personal privacy in this new environment. Could traditional African bead craft be used in it’s original function of communicating identity but used with modern technology in contemporary context?

Inspired by african beads and masks that use decorative symbols to communicate identity, designer Thorunn Arnadottir beaded Swarovski crystals into QR codes to explore notions of self promotion and personal privacy in todays digitally networked environment. By taking a picture with a smart phone with a QR reader application you can access the online identity that hides behind these patterns.

The ‘Super self-promotional dress’ designed for Icelandic pop star, Kali from Steed Lord directs the photographer to a number of links, including the band’s videos, music sites and an unique animation of the QR code itself.

The ‘Privacy glasses’ are on the boundaries of a mask and sunglasses, high-fashion and theatrical. They give an air of importance, like famous people in Venice would wear elaborate masks, or Hollywood stars wear big flashy sunglasses. When they are scanned you will be given the option to pay a set sum to a charity chosen by the celebrity. The glasses commodify the privacy of the celebrity to the benefit of the charity. Donate to the charity and the identity of the person will be revealed.’

A lot of research and reasoning behind the work! I’m impressed. How cool would it be to have the band playing live wearing this costume.

 

QR Codes

I remember this time last year, a few QR codes were bubbling on the surface. I wasn’t sure if it’s something that was going to to grow or fizzle out, but come this year and wow they’re popping up everywhere! Even the MI5 have used it for their recruitment ads in print.

I wrote about stickybits last year which works by scanning barcodes… similar to how QR codes work. Not sure what happened but I think QR codes have overtaken stickybits in populartity…perhaps because QR codes have been around for longer? Or am I just not aware of sitckybits activity this year. Last year, Contagious magazine have been plastering stickybits around Cannes which must have been great PR.

Having said that according to the stickybits website you can scan QR codes with the stickybits app. The idea with stickybits was that although useful, QR codes haven’t quite taken off in the west so it adopted the barcode instead – something that is already present worldwide and allowed anyone to tag information onto it. Go to the stickybits website to find out more.

QR codes have been widely adopted in the Japan and South Korea for a quite a few years now but not so much in the west. Three years ago, whilst I was holidaying in Japan it was common to see it – in fact a friend has scanned it on her phone to get a discount voucher at an all-you-can-eat cake buffet for her and myself. Well Japan’s been well ahead with with their technology and have been using smartphones longer than the west (way before the iPhone hit the market), so that probably has something to do it.

I wonder if the aesthetic also has anything to do with its popularity. The matrix pattern has some kind of nostalgic 80s pixel art feel to it doesn’t it. This is the latest cool use of QR I’ve come across on the Mashable website.

Yup it’s a tombstone with a QR code attached to it. Yoav Medan’s mother passed away in June and the Israel-based medical technology executive couldn’t decide what to write on her tombstone – so decided to attach a QR code that will link to a tribute website that holds stories and photos from his mother’s life. You can read more about the story here. And the comments are an interesting read too.

Doesn’t it look like something you see in a sci-fi movie of the 21st century? Or some kind of alien language? Or aztec or hieroglyphic? I’m not sure what his mother would think of it but I’m sure she would appreciate the thought behind it. The act of changing information in to something very compact for the future kind of reminds me the Voyager program. Phonograph records containing sounds and images that portray life on Earth were bundled onto the Voyager Spacecraft – for the extraterrestrial to find.

On to more case studies. How did they manage to find someone to get tattooed with a QR code???

As part of the Ballantine whiskey’s “Leave the Impression” campaign, Paris tattoo artist K.A.R.L tattoeed the very first animated tattoo.

Another cool QR use- QRadio online new QR art project by Berlin based artist SWEZA

Which is similar to Yuri Suzuki’s project Sound Graffiti.

Pretty clever huh?

Also, recently hotel chain Radisson Edwardian have been using QR codes in their social media campaigns.

They have added QR codes to their menus which send users to videos of dishes being prepared.

“The reason we used the QR codes on our menus was that we had a lot of video content – on our YouTube channel, promoted through Facebook and Twitter.

It was I Spy’s idea to take that experience offline and turn it into something useful for diners, as well as to appeal to people who haven’t been introduced to our social media channels.

It has been a useful tool for our waiters too, and they have been able to prompt people who chose the highlighted dish that they could see the video of it being prepared by our chefs.

We didn’t want to bombard every diner with it, though it was clearly promoted on the menu itself.”

Now a combination of QR codes and projection mapping!

RedLaser and Lupe Fiasco took over Union Square in NY to promote the release of Lupe Fiasco’s latest album Lasers. The projected QR code allowed fans to pre-order the album on the spot or purchase merchandise. The campaign was supported through Facebook and Twitter which drove fans to Union Square to show their support.

On the other side of the Pacific, the N Building  in Tokyo have been layered with a giant QR code that, when scanned on a smartphone it takes you to a designated Web site that displays up-to-date store information, complete with content, images and videos. You can also make reservation and download shop coupons. The app also interfaces with Twitter so tweets relating to the N building can be viewed as well. Believe it or not this was made 2 years ago!

I’m sure many more QR code related campaigns are coming up soon.

And with that I just had a go at creating a QR code for my portfolio (above) and my blog (below) myself. Cool!

Exhibitions

So I finished my internship a few weeks ago, finished a big freelance illustration project and on the lookout for my next internship whilst working my portfolio. There’s always something to do, as soon as I get a bit of time I’m gonna hit the pile of design magazines I’ve been meaning to read…hopefully outside in the sun.

I think it’s high time I wrote about the exhibitions I visited back in April, I can’t believe it’s that long ago! In my previous internship, I and another intern girl was lucky enough to be sent by the MD to go on a day trip to visit exhibitions to take in a bit of inspiration. First the Design Museum’s Wim Crouwel and Brit Insurance Designs of the Year exhibitions, followed by ‘Roger That’ at Kemistry Gallery, and then a pop-in to ‘My Big Fat Royal Wedding’ at Maidenshop.

Dutch designer Wim Crouwel’s exhibition was a great inspiration for typography and grid layout design. The exhibition celebrate his career that spanned over 60 years! Wow. Unfortunately, no pictures were allowed. Here’s Crouwel’s interview with Crane TV to give you a bit of insight. It’s on to 3 July so hurry if you haven’t seen it.

http://static.crane.tv/player/flowplayer.commercial-3.2.5.swf?0.2654293088708073
 

The Brit Insurance Design of the Year nominations was also great- it’s great to see many different disciplines of design in one places and be amazed by the different ideas.

The winning Brit Insurance Design of the Year 2011 – the Plumen lightbulb which I’m sure everyone knows about. By British designer Samuel Wilkinson and product design company Hulger, it has a lovely shape and is a low-energy product!

Amplify Chandelier by Yves Behar/ Fuseproject for Swarwovski. These were stunning! Each paper shade only contained one swarovski crystal! Instead of many crystals used in one chandelier, this used one crystal and one LED light, resulting in multiple reflections and rainbow colour bursts. ‘Using low energy LEDs and FSC-certified paper shades, and produced using green energy, the lighting series is  as sustainable as it is beautiful.’

Concrete Canvas Shelters- Peter Brewin, William Crawford, Phillip Greer. Cheap, rapid and efficient design! the design combines an inflatable inner liner and an outer fabric impregnated with dry concrete powder. Once inflated, the curved surface is optimised for compressive loading and the outside layer simply needs water to make it harden. So basically shelters that only uses water and air for construction!

Design Criminals Edible Catalogue. Produced as a catalogue to accompany Sam Jacob’s exhibition Design Criminals at the Vienna MAK. The typographic slipcase is made of pastillage, pages are made from wafer printed with vegetable ink. Visitors at an evening event were invited to eat the catalogue – overthrowing the function of the catalogue, which in fact supported the exhibition’s subversive theme.

E-chromi. Wow! This is mind-blowing!

It’s a collaboration between designers and scientists in the new field of synthetic biology – bacteria were genetically engineered to secrete different coloured pigments – which can have all sorts of used for the future, for example you can use it to test if water is safe to drink (by turning red if they detect a toxin), by 2039 there maybe a probiotic yoghurt drink for cheap personalised disease monitoring!

Watch the video to understand it!

The ‘Roger That’ exhibition showcases a new interpretation of the Phonetic Alphabet by design studios Eat/Sleep/Work/Play, Inventory studio and Julia.’Playing on the code words assigned to the letters of the alphabet such as Zulu, Foxtrot and Oscar, each print in the exhibition exposes the often absurd and sometimes poetic connections between letter and code…his project brings together a suitably pan-global team of 3 boutique design studios based in London comprising of seven designers from France, England, Switzerland, Italy and Brazil. Each was responsible for four letters. United by their expertise in typography, and bringing their international heritage in lettering design and research to bear, Inventory Studio, ESW/P and Julia present a witty and imaginative visualization of the Phonetic Spelling Alphabet.’ I loved the colours of the posters – all posters were printed in two special Pantone colours. The exhibition made me somewhat cheeful.

On the downstairs floor of the Maiden Shop East End Prints have asked artists, illustrators and designers to produce prints loosely based around of the Royal Wedding. Some colourful charming works were on show.

A long day that left our creative minds refreshed!